Kyle Timothy Ng Chu - Project Portfolio

Trying to type in long commands can be quite a hassle. That is why Ark comes with tab autocompletion which is able to help fill in commands as well as the prefixes for you without requiring you to fully type out the command with the needed fields. Ark autocompletion is smart and knows exactly what field you need, all you have to do is press Tab and let Ark handle the rest!

Autocomplete for commands:
To make use of the autocomplete feature for commands, simply type in the first few letters of the command you want to use:

Figure 6.15.1 : Fill in the first few letters of the command you want to use. In this case, we want to use the Add command, so we enter a into the text field

now press the Tab key:

Figure 6.15.2 : After Tab is pressed Ark will fill in the command for you

Ark will then fill in the rest for you if there is a match.

If there is more than one possibility for the autocompletion, Ark will display the possible options to you as shown in the below.

Figure 6.15.3 : If there are multiple autocomplete options, the options will be displayed in the result window

In this case, you can press tab to cycle through the different options available.

Figure 6.15.4 : Pressing Tab again will cycle to the next matching command

Autocomplete for prefixes:
For commands that require prefixes, you can press Tab after filling in the command word. Ark will bring you to the next missing prefix for you to fill in. After this, you can then press tab to cycle through the list of prefixes.

Figure 6.15.5 : After filling in the command into the text field, pressing Tab will bring you to the first missing prefix

Figure 6.15.6 : Pressing Tab will cycle to the next missing prefix

Alternatively, you can also enter the first letter of the prefix you want before you press Tab and Ark will fill in the / character for you.

Figure 6.15.7 : Fill in the command you want along with the first letter of the prefix you want

Figure 6.15.8 : Pressing Tab append the / character for you

After you have chosen the prefix you want, simply enter in the details as needed.

Figure 6.15.9 : Fill in the needed details as per normal

After you are done entering the needed details of the prefix, press Tab to move on to the next prefix. Note that if your input ends with the first character of a prefix preceded by a space (e.g " n"), you will need to press Space before you press Tab to get the outcome you want.

Figure 6.15.10 : Pressing Tab will fill in the next missing prefix

Autocomplete for indexes:
For commands that require indexes, you can press Tab after filling in the command word. Ark will then allow you to cycle through the indexes available by pressing Tab

Figure 6.15.11 : After filling in the command into the text field, pressing Tab will bring you to the first available index

Figure 6.15.12 : Pressing Tab will cycle to the next available index

Examples:

End of Extract

The tab autocomplete mechanism is facilitated by the autocompleter package. The structure of the autocompleter package can be seen in the class diagram below:

Figure 4.9.1 : Class diagram of the autocomplete package

The role of the CommandBoxParser Class is to parse the text in the CommandBox to extract commands and arguments as well as to find missing prefixes.

The role of the AutocompleteCommand Enum is to keep track of the current command that the Autocompleter recognizes.

The rote of the AutocompleteState Enum is to keep track of the current state of the Autocompleter.

The Autocompleter class is the main entry point into the package. An instance of the Autocompleter class is instantiated inside the CommandBox class on start up. Inside the CommandBox, an event listener is attached to the TextField which calls the updateAutocompleter method whenever the text inside it is changed. The updateAutocompleter method then calls the updateAutocompleter method in the Autocompleter which updates the state of the Autocompleter according to the diagram below:

Figure 4.9.2 : Activity diagram of the updateAutocompleter method

Besides updating the state, the updateState method also updates the possibleAutocompleteOptions list. In the case where there are multiple commands available, this will contain all the possible options. In the case where multiple prefixes are available, this will contain the missing prefixes. These options are accessed using the resultIndex which is either incremented with wrap-around or reset depending on the state of the Autocompleter when autocomplete is called.
The countingIndex is used to keep track of the index field for commands that need it. Its maximum size is the size of the current ActiveList in the model. It is either incremented with wrap-around or reset depending on the state of the Autocompleter when autocomplete is called. When tab is entered by the user, the autocomplete method is called through the processAutocompelete in the Command box which then updates the text field according to the diagram below.

Figure 4.9.3 : Activity diagram of the autocomplete method