General Preferences

The General tab of the Preferences dialog has three sections: Program, Log and Command windows, and Files.

Program Section

You can specify how IDL handles starting up and exiting. Click on the following check boxes to apply or disable the options:

Show Splash Screen - Select this option to show the IDL splash screen on startup. This selection takes effect the next time an IDL session is started.

Save Preferences on Exit (Motif only) - Select this option to save all the settings specified in the Preference tabs when the current IDL session exits. If you deselect this option, changes made to the current IDL session and not explicitly saved (by clicking either the Save or OK button) will be discarded when the current session ends.

Confirm Exit - Select this option to display a warning dialog when you exit IDL.

Users share preferences and macros (Windows only) - If this check box is selected, all users on the Windows computer share the same set of preferences and macros (which means that any user can change preferences and macros for all users on the computer). By default, each user on the Windows computer has a unique set of preferences and macros; changes affect only the current user.

Note

Log and Command Windows Section

The number of lines saved in the recall buffer for the Command Line has an impact on the performance of IDL. The amount of memory required for greater numbers of saved lines in the buffer affects the speed at which IDL runs. Click in the field next to each description and enter your adjusted value to change the settings.

Number of lines saved in the recall buffer - This field controls the maximum number of lines saved in the recall buffer. (See Command Recall and Line Editing for information on using the recall buffer.) The default is 20 lines.

Number of lines to display in the log / Lines to Save - This field controls the maximum number of lines retained by the Output Log window. The default is 1000 lines for Microsoft Windows systems and 500 for UNIX systems.

Number of log lines to delete at limit / Delete on Limit - This field controls the number of lines that will be deleted from the Output Log window when the maximum number of lines is reached. The earliest lines in the log are deleted. The default is 100 for Microsoft Windows systems and 125 for UNIX systems.

Files Section

You can change the way in which IDL handles opening files. Select or clear the following check boxes to apply or disable the options:

Change Directory on Open - Select this option to cause IDL to change the current working directory when you open a file. The new current working directory will be the directory that contains the opened file.

Open Files Read Only - Select this option to open files so that they can be viewed, but not changed.