Vortex Action Command-line Options

These Vortex command-line options specify an action to do; they are mutually-exclusive. See also the library and schedule options, however:

• -? or -H Print a help message.

• --apply-license{=| }file Apply an arbitrary Texis License update file (provided by Thunderstone, in license.upd format) directly. A user and password for authentication must be provided, with -u and -p. The file may be "-" (a dash) to indicate that standard input should be read; this can be useful for cut-and-pasting a license update to a command-prompt window. A success or failure message and exit code is generated. Note that license updates must be enabled via texis.ini (usually done at install); see the [License Update] settings in the Texis manual. Also see <vxcp applylicense>, here. Added in version 6.

• -C

  Compile script only; do not execute. It is good practice to also use the --warnings-are-fatal and --warn-all flags with -C if running in a development (non-production) environment, so that subtle warnings are found early because they will halt compilation.

• -K pid [sig] Kill Texis process pid. An optional signal sig (name or value) may be given; the default is SIGTERM, which is a safer way to terminate a Vortex script (especially under Windows) than SIGKILL or Task Manager's End Process button. Under Windows, SIGTERM is mapped to a Vortex-specific soft-terminate event, and SIGINT/SIGBREAK are also mapped to soft events. Added in version 5.01.1172007224 20070220.

• -license Print current license statistics. In version 8 and later, -v may be added for more verbose statistics (equivalent to -License).

• -License Print more verbose license statistics.

• -r Run Vortex script. This is the default action, unless a SQL command is given.

• -R script Run Vortex script, specified in next argument, and pass remaining arguments to script via <vxinfo scriptargs> (here), i.e. do not parse them as Vortex options. This is useful for Unix "shebang" scripts, as the last option on the "#!" command line, so that arguments to the script (not Vortex) may be passed in without flummoxing Vortex command-line syntax (which normally requires the script to be the last Vortex argument). See --shebang example (here). Added in version 7.01.1395172000 20140318.

• -s Execute SQL statement. The remaining options only apply to SQL statements:

• -update Signal the Texis Monitor to try to update the Texis license, either by reading the "license.upd" file in the install dir (provided by Thunderstone), or by contacting the Thunderstone license server over the Internet.

• -version Print version information and exit.

• --build-id Print just build id and exit. Added in version 7.07.1590983966 20200531.

• -platform Print just platform ID and exit. Added in version 6.00.1277838424 20100629.

• -W Wipe the state table (delete and re-create it). A srcfile need not be given. Occasionally running texis with this option when the server is inactive is recommended, as the state table may grow large on heavily used servers.

• -mkwebinator Create Webinator tables and indexes. Unsupported/internal use. Added in version 3.01.994500000 20010706.

• --translate-from-version{=| }n[.n[.n]]

  Attempt to translate script from Vortex version n[.n[.n]] syntax to current (texis executable) version syntax and print the result. The script must be compilable with the given syntax version as the default (i.e. syntax used in script before syntaxversion pragmas, if any).

  Note that while this option attempts to fully translate the script, full translation may not be feasible or implemented, and further manual translation may be needed. In some cases, warning messages about syntax change or other caveats may be printed in comments to aid such fixups; these messages will contain the token translate-from-version. For example, looping statements no longer accumulate return values in syntax version 8 and later, so later code that assumes so (and/or the looping statement) may have to be modified. Remove these comments as the issues they discuss are addressed, so that it is clear in the future (when memories may fade) that they have been addressed. The line numbers for existing code are generally preserved in the output, to aid in comparative diffs and in finding the original source of a modified statement.

  The --translate-from-version option is typically used in an environment that has just been upgraded to Texis version 8 - but still has legacy version 7 scripts. Thus, the texis.ini setting [Texis] Compatibility Version is typically temporarily set to 7 in such environments (to allow the version 7 scripts to run). The --translate-from-version option assumes this is so, and will therefore set a syntaxversion 8 pragma (here) and a <vxcp compatibilityversion 8> statement (here) in the output, because it assumes that syntax/compatibility version 8 is not currently the default. These temporary pragmas and statements can be removed once all legacy version 7 scripts have been translated, and the temporary [Texis] Compatibility Version setting removed.

  See the syntaxversion pragma (here) for details on Vortex syntax changes, and which of these the --translate-from-version option handles. The option was added in version 8.

  Not that while legacy scripts might be made usable in version 8 simply by adding a syntaxversion 7 pragma at the top, legacy syntax is deprecated and may be removed in a future release. Thus it is advisable to translate scripts to the latest syntax version (perhaps with the aid of -translate-from-version) as soon as practical.

  See here for more on converting scripts to version 8 when upgrading.