Bash & wiptail

BASH & WIPTAIL

• whiptail

• samples

SYNOPSIS

      whiptail  [  --title  title  ]  [ --backtitle backtitle ] [ --clear ] [
      --default-item string ] [ --defaultno ] [  --fb  ]  [  --nocancel  ]  [
      --yes-button  text ] [ --no-button text ] [ --ok-button text ] [ --can-
      cel-button text ] [ --noitem [ ] --output-fd fd ] [ --separate-output ]
      [ --scrolltext ] [ --topleft ] box-options

DESCRIPTION

      whiptail  is a program that will let you present a variety of questions
      or display messages using dialog boxes from a shell script.  Currently,
      these types of dialog boxes are implemented:

      yes/no  box,  menu  box,  input  box,  message box, text box, info box,
      checklist box, radiolist box gauge box, and password box.

OPTIONS

      --clear
             The screen will be cleared to  the  screen  attribute  on  exit.
             This  doesn't  work  in  an xterm (and descendants) if alternate
             screen switching is enabled, because in that case  slang  writes
             to (and clears) an alternate screen.

      --defaultno
             The dialog box will open with the cursor over the No button.

      --default-item string
             Set  the default item in a menu box.  Normally the first item in
             the box is the default.

      --fb   Use full buttons. (By default, whiptail uses compact buttons).

      --nocancel
             The dialog box won't have a Cancel button.

      --yes-button text
             Set the text of the Yes button.

      --no-button text
             Set the text of the No button.

      --ok-button text
             Set the text of the Ok button.

      --cancel-button text
             Set the text of the Cancel button.

      --noitem
             The menu, checklist and  radiolist  widgets  will  display  tags
             only,  not  the  item  strings. The menu widget still needs some
             items specified, but checklist and radiolist expect only tag and
             status.

      --separate-output
      --backtitle backtitle
             Specifies a backtitle string to be displayed on the backdrop, at
             the top of the screen.

      --scrolltext
             Force the display of a vertical scrollbar.

      --topleft
             Put window in top-left corner.

      Box Options

      --yesno text height width
             A yes/no dialog box of size height rows by width columns will be
             displayed.  The string specified by text is displayed inside the
             dialog box. If this string is too long to be fit in one line, it
             will be automatically divided into multiple lines at appropriate
             places. The text string may also contain the sub-string "\n"  or
             newline  characters  `\n'  to  control line breaking explicitly.
             This dialog box is useful for asking questions that require  the
             user  to answer either yes or no.  The dialog box has a Yes but-
             ton and a No button, in which the user  can  switch  between  by
             pressing the TAB key.

      --msgbox text height width
             A message box is very similar to a yes/no box.  The only differ-
             ence between a message box and a yes/no box is  that  a  message
             box  has only a single OK button. You can use this dialog box to
             display any message you like.  After reading  the  message,  the
             user  can press the ENTER key so that whiptail will exit and the
             calling shell script can continue its operation.

      --infobox text height width
             An info box is basically a message box.  However, in this  case,
             whiptail  will  exit immediately after displaying the message to
             the user. The screen is not cleared when whiptail exits, so that
             the  message  will  remain on the screen until the calling shell
             script clears it later. This is useful when you want  to  inform
             the  user  that some operations are carrying on that may require
             some time to finish.

      --inputbox text height width [init]
             An input box is useful when  you  want  to  ask  questions  that
             require  the  user  to  input a string as the answer. If init is
             supplied it is used to initialize the input string.  When input-
             ing  the string, the BACKSPACE key can be used to correct typing
             errors. If the input string is longer than the width of the dia-
             log  box,  the  input field will be scrolled. On exit, the input
             string will be printed on stderr.

      --passwordbox text height width [init]
             A password box is similar to an input box, except the  text  the
             user  enters is not displayed. This is useful when prompting for
             passwords or other sensitive information. Be aware that if  any-
             forward and backward searching functions are also provided.

      --menu text height width menu-height [ tag item ] ...
             As its name suggests, a menu box is a dialog  box  that  can  be
             used  to present a list of choices in the form of a menu for the
             user to choose. Each menu entry consists of a tag string and  an
             item  string.  The  tag gives the entry a name to distinguish it
             from the other entries in the menu. The item is a short descrip-
             tion  of the option that the entry represents. The user can move
             between the menu entries by pressing the UP/DOWN keys, the first
             letter  of  the  tag as a hot-key. There are menu-height entries
             displayed in the menu at one time, but the menu will be scrolled
             if  there  are  more entries than that. When whiptail exits, the
             tag of the chosen menu entry will be printed on stderr.

      --checklist text height width list-height [ tag item status ] ...
             A checklist box is similar to a menu box in that there are  mul-
             tiple  entries  presented in the form of a menu.  You can select
             and deselect items using the  SPACE  key.   The  initial  on/off
             state  of each entry is specified by status.  On exit, a list of
             the tag strings of those entries that  are  turned  on  will  be
             printed on stderr.

      --radiolist text height width list-height  [ tag item status ] ...
             A  radiolist  box is similar to a menu box.  The only difference
             is that you can indicate which entry is currently  selected,  by
             setting its status to on.

      --gauge text height width percent
             A  gauge  box displays a meter along the bottom of the box.  The
             meter indicates a percentage.  New  percentages  are  read  from
             standard  input,  one integer per line.  The meter is updated to
             reflect each new percentage.  If stdin is XXX,  then  subsequent
             lines  up  to  another XXX are used for a new prompt.  The gauge
             exits when EOF is reached on stdin.

NOTES

      whiptail interprets arguments starting with a dash "-" as  being  argu-
      ments.   To  avoid this, and start some text in, for example, a menubox
      item, with a dash, whiptail honours the getopt convention of  accepting
      the special argument "--" which means that all following arguments with
      dashes are to be treated verbatim and not parsed as options.

DIAGNOSTICS

      Exit status is 0 if whiptail is exited by pressing the Yes or  OK  but-
      ton,  and 1 if the No or Cancel button is pressed. Otherwise, if errors
      occur inside whiptail or whiptail is exited by pressing  the  ESC  key,
      the exit status is -1.

AUTHOR

Whiptail Version 0.52.5 31 January 2007