CISIS Formatting Language

The Formatting Language (often referred to as PFT) is the core mechanism in CISIS for extracting, transforming, and displaying data from records. It is used in:

• Display Formats: To present records on the screen (HTML/Text).
• FST (Field Select Tables): To define indexing rules.
• FMT (Worksheets): To validate input data.
• Sorting: To define sort keys.

Basic Syntax

A format is a set of commands that tells the system how to process fields.

Field Selection

• v10: Extracts the content of Tag 10.
• v10^a: Extracts only subfield ^a from Tag 10.
• v10*3: Extracts from character position 3 onwards (Offset).
• v10.5: Extracts the first 5 characters (Length).

Literals

Text enclosed in specific delimiters is treated as a literal string.

• 'Text' or "Text": Unconditional literal (always displayed).
• |Text|: Conditional literal (displayed only if the preceding field is present).

Repeatable Groups

Used to handle repeatable fields.

• (v10/): Iterates over all occurrences of Tag 10, adding a new line after each.
• +: Suffix. Displayed after the field if it exists.
• *: Prefix. Displayed before the field if it exists.

Execution Modes

The language behaves differently depending on the context:

1. Proof Mode: Default display mode. Shows data as-is.
2. Data Entry Mode: Used in validation.
3. Heading Mode: Used in sorting and indexing. Ignores non-filing characters (like HTML tags or enclosed in <>).

Command Structure

Commands can be nested and combined:

if p(v10) then "Title: " v10 else "No Title" fi