The messages given when an atom is picked can be customized. This is done via two text datablocks, .message_template and .id_template. The text datablock contains lines of text that will be concatenated to form the string to be displayed. In the absence of the templates, only the residue name and atom name is shown. Thus, there is no default .id_template. Certain predefined format strings will be expanded, but atom and residue properties can be included as well. The atom or residue property names must be at the beginning of a line and be written in full. This is best illustrated by an example. The default template for messages is:
.message_template t 9 40 %MOLNAM %RESNAM %Restyp %ATMNAM, xyz = atom_xyz ; B = atom_b ; Z = atom_z atom_bone ; residue_2ry_struc
This could generate a string like this in the message area at the top of the screen:
HCAC 43 Ser CA, xyz = -22.06 4.02 37.76 ; B = 25.86 ; Z = 6 ;
No secondary structure nor skeleton data was output because no such datablocks existed in the user database. Without an Id template, the label beside the atom would be simply
43 CAFormat strings which are expanded in the template include:
The case of the letters in the format string is important and controls the case of the output text. For example, %RESTYP expands to TYR, %Restyp expands to Tyr, and %ReStyp expands to TyR. Datablock items must be given on separate lines , and if a datablock does not exist, it is simply ignored. In the example above, the _atom_bone property is shown when a bone atom is picked, and the element number is shown when a normal atom is picked.