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Core Text Commands


Table 8.1: Summary of core text commands in VMD.
First Word Description
animate Play/Pause/Rewind a molecular trajectory.
axes Position a set of XYZ axes on the screen.
color Change the color assigned to molecules, or edit the colormap.
colorinfo (Tcl) Obtain color properties for various objects
debug Turn on/off printing of debugging messages.
display Change various aspects of the graphical display window.
echo Turn on/off echoing of text commands to the console.
exit, quit Quit VMD.
help Display an on-line help file with an HTML viewer.
imd Control the connection to a remote simulation.
logfile Turn on/off logging a VMD session to a log file.
label Turn on/off labels for atoms, bonds, angles, or dihedral angles.
light Control the light sources used to illuminate graphical objects.
material Create new material definitions and modify their settings.
menu Control or query the on-screen GUI menu forms.
molecule or mol Load, modify, or delete a molecule in VMD.
mouse Change the current state (mode) of the mouse.
play or run Start executing text commands from a specified file.
render Output the currently displayed image (scene) to a file.
rock Rotate the current scene continually at a specified rate.
rotate Rotate the current scene around a given axis by a certain angle.
scale Scale the current scene up or down.
stage Position a checkerboard stage on the screen.
tool Initialize and control external spatial tracking devices.
translate Translate the objects in the current scene.
user Add new keyboard commands.
vmdinfo (Tcl) Get information about this version of VMD
wait Wait a number of seconds before reading another command. Animation continues.
sleep Sleep a number of seconds before reading another command. Animation is frozen.


All text commands in VMD are composed of one or more words or phrases separated by white space, and terminated by a newline. Since the parser now uses Tcl, a ``phrase'' is text surrounded by double quotes or by a matching set of open and close braces. (Please read the Tcl manual to better understand what constitutes the end of a statement.) The first word of each command indicates the general purpose for the command, and the following words specify the exact type of command to execute. Table 8.1 summarizes the text commands in VMD by listing the first words, and describing the general purpose for commands starting with those words. Since VMD can be compiled with optionally included components and features, commands labeled optional may not be available in your version of VMD.

The commands described in the following sections are listed by name, and followed by a list of the available arguments. If an argument is optional, it is enclosed in []s. If only one of a list of arguments is needed, the list is enclosed in <>s and the items are separated by |. Words in italics indicate a string or value to be specified by the user.



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