**CIGAL Reference Manual, Chapter 3 (Functions): menuitem**
===== Menuitem -- Get information about menu commands =====
**        usage: result = menuitem(menuspec,item,flag)**

MENUITEM is used to get information about menus in the menu file
(see [[jvs:cigal:manual:chapter4:menufile|MENUFILE(4)]]).  It is most useful when used within a menu, so
that one menu entry can have access to other menu entries, or within
a macro designed to extract menu help information.  It can also be
used interactively, however, as a way of finding out about the contents
of a menu, but for this the SHOW MENU command is probably more useful
(see [[jvs:cigal:manual:chapter2:show|SHOW(2)]]).

If MENUITEM is called with no arguments, or if the MENUSPEC argument is 0,
the function returns the total number of menus stored in the menu file.

The MENUSPEC argument specifies which menu to look up:
     If MENUSPEC is a name, that name is searched in the menu file table.
  
     If MENUSPEC is a number > 0, the menu that is currently active in position
      MENUSPEC (1-13, see [MENUS][1] or [MENU][2]) is used.
  
     If MENUSPEC is a number < 0, the menu in position -MENUSPEC in the menu
      file is used.

The ITEM argument indicates what information about the menu to return:
      If ITEM is omitted, or less than -1, the function returns the total number
       of items in the specified menu.
  
      If ITEM is -1, the returned value is a character string containing the
       name of the specified menu.
  
      If ITEM is >= 0, the returned value is a character string containing the
       ITEMth entry in the specified menu.
  
If the FLAG argument is specified and non-zero, the function returns no value.
   Instead: 
            if FLAG is > 0, and the ITEM argument is >= 0, then the ITEMth entry
                in the specified menu is executed.
            
            if FLAG is < 0, and the ITEM argument is > 1, and the specified menu
                is a SCREEN or TEMP menu, then the ITEMth entry is highlighted
                by reversing the display attributes (reverse video).

**See Also:**\\
[[jvs:cigal:manual:chapter2:exec|EXEC(2)]], 
[[jvs:cigal:manual:chapter2:menu|MENU(2)]], 
[[jvs:cigal:manual:chapter4:menufile|MENUFILE(4)]], 
[[jvs:cigal:manual:chapter1:menus|MENUS(1)]], 
[[jvs:cigal:manual:chapter2:show|SHOW(2)]]

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