Table of Content
HAL Forum
Get Started With HAL
All you need to compile and run your own HAL programs is included in the Hansa World Application. This makes is extremely easy to get started with the programming. To do customizations to existing functionality the standard source code is needed. The complete standard source code is included in the HAL Beginners education. After attending the education you will always be granted access to the latest version of our source code.

Settings to get started
To start programming Hansa you must enable the HAL check boxes in the configuration setting in the system module and then create a folder named halcust in your Hansa program folder. The halcust folder is where you store your new and modified source files. If you are running in client/server mode (which you most likley will do) the halcust folder with your HAL files must be present on both the client and the server. Note that any changes to the source files will not affect the system unless you store the files into the halcust folder.

Compiling HAL code
After you have put your HAL source files into the halcust folders you only need to recompile or restart your system and your code will be activated. If any problems are encountered a report will show compiling errors or any other problems. Compiling always takes place when you restart Hansa. Some changes will always require a restart of Hansa for example adding a new report to the system while changing an existing report only requires recompiling. See the Language Reference section for more details. Both the server and the client must be recompiled after any changes have been done. Compiling is done the following way:

Compiling On Server
Windows Server: Restart or Ctrl – F5
Mac and Linux Command Line Server: Restart or by running the maintenance in the Technics module called Recompile HAL files from the client.

Compiling On Client
Windows: Restart or Ctrl - F5
Mac: Restart or Command-Shift-k
Linux: Restart

Developing HAL code
When developing and testing HAL code the most convenient way is to run Hansa in single user mode unless you are developing web application where client-server mode is required to see the web pages. Single user mode means that you don’t connect with your client program to a server but instead run your program as both client and server at the same time. This is achieved by removing IP addresses and port numbers from your company register on your client and restarting your client that now will act as both client and server. To compile in single user mode use the short keys shown above for compiling on clients. After you have tested your code, install it on both clients and server and switch back to client-server mode.