After everything is initialized, VMD reads the startup file using the equivalent of the command play .vmdrc. This file contains text commands for VMD to execute just as if they had been entered at the VMD text console command prompt. The file can contain any number of commands, including blank lines and comment lines (which begin with the # character). If an error is encountered while reading this file, the command in error is skipped and processing of the file continues.
VMD searches for this file in three locations on Unix; ./.vmdrc, $HOME/.vmdrc and $VMDDIR/.vmdrc. On Windows, VMD searches in ./vmd.rc, $HOME/vmd.rc and $VMDDIR/vmd.rc. Only the first file found will be read in and processed.
See chapter 9 for a description of the VMD text commands which may be put in this file. Also, section 5.1.3 discusses how to put commands into the .vmdrc file to customize the behavior of the hot keys.
Here is an example of a startup file:
# add personalized keyboard shortcuts user add key E echo on user add key e echo off user add key g display reset user add key A stage location bottom user add key m mol list # position the stage and axes axes location lowerleft stage location off # position and turn on menus menu main move 5 196 menu display move 386 90 menu graphics move 5 455 menu files move 5 496 menu main on # start the scene a-rockin' rock y by 1