[REBOL] Re: More REBOL IOS questions.
From: greggirwin:mindspring at: 13-May-2002 22:08
Hi Ed,
<< In what little testing I've done, it looks like, if I have to publish
multiple scripts, I have to do it once for each one. Our development
scripts are structured in a psuedo-object-oriented fashion. It would be
convenient then to take a directory, or a group of files and publish
them to IOS all at once. >>
Two options OTTOMH. 1) the up-file utility that comes with IOS might be all
you need. 2) write a custom reblet that works exactly how you want.
I can't over-emphasize how important this (#2) kind of thinking has become
to me. The bar is so low that it's almost always worth writing little
scripts for tasks you might only do a few times. Anything beyond that is
gravy. I find that many reblets have common traits of some kind and, while I
had largely weaned myself away from cut-and-paste code reuse, I'm doing it
again with REBOL and it's working really well so far. I know that just
sounds wrong, and I haven't built a large system this way, but having a
completely self-contained script is really nice. When I find that I'm using
something more than twice, I start thinking about putting in my general
purpose library. The other big difference with REBOL is the code/data
duality. Lots of stuff I would have considered code before, is now data. For
example, rather than coding directory names that might change into your
scripts, build a data file that you just LOAD or DO, and your other scripts
can use that.
<< But Link is extensible through REBOL, correct? So if REBOL can, I assume
we can create an app in Link to do so. >>
Sorry for the confusion. Link is basically View with some extra pieces for
talking to IOS servers. The CALL function and external library access are
not enabled in the current releases of Link, and there's no easy way around
that. Cal Dixon, I think, figured out a way to do it with some extra effort,
but I'd have to look for it if you're interested. For me, I'll just keep
asking RT to enable CALL in Link and I'll use View/Pro or Command for those
pieces in the meantime.
<< I mean, within Link, using REBOL, can I intercept a change in a file and
us it to fire of an action. It is functionality that we could use to
help us manage our scripting process. >>
OK, it's the 'can I *intercept* a change in a file' part that I'm not clear
on.
Let's say a file is changed, and saved back to disk. You can monitor
timestamps, with a polling daemon of some kind with pure REBOL. If you want
Windows to use the file change notification callback, that I don't know
about. I'm not a *nix guy, so maybe there's a file-change-interception
mechanism you're referring to that I'm not familiar with.
--Gregg
