Zugg Software :: View topic

Adept Joined: 01 Mar 2005 Posts: 277

Zugg,

I just thought I'd post this as an FYI. It would allow advanced compiled scripting in either Pascal or Basic:
http://www.tmssoftware.com/scriptstudio.htm#whatsnew

It probably doesn't fit into the zApp philosophy but I thought since I came accross it by accident I'd let you know about in case you didn't (I was actually looking up themes for ThemeEngine when I clicked on a link that lead me to click on a link... etc.)

Go ahead and delete this thread if you want after you read it.

-Steven

Magician Joined: 09 Oct 2003 Posts: 459 Location: USA

I believe this is one of the packages he was considering in the very early stages of zApp.

Thinking back on it, I really think it is, because I remember the TMS Software site.

Adept Joined: 01 Mar 2005 Posts: 277

Some of the features look nice, for example the step-through debugging. I think what is in zApp is fine, though.

Enchanter Joined: 10 Oct 2000 Posts: 698

Here are the forum references:

Scripting tool

First Alpha Release

Adept Joined: 01 Mar 2005 Posts: 277

Thanks for the links, mr_kent!

Posted: Thu Mar 10, 2005 11:45 pm

Yeah, the problem with their Scripting Studio is that it completely ignores the Microsoft Scripting Host interface. I didn't want to limit myself to only certain languages in zApp. By using the Microsoft Scripting interface that is built into every version of Windows, it allows you to use any scripting language that you want which supports this. Most of the solid scripting systems that have been around for a while, like Perl, Python, etc, all have "active scripting" versions.

The fact that TMS ignored this well-defined scripting interface is just another example of how much of their code isn't really "commercial" quality. I'm sure there are probably other Pascal-like scripting systems out there which *do* interface to the scripting engine.

Of course, the downside of this is that it will be very difficult to provide an IDE with syntax checking, debugging, etc, since there won't be any easy way to know what the syntax of the chosen scripting language is. I'll probably end up including some stuff for the default VBScript and JScript languages, but for stuff like Perl, Python, etc, it will be difficult to implement.

Wizard Joined: 10 Oct 2000 Posts: 1551 Location: Australia

Maybe you could do what many syntax-highlighting programs do and have a file which defines the colour words should be highlighted ... eg UltraEdit has a weird looking textfile that says stuff like:

Posted: Fri Mar 11, 2005 3:58 am

Yep, that's basically what I'll probably end up doing. There are several possible 3rd party components that do this, and when I get into doing the IDE I'll be evaluating them a bit more. I'll mainly be looking for something that works with the RichView editor component that I'm using in zApp. There is a crude syntax highlighter that works with it, but I'm still in search of something better. I really don't want to give up the RichView editor component at this point since it is very powerful and does most everything a rich text editor should do, and more. It already supports the Addict spellchecker and has powerful HTML import and export features that are needed for eMobius, along with a rich set of predefined Actions (see the Editor demo for examples).

Adept Joined: 01 Mar 2005 Posts: 277

Is there a way to "lock" the content in the RichView so it can't be edited or selected but only viewed?

Posted: Fri Mar 11, 2005 6:06 am

Yes, there is a ReadOnly property somewhere. Like the other complex controls (grid, tree, etc) I haven't fully published or wrapped all of the RichView functionality yet.