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From: ericsc@microsoft.UUCP (Eric Schlegel)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac.programmer
Subject: Re: Subtantiatng my criticism (was: simple text interface)
Message-ID: <7241@microsoft.UUCP>
Date: 4 Aug 89 15:49:34 GMT
References: <9674@phoenix.Princeton.EDU> <43528@bbn.COM> <14780@dartvax.Dartmouth.EDU> <183@dbase.UUCP> <14834@dartvax.Dartmouth.EDU>
Reply-To: ericsc@microsoft.UUCP (Eric Schlegel)
Organization: Microsoft Corp., Redmond WA
Lines: 36

In article<14834@dartvax.Dartmouth.EDU>ari@eleazar.dartmouth.edu (Ari Halberstadt) writes:
>Ok, perhaps the bug I found is due to my ignorance. But what happens is
>that all the commands and nearly all the menu items on MPW v 3.0 stop
>functioning! Since I can't send a kill signal to the process, I have to
>reboot my mac. I've discovered I can save changes if I click on the
>close box of unsaved files. Anyone got a sollution? I've saved a shell
>script which seems to cause the bug consistently, but the bug also
>appears at random times during my work.
>...
>Now, to the command line interface of MPW. Very very annoying. I think
>a prompt based system like the csh would have been much better. My main
>gripe is that I'm a lefty, and I always have to reach way-yonder to get
>to the "enter" key just to execute the simplest command. Geesh! Now, it

Two quick comments: your bug sounds like you've got a tool running that's
reading from stdin. For example, if you type 'C' without any arguments
and execute it, the c compiler will read its input from stdin and compile
whatever you type. (Very handy for quick tests of code!) If you have a
tool reading from stdin, most of the menus _are_ disabled as you describe.
You should be able to kill a tool by typing cmd-Enter, which signifies
end of input (ctl-D in unix) or by typing cmd-. which MPW intercepts and
simply terminates the tool.

If you would post your problem shell script we could probably determine
if this is what's happening.

Also, instead of pressing Enter to execute a command, you can also
press cmd-Return (I've gotten so used to typing cmd-return that I
find myself doing it in csh) or for the mouse-happy among us : ) you
can click in the status box in the lower left-hand corner.

These points are all documented in the shell reference.

eric schlegel
dartmouth '90, currently an intern low-life at Microsoft
These opinions are MINE, ALL MINE!!!