Path: utzoo!attcan!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!ames!sun-barr!oliveb!amiga!cbmvax!jesup
From: jesup@cbmvax.UUCP (Randell Jesup)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.tech
Subject: Re: Dealing with multiple scripting languages (was: Elinating the 'rx' from AREXX)
Message-ID: <7807@cbmvax.UUCP>
Date: 1 Sep 89 18:54:28 GMT
References: <721@lpami.wimsey.bc.ca> <1989Aug29.031707.9022@agate.uucp> <7782@cbmvax.UUCP> <1989Aug31.004647.12718@agate.uucp>
Reply-To: jesup@cbmvax.UUCP (Randell Jesup)
Organization: Commodore Technology, West Chester, PA
Lines: 51

In article <1989Aug31.004647.12718@agate.uucp> mwm@eris.berkeley.edu (Mike (I'll think of something yet) Meyer) writes:
>In article <7782@cbmvax.UUCP> jesup@cbmvax.UUCP (Randell Jesup) writes:
><	This was discussed at length months ago on BIX in amiga.dev/
><suggestions.  The final more-or-less consensus was that you should look
><for the string #!...!# (... being name of interpreter) anywhere in the
><first line.  This allows embedding it in any type of comment.
>
>Someone who knows what's going to happen. Lotsa question...

	Note: I said the developers on Bix come to a consensus.  Doesn't
necessarily mean it will occur.

>Is the search going to be length-limited, as well? Or will it search
>in vain through a megabyte of database for the newline that isn't
>there?

	I think the stipulation they said was 512 bytes max.

>One of the first uses of #! on Unix was for a Pascal P-code
>interpreter - the interpreter was tweaked to skip the first line, and
>the compiler generated "#! pcodeinterpreter" as the first line,
>followed by binary. What happens if someone has a similar binary
>"script", the first word of which is 0x00000f3f? Or will that be
>considered an error on the part of the compiler?

	I think you mean 0x3f3 (hunk_header).  Sounds like a strange example.

>I assumes this code is going into Execute(), as it needs to read the
>first part of the binary in any case. That is the case, isn't it? It's
>not going into the shell, is it?

	I didn't say it's going in anywhere.  Might be, though.

>If Execute() fires off an ARexx script, how will the script
>communicate with the shell as a client? Or will the default shell not
>be a client?

	I think ARexx support in the Shell is a good thing.

><There still needs to be some hard-coded recognitions of executables,
><AmigaDos scripts, and _perhaps_ ARexx scripts.
>
>Why? Backwards compatability, or does #!Execute!# fail?

	Because there are many scripts already written that we should not
force people to rewrite.

-- 
Randell Jesup, Keeper of AmigaDos, Commodore Engineering.
{uunet|rutgers}!cbmvax!jesup, jesup@cbmvax.cbm.commodore.com  BIX: rjesup  
Common phrase heard at Amiga Devcon '89: "It's in there!"