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From: ephraim@think.COM (ephraim vishniac)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac.hypercard,comp.sys.mac
Subject: Re: HyperCard XFCNs in MPW C
Message-ID: <16007@think.UUCP>
Date: 1 Feb 88 16:13:57 GMT
References: <226STORKEL@RICE> <3105@watcgl.waterloo.edu>
Sender: usenet@think.UUCP
Reply-To: ephraim@vidar.think.com.UUCP (ephraim vishniac)
Organization: Thinking Machines Corporation, Cambridge, MA
Lines: 35

In article <3105@watcgl.waterloo.edu> kdmoen@watcgl.waterloo.edu (Doug Moen) writes:
>You can't have global variables *or character string literals* in
>an XFCN written in MPW C.

>Boy was I pissed off when I figured this out.
>I don't know of any reasonable workarounds, either.

Sure you do.  As you go on to say:

>Some kludges for faking string literals:
>* You can put them into STR# resources

That's the correct method.  Or 'STR ' resources, or any custom
resource that takes your fancy (preferably with a ResEdit TMPL, to
make editing easy).

>Both kludges are really pretty awful, but I have no better ideas right
>now except to write a preprocessor for stripping out string literals
>and replacing them with something that the linker won't choke on.

What's awful about putting your strings into string list resources?
It's not popular C hacker's style, but it's a hell of a lot easier
than recompiling every time you want to change some trivial message.

>By the way, you can't put global variables or string literals into
>INITs, desk accessories, and related code resources, either.

>Does anybody at Apple care enough to fix this?

Probably not, since nothing is broken.  You've already mentioned the
correct method for embedding text in a program: use separate
resources.  Putting them directly into your code resources will cause
would-be translators of your work to curse your name forever.

Ephraim Vishniac					  ephraim@think.com
Thinking Machines Corporation / 245 First Street / Cambridge, MA 02142-1214