Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!lll-winken!lll-tis!ames!pasteur!ucbvax!dewey.soe.berkeley.edu!oster
From: oster@dewey.soe.berkeley.edu (David Phillip Oster)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac.programmer
Subject: Re: Capps' Editor Construction Kit
Message-ID: <23729@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU>
Date: 24 Apr 88 14:55:31 GMT
References: <48@melbcae.edu.au> <332STORKEL@RICE>
Sender: usenet@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU
Reply-To: oster@dewey.soe.berkeley.edu.UUCP (David Phillip Oster)
Organization: School of Education, UC-Berkeley
Lines: 49

In article <332STORKEL@RICE> STORKEL@RICE.BITNET (Scott Storkel) writes:
>Has anyone used the CAPPS' Editor Construction Kit from Think? Exactly what
>kind of routines does this package include, and how useful are they?

I found their advertising accurate, but I was mislead by it. You get:
1.) a library (in two forms) that is somewhat similar to TextEdit but
doesn't have word wrap. It does have tabs, and supports text records that
can be as big as memory.  (Getting scroll bars to work when you have >
65767 lines in the record is left as an exercise for the usr.)

2.) another library that implements the "grep" style searching used in
LightSpeed C.

3.) another library that implements the tree-walking file searching that
Lightspeed C does when it is trying to find where in the folder hierarchy
you put that incluse file.

4.) source code for a simple editor using the libraries.  The source code
has some nifty stuff in it, like a routine to bold face the name of any
system call that occurs in the text.  It is a really good example of how
to program the mac. The editor implements undo, so you get to see how to
do that.  I learned a lot from it.

5.) you also get source for:
5.a) a trivial editor, just ot get you up and running on the package
5.b) a desk accesssory version.

Now here is the point I missed: 

You do not get source code for the libraries.

There are hooks into the text editor to boldface, italicize or strike out
arbitrary blocks of text, to have things like the LSPascal breakpoint stop
signs scroll as the text scrolls, and LightSpeed C style tabs are
supported, but:

no wordwrap (though you could certainly use the hooks to auto-insert 
carriage returns. (I'm not certain if you could create a "soft carriage
return character" like wordstar used to use.))
All lines must be same height (you'd be better off not buying this if you
want to learn how to write a real word processor.)

If you are the kind of person who tends to hang a programming language on
the side of his programs (I know I am), then this package lets you add a
really nice editor for those files very simply.  They ask no monetary
royalties, only that you give them credit, in the same font you use, among
the copyright messages.

Although I was disappointed that I didn't get the library source, I'm
still happy I bought it. It's come in handy more than once.