Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!clyde!att!osu-cis!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!bloom-beacon!mit-eddie!ll-xn!ames!oliveb!amiga!jimm
From: jimm@amiga.UUCP (Jim Mackraz)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga
Subject: Re: 1.3 includes
Message-ID: <3058@amiga.UUCP>
Date: 24 Oct 88 20:05:08 GMT
References: <8377@cit-vax.Caltech.Edu> <215@antares.UUCP> <2879@sugar.uu.net> <3053@amiga.UUCP> <2900@sugar.uu.net>
Reply-To: jimm@cloyd.UUCP (Jim Mackraz)
Organization: Commodore-Amiga Inc, Los Gatos CA
Lines: 53

In article <2900@sugar.uu.net> peter@sugar.uu.net (Peter da Silva) writes:
)In article <3053@amiga.UUCP>, jimm@amiga.UUCP (Jim Mackraz) writes:
)> The dos does some validation based on size, wrongly, which effects
)> moving preferences file from new disks to old, and so on.
)
)I hope this is fixed in a later version, rather than going to something
)nonstandard.

Hey, big guy, we ARE the standard.

)> )I should hope so, since it was in the 1.2 Prefs with NO indication that it
)> )was unauthorised.
)
)> I hope you didn't assume it was usable by a program other than morerows
)> or the equivalent.
)
)Prefs is the equivalent of morerows. All it does is dump your preferences
)structure or let you poke values into it from a text file. It's the
)nonwindowing equivalent of Preferences.

Sounds fine.  Note that Preferences does some measure of validity
checking on some things (e.g., PointerTicks) which are not documented.

Poking preferences values without the help of a Commodore program (which
doesn't include morerows, by the way) might just lead one into
the cracks in the Preferences scheme.  Caveat user.

Making frequent calls to SetPrefs at runtime to carve some desired
behavior out of the system is another way to get stuck in a crack.
Caveat programmer. 

Preferences isn't so great as a "black box"  ;^)  Treat it with
kid gloves.  Anything screaming for enhancement that much will
eventually change in some way.  It's always an inviting challenge to
maintain perfect upward compatibility for all sorts of creative
programs while presenting a completely new, modern paradigm for
doing basically the same thing, except different.

)> Too bad.  I hope you don't count too heavily on its values, which are
)> not documented.
)
)I don't care about its values. In fact I just had a look at my code again.
)I didn't understand it so I didn't include it.
)		Peter da Silva  `-_-'  peter@sugar.uu.net

I feel like that all the time.

	jimm
-- 
	Jim Mackraz, I and I Computing	  
	amiga!jimm	BIX:jmackraz
Opinions are my own.  Comments regarding the Amiga operating system, and
all others, are not to be taken as Commodore official policy.