Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!van-bc!lpami
From: lphillips@lpami.wimsey.bc.ca (Larry Phillips)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.tech
Subject: Re: Standard File Requesters
Message-ID: <2419@van-bc.UUCP>
Date: 16 May 89 03:20:17 GMT
Sender: lpami@van-bc.UUCP
Lines: 43

In <2977@cps3xx.UUCP>, golden@cps3xx.UUCP (golden james) writes:
> That's exactly the point.  You shouldn't have to be a hacker to get a
> filerequestor that works well for you.  I guess your saying that only
> people with technical expertise deserve to have file requestors that
> they like.

As it stands now, I can only get a file requester that works for me when I run
one or two programs.

A 'standard' FR call, with well defined parameters and return values, easily
replacable, will give us the best of all possible worlds. What programmer
wouldn't welcome a simple FR call?  If the programmer doesn't like the supplied
one, he supplies on of his own. If the user disagrees, he replaces it with one
he has written, one his friend has written, or one he has purchased either
standalone or as part of another package.

Saying that you shouldn't have to be a hacker to get a FR that works for you is
rather like saying that you shouldn't have to be a mechanic to have a souped up
engine or racing suspension.

The main problem, as I see it, is to define the program interface to the FR.
There must be enough there to do the minimum required functions of a FR,
certainly, and there should probably be enough there to allow the programmer to
supply a default directory, a title for the FR, perhaps filename filters,
perhaps whether a filename pointer or lock should be returned, and so on.

 Once that is defined and implemented, we would be virtually deluged with FRs,
ranging in quality form good to worse than bad (witness the current crop of
FRs, replacement commands, pallette tools, and so on).  The main point,
however, would be that you, as a user, could define the good for yourself, and
that need not be the same as the FR I define as good.  In either case, with my
good FR, and your not so good FR :-), we would each have consistency within our
own environment for all the programs that made use of the system call.

-larry

--
  - Don't tell me what kind of a day to have! -
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|   //   Larry Phillips                                                |
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