[jawsscripts] Re: I guess everyone else already knew this, but, ...

  • From: "Jim Snowbarger" <Snowman@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
  • To: <jawsscripts@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
  • Date: Tue, 25 Feb 2014 20:53:37 -0600

Regarding Andrew's comments about the JAWS Script manager not being a 
full-on professional development tool.  I am curious about that, especially 
since I've done a lot of scripting, and always have used it.  (thanks, 
Andrew.  <grin>).

I had also heard that the guys at FS don't use it either.

We may have talked about this before.  Sorry, if so.  but, for those of you 
who use other editors, what are your reasons for doing that?  What do you 
find more convenient in your favorite editor, over the Script Manager?

I personally find it much easier to get an exact name reminder, or prompting 
on the parameters to, and returned value from, a rarely used JFW built in, 
for example.  And, a convenient way to also create the JSD documentation 
without having to muck with yet another file.   Some of these things, I 
expect you could accomplish by marrying JScript into your editor as a tool, 
like compiling directly from the source file, or even having your editor 
place your cursor on the eroneous line that just barfed your compilation 
attempt, as we often do with other compilers.
And, you could probably figure out some way to have your editor quickly move 
you from one function to the next, or bring up a list of functions for 
convenient access.  All those things could probably be done.
But, that would take work to figure out exactly how to do that.  So, I 
wonder why anyone would do that work, when it's already been done, and works 
fine.
There has to be some great advantage.

Here are the only one's I can think of. Mostly, they have to do with the JSD 
documentation file.

One issue I have heard rumblings about is the constant mucking about in the 
JSD file, that makes version control systems think the file has changed, 
when it has only jusbt been rearranged.  If you manage the JSD file 
yourself, that won't happen.

Here's another one.
If  file x.jss uses file y.jsb, and some function in file Y wants to call a 
function that resides in x, and the interface to that function, it's 
parameters and returned value,  is not the default, then how does one tell 
file Y how to invoke that function?
(yes, I know, this seems awkward design.  But, it offten gets desireable far 
down the road, when orderly design gives way to pure pragmatism).

The only way I have managed to do this is to put the function prototype, 
describing the function from x, into y.jsd, even though it actually resides 
in X.
The automatic management of y.JSD has bit me a few times in this regard.
By the way, is there a better way to do that?

So, what else.  What are some other good reasons not to use the script 
manager?











----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Andrew Hart" <ahart@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: <jawsscripts@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Tuesday, February 25, 2014 3:43 PM
Subject: [jawsscripts] Re: I guess everyone else already knew this, but, ...


It is a bug in so far as no other Windows software behaves like this
when launching an application to deal with a file association.  The
script manager should load precisely what you tell it to, but then save
it into the appropriate user settings directory.  This, however, makes
things kind of hairy since if the jss file depends on jsm, jsd or jsh
files, it would also need to get those from the same directory the file
was loaded from and then also copy them across to the user settings
directory when saving so as not to break anything.  However, the user
may not want this and it ought to inform the user of these kinds of
actions.  However, I wouldn't be too optimistic about FS fixing this
because of the above-mentioned hairiness.

The script manager is not really a professional-quality development
tool, which is a real shame, since it does have some very useful
features for navigating around script files, etc.  It is however a very
handy tool for learners and people who aren't full-on developers to do a
little needed scripting and customisation.

Cheers,
Andrew.

On 25/02/2014 6:20 PM, Octavian Rasnita wrote:
> I also thought everybody knew this. :-)
>
> If you create an empty file named default.jss anywhere on your computer 
> and
> press enter on it, Jaws Script Manager won't open that empty file, but the
> right "default.jss" script which is placed on your user settings/enu
> directory. And if there is no default.jss there, it will open the default
> default.jss from the "all users" directory. And if you change and save it,
> it will write the results to the current user settings/enu directory.
>
> So I often used TextPad to edit Jaws scripts because of this way of 
> working.
> But I think it is not a bug, but a feature.
>
> --Octavian
>
> ----- Original Message ----- 
> From: "Mike O'Brien" <mike23432@xxxxxxxxxxx>
> To: <jawsscripts@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> Sent: Tuesday, February 25, 2014 9:59 PM
> Subject: [jawsscripts] Re: I guess everyone else already knew this, but, 
> ...
>
>
>> Hi
>>
>> It has been my experience that when you try to open a script source in
>> Script Editor, the script source opened by Script manager is for the
>> version
>> of JAWS that you are currently running.  It will load the script from the
>> user settings folder if it is there, or if not, from the default settings
>> folder.  For example, If you're running JAWS 15 and want to edit a script
>> from the user settings directory for JAWS 14, the script for JAWS 15 will
>> be
>> opened.  To edit a script in Script Manager for a different version of
>> JAWS,
>> you have to shut down JAWS and start JAWS for the version you want to
>> edit.
>>
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: jawsscripts-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
>> [mailto:jawsscripts-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Geoff Chapman
>> Sent: Tuesday, February 25, 2014 01:27
>> To: jawsscripts@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
>> Subject: [jawsscripts] I guess everyone else already knew this, but, ...
>>
>> I have just newly discovered a lovely curve ball anomaly that I thought
>> I'd
>> just throw in for young players. hahaha.
>> At least with jaws 12 under xp,
>> (Not yet tested with later versions of OS/jaws,) if you, say, have a jss
>> file in some other random folder, and you either just hit enter on it, 
>> or,
>> hit applications, hit h for open with, then choose English resource 
>> script
>> manager and hit enter, Did anyone else know that it doesn't actually load
>> the jss file you're expecting? the one your focused on? No! instead, it
>> loads some other one! either from the user area or the shared area, that
>> not
>> yet determined! But, I sure  know it doesn't load the file you've 
>> actually
>> hit enter on to open in there. that's for darn sure!
>> Just thought I'd throw that out there in case anyone scratches their head
>> for a bit wondering on this one.
>> Any reports if anyone would care to test on later versions of either OS 
>> or
>> jaws, might round out the thread nicely.
>>
>> Regards
>> Geoff C.
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