Re: [MacPerl] Editors

["Jay Bedsole" <rwdd30@email.sps.mot.com>]

Vicki wrote:

> At 08:37 +0900 98/07/28, dj_feldmeyer@jft.com wrote:
> > If I'm not mistaken, BBEdit and Alpha are set apart by their 
> > ability to send  AppleEvents on the closing of a window or 
> > saving of a file.
> 
> More clarification?  I don't understand.  Which does/doesn't do
> this?  What does this mean to me, the user?

They both do this, which was the point. Most **OTHER** Mac editors
don't support AppleEvents. What this means to you, the user, is
that you get a more seamless interface and integrated behaviors.

> I know that if BBEdit is set as the editor choice with Internet
> config, and you choose Edit from the MacPerl Edit menu, changes
> to the editor window automagically make themselves known to
> MacPerl (and vice versa).  I have been told by a reliable source
> that this does not happen with Alpha. I have not confirmed this.

Not true. Alpha can work this way too. I have confirmed this.
However Alpha also is MacPerl aware in such a way that it can
launch MacPerl with the script you're editing and the output,
errors, etc. are "piped" into Alpha windows. In other words,
MacPerl seems more like a "plugin" for Alpha. I don't have to
launch MacPerl - Alpha does this for me automatically and closes
it back down when I'm done.  Since I don't have a licensed copy
of BBEdit, I don't know if it can work this way too. To me, this
seems more intuitive.

> >Alpha also has syntax colouring for MacPerl, etc.
> 
> As does BBEdit :-)
> And line numbering, and function marking, and jump-to, and regex,
> and...

Ditto for Alpha. Plus keyboard macros, emacs emulation, tcl
extensibility, HTML functions, templates, auto completion,
named file markers, interactive spell checker, interactive diff,
hypertext, and lots, lots more...

Even cooler; Alpha can use a MacPerl script as a built-in filter
to operate on whatever text you choose. I've added a number of
filters. For instance, one can strip HTML tags from text (sure, I
could have a droplet to do this, but with this filter I can select
a portion of text within Alpha and only operate on this). Other
more esoteric filters that I've built can transform non-standard
file formats into standard ones, synchronize embedded data in
multiple HTML files, sort data in files based on crazy, non-
standard criteria, perform search and replace operations that are
just not possible with regex, count "objects" like variables or
HTML tags, generate CRCs, yadda, yadda, yadda.

Trying to avoid evangelical opinions, I'd be interested in the
honest assessments of people who have tried and evaluated both.
This might be useful to others contemplating which editor to get...

...me, I just want to feel good about my choice! [wink]

jay

***** Want to unsubscribe from this list?
***** Send mail with body "unsubscribe" to mac-perl-request@iis.ee.ethz.ch