Re: [MacPerl] MPW - how many use?

["Doug McNutt" <dmcnutt@macnauchtan.com>]

>For those of us (me) that are still in the dark, could someone summarize
>what MPW, ToolServer, and any other associated pieces of software would do
>for me? I think I have access to this stuff courtesy of my CodeWarrior CDs

Yes - MPW is shipped with CodeWarrior but it's also free now from Apple.

By far the most important thing you get with MPW is a real command line
interface to MacPerl. You really can set switches, enter numeric paramaters,
and do filename generation. You really know what your working directory is
when you enter perl.

Also - you get yet another set of regular expression conventions which you
may and may not like. The escapes are from the 8 bit extended character set
and quoting requirements are a bloody disaster.

Toolserver is a version of MPW that runs in background. It was developed to
handle long compile/link operations over an AppleTalk net. MPW tools are
pieces of code which take advantage of the MPW environment; argv, stdin,
stdout, and the like all work. perl is an MPW tool as are the compilers and
assemblers. It's a whole lot easier to scribble out an MPW tool than it is
to prepare a complete Mac application.

It is often a tossup whether to do simple editing with an MPW script or with
perl. It is, IMHO, easier to traverse the file system in MPW than in perl.

Until Apple comes up with an optional command line interface or other shell
- OS-X?? - I consider MPW a required capability.

--> From the USA, the only socialist country that refuses to admit it.<--


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