Subject:
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Re: Backwards Compatibility (Was Calling all Meta-commands)
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.cad.dev
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Date:
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Sun, 16 Mar 2003 14:36:46 GMT
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Viewed:
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2035 times
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In lugnet.cad.dev, Dan Boger writes:
> On Sun, Mar 16, 2003 at 06:22:40AM +0000, Travis Cobbs wrote:
> > > Another suggestion Kevin kicked around with me (and I mentioned it to Steve,
> > > I forget his rection though), was introducing a new line type specifically
> > > for meta-commands. Thoughts on that?
> >
> > Well, I don't know about other programs, but LDView will throw them in the
> > error log, but otherwise ignore them. It would be really easy for me to add
> > support for the new type and not throw them in the error log, though.
> >
> > One downside of a new line type is that I think we would need to wait for
> > fairly wide-spread tool support of the new line type before we could
> > reasonably make it "official".
>
> besides, if we add a new linetype, we're breaking LDRAW.EXE and
> LEDIT.EXE, wouldn't we?
>
> > Come to think of it, the above {META} is somewhat unnecessary. If we're
> > going to use braces, then the mere presense of the braces could indicate a
> > meta-statement. i.e.:
> >
> > 0 {MPD-FILE} <filename>
> > 0 {NOFILE}
> > 0 {FIELD} Author: Travis Cobbs
>
> I think that's a great idea :)
>
> > If non-programmers think the braces make it too difficult to enter by hand,
> > I'm comfortable with not having them, and just using 0 META to specify
> > meta-commands.
>
> I'm sorry, I can't understand why it's "too difficult" to enter {} by
> hand. It's on the standard keyboard. The people who actually edit
> stuff by hand have the requirement of knowing how to use a keyboard :)
> I mean, when SMTP format was design, you think they were worried that
> people will have a hard time typing "@"? *grin*
As A C programmer, I'm quite adept at { and even } :)
A a developer of L-CAD software, I'd rather see the syntax for current
meta-commands unchanged. If we were to formalize meta-commands with a
syntax change, we'd have to support both old and new style meta-commands
anyway. Anything that is not detected as a meta-command is a comment.
Changing meta-command syntax would not be good for the parts database
either. Just more work to do.
It makes much more sense to me to have a COMMENT (or something less
laborious like // which means comment for the rest of the line in C++).
// This is a comment
is nicer than
// COMMENT this is a comment.
The programs all have to ignore type 0 records that do not match the list of
meta-comments the programs support and assume they are comments. The above
formalizing of comments would be for the reader, not for the programmer (due
to backward compatibility issues), but the technique would be compatible
with all existing LDraw compatible programs.
>
> > > Nevertheless - I do think RIGHT NOW the focus should be on documenting what
> > > we have, per Kevin's goals, and LATER we should worry about the future of
> > > meta-commands. One thing at a time.
> >
> > This seems reasonable. However, news threads (including this branch of this
> > one) can't really easily be put on hold.
>
> Also, most of us don't really have anything to contribute to the
> documentation process - it's up to the program authors to supply the
> data. Meanwhile, the community as a whole can consider and design the
> future of the format here :)
Nothing wrong with that in my book.
Kevin
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