[News] Codeaholic/LL

That's it then ... 99.9% of the languages that were listed down the left hand side are now over on the Code-a-holic Language List.

Mate! I'm glad that's over.

[News] Today and Tomorrow

Today it was swapping hard drives; sharing receipt printer; finding, downloading, and failing to get working the old touch-screen software; telling all the other machines to use LPT6 when running the POS application, but making sure that the POS machine itself still uses LPT1 (using Clipper 5.3); and getting the floppy drive to work in the SERVER.

Today I celebrated by 45th birthday. One of the gifts I received was a PLUG membership. Eventually the ancient source codes promised but never delivered on Code-a-holic will find their way there.

Tomorrow is the first day (of about 1.5 weeks) at Home Open working on the help desk. More news, and code, as it comes to hand.

[News] End of Contract ... again

The Holy Grail, permanent work, remains elusive. I have good KSAs (Knowledge, Skills, Attitudes) but employers seem only interested in having me around for a few weeks ... maybe it's my deodorant / mouthwash / politics / religion ...

A couple of times it's been suggested I try out writing for a living. What do I live on in the meantime? Others have suggested getting a heavy-rigid licence and signing up to be a bus driver. That's tempting, and it may leave time to write. But it also means stepping into the twilight between an IT career and "something else."

So Monday it's climb back into the suit, catch the bus into town, and go door to door, employment agency to employment agency, saying, "Hey, remember me? I'm looking for a job (again.)"

[Languages] The Left-Hand List

The list of programming languages on the left-hand side is shrinking. That's A to E done. They've all been moved over to the language list on Code-a-holic/LL.
Over the next few weeks I'll be posting the rest of the data I have on those languages (the bare minimum of name, link, and description.) If anyone's interested in the metacard database or having an XML-ish file with all of the extra details (platform, users' group, date of last activity, etc.), please leave a comment.
Leave a comment too, if you can see anything that needs changing / updating.

[VBScript] CliVE - Command Language Interpreter VBScript Environment

A few years back ZATZ Publishing, in their DominoPower Magazine, published an article entitled Using Python to create a command line interpreter for Notes. Not being that au fait with Python I decided to have a go at doing the same thing in VBScript. CliVE is the result.

CliVE takes the basic CLI mechanism of my previous posting ([VBScript] CLI Framework) and adds a couple of extra bits: Loading, Saving, and a shorthand for 'WScript.Echo'

First the code supporting the standard header.

option explicit Function GetEnv( strEnvVar ) Dim oProcessEnvironment Dim sResult With CreateObject( "WScript.Shell" ) GetEnv = .Environment( "PROCESS" )( UCase( strEnvVar ) ) End With End Function Sub Include( scriptName ) Dim sScript Dim oStream 'on error resume next err.clear With CreateObject( "Scripting.FileSystemobject" ) Set oStream = .OpenTextFile( scriptName ) End With If Err.Number > 0 Then MsgBox "Could not open " & scriptName WScript.Quit End If Err.Clear sScript = oStream.ReadAll() oStream.Close ExecuteGlobal sScript If Err.Number <> 0 Then Die "Error in loaded script" End If On Error Goto 0 End Sub Include "C:\Script\StandardLibrary.vbs"

Then support for putting script files on the commandline. Files specified on the command line are loaded and interpreted, one after the other.

Dim oArgs Set oArgs = WScript.Arguments.Unnamed Dim i If oArgs.Count > 0 Then For i = 0 to oArgs.Count - 1 LoadRun oArgs( i ) Next End If

This is the main interpreter loop.

The aSession array stores each line passed to Evaluate so that a given session's script can be stored.

In the main loop, a prompt is output and input received. The sLine is split into a two element list: the first element being the keyword; the second being all subsequent text.

There are a few keywords starting with a dot. These are peculiar to CliVE:

.quit

.exit

Synonyms for WScript.Quit

.echo

?

Synonyms for WScript.Echo. Unlike other dot commands, the line starting with this command is passed to the Evaluate function.

.save

Saves the contents of the aSession array to SaveClive.clive unless a filename is given as an argument.

.run

.load

Reads the filename given in the argument and executes the code therein by passing it to ExecuteGlobal.

.debug

An empty procedure. A place to put test code.

All other commands are treated as VBScript commands and are passed to the Evaluate subroutine.

Dim aSession Dim sLine Dim aLine Dim sKeyword Dim sArguments Dim sClip ReDim aSession( -1 ) Do While True WScript.StdOut.Write "cliVE> " sLine = WScript.StdIn.ReadLine aLine = Split( sLine, " ", 2 ) If UBound( aLine ) > -1 Then sKeyword = aLine( 0 ) If UBound( aLine ) > 0 Then sArguments = LTrim( RTrim( aLine( 1 ) ) ) Else sArguments = vbNullString End If Select Case LCase( sKeyword ) Case ".quit", ".exit" Exit Do Case ".echo", "?" Evaluate "WScript.Echo " & sArguments Case ".save" Save sArguments Case ".run", ".load" LoadRun sArguments Case ".debug" DoDebug Case Else Evaluate sLine End Select End If Loop

Evaluate, Save, LoadRun and Debug.

Note that the code for Evaluate traps errors, and displays an error message. Note also that LoadRun has no such protection. It's something one might want to add ASAP!

Note also the call to AAdd, which adds the evaluated command to the aSession array if the command works without error.

Sub Evaluate( sArg ) On Error Resume Next ExecuteGlobal sArg If Err.Number <> 0 Then WScript.Echo "Error:",Err.Number WScript.Echo vbTab, Err.Source WScript.Echo vbTab, Err.Description Err.Clear Else AAdd aSession, sArg End If On Error GoTo 0 End Sub Sub Save( sFilename ) Dim nMode If sFilename = vbNullString Then sFileName = "SaveClive.clive" nMode = WF_APPEND Else nMode = WF_CREATE End If WriteFile sFilename, Join( aSession, vbNewLine ), nMode End Sub Sub LoadRun( sFileName ) If sFileName <> vbNullString Then If Exists( sFileName ) Then ExecuteGlobal ReadFile( sFileName ) WScript.Echo sFilename & " evaluated without error" Else WScript.Echo sFileName & " not found" End If Else WScript.Echo "Please specify filename" End If End Sub Sub DoDebug End SUb

Rather than reproduce the entire StandardLibrary (1500+ lines), here are the referenced routines (AAdd, Exists, ReadFile, WriteFile), plus supporting symbols.

Function AAdd( ByRef aToThis, ByVal xAddThis ) Dim nPos nPos = UBound( aToThis ) + 1 ReDim Preserve aToThis( nPos ) aToThis( nPos ) = xAddThis AAdd = nPos End Function Dim oFSO Set oFSO = CreateObject( "Scripting.FileSystemobject" ) Function Exists( sFile ) Exists = oFSO.FileExists( sFile ) End Function Function ReadFile( FileName) Dim oStream Dim sData sData = VBNullString Set oStream = oFSO.OpenTextFile(FileName) sData = oStream.ReadAll oStream.Close ReadFile = sData End Function Const WF_APPEND = 1 Const WF_CREATE = 2 Const WF_FOR_APPENDING = 8 Const WF_FOR_WRITING = 2 Const WF_CREATE_NONEXISTING = True Sub WriteFile( sFilename, sContents, nMode ) Dim oStream If nMode = WF_APPEND Then Set oStream = oFSO.OpenTextFile( sFilename, WF_FOR_APPENDING, WF_CREATE_NONEXISTING ) ElseIf nMode = WF_CREATE Then Set oStream = oFSO.OpenTextFile( sFilename, WF_FOR_WRITING, WF_CREATE_NONEXISTING ) Else Die "Mode incorrectly set for WriteFile2" End If oStream.Write sContents oStream.Close End Sub

[Community] Code-a-holic in print

TechTrax January 2006, from MouseTrax Computing Solutions.