[texworks] HELP: Integrated Tw LaTeX2e Help dialogue

[Paul A Norman]

Thanks for the feed back guys, will look into things as more comes in.

Major problem is that you can not navigate that cut down browser
widget! QUrl is not made available to scripting,  Dog of a thing -
have a look at the code. Especially implementing url bookmarks.

I do feel very strongly that we will hamper development of things if
we dont throw in  Tw Script getText() and savetext() and related
functionality. I want to extend help dialogues to allow the usert to
edit/make their own help fules the TextBrowser is descended from a
texteditor and has all we need. but we will need to save files!

There are other problems doing this workaround TW.file stuff.

     + The Recently Used Files list gets bloated and blasted!

     + Plus the constant distraction of file windows opening and closing
        Looks unprofessional to say the very least.

     + Really impairs script execution performance.

Plus we need to please come to a consensus on QtScript libraries,
location, implementation, and any core libraries to be
supplied/maintained by the Tw project.

I have been developing for nearly twenty years, and *never before*
have I been in something as well designed/developed as TeXWorks, and
not had scripting access to the filesystem!

Lets be really honest, as far as I know everyone of us who has posted
scripts has used QtScript via a workaround of one sort or another to
access the file system!

Regarding concerns about standards, EMCA, and file access -- The
standard (as I showed by copying and pasting extensive excerpts here -
some months ago) allows for extension of ANYTHING by the host
environement infact they virtually encourage it.

The point is that fileaccess is not defined or enabled by default --
it is up to project implementers where they want to take it or
anything else.

I have not yet found a statement even in the current EMCA that says
`thou shallt not implement file system access in your project
implementation under any circumstanes' - we falsely bind ourselves if
we imagine it says or means that.  And the EMCA's latest draft incudes
direct optinal file access.

This is not actually an issue about EMCA standards, those allow
extensions, but about the Tw project -- thats the kind of thinking
that the writers of EMCA expect us to do -- not themselves.

Now the issue is:  should Tw scripting genreally have various forms of
file access or not.

If it is not consdidered safe, then logically we must disable it for
the Lua and Python and any other future scripting modules as well.

Else I might as well write library files in python, use them to open,
return,  and put and  save stuff, and utilise Tw Global objects
between QtScript and Python -- or why don't we just cut to the chase
and do it all directly, speed script processing up, and get rid of
side stepping methods  that hog memory and which raise other exotic
issues as well. -- Rhetorical question :)

If we consider the risks well enough managed then we are permitted to
take (EMCA or any other) scripting whereever we want to go.

:) Yipeeee ....

Paul



On 1 July 2010 06:46, Jonathan Kew <jfkthame at googlemail.com> wrote:
> On 30 Jun 2010, at 10:20, Stefan Löffler wrote:
>> * There's a bug in getText(). If I have an unmodified, untitled
>> document, Tw automatically replaces it with the content of the loaded
>> file.
>
> This serves to illustrate that we need a TW.readFile() function for scripts to use; they should not need to create a document window simply to read data from a file.
>
> JK
>
>
>