Re: XPL insight: old news?

[Carl Distefano CLDistefano@xxxxxxxx]

Reply to note from "Bruce Middleton"  Wed, 29
Dec 1999 23:14:09 -0800

-> >your assertion that "there is no function which will insert"
-> >a string loaded to a save/get... is patently wrong.
->
-> Carl: I will be properly startled and abashed if you point out
-> a function which does this. ...
-> ...
-> To be perfectly clear: suppose that you have loaded the macro
-> "BC test macro" to @A - and decide that you would like to
-> revise it, or use it as a template for a related function. PV
-> and GT will both execute it - so how do you get it into an
-> editing window?

So, by "loaded string" you mean a SUbroutine. And the question is,
"How do you get the contents of a SUbroutine into an editing window?"

Well, of course neither PV nor GT will do for a SUbroutine -- unless
you save the SUb in the form of a string , in
which case PV will execute it and GT will write it to screen. This is
the usual stratagem when it's necessary both to execute a child
process and subject its code to string manipulations. If you
absolutely *must* use a SUbroutine (the only reason to do so, aside
from clarity of exposition, is to force the current CMline into S/G 00
when the SUb is executed), then conversion to a string by appending
the null string *will* work -- as I said at some length, with
examples, in my reply to your December 19 post.

And lest there be any doubt, this is not a novel insight: XPLers knew
it long before the advent (nine years ago) of Signature and the 4th-
generation improvements described in my earlier reply.

I hope this helps.

--------------
Carl Distefano
CLDistefano@xxxxxxxx
http://users.datarealm.com/xywwweb/