Re: Basic Guide to Scripting Terms?
Re: Basic Guide to Scripting Terms?
- Subject: Re: Basic Guide to Scripting Terms?
- From: email@hidden (Michael Sullivan)
- Date: Tue, 23 Oct 2001 17:26:11 -0400
- Organization: Business Card Express of Connecticut
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I've dabbled in AppleScript and HTML and am now trying to learn a bit of
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JavaScript, VB Script and ASP. I can now do some rudimentary things in
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all these languages, but mostly I've been learning by taking apart
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examples and putting them back together.
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I'm hampered by my ignorance of basic scripting term definitions -
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objects, classes, cases, properties, functions, methods, variables, etc.
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I'd like to find a nice, clearly worded glossary of those terms - even
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knowing their use and function is not the same across all scripting
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languages. A universal guide to basic terminology, I guess, is what I'm
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hoping to find.
Consider any well regarded introductory book on programming. Scripting
is basically programming that drives existing applications and tools,
rather than building things from scratch. (We had a
not-so-very-restrained thread on the difference in MacScrpt a few months
back) It's like the difference between scratch cooking and using
Bisquick, Hamburger helper, etc. You don't have to know all the gory
details to get results, but you're still doing basically the same thing:
cooking, or in our case, programming.
Thus, most of the terms used for scripting languages (when not language
specific) are general programming terms. It's also true that scripting
documentation, even for the supposedly "intuitive" Applescript, tends to
assume a certain very basic level of understanding of programming terms
and principles (what you'd get from farting around or taking a few
courses).
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I have the AS Language Guide and will have another look at it, but I've
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found it nearly opaque in past readings. I tried to find something on
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the web, but almost all such offerings are language specific.
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Any suggestions?
Yes. the AS language guide is a good reference, but doesn't do much for
really getting you familiar with how to use Applescript in the real
world of applications and third party additions.
I'd go with a good intoductory book. I've used and had recommended
Danny Goodman's _Applescript Handbook_, and _Applescript for the
internet_, visual Quickstart guide, by Ethan Wilde. I've also heard
good things about _Applescript in a Nutshell_ by ?, but I haven't gotten
into it yet. From skimming, it looks like more of a reference than a
tutorial book though, which is typicaly of the Nutshell series.
For me, the key to learning applescript was getting out of the
laboratory with programs that actually worked. I've had programming
experience, so I was just fine with all the specs and figuring out the
basics of how to use the language. But as soon as I tried to put
something in a tell block to a program not in the language guide, or do
something with the finder that wasn't shown, it got ugly.
Ask yourself what you want to script and go from there. _AS for The
Internet_ does a lot with scripting web browser and email apps, as well
as some FMP and a quick dip into QXP and some others. If you're going
to script Quark, try Shirley Hopkin's books (she posts here
occasionally, IIRC). If you're scripting the Finder and other OS tools,
Danny Goodman's book is easier and more comprehensive than the Language
guide
The books I've listed here will not assume you know all the basic
programming and OO concepts, although they will not always give you a
complete, detailed explanation of them. For that you'd have to look
specifically for CS, OO design, or programming books.
Michael
--
Michael Sullivan email@hidden
Business Card Express of Connecticut Thermographers to the Trade
"You hate your job -- why didn't you say so? There's a support group
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