Re: solutions to scripting addition terminology confilicts [going OT a bit]
Re: solutions to scripting addition terminology confilicts [going OT a bit]
- Subject: Re: solutions to scripting addition terminology confilicts [going OT a bit]
- From: email@hidden (Michael Sullivan)
- Date: Sun, 27 Jan 2002 21:22:11 -0500
- Organization: Society for the Incurably Pompous
has writes:
>
In the meantime, look at the huge quantity of modules you can get for
>
languages such as Perl and Python, and compare that to AppleScript. If you
>
can measure the health and success of an OS by its application support, I'd
>
say that you can tell a few things about a scripting language by its
>
third-party mod support. One of these days OSA-compliant versions of those
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languages could well eat AppleScript's lunch if it isn't careful. And
>
hand-wringing and wailing that "the osax authors should've tried harder"
>
won't deserve to cut much ice.
Well, here's the thing. AppleScript's main benefit is the OSA
architecture and it's ability to drive certain programs on the mac.
As a language it has some cool features, but also some drawbacks, not
just in implementation but in basic design. If someone comes out with
an OSA compliant Perl or Python that eats AS's lunch because of much
better third party mod support -- I'll gleefully learn that language and
start using it, and won't mourn AS all that hard unless it stops being
supported entirely soon enough that I have to rewrite all my existing
scripts before their time.
Okay, I'm sure there will be things I'd miss about AS, but the
fundamental reason I use it is its ability to drive mac software, and
that will be true of any OSA-compliant language implementation.
Granted, I'm not especially fond of Perl or Python, and learning a new
language will probably generate another few weeks/months of beating my
head against every wall in the office, but if that's what it takes to
script the software I need to script, then I'll learn them.
Michael