Thus spake Paul Berkowitz <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, circa 12/15/2004 3:19 PM:
> Well, that might be because you haven't studied AppleScript?
Oh, absolutely. I really meant my comment about "a Yoda like language" in
jest ... that snippet of code just sounded like Yoda ... "A variable for the
program now defining are we" :->
I'm sure that once I make the effort, I'll get the hang of it. And I
actually have written some scripts, in fact -- it's just that when I look
things up in the dictionary, the way they have written it makes no sense,
and I have to try multiple permutations of the line of code to get it right.
That's not Microsoft's fault, or even AppleScript's, but whoever wrote the
documentation. A good book will always beat the documentation.
> Generally speaking, Entourage's syntax is pretty clear and "English-like"
> [... But include] has an unlikely declension of an English verb [...]
> inside a phrase used as a noun
Wow, your knowledge of English grammar is as good as your knowledge of
AppleScript syntax! I would have to pull out Fowler's "Modern English Usage"
to follow you precisely, but I get the gist. And no matter how it's written,
it's going to be better than most other languages which tend to look like
setProp.deflist{sig;\*.;1} or worse.
> Not much of an improvement, is it? But 'membership' - a noun - rather than
> 'include' - a verb, reads better. Maybe a good shorthand would have been
> 'membership in random list':
> set the membership in the random list of every signature to true
> Still not much better. See how 'include in random' gets the idea across in
> fewest words?
Yes, putting it that way, it could be much worse. And I suppose that
AppleScript's flexibility can lead to odd looking syntax sometimes, as well.
That took some getting used to in HyperCard, as well, and I learned to love
that. I'll get the AppleScript book and do a little digging. The languages
are very similar.
Thanks for the lesson,
peter
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