Copying Scripts line by line

[jimkent]

I have about 100 scripts that do various tasks. My client has just asked me to incorporate an additional field that tracks an attribute of my database. In order to do this I have to adjust the new field in almost all the scripts I have.

The "adjustment" requires that I do an IF statement that has about 3 lines within it. Is there a plug-in out there that will allow me to copy the 5 lines of code from one script to the next? You know, Highlight-Rightclick-"copy"-next script, Insert-Paste (windows users). This is a huge deal for me if I have to rewrite the same code for every script...."AHhhhrg"

[Lee Smith]

Hi Jim

Could you make it a separate script, and then you would only have to insert one Script Step "Perform Sub Script"

HTH

Lee

[Fitch]

Can't copy scripts like that. But you could put that little section into its own script, then call that script from your existing scripts as needed, so you'd just be adding one line and deleting the old stuff. Put the new sub-script at the top of your scripts list so it's easy to grab it. When you're all done, move it where you like.

[jimkent]

Yeah I guess your right. I could do the subscipt thing and I may have to but I can just think of so many other uses for a copying line by line script editor would be so advantagous...

[kennedy]

Agreed... I wish they gave an option to use an arbitrary text editor to edit the scripts. As a long time programmer, it would be sooooo much easier if I could just type the scripts, rather than all the ******* point and click. And then wholesale edits would be trivial.

Oh well.

[Lee Smith]

There is another way to do this, provide you are using a Macintosh and your system is less than OS 10, but it might be as combersome as what you are doing now, or as I suggested First about making it a Subscript.

I use this file a lot, especially for verson 4 and before, but since the ability of 5 brought the direct importing of scrips, Gregory has ceased to upgrade it. It is still useful for adding lines in to existing scripts.

You can download a working copy of

AutoScript.fm Pro By: Gregory Charles Rivers URL: http://www.fmfiles.com/dev12.html

[SteveB]

This is clearly one of the most moronic things those clowns refuse to deal with. They have had to intentionally prevented copying to the clipboard, which would have then allowed us to use an external editor.

This would save us thousands of hours a year. I personally believe that those little minds don't want it to happen, because then someone could write a translator and we'd be free to leave FM if desired.

Steve

Steve

[Lee Smith]

Hey Steve,

Don's sugar coat it, tell us what you really think.

[SteveB]

It's one thing to not have written in certain features, like not having the ability to pop up a calendar as part of field formatting, but its quite another thing to actively prevent copying to the clipboard. This kind of stuff just sets me off (obviously), because it creates a lot of extra work for us.

There was a thread that started some it ago (probably when they released version 5.5) that involved Moon Mullins. I laced into Old Advance Man for what I felt was the shitty job they did. Moon agreed that they don't look at things the way developers do. We have to live with the product day in and day out, under real life conditions. They work with tiny databases, and never attempt to do the things we do. If they did, alot of the annoyances would have gotten fixed along time ago.

If it were up to me, they would never get to touch a line of code until they spend a year using FM to solve real world problems, and working for some of the real experts on this forum (too many to name).

Ah, thanks Lee, I feel better...a good rant never hurt anybody.

Steve

[jimkent]

Has anyone ever asked Filemaker Directly this question? Does it fall on deaf ears? Why can't we report it as a Bug - "Can't copy to the clipboard" and see what they say? If they say, working as designed, force them to explain why. We might not get anywhere but at least they might understand that it would be an enhancement (fix) that would make sense.