[jsword-devel] Newbie JSword Developer wishes to help

[DM Smith]

Joe replied:
>
>Hi,
>
>DM Smith wrote:

... Stuff deleted ...

>>4) I then tried the bat file and since it had "C:\Program Files" hard 
>>coded, it did not work. I think that it should have a "pause" with a "Hit 
>>any key to continue" when it can't find the program.
>
>I don't have a good answer to the hard coded path problem. I took a look at 
>the bat files for ant and tomcat and they both do similar things so I 
>figured, if they haven't found a better solution...
>
>The big difference between us and them is that JSword is not aimed at 
>programmers so we can't expect our users to edit batch files.
>

Then I would suggest that the bat file be removed from the 1.0 release.
The bat files are particularily ugly as they leave a "cmd" window laying 
around.
As an alternative to *.bat, I have used wsh (Window Script Hosting) which
does not use a cmd window. Still, I think your approach to get an installer
to work correctly is better.

>>5) So I tried to modify the bat file to point to the installed location. 
>>The application came up but declared a NPE on line 58. It appears that 
>>this is due to the fact that I have not installed modules. I think that 
>>the application should come up with out error when Sword modules have not 
>>been downloaded. From looking at the code a bit it seems that it looks for 
>>books in the resources directory tree of the JSword install. A bit of a 
>>"Catch 22"....
>
>I've done a fair bit of work recently creating a module installer. Before 
>that the approach I took was "module installation is your job", so I didn't 
>worry too much about the zero modules problem.
>There clearly are some zero module startup problems, which is funny because 
>I thought I'd tested that.
>There are several module drivers. The 'ser' driver uses serialized files 
>and is supposed to be very quick looks in the resources tree. The Sword 
>modules driver tries for a current C++ Sword installation, and a few other 
>places.
>

I think that you have solved the zero modules startup problems.
The problems that I mentioned here are from 0.9.6, not CVS.

>>7) I ran the current code and I encountered a significant problem. I get 
>>an error dialog before the main windo comes up, but the dialog is modal 
>>and it is covered by the main window. The problem is that the main window 
>>is unresponsive to the mouse and it looks like the program froze. The only 
>>give away that it has not froze is that it repaints. I then had to 
>>"Alt-Tab" to get to the dialog window to dismiss it.
>
>Oh dear.
>I recently changed code in ExceptionPane (see the comments on line 246) in 
>an attempt to fix a problem along these lines elsewhere.
>I think the problem is partly that we are doing some guessing as to how to 
>parent the dialog and getting it wrong.
>Do you know if there is a way to go from a window to find if there are any 
>modal dialogs that are hanging off it?

The startup problem I saw was that it was having problems with "Single 
Document Interface".
I am not sure but I think that there may have been bleed over from not 
having uninstalled 0.9.6.
I see that you removed SDI from config.xml.

I "updated" my workspace today from CVS to get your changes since yesterday.
With this update, the uninstall of 0.9.6 and removal of ~/.jsword, I am not 
seeing
any startup problems.

But if they do occur, then this problem may be back.
I think the problem is that the error dialog box is parented to the splash 
screen
and not to the main window. I'll see what I can find.

>
>>I have not worked in a CVS environment before (I used RCS, Sablime and 
>>ClearCase) so I am not sure what the workflow model is or how the owners 
>>of JSword wish me to participate.
>
>The easiest thing for me would be for you to send me a patch file. It's 
>easy using eclipse - just right click on the project and select "create 
>patch ..."
>A recursive, new files inclusive, unified (see the options in the wizard) 
>patch is the right way to go.

Sounds good to me.

>
>I'm helping to organize a study weekend which is going to keep me from 
>devoting any serious time to JSword for the next 3 weeks, but I should be 
>able to look at installation after then.

Enjoy!!!

>
>Hope this helps.
>
>Joe.
>
>
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