Re: Changes 2009-07-15/16 in branch?

[Ian Eure <ian@digg.com>]

On Jul 31, 2009, at 8:21 PM, Richard Stallman wrote:

>    More specifically, it's a combination of the Open Scripting
>    Architecture and the AppleScript programming language. OSA is a
>    mechanism which allows applications to expose functionality to  
> other
>    programs in order to automate tasks.
>
>    Access to this functionality is provided by way of OSA Scripting
>    Components, which is a way to plug new programming languages into  
> OSA.
>    There are components available for free languages, such as Ruby,
>    JavaScript, and Python.
>
> If it is normal for apps on MacOS to expose their functionality for
> access thru OSA, I think it is proper for Emacs to follow.
>
It would be very nice, though I don't know what's involved to make it  
work. I'd prefer to see the existing problems with the NS port fixed.


> Is this the functionality that some have said is comparable to Dbus?
>
I'm not familiar with D-Bus, so I can't say.


>    The AppleScript support in the Cocoa port allows one to execute
>    AppleScripts from inside Emacs to control Mac OS or applications
>    running on it.
>
> Surely this is something that most apps don't have.  So we should
> delete this from Emacs.

>

Most apps don't do what Emacs does. The programs I'm aware of which  
have a similar capability (Script Editor and Xcode) are tools for  
developing and testing software, as Emacs is. So it's not inconsistent  
to maintain it.

I think it would be unfortunate if it were removed. As Emacs can be  
used to develop AppleScript (or other OSA supported languages) this  
feature would be needed to run them from within Emacs to test the  
code. Without it, you must rely on other tools outside of Emacs for  
this functionality.

  - Ian