December 2012 - Pharo-dev - lists.pharo.org

[Pharo-project] Helping the noobs help out - i.e. fixing the debugger
by adrians Dec. 18, 2012

Dec. 18, 2012

Hi, I'm a Smalltalk newbie and I would like to help fix some simpler issues. For example, I've recently logged some issues surrounding smart character use. I set a breakpoint in NECController>>#smartCharacterWithEvent: and proceeded to debug. Now, I understand that for the old-timers stepping through a selector is straightforward, no matter what help the debugger gives you. For myself, and likely many other Smalltalk noobs who'd like to help, I need all the help I can get. One such support is an accurate indication of where the PC is as you step through a body of code. Currently, in the 2.0 one-click image (build 20431), things seem quite broken wrt getting accurate visual feedback of where you are. First, as you step over message sends, the highlighted selection is shown in a totally incorrect spot. Sometimes, just a bit off from where you expect to be, but sometimes quite a bit off, for example in a block that should not even be entered. In the selector I mentioned above, the highlighted location enters the "editor hasSelection ifTrue: []" block when "editor hasSelection" returns false. Second, the PC location highlight is removed when you click somewhere inside the code. This should never turn off - it's as if you switch the lights off, for people not familiar with some particular code. I know you can use the "Where" button to re-establish the highlight, but other than the fact that you shouldn't have to do this, the highlighted selection is sometimes shown in the wrong place. Third, as you step through code, you would expect that the values of variables as shown in the bottom right panel of the debugger are accurately updated as state changes. I've seen cases, relatively frequent, where this is not so. Current values are shown only after some further advancement through code. There is an old issue tracking debugger selection, http://code.google.com/p/pharo/issues/detail?id=709 <http://code.google.com/p/pharo/issues/detail?id=709> , but fixing the problem seems to have stalled. Additionally, I'm not sure that this particular issue addresses the third point I made about stale variable values being shown. Could I ask that making the debugger work be made a priority? Of course one can muddle through some code even with visually broken indicators, but it should not be so, IMO. The old timers can make the case that there are other more pressing issues to be addressed, but IMO it makes sense to make the actual tool used to fix problems as helpful as possible for everyone so that even non-experts can be productive and lend a helping hand. Cheers, Adrian -- View this message in context: http://forum.world.st/Helping-the-noobs-help-out-i-e-fixing-the-debugger-tp… Sent from the Pharo Smalltalk mailing list archive at Nabble.com.

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[Pharo-project] New Cog VMs available
by Eliot Miranda Dec. 18, 2012

Dec. 18, 2012

New Cog VMs available at http://www.mirandabanda.org/files/Cog/VM/VM.r2637/. CogVM binaries as per VMMaker.oscog-eem.238/r2637 Restore ThreadedFFIPlugin wanting COGMTVM to be determined on command line. Probably broke in VMMaker.oscog-eem.218 Fix bug in changeClass:from: so that if receiver has long header and class is compact, receiver still gets compact class field set, not cleared. No matter what header an instance has, if its class is compact it should have the compact class index set. -- best, Eliot

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[Pharo-project] Persistence Options
by Torsten Bergmann Dec. 17, 2012

Dec. 17, 2012

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[Pharo-project] about isAbstractClass
by StÃ©phane Ducasse Dec. 17, 2012

Dec. 17, 2012

Hi guys I will deprecate isAbstractClass and introduce defineAbstractMethods. why? because as soon as we have an abstract method in Object nearly all the classes becomes abstract and this does not make sense. Now I can understand that we want to know if a class defineAbstractMethods and sometimes taking into account inheritance. http://code.google.com/p/pharo/issues/detail?id=7123 Stef

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[Pharo-project] Interval protocol
by Igor Stasenko Dec. 17, 2012

Dec. 17, 2012

hi, i am alone with this problem (or just mentally ill?), why every time i use #start and #end protocol for Interval, e.g.: start := (1 to: 100) start. end := (1 to: 100) end. why i expecting that something called 'interval' should answer its start and end (or begin & end, if you like)? and i always hitting the wall with my head again and again.. because there's no such protocol and instead (after opening browser and looking at class, i figuring that i should use #first/#last, but it is completely unintuitive to me).. So, i am alone with this? Or maybe intervals deserving to have start and end? -- Best regards, Igor Stasenko.

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[Pharo-project] Anonymous subclasses support
by Ciprian Teodorov Dec. 17, 2012

Dec. 17, 2012

Hi guys, Can somebody tell what is the correct way of creating anonymous classes in Pharo? When I say correct way I mean something that does not break the image or the tools. The thing is that we can use them in NativeBoost and I cannot stop running into errors because of these anonymous classes. Is it just me or maybe we should do something about it... I am really frustrated about this thing because everybody knows that we can do it... but at the end of the day it is not working properly, and has bizzare side effects. What about an official API for doing this? Or at least a way to check if your class is anonymous so that we can refactor the tools to ignore them or something... -- Dr. Ciprian TEODOROV IngÃ©nieur DÃ©veloppement CAO tÃ©l : 06 08 54 73 48 mail : ciprian.teodorov(a)gmail.com www.teodorov.ro

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[Pharo-project] Zinc-Character-Encoding-[Core|Tests]
by Sven Van Caekenberghe Dec. 17, 2012

Dec. 17, 2012

Another quick note about Zinc repackaging: There is now a package called Zinc-Character-Encoding-Core (and accompanying unit tests package) that is separate and standalone from Zinc-HTTP and that contains UTF-8 encoding, various byte encodings with their own mappings, Base64 encoding and Percent encoding (sometimes called URL or HTTP encoding), Character read and write streams that wrap binary streams as well as buffered read and write streams. All this without any dependency on older bits and pieces. I think these are clean, modern and correct implementations, but only time and external usage will tell (these classes are not new, they have been in Zinc in some form for years). Zinc-Resource-Meta-[Core|Tests] now depends on this new package (because URLs use Percent encoding, which also requires Character encoding itself). Zinc-HTTP now requires both Zinc-Character-Encoding as well as Zinc-Resource-Meta. ConfigurationOfZincHTTPComponents has been updated and now also includes groups for Zinc-Character-Encoding as well as Zinc-Resource-Meta. Sven -- Sven Van Caekenberghe http://stfx.eu Smalltalk is the Red Pill

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Dec. 17, 2012

Hi guys I would like to block a date for the next sprint at Lille. Would the 8th of february of for you? Stef

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[Pharo-project] Athens + Amber + HTML5 canvas
by Igor Stasenko Dec. 17, 2012

Dec. 17, 2012

Hi, i just looked at js.html5 canvas.. you know that it will be very easy to port Athens on Amber and provide Athens API for html5 canvas. the functionality is quite similar to cairo. (a bit obfuscated though.. but still) Now the point it that one can use Athens API for drawing things in pharo as well as in browser.. without much changes.. So, you can develop & test graphics in pharo, and deploy in browser app.. Any takers? :) -- Best regards, Igor Stasenko.

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[Pharo-project] Could someone resuscitate the Google Groups mirror?
by adrians Dec. 17, 2012

Dec. 17, 2012

Could I ask that whomever set up the Google Groups mirror of this list get it back to working order? That mirror was kicked of this list last February for excessive bounces and at this point is dead. For one, this neglect doesn't look good for people happening onto Pharo from Google Groups. Second, I actually like to read my subscribed lists from as few different places as possible and while I like the Nabble front end, I have the vast majority of the many lists I follow on Google Groups and it would be nice to have this one under that umbrella, too. Fourth, having as many places from which people can interact with the Pharo community is a good thing, more exposure should be welcomed. If whomever set up the current group ( https://groups.google.com/forum/?pli=1#!forum/pharo <https://groups.google.com/forum/?pli=1#!forum/pharo> ) doesn't want to bother, could you at least kill it so I could set up a mirror myself? If on the other hand there is someone on the Pharo admin side who looks after this (but just forgot to do the maintenance here) could you please reset things so that messages are flowing again? While you're at it, could I ask that a Google Group be set up to mirror pharo-users as well? As I said, I could set up another mirror of this list myself, but it doesn't make sense to have two same name groups there. Much appreciated, Adrian -- View this message in context: http://forum.world.st/Could-someone-resuscitate-the-Google-Groups-mirror-tp… Sent from the Pharo Smalltalk mailing list archive at Nabble.com.

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