In reworking the InsetCommand stuff, I've run into the following
problem. Each InsetCommand needs to have an InsetCommandParams to
represent its parameters. At present, it is assumed that the parameters
an InsetCommand accepts are determined statically, by the C++ type of
the inset. For various reasons, this is not a good assumption. (See
below.) So we need to allow InsetCommand's to say what parameters they
want dynamically. Now, to some extent, this is relatively easy, and
there is code in my personal branch, which I'll commit shortly, that
moves in this direction. But there is a problem here, and I'd welcome ideas.
Even with the changes I'm making, it is essentially assumed that the
parameters an InsetCommand accepts are determined by (a) its type and
(b) the command it represents. So what we have is (more or less) a routine:
static ParamInfo InsetFoo::findInfo(std::string cmdName);
which returns info about the acceptable params, depending upon the
command name. But what parameters are acceptable may not be wholly
determined by the command name. The two crucial cases are InsetCitation,
where the acceptable parameters can also depend upon the CiteEngine in
use (which itself will shortly become user definable, I hope), and a
hypothesized InsetCommandCustom, which would be the InsetCommand
equivalent of InsetFlex, i.e., something that would allow user-definable
command insets (see bug 4066). Indeed, there is another problem, in both
cases, namely, that the code assumes that the commands an inset can
represent depend only upon its C++ type, but let me not discuss that, as
it's essentially the same problem.
Now, so far as I can see, the un-handled variable here is the current
Buffer. The Buffer will determine the CiteEngine; and if we have
user-defined InsetCommand's, those too will be fixed by the Buffer
(i.e., by the text class and modules). So what we really need is to be
able to determine the current buffer inside InsetFoo:findInfo. Since
this is static, I take it we aren't likely to do that, so perhaps what
is needed is the option of passing the Buffer as argument to findInfo.
But this is also problematic, as findInfo is called from
InsetCommandParams, and so far as I can see there is no way to determine
the current Buffer from inside InsetCommandPararms. We can get at that
when InsetCommandParams is constructed, perhaps, so maybe that is the
solution: Either to pass it or to determine it at construction-time,
somehow. But maybe there are other possibilities I'm not considering.
Anyway, maybe that's enough to give a sense of the problem. Ideas, and
questions, more then welcome.
Richard
--
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Richard G Heck, Jr
Professor of Philosophy
Brown University
http://frege.brown.edu/heck/
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