Richard: Thanks for the great explanation. I'm sold, though the discovery of this feature's existence WAS a bit traumatic! I wasn't following this list for a few months. In addition to my very poor vision, I recently broke a couple of fingers on my right hand, so the number of my typos has increased substantially, making this a very welcome addition.
Jod Wilkins On Nov 23, 2012, at 7:14 AM, Richard Gaskin wrote: > Joe Lewis Wilkins wrote: > > > With my poor vision I can see how I've missed "Strict Compilation > > Mode"; why couldn't they have used "explicitVars"? (sigh!) > > There's a Preference setting under "General" with the option to have the IDE > display either "Description of option" or "Name of LiveCode property". > > By default the IDE is set to use the former, though I find it much more > helpful - especially for learners - to use the actual property nanes since it > lets use of the IDE also reinforce one's learning of what the engine is doing > in the IDE. And, after all, the English-like readability of property names > in LiveCode makes most of them self-evident anyway. > > The "Strict Compilation Mode" option in Preferences->Script Editor may appear > to be an exception to this, since its label doesn't change when you change > the IDE labeling preference. > > But on closer examination, what the IDE does with "Strict Compilation Mode" > isn't quite the same thing as setting the explicitVars global property; IMO > it's much more useful: > > With explicitVars set to true, all scripts in memory during the session must > have been written with that relatively-recent addition to the language in > mind; any exceptions will throw an error, and all such scripts will need to > be updated to conform to the requirements of explicitVars before they can be > used at all, even those you didn't write like plugins, third-party libraries, > or IDE elements. > > With "Strict Compilation Mode", the explicitVars property is set only > temporarily during the brief moment a script is saved to its object, > effectively limiting its scope to only those scripts you're editing yourself. > > Personally I find this a much more useful option, since it allows me to use > it only when I want it, but doesn't stop all work on a project until I bring > every script into compliance with explicitVars. > > I think there are good reasons to use explicitVars and not to use it, > depending on the nature of the work I'm doing at a given moment. The IDE's > implementation, limited in scope as it is, gives us the best of both worlds. > > -- > Richard Gaskin > Fourth World > LiveCode training and consulting: http://www.fourthworld.com > Webzine for LiveCode developers: http://www.LiveCodeJournal.com > Follow me on Twitter: http://twitter.com/FourthWorldSys > > > _______________________________________________ > use-livecode mailing list > use-livecode@lists.runrev.com > Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription > preferences: > http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-livecode _______________________________________________ use-livecode mailing list use-livecode@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-livecode
