From: Paul Guyot (pguyot_at_kallisys.net)
Date: Fri Jan 02 2004 - 13:18:18 PST
Aux environs du 2/01/04 ŕ 14:33 -0600, sous le titre "[NTLK] Belated
Christmas Present (nsTools)", Spacelord Carpman prit sa plus belle
plume pour écrire les mots suivants:
> I had hoped to get this out before Christmas, but I didn't. So, even
>though it's late, I'd like to announce nsTools 0.1. nsTools is a set of
>utilites to manipulate .pkg files, and Newton bytecode. It can currently
>translate a .pkg file into XML, and decode (some) Newton bytecode. My
>plan is to be able to turn an XML file into a .pkg file, and then to
>write a NewtonScript compiler. The current mess is available at
>http://www.voidptr.org/downloads/nsTools.tar.gz
Great!
Still, did you have any particular reason to not follow the
NewtonScript DTD [1] for your XML output?
For your information, there already are at least two open source NSOF
decoders [2, 3]. The Desktop Connection Library even has NSOF to XML
conversion code, and it has been tested and seems to fully implement
the NSOF format, except for compressed data (I would need to include
Philz work on that bit). The DCL handles precedence references --
unless I missed it in your uncommented Python code, you don't handle
them yet and they will probably require a big redesign -- since NSOF
doesn't describe trees but Direct Acyclic Graphs.
There are dozens of package structure dumpers, and other package
splitters [4, 5]
There even is at least one Bytecode disassembler on the Desktop, such
as Philz' [4].
You seem to want to work on development tools for the Newton on the
Desktop. Fine. Excellent. I know that Simon Bell also worked in that
direction and I sometimes happen to dream about it, this is one of
the goal of the DCL project. But for that dream to come true, you'd
better work with existing bits rather than starting from scratch.
I don't know how much time you spent on designing your XML format but
don't you think we (mostly Michael Vacík) might have spent quite a
long time on that issue and what he achieved [6] may be worth having
at least a brief look at?
Paul
[1] http://www.kallisys.com/DTDs/newtonscript.dtd
[2] http://web.archive.org/web/*/http://anrp.irulethe.net/newton/
[3] http://www.kallisys.com/newton/dcl/
[4] http://philz.vyx.net/~philz
[5] http://newton.vyx.net/downloads/
[6] http://metastasis.net/mici/pkgs/newtonscript.dtd.html
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