Re: SWI-Prolog MacOS app

On 17/08/2013, at 1:00 AM, Abdallah, Samer wrote:
>> - Double clicking always sends a message to the already running app,
>>   while I think you want to load the file into a new instance.  So,
>>   if a running app gets a file-open-event, it now runs
>> 
>> 	open -n -a <myself> <file>
>> 
>>   Does that make sense?
> 
> Generally, multiple instances are the not the Mac OS way of 
> doing things. I think the standard behaviour would be keep
> just one instance, open a new window or a new tab with the new
> file source, and optionally consult the file.

I would find an automatic consultation of the file always
disconcerting and occasionally disastrous.  There should not
be any preference for this.  It should be consistent with
other programming language processors.  Opening a file that
is associated with a language processor ensures that the file
is open in an edit window managed by the processor, and there
should be a keystroke and/or menu command to compile/evaluate/
consult/whatever the contents of that window.

I've used a couple of Prologs on a Mac, and that's how they
worked.

> I think that on the whole, GUI apps should not rely on the
> concept of a 'current directory',

GUI apps that let the user execute code that uses relative
file names don't have any choice in the matter.

Having used "open . -a R" a lot, I wish _every_ programming
language processor followed that convention.  You have to do
*something* sensible when the filename you were given is not
that of a plain file.