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Tips & Tidbits

By Steve Sisak, Contributing Editor

TIP OF THE MONTH

Specifying Your System Install Precisely

I just had cause to remember this, and thought it might be a good tip. If this is already well known, please forgive me.

System 7.5’s installer doesn’t list individual machines under system software. There are several reasons for this, all good, but none of them make you feel any better when you want to install a configuration any more complex than the “(full | min) system for (this | all) machines.”

If you would like see such a list, and stand looking at raw unpolished UI, then hold down the shift key while choosing “Custom Install” from the popup. A sub-package called “Specific Systems” will now be available under “System Software.”

- Eric Slosser

It’s a Tie!
No Ned Strikes Again.

If your application needs to put up a dialog while it is in the background, Inside Macintosh says that you must use the notification manager to request the user’s attention and wait for him to bring your app to the front before proceeding. If you’re running under System 7 or greater (the AppleEvent Manager is present), you can do this in one line by calling AEInteractWithUser().

Note that not only is this easy, but it also allows you to specify a timeout value, a notification record if you want to do a custom dialog, and an idle proc so you can continue processing while you’re waiting. If your application is in the foreground, AEInteractWithUser() returns noErr immediately.

- Ned Flanders
Springfield, U.S.A.

FWST!

This isn’t exactly undocumented, but it’s easy to miss. When you’re writing a control panel, don’t forget to delete the ‘fwst’ resource from the control panel before changing the panel’s size via the ‘nrct’ resource. The ‘fwst’ stores the old size, and unless you delete the changes you make to the ‘nrct’ will not register.

- Vinay Prabhakar
Gray Owl Software
GrayOwl1@aol.com

Even Better Than Bus Error

It seems that not a month goes by without hearing of the benefits of installing EvenBetterBusError on your system. One of the disadvantages of EvenBetterBusError is that since it is a VBL task that periodically checks Address 0, sometimes the MacsBug log is not helpful as the stack may be invalid. If, however, you are using Steve Jasik’s theDebugger, while debugging your App, set a watch point on address 0 (0,4). Now any attempt to write to Address Nil will stop your program on the offending line (source code et al).

- Anonymous