1 Topic by designer (edited by designer 2022-02-02 21:14:15)

Topic: How do I add comment line and uncomment line to the tool bar?

Can I add the Edit commands Comment Line and UnComment Line to the tool bar next to Undo and Redo icons?

Note that when I select "Contents ..." under Help, an empty transparent window opens on the right side of my screen. This is a 2018 MacMini running OS 12.2 (Monterey). There seems to be no way to close that transparent window except to quit SimplyFortran.

  • jeff
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Re: How do I add comment line and uncomment line to the tool bar?

Simply Fortran doesn't support modifying the toolbar unfortunately.

The help window is surprising, though.  We ship a standard Mac help package.  Are you on Intel or Apple Silicon?

You can always access the docs at https://simplyfortran.com/docs/.

Jeff Armstrong
Approximatrix, LLC
  • jeff
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Re: How do I add comment line and uncomment line to the tool bar?

I appear to be able to replicate the issue right now.  I'm looking into it.

Jeff Armstrong
Approximatrix, LLC

Re: How do I add comment line and uncomment line to the tool bar?

You can see it on your machine. Just as a datapoint, mine is an Intel box. Maybe next year will be an M1 (or M2) world.

  • jeff
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Re: How do I add comment line and uncomment line to the tool bar?

The issue with viewing help on the Mac is a bit of legacy sloppiness.  The original code was directly opening the help viewer using a bit of AppleScript.  I think that modern macOS probably saw this as a very questionable action, which it was, and blocked the operation. 

We've added the proper code to legitimately open help now on macOS, so it should work fine in the next release.  We were planning on a release tomorrow, so this change should only delay things by a few hours.

Jeff Armstrong
Approximatrix, LLC

6 Reply by designer (edited by designer 2022-02-04 03:22:50)

Re: How do I add comment line and uncomment line to the tool bar?

My programmer skills delay things by much more than a few hours smile

I'm having to look up every little thing that is different from FORTRAN IV. Sure, it wasn't as "full-featured" as what we have today, but we LIKED IT.

So I'm learning that "equal to" is not "=" but "==". Or maybe I should say, '=='  But I'm having fun reuniting with an old friend. Eventually, I'll move the works to a more windowy user interface. But for now, I can do all kinds of "proof of concept" stuff. Test out functions and structures that will take only a little tweaking (if any), for compatibility in their eventual home.

  • jeff
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Re: How do I add comment line and uncomment line to the tool bar?

Testing for equality is indeed ==, but you can still use Fortran's dotted operators (.EQ.).  Those operators aren't even deprecated (at least I don't think they are...), and they regularly show up in new code. 

The new "not equal" operator, /=, isn't really my favorite, so I often still use .NE..

Jeff Armstrong
Approximatrix, LLC

Re: How do I add comment line and uncomment line to the tool bar?

Thank you, Jeff. When I see things like /= for not equal, I can imagine the person who thought that up never had to diagnose someone's 10-year-old, undocumented code. It's real easy to make a typo with just /=;  while .NE. is more deliberate and "reads" easier. Sure, one can play games with "How few statements/characters can be used to get this done?" but in real life, it's more often, "How fast can you find this error?" And we don't have to live in 32K partitions anymore. Not say'n we should go back to COBOL, but clarity does count.

Just for your tech notebook - and I know it will be fixed on the next release - that transparent window had a few side effects. It must have had some "In Front" attribute because if it covered part of another app's window - like a web page - the buttons under the transparency were shielded from picking up a mouse click.

The unaware user would think their browser was malfunctioning or their mouse needed new batteries. Yes, you can see the faint border of that transparent window - if you have the right colors on your background graphic.

Thank you for checking it out and jumping on a fix. There is no slow-down because of it.

I am using Modern Fortran by Clerman and Spector and Modern Fortran Explained by Metcalf, Reid, and Cohen for syntax examples.  Not the best - Clerman's doesn't even have the word "Operator" in the index - but I'm pushing my way through.