From: benjohn@...
Date: 2007-01-04T22:09:50+09:00
Subject: Re: Ruby Cocoa Run Loop

 Spooq:
> Perhaps you could invert the problem, and put a widget in your app
> that allowed you to type in code and eval it? You could probably
> emulate a terminal-style interface without much effort.

It's a good plan and I definitely could do that. In fact, the original
inspiration to do this came from an article that followed your
suggestion. I don't want to do that however because it seems
restrictive.

My way round, I can have a re-usable component that you can "require",
that will give you an application run loop. If you happen to be using it
from IRB, you can continue to explore and poke about with the
application. You could also fire it up from a script, or have your unit
tests making use of it.

The other way round (your inverted suggestion), I've got a basic
application that includes a console. Unfortunately, I loose the tools
I'm used to having available from a terminal prompt, and I think it
would restrict using it from a finished script or from a unit test, etc.

I'm sure there's more to it than that, but I can't put my finger on it.
Or I'm just being stubborn :)

Cheers,
  Benjohn