[squeak-dev] Copying a file from Squeak on Linux

Hello all,

I am starting to move files back and forth between Windows and Linux.
On Windows, I do this using an evolved version of a command line program
I wrote in the win3.1 days, and is now a GUI app written in Dolphin.  I
now need to create a Squeak version of it to idiot proof my copying to
and from Linux.

My question is in two parts.  First, is there any trick to the
modification times on Linux vs. Windows.  I vaguely recall hearing that
a forgotten difference in behavior of the two systems lead Sun to cause
some trouble in the early days of Java.  Cautions will be gladly
researched.  Ubunutu at least seems to do what I expect when I copy
"manually."  The second question is what is the best way to copy files
in/from Squeak, given that I care about preserving modification times?

I thought to load OS Process, but Squeak exited silently (sadly, I did
not think to look for an error until after the log was overwritten by a
subsequent error).  I tried again and it loaded normally; is OSProcess
stable?

Bill




Wilhelm K. Schwab, Ph.D.
University of Florida
Department of Anesthesiology
PO Box 100254
Gainesville, FL 32610-0254

Email: [hidden email]
Tel: (352) 846-1285
FAX: (352) 392-7029

On Sun, Mar 02, 2008 at 12:31:55PM -0500, Bill Schwab wrote:
> I thought to load OS Process, but Squeak exited silently (sadly, I did
> not think to look for an error until after the log was overwritten by a
> subsequent error).  I tried again and it loaded normally; is OSProcess
> stable?

Bill,

OSProcess should be stable on Unix/Linux, and I think that most of its
functions work on OS/X. It's not much use on Windows. If you encounter
this problem again on a Linux system, I would be grateful for any details
you can provide.

I'm not sure that I understand what you are trying to do, but if
you mean to move or copy files using unix commands driven by Squeak,
then the combination of OSProcess and CommandShell will help, but this
would be a platform-specific solution.

Note also that Squeak has the FileCopyPlugin (you may need to build
it yourself with VMMaker if it's not in your VM, I'm not sure). This
is attempt to provide some of the file copy behavior that you are trying
to achieve, and it should work on multiple platforms, so possibly
that would be of some help.

See FileList>>primitiveCopyFileNamed:to: which uses the FileCopyPlugin.

Dave

Dave,

Thanks for the read on OSProces; I will try it a few more times and see
what happens.  As an aside, I have long thought that the error log
should append vs. truncate by default; this is by no means the first
time I have lost data due to the current behavior.  Whenever I have a
stubborn problem, I alter the logging code, but it is often too late for
something (hopefully) transient like this.

Back to my immediate goal, a Linux-specific solutoin is perfectly
adequate, as I already have a working solution on Windows.  The
exchanges occur between a "floppy" (now typically a flash drive) and the
local file system.  So, I can get Windows to copy to the stick, and then
have Squeak copy from the stick to the file system and back.

The copy plugin appears not to be in my VM.  To be safe though, how
would I test that?  So far, all I have found is to call a function in
the plugin, which could fail for various reasons besides the code not
being present.

Thanks,

Bill





============================
"David T. Lewis" <lewis@...> lewis@...  wote:

On Sun, Mar 02, 2008 at 12:31:55PM -0500, Bill Schwab wrote:
> I thought to load OS Process, but Squeak exited silently (sadly, I did
> not think to look for an error until after the log was overwritten by
a
> subsequent error). I tried again and it loaded normally; is OSProcess
> stable?

Bill,

OSProcess should be stable on Unix/Linux, and I think that most of its
functions work on OS/X. It's not much use on Windows. If you encounter
this problem again on a Linux system, I would be grateful for any
details
you can provide.

I'm not sure that I understand what you are trying to do, but if
you mean to move or copy files using unix commands driven by Squeak,
then the combination of OSProcess and CommandShell will help, but this
would be a platform-specific solution.

Note also that Squeak has the FileCopyPlugin (you may need to build
it yourself with VMMaker if it's not in your VM, I'm not sure). This
is attempt to provide some of the file copy behavior that you are trying
to achieve, and it should work on multiple platforms, so possibly
that would be of some help.

See FileList>>primitiveCopyFileNamed:to: which uses the FileCopyPlugin.

Dave




Wilhelm K. Schwab, Ph.D.
University of Florida
Department of Anesthesiology
PO Box 100254
Gainesville, FL 32610-0254

Email: [hidden email]
Tel: (352) 846-1285
FAX: (352) 392-7029

On Sun, Mar 02, 2008 at 05:49:54PM -0500, Bill Schwab wrote:
>
> The copy plugin appears not to be in my VM.  To be safe though, how
> would I test that?  So far, all I have found is to call a function in
> the plugin, which could fail for various reasons besides the code not
> being present.

Bill,

If you call the file copy primitive, it will try to load the plugin.
The #listLoadedModules method will show you the loaded plugins, hence:

  FileList new primitiveCopyFileNamed: 'foo' to: 'bar'.
  SmalltalkImage current listLoadedModules
      detect: [:plugin | 'FileCopyPlugin*' match: plugin]
      ifNone: ['the FileCopyPlugin is not installed']

Dave
 

On Mar 3, 2008, at 3:37 , David T. Lewis wrote:

Also, #listBuiltinModules will list the plugins compiled into the VM.  
There is no similar call for external plugins, but these you can see  
in the files system yourself.

- Bert -

Bert,

My image reports its #vmPath as:

    /usr/local/lib/squeak/3.9-8/

and looking there, I see the vm and some plugins.  Is being in that
directory enough, or is there something else I have to do to get it to
see and/or report a plugin's existence?  Are they loaded at startup,
only on demand, etc.?  

>From my feeble experiments, I'm guessing that it is on demand.  I became
curious over the DES plugin, which I now appear to have working.  To get
there, I grabbed the plugin from

   http://wiki.squeak.org/squeak/2410

and then saved it as both

   /usr/local/lib/squeak/3.9-8/DESPlugin
   /usr/local/lib/squeak/3.9-8/DESPrims.so

Not quite knowing what I was doing (make that being completely
clueless), I am not sure which one made it work.  Any ideas?  The
DESPlugin class comment includes:

   You should build this plugin with the module name 'DESPrims'.

and adding the .so seemed like might be a good idea.  Does the plugin
load code try/ignore that extension?

Thanks,

Bill




==========================
Bert Freudenberg <bert@...>bert@...  wrote:

Also, #listBuiltinModules will list the plugins compiled into the VM.
There is no similar call for external plugins, but these you can see
in the files system yourself.

- Bert -

Wilhelm K. Schwab, Ph.D.
University of Florida
Department of Anesthesiology
PO Box 100254
Gainesville, FL 32610-0254

Email: [hidden email]
Tel: (352) 846-1285
FAX: (352) 392-7029

On 3-Mar-08, at 8:01 PM, Bill Schwab wrote:
>
> and looking there, I see the vm and some plugins.  Is being in that
> directory enough, or is there something else I have to do to get it to
> see and/or report a plugin's existence?  Are they loaded at startup,
> only on demand, etc.?
The best place for plugins to live is somewhat platform dependent,  
unfortunately. I'm fairly sure that having a plugin file in the same  
place as the vm will usually be ok though. External plugins load on  
demand and get bound to the vm. Internal plugins are sort of pre-
loaded but they are connected up internally on demand just like the  
externals. This is part of making it possible to have an external (for  
updating etc) copy of a plugin that is also internal.

tim
--
tim Rowledge; [hidden email]; http://www.rowledge.org/tim
Fractured Idiom:- FELIX NAVIDAD - Our cat has a boat

The last time I looked at the file plugin on the macintosh (a decade  
ago?) sure feels like it. Tim was trying to get it to work as
some way to copy files between a master directory and the build  
directory for the first revision of VMMaker..  Yes?

Anyway Apple didn't actually offer a way to copy files between  
locations until mmm os-x 10.4 came out, shamed into it I think.
Certainly the OS-9 code ran to a hundred pages, aliases, HFS+ servers,  
server aliases, etc etc. Folder/File.

However 10.4 (was it 10.3?) they introduced access control list meta-
data on files and muttered about an API you could use
that would invoke the same logic as the Finder uses to copy an object  
from one place to another.   We use that in Sophie, so
the bits go, and so do the multiple dates, permissions, meta-data,  
endless list...

Files simple, Yah that would be CP/M

Likely once you did into it the file plugin on unix is *mostly* there,  
but really a better solution would be to use FFI, or OSProcess and
invoke the right shell command.


On Mar 3, 2008, at 10:12 PM, tim Rowledge wrote:

--
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John M. McIntosh <[hidden email]>
Corporate Smalltalk Consulting Ltd.  http://www.smalltalkconsulting.com
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========================================================================

On Mar 4, 2008, at 5:01 , Bill Schwab wrote:

On demand.

You have to look in the image where the primitive is called, you'll  
have a line like

        <primitive: 'primitiveName' module: 'PluginName'>

That module name is used to find the plugin, see

See http://squeakvm.org/svn/squeak/trunk/platforms/unix/vm/ 
sqUnixExternalPrims.c

It tries to load the name as given, or with a "lib" prefix and ".so"  
suffix" (and ".dylib" for MacOS X).

Also it tries to find it in "./", $SQUEAK_PLUGIN_PATH, "/usr/local/
lib/squeak/3.9-8/", $LD_LIBRARY_PATH, and the system standard library  
directories ("/usr/lib" etc.).

If all that fails, it looks if this is an internal module.

- Bert -