Sorry, but I still haven´t got the time to write a real documentation, so in the following I´ll give you a short introduction to some parts. Though I tried to make ASED very intuitiv and easy to use, some remarks may help to better understand, how ASED works.
1. Testing Code
If you press the TEST button, ASED executes allways
the content of the current editor window (not the opened file!). This enables
you to make changes and test it without the need of storing before or making
backups. On the other hand, if you save the content of an editor window to a
file, the current file will be copied to a *~ file before the content of the
editor window is stored to that file. This enables you, to restore allways the
latest version of a file. By pressing the TEST-Button, ASED either starts a
slave interpreter to execute the code or if you have activated the option "use
eval server" in the TEST menu an eval-server will be started and your code
will run within a separate wish instance. This is the prefered method for unstable
code, cause ASED itself can´t crash this way. You can choose the wish,
the server should run via the TEST Menu. In addition it allways automatically
loads Tk. It is possible to start several applications at the same time. The
running application could be terminated via the STOP-Button, even if you see
the "watch"-cursor. However, this may fail, if your application runs
in some kind of an infinite loop and never returns to the eventloop of tcl.
So if you run your code via the server, you could simply kill the hanging app
by the operating system (ie. kill command) and ASED will still work. By pressing
the STOP-Button the slave interpreter of the current editor window will be destroyed.
You can also edit and test extensions without the need to load the main application into an editor window by associating a startfile to that extension file or to define a default startfile via the test menu. If you have defined a startfile and press the TEST-Button, this startfile will be executed (instead of starting the content of the current editor window). Though in this case also the content of the editor window will be executed.
If you run your programs via the eval server, there will be an additional page in the Bottom Window, which will show you the output of your program. In addition you can enter any valid command at runtime, which then will be executed within your app. IE. typing "info vars" will show you all vars of your app (from a global scope). You can also set vars or overwrite procs from within that window, while your app is runing. This might be quite helpful for debugging.
To start your program with additional args you can key in additional args in the right combobox within the toolbar.
2. Console
Since there is typically no console available under
windows, the output of "puts" commands is redirected to ASED´s
console window. So this can be used for easy debugging via including "puts"
commands in the code, like it is possible under UNIX. But this currently doesn´t
work for slave interpreters.
3. Sourcecode Navigation
To enable fast sourcecode navigation
there are included:
3.1 Code Browser Window
this shows
you all the procs, namespaces, classes methods and so on in a tree structure.
Clicking on a node will bring you at once to the corespondent code line.
History Buttons (at the bottom of the Code Browser)
By clicking "Next" or "Prev" arrow, ASED will bring you
to the previous edited code lines. But the history will allway store only one
position per proc.
3.2 Goto Line Combobox
This will allways
show the current line. By pressing the button right from the line entry field,
ASED stores this value in the line history. You can also enter a line number
and press that button to go to a code line. To jump back open the history, chose
a line and press the button. ASED 2.0 allows now also entering relativ line
numbers like "+10".
3.3 Quick Search
To search in an opened file just enter a string
in the left combobox of the toolbar and press ENTER. Clicking on the arrows
will search (again) forwards or backwards. For an extended search use the Find-Button
within the toolbar.
4. Popup Menus
Just try clicking the right mouse button in the editor or the code browser window and have a look at these menus.
5. Highlighting correspondent braces, parenthesis and brackets
To highlight a correspondent brace, parenthesis or bracket click just before that char and the correspondent one will be highlighted.
6. Using the graphical "grep"
Choosing "Search in files.." in the Edit menu will open a dialog window where you can enter settings for searching complete directories for code. The founded lines are shown in a result window. A single click on an entry in the result-window will open the file (if not already opened) and bring you immediately to that line in the code.
7. Reset "watch cursor"
If an error occures through testing of a piece of code, sometimes the cursor remains as a "watch cursor". You can "reset" the cursor to the normal arrow via clicking on the STOP Button.
7. Clear Console Window
To clear the Console-window type cls at the prompt.
8. How to build your own language file
You simply have to edit one of the provided language files (ie. ~/ased2097/lang/deutsch.txt).
Replace in each line the right expression with the expression in your language.
Please note, that all expressions have to be quoted by quotation marks <">.
Save your file under a different name in the lang-directory. The filename-extension
should be .txt.
Now you should be able to choose your language-file via the options-menu.