[Gambas-user] Searching a key in the array of gb.settings

[Doriano Blengino]

gambas at ...1938... ha scritto:
>
>> What you are trying to do could only work in true interpreted languages
>> - perhaps; 
>>     
> That's the answer why it works in Perl! :whistle:
>
>   
>> it is a total non-sense in every serious programming language. 
>>     
I have to correct myself. The distinction is not among "serious" 
languages and "not serious" ones.
I don't want to say that Bash, Tcl, Perl and probably others are not 
serious.
The difference is in compiled languages (either compiled to machine code 
or p-code) and interpreted ones.
Sorry if my previous mail offended someone ;-)

Problem is that, normally, compiled languages discard informations about 
names. So if you construct a string in program, there is no way to 
associate it directly to what was a program symbol. But often compilers 
keep, for at least a part of the program, some information about the names.

> But I'm still lost in the dark.
> How can I check, if the user entered a valid option of my servicemenu 
> (settingsfile)?
>   
I think your program offers a finite set of procedures, and the 
settings[] content is managed by your program too, so:

    1. hCFG["Action/" & sItem] can be empty (""), and so it is invalid, or
    2. it contains something your program wrote in it, and so it should 
be valid
    3. unless you take a user input and, without checking it, you use it 
verbatim. And this is no good.

Next problem is to deal with a set of strings, and associate them to the 
routines. If they are not too much, a simple (in pseudo code):

    sAction = settings[...]
    if sAction="Item1" then Item1();
    if sAction="Item2" then Item2();
    ...

or, even better,

    select sAction
      case "Item1"
      Item1()

      case "Item2"
      Item2()

      ...

      case else
      print "Unknown command"
  end select

Don't know if there are other ways to store the address of a routine 
somewhere (an array or a collection) - probably is possible by using 
object.xxxx methods, but I would stay to the clear and simple method 
depicted above.

If you want me to be more precise, you should give more information 
about your program.

Regards,
Doriano