Installing Livecode on Linux

I had to set up an new Linux box this week and came accross that time when to Install Livecode, again. Since we been asked this question before. How to install Livecode on Linux? I figure why not do an quick 1 minute video screen how to. Hopefully someone finds this useful. If not , oh well.

Java To Objective-C Translation

I came across an interesting little open source project today. J2ObjC which is an Java to iOS Objective-C translation tool and runtime. The tool enables Java code to be part of an iOS app. J2ObjC is an Google made tool and worth checking out. Even if just for experimentation.

More Info

Adding Borders to Images with Livecode

If your looking for an clean rect boarder within an image within Livecode you need to do so using groups. I found an great tutorial demo this off by  Jan Sckenkel of Quartam Software. Jan's example is way beyond just borders and is worth checking out.

His StyledImageView custom control article come in two parts

Part 1 StyledImageView custom control
Part 2 StyledImageView custom control(Part 2)

I suggest checking these out. It an really cool project demo with code. Great job Jan.

Livecode Control Margin fix for OSX

As of Mac OSX 10.7 or later the controls in Livecode are off. Off how you might ask, well the label is off on the buttons, Checkboxes, Radio Buttons etc. The label is not aligned to the control and makes the user experience feel incorrect. There an simple fix however, by setting the text margins to align back to center. These are the margins I found that work to get the appearance correctly align for these controls.

Livecode 5.1.0 or later

This is for the default object height.

Push Buttons: 2,12,2,13
Rectangle Button: 2,12,2,13
Combo Box: 6,8,2,13
Radio Buttons: 4,15,2,13
Check Box: 4,15,2,13
Option Menu: 2,14,2,13
Pulldown: 4,14,2,13

These margins can be set by script or the properties palette.

Open Source Livecode iOS Externals

I had made some externals to interface with Livecode and iOS. Some of which are now built into the IDE or do an small little things. I added these iOS externals for Livecode as free downloads with full source code to an backend webpage. I add an few new ones every once in an while.

I tried charging for my OSX Core Image External for Livecode OSX for only $50.00 and only an handful bothered buying and supporting it. It also seem to piss an ton of people off (I know because they emailed us.) that some one would spend months making an really cool addition to the Livecode tool, and then actually charge an small fee of $50.00 for there effort.  Specially when most of the Livecode 3rd party tools cost more than that, and do far less.

With that I am over selling externals for Livecode. I will share them as full open source and AS-IS. Maybe it will help someone learn or whatever.

Here an page to some limited open source iOS Livecode Externals we made, hope you enjoy. Link

10 Livecode features I want

Livecode is an great tool and does so many things out of the box its mind boggling. However as technology changes so does any development tool, and its need to support new things. Here my top ten wish list for Livecode (Not in order).

1. Full Cocoa Support For Mac.
2. Windows Mobile & Surface supported
3. Native Spell Checking (All platforms)
4. Multi-Channel Audio Player for all platforms (Like iOS and Android have)
5. Upgraded IDE (with Custom editor improvements, Scaleable window editor, one window design.)
6. Full Game Center (for both iOS & Mac)
7 Native Toolbars
8 Native Web Browser on Linux (The only livecode platform without one, why?)
9 Native Movie Player for every platform
10 64-bit for all desktop platforms

Get & Set Linux Theme with Livecode.

With Linux there many different options for window themes, based upon what distro you or your users are running. But using Livecode this is easy info to get and can be used to alter the window theme layout like the following Picture below alters the toolbar and window menu in unity theme of an Livecode built app.

To query this data is simple for Livecode use the Environment Variable $XDG_CURRENT_DESKTOP.

Use like such 

function getLixTheme

return $XDG_CURRENT_DESKTOP

end getLixTheme

For the above if its unity I alter the window layout as show, else I alter nothing, and remove the unity toolbar and White in window menu.

Livecode: Copy File with Mac Sandbox & Mobile

If you find out RevCopyFile does not work. There an really simple fix, and one that used in mobile with iOS and Android with Livecode that can be used to fix this fast.

It super super simple. Use URL and binfile. like such

put URL ("binfile:" & tPath2File) into URL ("binfile:" & tPath2CopyLoc)

The Variables

tPath2File is the var that holds the path to the location of the file to copy.

tPath2CopyLoc is the var that holds the path to the location to copy the file to.

It works and does not require the use of anything like applescript, VB script or shell. Also it supported with iOS, Android, Sandbox Mac Apps, and all the Livecode supported platforms.

Livecode Mac Sandboxing

Here an overview for Livecode built apps enabling Sandboxing for the Mac apps store. I includes an video walk over on you tube for testing your Livecode built app against the sandbox security.

Some item you will need to get this to work with Livecode
• Livecode Version 5.5 or later (This version includes Power Box Dialogs for file and folder access, when  sandbox entitlements are chosen for such, previous version will crash and not work)
• An Mac Paid Development Account from Apple ($99 US)
• An Mac CPU running 10.7 or later (suggest having the most latest public release of OSX as newer entitlements are added pre release that make more things work.)
• Download and add your Mac App Store certificates to your machine for Code signing
• An sandbox entitlement file (This can be created in Xcode, and Text editor or using an 3rd party tool such as RB Package Maker Studio)

You can code sign by the command line or use an 3rd party tool (I using  RB Package Maker Studio as it make it more simple and catches problems before hand. RB Package Maker Studio is said to be for Real basic but works with an Mac app, including apps made with Livecode, Mac Ruby, Unity 3D and Other development tools. )

There two current gothias with Livecode built apps :

1. All Livecode built apps for Mac return an Print Violation , even if your app does not print. Fix this by enabling the Print Entitlement "com.apple.security.print"

2 Power Box Dialogs do not work correctly with the "as sheet" syntax. Current Fix do not sheet file and folder dialogs. (The video will show what happens if you do.)


--

To access your own apps sandbox containers use the specialFolderPath() Livecode Syntax.

Such as:

specialFolderPath("Home")
returns:
/Users/username/Library/Containers/com.yourbundlename.yourappname/Data
specialFolderPath("Documents")

returns:

/Users/username/Library/Containers/com.yourbundlename.yourappname/Data/Documents

specialFolderPath("Temporary")
returns:
/Users/username/Library/Containers/com.yourbundlename.yourappname/Data/Library/Caches/TemporaryItems

Go ahead and try it for your self. Also Not everything works, any app the access an older system dialog will fail, such as answer record. There is some thing like this that need an bug report issued for an future fix. However most items work with sandbox enabled.

Also beware that some shell function and command line tools will not work, while most do. Items like screencapture will not because it an global system level item, and is not seen as secure. The best way to determine if your apps will work is to enable sandboxing and test for violations. It maybe you just need to recode some areas or recode the whole project. Also some apps may work 100% out of the box with no code changes.

Have fun, and remember follow the guidelines apple has published on the subject. This just confirms that Yes Livecode built apps do work with Sandboxing.

Edit: The best 3rd party tool I use now is App Wrapper (link). It works awesome with Xojo and good with Livecode. So it now the best all around solution (I suggest using the the full non mini version, as it supports way more stuff, and is worth the money. Also its developer is very helpful.)

Moving Interpreted Keystrokes

The last four years Interpreted Keystrokes was located part of Posterous. We had thousands of followers thanks to Posterous. Last month when Posterous was bought by Twitter we knew we would have to move our blog else where. After test driving an number of blogs hosts, we settle for blogger.

We will move an number of older archive posts over. Then after that add new Programming cool stuff posts again.