From:	CRDGW2::CRDGW2::MRGATE::"SMTP::CRVAX.SRI.COM::RELAY-INFO-VAX" 17-MAY-1989 19:38
To:	MRGATE::"ARISIA::EVERHART"
Subj:	Re: Command line arguements

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Date: 16 May 89 21:40:54 GMT
From: versatc!leadsv!laic!nova!darin@apple.com  (Darin Johnson)
Organization: Lockheed AI Center, Menlo Park
Subject: Re: Command line arguements
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References: <3633@udccvax1.acs.udel.EDU>, <7214@bsu-cs.bsu.edu>
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In article <7214@bsu-cs.bsu.edu> cfchiesa@bsu-cs.bsu.edu (Christopher Chiesa) writes:
>2) If you want a CDU-created command to be active every time you log in, there
>are two ways to do it: one, you can explicitly issue a SET COMMAND command for
>each of your "custom" commands, every time you log in -- this takes some TIME,
>usually.  The other method consists of saving the SET COMMAND output as a
>"compiled" command definition table in a FILE in your area, and do a SET
>COMMAND/TABLE command on login; this skips the lengthy "compilation" step
>and is faster, but has the drawback that if you use only your OWN command
>table (I BELIEVE) you LOSE the "standard" table with all the normal DCL
>commands in it!  Ugh.

The problem with these, is that the definitions don't show up in
subprocesses, and are really annoying if you want to put them in
sylogin (modifying dcltables here is a big no-no).

So I sat down one day after hearing that it was possible to link
in a command table, and read through some manuals in depth.  It turns
out that SET MESSAGE/OBJECT will create a .OBJ file that can be linked
into your program.  Then all you need to do is to get the command line,
(lib$get_foreign), parse it (cli$dcl_parse), and then dispatch off of
it (cli$dispatch).  Then the routine specified in the .CLD file can
process the command line arguments like normal.  It was simple enough
for me that all I had to do was to rename my main routine, and create
a new 10-20 line main routine.  I have only done this in C, but it should
work for Pascal as easily.


Darin Johnson (leadsv!laic!darin@pyramid.pyramid.com)
	We now return you to your regularly scheduled program.