[sword-devel] RE: e-Sword

[Jerry Hastings]

I don't know about going from C++ to VB, but there is a free program that 
takes BASIC code and converts it to C. The program is BCX, which you can 
download from http://www.users.qwest.net/~sdiggins/bcx.htm . The code is 
said to compile flawlessly with the free lcc-win32 ANSI C compiler from:
http://www.cs.virginia.edu/~lcc-win32/ .

So, if nothing else, the Sword may be able to use some of his VB code.

I have taken a look at BCX and the basic it converts is much like VB. It 
does have some limitations though. It does not create C++ code and does not 
support arrays of user defined types. I have not yet used it to convert 
with, but it gets good reviews by others that have used it. I was checking 
out free and open source basic compilers a few months ago and this was one 
of the systems I was looking at. This was the only one of the systems I was 
checking that I have not yet written a program for.

FWIW: here is some info on two other systems I found worth a look.

XBasic: Free Open Source compiler. http://www.xbasic.org/
         Produces powerful, very fast, binary machine code. Will compile 
for windows or Linux. Produces both console and GUI applications. Has a 
rich language with a good set of standard objects with a lot of conveniences.
         However: a large DLL is needed to run the EXE files. It uses a 
strange message system to communicate between objects. It is not well 
suited for applications running below 1024 x 768.


Rapid Q: Free, but not open source, compiler. 
http://www.basicguru.com/abc/rapidq/index.html
         Produces both console and GUI applications. Syntax is similar to 
Qbasic. EXE is standalone. Built-in socket support. Directly supports 
MySQL. Objects are similar to VB objects.
         Not truly multiplatform, Linux/Unix version is a stripped down 
version. MDI applications not supported. No thread support. Arrays of 
objects not supported. No support for ON ERROR.

Jerry


At 11:42 PM 11/5/2000 -0800, Chris Little wrote:
>Rick Meyers (the e-Sword author) seems very receptive to the idea of joining
>forces, and I've invited him to join the list.  I still don't know how easy
>it will be for him to do much work with SWORD if he turns out only to know
>VB.
>
>Which brings me to a new question...
>
>Does anyone have any idea how easy it might be to compile a Windows lib/dll
>of SWORD?  Could cygwin perhaps compile SWORD OOTB?
>Troy, is SWORD still incompilable with VC++ because of non-ANSI-compliance
>or might that have been fixed in VC++ 6.0?  If we could get a SWORD dll (or
>lib), then I could churn out an ActiveX control and we could let everyone
>with VB brew his own SWORD frontend.
>
>--Chris Little
>
>
>
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: owner-sword-devel@crosswire.org
> > [mailto:owner-sword-devel@crosswire.org]On Behalf Of Chris Little
> > Sent: Saturday, November 04, 2000 2:21 PM
> > To: sword-devel@crosswire.org
> > Subject: RE: [sword-devel] RE: e-Sword
> >
> >
> > I'll ask, but am not too hopeful, if for no other reason than we
> > don't have
> > a VB interface to our library.  Worth a try anyway.
> >
> > --Chris Little
> >
> > Paul Gear wrote:
> >
> > > Why not ask if the author would like to join forces?  Maybe they could
> > > fill the role of the coordinator for the Windows frontend and let Troy
> > > concentrate on the libraries like has wanted to for some time.
> >