[comp.lang.forth] Utility.blk and view

RAYBRO%UTRC@UTRCGW.UTC.COM ("William R Brohinsky", ay) (07/23/90)

Elliott Chapin,

(This one takes me back a ways, so I won't guarantee everything I say. Sorry,
I wish I could trust my memory better, but I keep catching myself in little
slips. I will say that this is as I remember it!)

I had the same problem (as you might imagine) running F83 on a large
computer. However, the problem is not in EXTEND.BLK, or at least it
is not only there. It also was an easier solution than you might think:
F83's view utility uses the file name that is compiled into the
dictionary when a file is read in by EXTEND.BLK, and includes the
path that that file was originally accessed through when F83 was
meta-compiled.  That means that, if utility.blk was in the A: drive when
your F83 was compiled, that is where F83 will want to find it. My first
solution to using view was simply to keep a floppy in A: with the needed
.BLK files on it---clearly not an optimal solution!

If you ensure that all of the meta-comp .BLK files (EXTEND.BLK, UTILITY.BLK,
KERNEL.BLK, any others) are in default directory, and search all of the
.blk files to ensure that none of them REQUIRE a file to be on A:,
you should be able to meta-compile F83 so that it will see all of the
source files as being on the C: drive. I believe that this even
works if you start from KERNEL.COM and merely extend to F83 (again, the
weak memory---try it, and if it works, so much the better!).

I do know that this is all that's necessary to make view work the way you
want it to.

raybro