CompuServe Messages

Thanks. About DataTypes, generally it's a whole new way of handling data under the Amiga OS. Being supported by CBM, it's in at the "root" level, so I think it'll be well supported and widespread. I've included a general discussion from the CBM autodocs – no specifics, just the description of what it is supposed to do. Unfortunately, the genesis of the discussion, being technical docs, makes this come across as technobabble more than anything else, unless you read it fairly carefully. My conclusion is that this new capability will add a great deal of data-handling power to applications that choose to use it – and the user will benefit. When we, for instance, add a datatype for a particular image type, then an owner of GVP software (assuming they support datatypes) could also load or save that image type. Synergy is the key here. Here's what CBM has to say: Purpose ——- The datatypes.library provides transparent data handling abilities to applications. Application developers can register their data format with datatypes.library and provide a class library for handling their data within other applications. Object Oriented ————— datatypes.library implementation is object oriented, using the boopsi functions of Intuition. Each data class is implemented as a shared system library. Embedded Objects —————- datatypes.library provides the ability to embed different object types within an application. For example, an application can embed an picture object or even an AmigaGuide document browser within their application's window. Objects can also be embedded within other objects. Gadget-like ———– Embedded objects are actually boopsi gadgets. That means that input handling is done on Intuition's task. Time intensive operations, such as layout when the window size changes, are off-loaded to a sub-process. Printing, clipboard operations, file read/write are also off-loaded to a separate process on an as-needed basis. <continued>