Stackrunner and Databases

[Len Morgan]

On Mon, 19 Mar 2007 17:18:20 -0500, Len Morgan wrote:


> > Hello all!
> > 
> > I'm trying to do two things at once that may not be possible - at 
> > least I haven't figured out how yet.
> > 
> > I want to use stackRunner to load and run a stack from a URL.  This 
> > stack needs to access a PostreSQL database on the same server as the 
> > stack will come from.  The stack works fine in the IDE but when I try 
> > to run it from stackRunner with a URL, I get a database error (wrong 
> > database type).  My question is where do I need to put the database 
> > drivers?  Can I keep them on the same server as the stacks?  
>   

> No, the drivers have to be accessible as a file path (AFAIK).


> > I want 
> > to have the minimum "footprint" on the client machines and using a 
> > shared or network drive is not a viable option.
>   

> What platform(s) do you need this for?

Ken - thanks for the reply in a message I sent that probably crossed yous, I fixed the problem.  I didn't have the "Database Drivers" folder on the workstation.  Since those are unlikely to ever change (unlike my stacks) I don't have a problem including them with the stackRunner installation.

The platform is Windows by the way and that brought up another question: Do they externals have to be truly external because Windows won't look for them in the exe file?  Would it not be possible (and I'm not suggesting that you try this) to include zipped dlls in the exe and if they are not found at run time, unzip them into whatever folder stackrunner was started in?  If they are already there, this step could be skipped.  I know that Tcl "starpacks" do this but their stackRunner.exe equivalent has a virtual file system built in that makes all the included libraries and dlls look like they are on another "hard drive."  It just happens to be in the same file as the exe.

While I've got you, since you seem to know a lot about the internals of Rev, do you know if it's possible for an external to do drawing in the Rev window?  The reason I ask is because I've been waiting for almost 3 years for Rev to do a table field that is at least somewhat useful (i.e., editable at the cell level for color, alignment, font, etc).  There is a great table package for Tcl that is available as C source, it's cross platform, completely open source.  As long as it is allowed to "draw" in Rev windows, it should be a simple matter to get this working as a Rev external.

Just thought I'd ask...