when sent a message, the target can't find itself!

[Kay C Lan]

On Sun, Aug 5, 2012 at 6:37 AM, Dr. Hawkins <dochawk at gmail.com> wrote:

>
> In several places, the names of the fields are actually being
> constructed by string manipulation (e.g., val_sbt comes from [ fldNam
> & "_sbt"  ], and then I want to add the $123.45 in val (or possibly
> fld fal) to the $852.87 already in fld_sbt.)
>
> OK let me try and explain this again.

Whilst it is possible to add a number to 'the target', as you've discovered
if you take 'the target' and then try to build a reference to another field
you can't use the same syntax to add a number to it:

put the long name of the target into tStartFldName
-- field "fld1" of card "cd1" of stack "stk1"
put Value(the target) into tAmount
-- 50
put tStartFldName into tSummaryFldName
put quote & "Sum" & quote into word 2 of tSummaryFldName
put quote & "Sum" & quote into word 5 of tSummaryFldName
put quote & "Sum" & quote into word 8 of tSummaryFldName
-- field "Sum" of card "Sum" of stack "Sum"

You can't:

put tAmount into tSummaryFldName

All that happens is tSummaryFldName now contains 50 rather than putting 50
into the field.

Now some have suggested that the problem is that tSummaryFldName already
contains the word 'field' so you can't

put tAmount into field tSummaryFldName

But it doesn't matter if you:

put word 2 to -1 of tSummaryFldName into tSummaryFldName
-- "Sum" of card "Sum" of stack "Sum"

put tAmount into field tSummaryFldName

results in an execution error 'no such object' (at least is does for me
with Rev 5.5.1 on OS X 10.6.8)

BUT, if we go back to the situation where tSummaryFldName contains a full
name reference:

field "Sum" of card "Sum" of stack "Sum"

then you can:

set tSummaryFldName to tAmount

This is the same syntax you'd use if you wanted to change the 'visible' or
'lockText', or any other property/custom property of a field.

So, as I said in a previous post, treat the numbers in each field the same
as you would if you were trying to get and set any other property of that
field.

So as long as you correctly build your full name references, with all the
quotes in the right place, it is possible to create a generic math handler
that will work regardless of where the numbers are coming from and where
you want them to go.

HTH