[PD] dealing with arguments and inlets

[Hans-Christoph Steiner]

On Jan 31, 2006, at 2:02 PM, Stefan Turner wrote:

>> Message: 8
>> Date: Mon, 30 Jan 2006 19:03:09 -0500
>> From: Hans-Christoph Steiner <hans at eds.org>
>> Subject: [PD] dealing with arguments and inlets
>> To: PD-List List <pd-list at iem.at>
>> Message-ID:
> <f800a0b7f1f7e6ccf418411ac1afacee at eds.org>
>> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
>>
>>
>> I have written some classes for handling arguments
> when writing classes
>> in Pd.  They are [float_argument],
> [symbol_argument], and
>> [any_argument].
>   Currently, I am thinking in general,  inlets should
> be
>> matched to arguments and vice versa, so these
> objects all have a
>> "convenience" right inlet, to attach the [inlet] to
> so that the data
>> all comes from the [*_argument] object.
>>
>> To use them, you add the argument you want it to
> handle like this:
>>
>> [float_argument $1]
>>
>> If you want a default value for when none is
> specified, you would do it
>> like this:
>>
>> [float_argument $2 234]
>> [symbol_argument $3 default]
>> [any_argument $9 asdf]
>> [any_argument $5 444]
>>
>> My goal is to make these a standard way of handling
> arguments when
>> writing classes in Pd.  What do y'all think?
>
> This is a very cool idea. Virtually all my
> abstractions have an inlet and ii (from iem) for each
> argument: would definitely be better to have both in
> one.
>
> Might it be better to go all the way and have these as
> externals which function as [inlet], but also support
> defaults as you've said? Obviously then it would be
> cool to keep the naming argument of [inlet], which
> appears when you hover.
>
> Or alternatively to extend the built-in inlet to give
> the functionality you've said, while just behaving as
> currently if the extra arguments aren't given, e.g.:
>
> [inlet] - as current
> [inlet name] - as current, with a name
> [inlet name $1] - as current, but at loadbang-time
> output $1
> [inlet name $1 123] - as current, but at loadbang-time
> output $1, or 123 if $1 not specified
>
> Don't know how you'd handle the separation of floats,
> symbols and anys then though...maybe add finlet and
> sinlet...??

I like keeping them separate because that means it can be written in  
Pd, and the C objects are just the most primitive, like plain old  
[inlet].  Plus you can use them separately, since inlets and arguments  
are not one in the same...

.hc

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