Re: Get login name and/or path to home directory of current user?

In article <1360q776p2v9775@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>,
 SM Ryan <wyrmwif@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:

> Gregory Weston <uce@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
> 
> # > # OSErr FSMakeFSRefUnicode (
> # > #    const FSRef * parentRef,
> # > #    UniCharCount nameLength,
> # > #    const UniChar * name,
> # > #    TextEncoding textEncodingHint,
> # > #    FSRef * newRef
> # > # );
> # > # 
> # > # 
> # > # Only 1 line to debug and only one error code to check.
> 
> # Did you catch the part in the post to which you responded a minute 
> # earlier where I used the phrase "the right tool for the job?"
> # 
> # Did you notice that the OP is trying to create a reference to a single

> # file that already exists? (And, in fact, the error result this
function 
> # would give him if the file _doesn't_ exists, obviates some additional 
> # code.)
> 
> You seem fixated on other people writing simple functions for you.

Um. No. Not sure how you got that at all. I've written code by typing 
hex values explicitly, I've used ProGraph (a tool that let you create 
substantial programs essentialy by drawing their flow chart), and tools 
offering pretty much any level of simplification in between.

Now on the other hand if someone already _has_ written something for me 
- something that can reduce the amount of code I have to write, debug 
and maintain for a conceptually simple task by 80% then I'd be a fool to 
not at least consider using it.

But then, apparently you also use library functions. So what's your 
problem again?

> It's not that hard to write an extension of open that takes a format
> and var-args that internally calls vasprintf followed by open and free.
> You won't find that in the C library in part because constructing a
> path and openning a file are considered separate tasks.

Constructing a file reference and opening the file are separate tasks 
with FSRefs, too. So?

> Problems with
> things like FSRef is trying to represent a path with nonexistent
> directories in the path.

And if issues like that had any bearing on what the OP was trying to 
accomplish, no rational person would have suggested a solution relying 
on FSRefs. But it doesn't, and FSRefs can *gasp* make the task he was 
trying to accomplish simpler to write, debug and maintain. In fact, in 
this case the error that would result from trying to create a reference 
to a nonexistent file is actually a useful thing.

Right tool for the job.

> That leads to multiple representations of
> the same concept, and the extra overhead of keeping them
> coordinated.

Silly us for thinking it might be useful for the base level toolkit to 
provide anything more complex than inc, cmp and jmp.