Re: [Chicken-users] Objective-C interface (sort of...)

[Thomas Chust]

Am 25.11.2005, 06:49 Uhr, schrieb felix winkelmann <address@hidden>:

> [...]
> Well, objc_msgSendv is undocumented, and we have to
> construct calls somehow, anyway. I don't know how easy it is to
> build NSInvocation instances by hand, but it all looks like a hack as
> well (just as with libffi), especially regarding your comments about
> non-working ObjC dispatching code, etc.
> [...]

My installation of the ADC Reference Library includes documentation of
objc_msgSendv along with all the other runtime methods. And in contrary
to the class and method creation functions, this documentation is even
correct ;)

Building NSInvocation instances is even easier than doing everything by
hand -- for example the parsing of ObjC parameter type encoding strings
is much less work, because the NSMethodSignature objects at least split  
them
correctly for you. You just have to create the object, set the parameters,
execute the call and retrieve the return value -- like in this pseudocode
snippet:
  SEL sel = sel_registerName("someSelector");
  NSMethodSignature *sig = [someObject methodSignatureForSelector:sel];
  NSInvocation *inv = [NSInvocation invocationWithMethodSignature:sig];
  [inv setTarget:someObject];
  [inv setSelector:sel];
  for (int i = 2; i < [sig numberOfArguments]; i++)
    [inv setArgument:convertArgumentFromScheme(i-2, [sig  
getArgumentTypeAtIndex:i])
             atIndex:i];
  [inv invoke];
  void *rbuf = alloca([sig methodReturnLength]);
  [inv getReturnValue:rbuf];
  convertReturnValueToScheme([sig methodReturnType], rbuf);
  [inv release];
  [sig release];

But I don't want to urge you not to use the library of your choice if you  
find
it more convenient.

> [...]
> I would simply disallow class-changes at runtime.

... and then you have to fix method signatures upon registration with
the runtime.

> But I better spend my time with things I understand. I'm pretty new
> to OS X and have to learn a good deal more.
> [...]

Your code doesn't look like you didn't know what you were doing --
I really appreciate the quality of your work :)

cu,
Thomas