Date: Tue, 22 Sep 1998 2:05 AM -0700
Subject: Re: Scripter via Download
From: Main Event <mainevent@his.com>
To: BareFeetWare

[snip]

Scripter and FaceSpan are well integrated (moreso than SD and FaceSpan). The external editing mechanism was designed by Cal Simone, our founder.

[snip]

While Scripter won't win any awards for aesthetics (the physical appearance is plain and without ornaments -- it's 2-3 years older in design), it packs nearly twice as many features as SD and offers approximately three times the capabilities.

We're curious (this is a genuine request for information) how important "self scripting support" is to you. And having a class-library browser style introduces distortions into the visualization (we know; we tried to do this for 6 months and concluded that it was impossible to make an accurate diagram for some hierarchies using that style of diagram). By contrast, the object map in Scripter is the only truly accurate representation of an object-model based application's object hierarchy.

The GUI in SD is based on the look of the Script Editor.  The Script Editor's interface, while clean, was is only designed as a simple tool; Scripter took a different approach right from the start.  Consequently, Scripter must be learned by reading the manual; the good news is that the manual is short and easy to read.

One of the huge differentiators is the depth of the debugger in Scripter. You can watch and modify the values of variables in the proper context if you should happen to be in a handler; you can change values and execute AppleScript commands, right in the middle of debugging!  That's just for starters.  (And it comes with a single-user copy of ScriptBase.)

[snip]