11. Scripting

VIDA is partly built on top of the Python scripting language, which is an interactive, interpreted, strongly and dynamically typed language. More information about Python can be obtained from the Python website located at http://www.python.org/. The website contains many useful tutorials and other related information.

All user interaction with the application goes through a Python layer even if the user is not aware of it. For instance, every button in the application is actually associated with a Python command that is sent to the internal interpreter when that button is pressed. The same integration is true of all the menu items and other GUI controls in the application. In fact, the journal file written by the application to save its history is itself a Python script which can be run to regenerate the state of the application.

The journal file (journal.py) is written to a user-specific local directory on the computer currently running the application. On Microsoft Windows, the journal can be found in C:Documents and SettingsUSERNAMEOpenEye VIDA2. On all other platforms, the journal can be found in USERNAME/.OpenEye/VIDA2. If the application were to unexpectedly exit, the journal file corresponding to that run will be saved with a separate file containing a time stamp of when the application exited. These journal files are particulary useful for debugging unexpected application behavior and are of extreme benefit to the application developers when tracking down user-reported bugs. The inclusion of journal files (if possible) is greatly encouraged when submitting bug reports.

The complete details of the Python interface is fully described in a seperate API manual which documents every possible command that can be run within the application.

Subsections

				VIDA User Manual

				VIDA User Manual