Referencing to a DOS program relative to UEP exe location

jerry · Oct 07, 2010#12010-10-07T13:59+00:00

Greetings Everyone,

I am running UltraEdit Portable v16.20.0.1011 on Windows 7 Ultimate 64 bit. I launch UltraEdit from the PortableApp.com Platform v1.6.1.0.

I desire to configure UltraEdit with JavaScript Lint. I have been successful in doing this. To do this I followed the instructions given on IDM's website at Configure UltraEdit with JavaScript Lint.

Though the configuration works on the computer where I executed IDM's instructions, it does not work on most other computers. Recall that I am using the "Portable" version of UltraEdit. The distinguishing selling point of this version of UltraEdit is the ability to carry one's installation of UltraEdit with then from one computer to another.

The failure could be my own fault. Below is my JavaScript Lint configuration details:

Tool Configuration
-----------------
Menu Item Name:JavaScript Lint
Command Line:"I:\PortableApps\UltraEdit Portable\App\UltraEdit\jsl-0.3.0\jsl.exe" -conf "I:\PortableApps\UltraEdit Portable\App\UltraEdit\jsl-0.3.0\jsl.default.conf" -process "%f"
Working Directory:%p
Toolbar Bitmap/Icon (file path):<empty>

Options
-------
Program Type:DOS Program
[X]Save Active File First
[ ]Save All Files First

It would be nice if I could replace I: with a command macro that resolves to the current directory of UltraEdit. Then the remainder of the path could locate JavaScript Lint with a relative specification. Then the configuration of JavaScript Lint would remain correct as I moved from machine to machine.

There is a good possibility that I have overlooked what I am looking for. If anyone can please show me what I am blind to.

Have a great day!

Jerry

Mofi · Oct 08, 2010#22010-10-08T06:16+00:00

That Windows operating system works with drive letters and not volume names as many other operating systems is really a problem when working with applications executed from a removable media.

I think there is no real good solution at the moment to solve your problem.

You could assign on all computers you plug in your USB stick via computer management (compmgmt.msc) the drive letter B to your USB drive before you start any application from your USB media.

You could also use good old DOS command subst B: letter of USB drive:\ to assign drive letter B to the USB drive and later before unplug the USB stick use subst B: /D to remove this temporary drive letter assignment, see for an example UE3 auto-complete file not portable?

Also possible is to use a small batch file stored also on the USB drive which you call after plug in which replaces all the drive letters in the INI file by the current drive letter using a console replace tool.

rhapdog has written a launcher tool to solve such problems, take a look on General discussion about UltraEdit portable UEP - the mobile edition of UE.

Something better would be when UE, UE3, UEP would set an environment variable UEPROGPATH by itself in its own environment space on startup which could be referenced in tool configurations by %Env:UEPROGPATH. But currently UltraEdit does not set such an environment variable and this solution would not help for files and folder paths configured in other configuration dialogs than the tool configuration dialog.

My best idea is that UltraEdit would support relative paths starting with .\ everywhere where files or folders can be specified in any configuration dialog and replace .\ by the applications path before using such a file/folder path. That's how my favorite file manager Total Commander works and that's the solution I implemented in the Windows application I'm responsible for development for my company to get the application portable. I wrote a long feature request email with much more details about this suggestion mainly for UE3 and UEP to IDM, but did not see any enhancement in that direction in the past, perhaps because of too less users asked for a better solution to configure files, folders and tools for being used from UE3 or UEP directly from the removable media.