Dispatch Aliasing
Volume Number: 5
Issue Number: 11
Column Tag: Pascal Workshop
By Roger Horton, Winston-Salem, NC
Note: Source code files accompanying article are located on MacTech CD-ROM orsource code disks.
Dispatcher - An Application Aliasing and Launching Utility
[Roger Horton is a Research Adjunct Assistant Professor at the Medical School of
Wake Forest University, and a private consultant. He is currently in a masters degree
program in computer science at the University of North Carolina, and has been
programming in the Macintosh environment since 1985.]
Recently, I completed a prototype of a database application for a dental office
specializing in the treatment of facial pain. I choose 4th Dimension as the development
environment due to its flexibility in reporting and for the ease with which external
code routines can be incorporated. However, 4D has the habit of creating a large
number of database files (for indexes, resources, data definitions, etc.), which can be
very unsettling to the typical office user who happens to take a glimpse inside a 4D
application folder. When the users reviewed the prototype they pointed this out, and