Resource Jargon
Volume Number: 13
Issue Number: 2
Column Tag: Toolbox Techniques
The Language of Resources
By Chris Stasny
A common sense introduction to the Resource Manager
Say Again?
I discovered a new version of English when I worked the oil fields of Trinidad years
ago. Part of this dialect's uniqueness was due to the influence of multiple cultures on
the island - notable for its heavy and complex accent. Eventually, I learned how to
respond to things like, "And me anudder spanner. Dees one's too slight." (He wanted a
larger wrench.)
Some years later I discovered that the Macintosh contained its own rendition of
English, where common terms were linked in new ways to form powerful commands.
This is clearly demonstrated in Resource Manager calls. Terms like USERESFILE and
SETRESATTRS turn out to be everything expected and more. This article will focus on
some common resource handling operations. While our syntax will be that of
FutureBASIC II, the toolbox calls are so easily recognizable that programmers of all
linguistic persuasions should be able to follow along without difficulty.
Resource Files
We all know that our application's resource fork is open and available. Some of us
understand that the System's resource file is also open and available. In real life, there
are usually between twenty and a hundred resource files open at any given moment, on
any given Mac. Remember all of those font files and sound files that you dumped into
the System Folder?
The layers of resources are guided strictly by the order they were opened via