11:07 a.m.
On Sun, 7 Nov 2010, Sven Schreiber wrote:
this may not be terribly important, but I am wondering about the
justification of the menu entry 'File / Send to...', which seems
to send the current dataset/workfile via email.
Isn't it strange that an econometrics program sends email? I
would guess this is a legacy feature, does anybody really use
it?
Well, I use it from time to time, and don't regard it as a legacy
feature.
I mean it's obvious that people send around gretl files by
email, but there are specialized programs for that. The same
argument is behind the fact that requests for more spreadsheet
functionality in gretl have been repeatedly (and rightly)
rejected.
Gretl doesn't implement a mail program from scratch; it just
provides a "convenience" interface to the system mailer. This is
quite common in software that deals with data that users might
want to share -- for example, gnumeric has a "Send to" feature
(along with several Microsoft programs).
Or if you keep it, why not be able to send session files (.gretl),
possibly among other formats?
You can also send scripts (the "letter" icon in the script editing
window); I think having this facility for scripts and data files
is enough.
Allin
12:37 p.m.
New subject: send dataset via email
Am 07.11.2010 17:07, schrieb Allin Cottrell:
Gretl doesn't implement a mail program from scratch; it just
provides a "convenience" interface to the system mailer. This is
quite common in software that deals with data that users might
want to share -- for example, gnumeric has a "Send to" feature
(along with several Microsoft programs).
Hm, for example what about IMAP mail accounts instead of SMTP, encrypted
connections etc.?
Don't know right now about MS Office (you're not talking about the
Outlook integration I guess, that's a different story...), but I notice
that OpenOffice has email menu entries which however just open up a mail
message window (of Thunderbird, my email program) with the document
already attached. With SMTP settings etc. gretl obviously does it
differently (tries to be smarter).
> Or if you keep it, why not be able to send session files (.gretl),
> possibly among other formats?
You can also send scripts (the "letter" icon in the script editing
window); I think having this facility for scripts and data files
is enough.
fair enough; since I'm arguing for the abolishment of the feature,
obviously I'm not in favor of adding it for sessions. But I must say I
don't understand the design logic behind it. All this seems quite ad hoc.
Anyway, hard to argue when the programmer itself is using it :-)
thanks,
sven
9:56 p.m.
New subject: send dataset via email
On Sun, 7 Nov 2010, Sven Schreiber wrote:
Am 07.11.2010 17:07, schrieb Allin Cottrell:
>
> Gretl doesn't implement a mail program from scratch; it just
> provides a "convenience" interface to the system mailer. This is
> quite common in software that deals with data that users might
> want to share -- for example, gnumeric has a "Send to" feature
> (along with several Microsoft programs).
Hm, for example what about IMAP mail accounts instead of SMTP, encrypted
connections etc.?
Yes, fair enough, if you don't have access to an SMTP server than
gretl's mailer (on platforms other than MS Windows, where we use
MAPI) won't work.
Don't know right now about MS Office (you're not talking
about
the Outlook integration I guess, that's a different story...),
but I notice that OpenOffice has email menu entries which
however just open up a mail message window (of Thunderbird, my
email program) with the document already attached. With SMTP
settings etc. gretl obviously does it differently (tries to be
smarter).
I see that OpenOffice.org works OK in this respect (if the
background stuff is set up correctly). But I also cited gnumeric
as a case of a program offering "Send to" functionality, and on
checking I see that it's broken if your default mail program is
Thunderbird: it pops up a compose window OK, but with no
attachment. Thunderbird doesn't accept an "attachment" field in a
"mailto" URI for security reasons, though you can get T'bird to
cooperate if you use its "-compose" option (gnumeric doesn't).
So, gretl "tries to be smarter" -- yes, it does!
Allin
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