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Amiga computer related discussion => Amiga Software Issues and Discussion => Topic started by: barney on May 26, 2009, 09:54:43 AM
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What is ARexx? What does it do? Thanks.
barney
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What is ARexx? What does it do? Thanks.
barney
ARexx is an Amiga implementation of the Rexx scripting language. It is a high level interpreted scripting language that allows you to automate tasks in any application that supports it.
Key to this notion are "ARexx Ports". An application opens an ARexx port that an ARexx script can connect to. Once connected, the ARexx interpreter will pass any commands it doesn't directly recognise to the port for the application to interpret.
Most amiga applications that support any form of script based automation use ARexx for the job.
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ARexx is an implementation of the REXX language for the Amiga, written in 1987 by William S. Hawes, with a number of Amiga-specific features beyond standard REXX facilities. Like most REXX implementations, ARexx is an interpreted language. Programs written for ARexx are called "scripts", or "macros"; several programs offer the ability to run ARexx scripts in their main interface as macros.
ARexx can easily communicate with third-party software that implements an "ARexx port". Any Amiga application can define a set of commands and functions for ARexx to address, thus making the capabilities of the software available to the scripts written in ARexx.
ARexx can direct commands and functions to several applications from the same script, thus offering the opportunity to mix and match functions from the different programs. For example, an ARexx script could extract data from a database, insert the data into a spreadsheet to perform calculations on it, then insert tables and charts based on the results into a word processor document.
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In short, if an application supports ARexx, you can write an ARexx script to make that application do stuff :)
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It can do more that just control a program - it can be used to create a stand alone program. It expands the versatility of the Amiga in the hands of a skilled, or at least eager programmer.
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Indeed it can, but you wouldn't want to use it for application development, unless execution speed is not a concern.
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What is ARexx? What does it do? Thanks.
barney
I missed rexx on the amiga, so Ive been using ooRexx on my win xp system. It was so much easer to use it to control 7zip to do a back up of my important files each time the computer was turned on, but I suspect the amiga verson has the advantage of specific Arexx ports in lots of programs.
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If I just use my Amiga for occasional gaming, do I really need this running in the background? Will it speed my Amiga up if I remove it from my startup?
Barney
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Quote; If I just use my Amiga for occasional gaming, do I really need this running in the background? Will it speed my Amiga up if I remove it from my startup?
I assume you mean the RexxMast program... I really, really doubt removing wil have any effect on the speed of your Amiga....
If you Only play games on your machine, I suppose you could comment out the line that runs RexxMast in your User-Startup...
I would just as soon leave it, you may someday run a program that uses ARexx... What version of the OS do you have? Cuz the OS 3.9 Workbench has an Arexx port too :) (OS 3.5 too maybe?) Later Amiga Format CD's had a search funtion that would automatically open the CD/sub-directories to the file you were looking for.
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I use OS 3.1. Initially, it didn't have AREXX. I think I actually added it myself to the User-Startup. Maybe I will just comment it out and see how my system performs.
Barney
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I don't think turning off ARexx is going to make any noticable difference to your system. The script host uses a very small amount of memory and unless an ARexx script is actually running, consumes slmost no CPU time at all.