CocoaDev

I wanted my application to be able to execute Perl scripts that in turn are supposed to communicate with it. My first thought was using Distributed Objects, so I set up an NSConnection using ObjC, registered it and set a root Object. Then on the Perl part my approach was supposed to be:

• getting an NSConnection object connected to the first one using the registered name
• retreiving a Proxy to the root object
• send a few test messges

My code however fails at retrieving the root object and I just can’t find out why….

This is my Obj-C code:

#import <Cocoa/Cocoa.h>

BOOL didPerform = NO;

@interface Logger : NSObject { }

-(void) logNSString: (NSString *) str;

@end

@interface PerlController : NSObject { NSTask *perl; Logger *logger; }

-(void) loadPerlStuff; -(void) unloadPerlStuff;

-(Logger *) logger;

-(void) finish;

@end

int main( void ) { NSAutoreleasePool * pool = [[NSAutoreleasePool alloc] init];

NSConnection *con = [[NSConnection alloc] initWithReceivePort: [NSPort port] sendPort: [NSPort port]];
PerlController *pCntl = [[PerlController alloc] init];

[con setRootObject: pCntl];
if( [con registerName: @"PerlConnection"] == NO )
{
	NSLog( @"Could not register connection." );
	[con release];
	
	[pool release];
	return 1;
}

NSRunLoop *runLoop = [NSRunLoop currentRunLoop];
[runLoop performSelector: @selector(loadPerlStuff) target: pCntl argument: nil order: 1 modes: [NSArray arrayWithObject: NSDefaultRunLoopMode]];

while( didPerform == NO )
	[runLoop runMode: NSDefaultRunLoopMode beforeDate: [NSDate distantFuture]];

[pCntl unloadPerlStuff];
[pCntl release];

[con registerName: nil];
[con release];

[pool release];
return 0; }

@implementation Logger

-(void) logNSString: (NSString *) str { NSLog( @”%@”, str ); }

@end

@implementation PerlController : NSObject

-(void) loadPerlStuff { NSString *path = @”/usr/bin/perl”; NSFileHandle *handle = [NSFileHandle fileHandleForReadingAtPath: path]; if( handle == nil ) { path = @”/usr/local/bin/perl”; handle = [NSFileHandle fileHandleForReadingAtPath: path]; if( handle == nil ) { NSLog( @”Could not locate perl” ); return; } }

perl = [[NSTask alloc] init];

[perl setArguments: [NSArray arrayWithObject: @"script.pl"]];
[perl setCurrentDirectoryPath: @"./"];
[perl setLaunchPath: path];

logger = Logger alloc] init];

[perl launch]; }

-(void) unloadPerlStuff { [perl terminate]; [perl release];

[logger release]; }

-(Logger *) logger { return logger; }

-(void) finish { didPerform = YES; }

@end

This is my Perl code:

#!/usr/bin/perl

use Foundation;

my $con = [[NSConnection->connectionWithRegisteredName_host_(NSString->stringWithCString_(“PerlConnection”), 0);

my $cntl = $con->rootProxy();

if( !$cntl or !$$cntl ) { print “damn it….”; exit(1); }

$cntl->logger()->logNSString_(NSString->stringWithCString_(“Log this!”)); $cntl->finish();