Which is the Best Scripting tool? 4

[thehustler]

Hi all,

im new to the scripting forum and will prolly be coming back alot more from time to time... i recently downloaded Scriptomatic 2.0 from MicroSoft... Is this the best scripting tool out there or should i look to something else?

thanx for the help =]
thehustler

 

[dm4ever]

Scriptomatic is a good tool for WMI related scripting. You may want to look at the docs for vbscript:

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/...48-207D-4BE1-8A76-1C4099D7BBB9&displaylang=en

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dm4ever
My philosophy: K.I.S.S - Keep It Simple Stupid

 

[xwb]

Depends what you mean by best.

Scriptomatic is great for cut and paste jobbies but you still need to tailor it to your needs.

Not all tools will highlight reserved words correctly.

Not all tools will indent the way you like it

Some tools (MSE) rearrange you HTML so that it no longer works.

Some tools (FP2003) remove code (VML definitions) that they think is no longer necessary. That can also stop your code from working completely.

When working with VBScript, you can be working in 3 or 4 different languages. You could be getting stuff in HTML, adding in stuff from an XML file, doing WQL/WMI queries and drawing in VML. You'll have a hard time finding a tool which will check the syntax of all those.

Personally, I like the highlighting but I like tools to do what they are told and not rearrange or remove my code. I just hate clever editors.

 

[thehustler]

i guess i should have been a little more thorough... i am just learning VB scripting. i read one book 'Windows XP under the HOOD" as a primer... now i am going through some online webcasts that microsoft provides...

basically my background is IT admin from Linux to WIn and i just want to expand my documentation methods with VB script and XML. So i think i should learn what are the best practices and tools available...

any suggestions?

thanx,
thehustler

 

[dm4ever]

Well for a scripting editor I like PrimalScript.

http://www.primalscript.com/

For reference I look at the documents previously mentioned.

For VBScript examples:

http://www.microsoft.com/technet/scriptcenter/scripts/default.mspx?mfr=true

http://www.microsoft.com/technet/scriptcenter/resources/qanda/hsgarch.mspx

(The scripting guys have a lot of examples of common tasks and they explain the steps taken)
FAQ section for this forum:

http://www.tek-tips.com/faq.cfm?pid=329

XML examples:

http://www.devguru.com/technologies/xml_dom/index.asp

Playing with various examples and reading a few of the docs is what helped me get started.

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dm4ever
My philosophy: K.I.S.S - Keep It Simple Stupid

 

[kmcferrin]

Primal Script is good, but I use a tool called SciTE (Scintilla Text Editor). What editor you use almost becomes academic though since you can even use notepad. Google "VBScript" and "test editor" and you'll get a lot of results.

Scriptomatic is a great tool for WMI scripts, but I honestly use that more just to find out what it is that I want to query in my scripts. For example, if I'm looking for information about hard disks, is the info that I want under Win32_LogicalDisk, Win32_DiskDrive, or Win32_DiskPartition? Once I know which class it is under, how do I know which property I want? I can run a couple of quick scripts from Scriptomatic to find exactly what I'm looking for, and then transplant that query into my script.

They also have another tool called EZAD Scriptomatic that provides similar functionality for ADSI scripting. Both are great tools.

 

[Rick998]

I use (and recommend) Sapien's PrimalScript as well. I've used it for several years then, a year ago, looked at Admin Script Editor (a.k.a ASE - available from

http://www.adminscripteditor.com/main.asp)

as a possible replacement.

I tested the trial version of ASE until it expired then decided to stay with PrimalScript... but it was a close call.

The new version of ASE v3.0 may yet tempt me so I guess it's another round of testing to go through.

(Unlike Sapien's PrimalScript website,) the ASE site has some very useful scripts available at

http://www.adminscripteditor.com/scriptlibrary/.

The MS Scripting Guys' "Scriptomatic 2.0" is very useful but, IMHO, just a beginning).

Have a look at MS' Scripting Centre itself (at

http://www.microsoft.com/technet/scriptcenter/default.mspx)

and the 'Community-Submitted Scripts Center' (at

http://www.microsoft.com/technet/scriptcenter/csc/default.mspx).

Hope this helps...

 

[markdmac]

Visual Studio is a great tool to use. The debugger in it is great and can really help you troubleshoot your scripts.

Since VS is rather costly, you might want to download a free copy of Visual Web Developer Express Edition fromt he Microsoft web site. It is free and is a scaled down version if Visual Studio.

You will want to customize either Visual Studio or Visual Web Developer to make running and debugging scripts easier. To do that refer to this doc from my web site.

http://www.thespidersparlor.com/downloads/VS2005_for_VBScript.doc

I also use an inexpensive product called VBSEdit. I like it a lot but wish it supported opening multiple scripts in tabs. It is however a LOT less expensive than PrimalScript.

For the record, I love PrimalScript, but it is VERY expensive and my paid for version stopped working when I upgraded to Vista.

I hope you find this post helpful.

Regards,

Mark

Check out my scripting solutions at

http://www.thespidersparlor.com/vbscript

 

[kmcferrin]

Marc,

I used to use VBSEdit quite a bit, but I found that I like SciTE much better. It does support opening multiple scripts in tabs, and it is also free. Other than the tabs, I think that they're functionally quite similar.

 

[djtech2k]

I use editplus and it is fantastic.

http://www.editplus.com

It has an almost unlimited level of functionality, its customizable, and its CHEAP!!

I have templates loaded for almost any language that you can imagine and they have all worked great for me. You can even record keystrokes and do great find/replace functions in file(s) or directories.

I have used many editors and editplus has been the best I have ever used. VS is nice as well, but I only use it for compiled apps and not for vbscript.

You can use editplus as a trial for free. It says 30days, but it never stops working as far as I know. I bought licenses for $30. The user community is also great because there are thousands of user contributed things for it to plugin.