Re: Tinkering with sketch as module

[hancock-anansispaceworks]

Thanks for all the responses, Bernhard, they will certainly
make my work easier!

>> Finally, can sketch be made to install like a regular python
>> module -- such as might be desireable on a server, where
>> I'm only interested in using it for conversions?
>
> I have never tried it, but this might work: Create a directory skencil
> in your python's site-packages directory and copy Sketch/, Plugins/ and
> Lib/ into it.  Then create and suitable .pth file in site-packages
>
>> And if I
>> do this, can I trim some library dependencies -- the server
>> might not have TK or GTK libs and stuff if it is normally
>> run headless.
>
> Only the code in Sketch.UI and some plugins actually uses the GUI.  If
> you stick to e.g. the import/export filter plugins, Sketch.Graphics and,
> in 0.7, Sketch.Editor you should be fine.  That's the theory anyway :-), I
> haven't really tested that lately.

Okay, well, I will.  I've had the chance since I posted to try some
experiments with generating images using Skencil.  The Skencil part
worked, but the Zope part needs some more coaxing (having trouble with
handling mime types and stuff). ;-)

There is one other Skencil problem, which is that an original drawing
may not all be contained in the .sk file (not all embedded).  This
creates a serious complication.  I'll probably need to find a way to
either embed all content during the upload, or at least generate an
error indicating that the drawing is incomplete. Still working on a
lot of details, but I'm pretty sure VarImage 2.5 will support this
feature, at least "experimentally".

My email access is very unreliable at the moment, but I'll post again
when I have something to show.

Cheers,
Terry