Detecting IDLDE or runtime

["Oliver Smith" <osmith(at)dera.gov.uk>]

Hi,

The short question:
Is there a way to detect if an IDL program is running in the development
environment, or as a run-time .sav file?

The !version system variable shows no differenece between IDLDE and runtime.


The reason:
I've written a fairly extensive project in IDL that will shortly be shipped
to colleagues.  I'd like them to have the option of using the runtime
version saved  as, 'CUSTARD.sav'. My program has the ability to detect user
written plugins named 'plugin*.pro' located in an appropriate directory. The
program searches for these files, then compiles and runs one using
CALL_PROCEDURE.

All works fine if the project is built and run in the IDL development
environment, however, if the runtime version is used then, not surprisingly,
CALL_PROCEDURE doesn't work (unless the particular plugin was included in
the project at build time). I don't have a problem with this functionality
of IDL, and I have a work around that includes a list of available plugins
included in the save file at build time. The problem is detecting whether
the software should look at this list, or search for additional plugins and
try to use call_procedure.

Cheers,

Oliver

Radio Science And Propagation Group, DERA Malvern
http://rasp.dera.gov.uk
osmith@dera.gov.uk

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