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OBEX on GitHub -- How do I get a single object or file? — Parallax Forums

OBEX on GitHub -- How do I get a single object or file?

Dave HeinDave Hein Posts: 6,347
in General Discussion
The title should be self explanatory. How do I get a single object, or even a single file from the OBEX on GitHub? It appears that I have to clone or download the entire thing just to get one file.

Comments

  • ElectrodudeElectrodude Posts: 1,657
    edited 2020-06-03 17:43
    To download a single file, navigate to the file, click the "Raw" button, and save the resulting page with Ctrl-S.

    Github doesn't seem to have any way of downloading a single directory through the web interface. There's some trick involving accessing the repository through SVN, but if you're going to use a terminal, you might as well just use git and clone the whole thing.

    There seem to be third-party online services that will download single directories from Github for you.

    I really hope Parallax or somebody else makes a HTML frontend for the new git OBEX soon. Git is great, but having one centralized repository stifles development because you can't just freely edit your own objects anymore; you have to wait to get your pull request approved. But splitting it into a separate repository for each object would be way too cluttered unless somebody wrote a custom web frontend to do it that could also act like the old OBEX for people who don't want to be bothered with git.
  • Dave HeinDave Hein Posts: 6,347
    @Electrodude , thanks. The Raw button followed by Ctrl-S works great.
  • jonabel1971jonabel1971 Posts: 184
    I have an offline copy of the OBEX website. It is 256 MB. Where can I post it?
  • ElectrodudeElectrodude Posts: 1,657
    What's wrong with the version on Github? Sure, it might be a pain to download a zip of the whole repository if you aren't familiar with git, but what does your zip file have that makes it better or less of a pain than the one from Github?
  • localrogerlocalroger Posts: 3,451
    Most people already know how to get a file out of a ZIP file. Few know how to get one from a GIT repository.
  • Wuerfel_21Wuerfel_21 Posts: 5,052
    But you can download the github repository as a ZIP file already, just click the big green button and then where it says ZIP
  • localrogerlocalroger Posts: 3,451
    But you have to know to do that. Nobody is born knowing that "clone repository" is the key to getting the files on your machine. It is completely different than any other regular web experience. Unless you are already specifically familiar with GIT it is a bewildering mystery as to what to do when you land on a repository link. Everywhere else you look for the link that says "download" and when you click it offers to open or save. People know what to do with that.
  • Wuerfel_21Wuerfel_21 Posts: 5,052
    It's a big green button that says "Code" and has a download symbol next to it and the dialog that opens has a "Download ZIP" link.
    If someone can't figure that out, I'm not sure that they'd have any use for the downloaded files.
  • localrogerlocalroger Posts: 3,451
    There is no "big green button." here is a randomly selected example of a single object picked from the community list per the instructions when you land on https://github.com/parallaxinc/propeller/tree/master/libraries.

    Following the link to Community/P1/All per the text directions to get legacy Obex files,
    https://github.com/parallaxinc/propeller/tree/master/libraries/community/p1/All

    Say I am interested in the 3 IO pin Hitachi LCD driver:
    https://github.com/parallaxinc/propeller/tree/master/libraries/community/p1/All/3 IO Pin Hitatchi compatible LCD driver

    Okay, so how do I download this object? Clicking on any of the four files just opens them in the browser, which is not helpful. There is no big green button. There does not, in fact, as far as I can tell, seem to be any way to download all the files for this object, but only this object, at all.
  • Dave HeinDave Hein Posts: 6,347
    The big green button is at https://github.com/parallaxinc/propeller . However, I think this zips up the entire repository.
  • ElectrodudeElectrodude Posts: 1,657
    edited 2020-08-09 01:51
    Dave Hein wrote: »
    The big green button is at https://github.com/parallaxinc/propeller . However, I think this zips up the entire repository.

    Yes. We're presently debating the merits of downloading a current zip of the whole thing from Github vs. downloading an zip of a scraped copy of the old OBEX. I think we're all agreed on the fact that it's much too hard to download just a single object.
  • DavidZemonDavidZemon Posts: 2,973
    Gosh... If only someone was listening to the cries and could do something about it... Too bad all that can be done is.... Oh wait
    https://obex.zemon.name
  • Cluso99Cluso99 Posts: 18,069
    I totally agree with @localroger. This is precisely what i found. I don’t know git and have zero interest in learning. I just want to see a download button on a file (or object group), not on the whole obex. What David has done is worthwhile but there is still the problem of uploading, and of searching.
  • DavidZemonDavidZemon Posts: 2,973
    For uploading, email your code to parallax.
    Searching seems to be the last unsolved issue
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