Question

The SciTE editor will run Ruby programs for me if I press F5. But when I try to run a program that requires user input (using “gets”), it doesn’t work. A black window with a blinking cursor pops up, but when I try to type in it, nothing happens. Running the same programs from the windows command line works fine.

I use the Scite editor version 2.27 and Ruby 1.9.2-p290.

Am I doing something wrong? What can I do to fix this?

ETA: Turns out the DOS window does nothing, and if I minimize it, I can type right into the output window. Modified question: How do I make the DOS window stop popping up?

Answer 1

It’s ‘normal‘

Some problems you have (I think) and the solutions:

1. Your output is not displayd before the script ends. So you don’t know what happens. Solution: STDOUT.flush
2. Your input is not expected in the DOS-windows, but in the output pane. Solution:Enter your answer in the output pane.
3. You get a DOS windows. Solution: Rename your script from ‘XYZ.rb’ to ‘XYZ.rbw’ (see the ‘w’).

My test script:

puts "In scite: Please answer in Output pane"
puts "User input:"
STDOUT.flush
input = STDIN.gets 
puts "You entered #{input.inspect}"