[Tutor] functions in other files, executing

[alan.gauld@bt.com]

> basically, every module has to be in it's own directory, 
> because they each have extra bits of data in separate 
> files with them. 

Its quite common for a module to depend on some 
kind of external configuration data. Applying the 
old CS maxim of "You can do it with one more level 
of indirection" this is normally tackled by having 
a config file that is read at startup by the module. 
The config file then includes the references to the 
real data - in your case the full path to the needed 
icons...

Now when you want to reuse the module in another 
project you just create a new config file pointing 
at the new projects icons... Now you can keep the 
modules and config files in the same folder or, 
probably better, keep the modules together but put 
the module file in a project specific directory 
specified by an environment variable say. Then each 
project can have its own environment variable and 
its own folder of config files....

If you need more control still then you can create 
a module init function that takes the config file 
path as a parameter. Then users can run several 
instances at the same time(on different projects 
say) for the slight penalty of having to call the 
init function:

import foo
foo.init('some/path/here/')

Like I said, "You can do it with one more 
level of indirection...."

Alan g.
Author of the 'Learning to Program' web site
http://www.freenetpages.co.uk/hp/alan.gauld