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Disk I/O and cdf

• To: mathgroup at smc.vnet.net
• Subject: [mg120332] Disk I/O and cdf
• From: "W. Craig Carter" <ccarter at mit.edu>
• Date: Tue, 19 Jul 2011 06:56:36 -0400 (EDT)
• References: <201107080854.EAA28729@smc.vnet.net>

Hello,
I have an application that I'd like to distribute as a .cdf file.
However, the application uses disk i/o to interact with qhull (an open 
source convex hull swiss army knife).

It uses something like the following which I can get to work on Windows 
and Mac platforms:

inputdata = dataAppropriateforQHULL;
Export[infile, inputdata];
cmd = "/sw/bin/qconvex Fx i n < " <> infile <> " >" <> outfile;
Run[cmd];
hulldata = Import[outfile, "TABLE"];

However, this relies on disk i/o and given a previous response on this 
group:

On 8 Jul,   2011, at 4:54 AM, John Fultz wrote:
>
>
> But, in version 8, the situation has changed significantly.  
Mathematica can now
> directly create and maintain CDF (or sometimes called "FreeCDF") 
files.  Player
> can play CDF files.  CDF, as they might say, is the new NBP.  There 
remain, of
> course, some restrictions as to what can be accomplished in the 
Player.  The
> broadest category of items is that CDF files created directly by 
Mathematica
> cannot store new content to disk.  They can't use Export[], save 
files, etc. (*)

It appears that this strategy wouldn't work.  Does anyone know of a 
work-around (i.e., streams to stdin and stdout for qhull)? I can see 
that I could probably learn to use mathlink and the qhull libraries.  
But, this will make distribution more tedious.

Thanks, Craig

• References:
  • Re: How to write a "proper" math document
    • From: John Fultz <jfultz@wolfram.com>