✑ Quills
MacTerm allows Python programming using APIs called Quills. As of MacTerm 5, Python 3.x is used; older versions used Python 2.6.
Although the API is currently quite small, it is already extremely powerful. It is primarily callback-based, allowing you to “plug in” customizations to key parts of the program.
There are two approaches to customization:
- You can restrict your customizations to one module, and let MacTerm import that automatically when it starts. This eliminates the complexity of Quills setup and lets you experiment with APIs immediately. On the other hand, the customization module is currently quite limited, and you will not be able to take advantage of everything that Quills can do.
- You can write an isolated script. Although this is more complicated (requiring you to handle library paths and other import issues yourself), you gain a lot of flexibility; for instance, you could write a script that doesn’t even start the MacTerm graphical user interface.
Basic Scripting Using a Customization Module
Advanced Topics
Quills APIs
You can use the pydoc program to read documentation on Quills modules, as long as all necessary Python and C++ library paths are set in the environment. Similarly, in an interactive Python shell where Quills is loaded, you can use the help() function.