In the Instructions.html document, it states that in the ReadMe document we need to specify exactly how to start the program. "...do not say something like "add server.jar to your classpath". You should document exactly how to add the jar file to the classpath."
Well depending on the OS, there are several different methods for setting and getting environment variables (such as classpath), do we need to document this operation for each concievable OS? This is problem #1.
As an work around, I thought about just setting the classpath in the command line, which is feasible but brings up another problem. The JAR tool has issues tyring to set the classpath in the command line:
Issue 1: Do we need to include instruction on how to unjar the jar file? If so, the JAR command does not allow you to specify the class path in the command line. The only other option is to set this environment variable, which leads to problem #1 (above), where we have to document how to set the classpath for every type of OS.
Issue 2: In the case where we have a Server.jar, Client.jar and then a Total.jar (containing all submission files). If you try to set the classpath in the command line you run into problems using Total.jar in your classpath and then using the "-jar" flag to start Client.jar. So, the following code does not work.
java -classpath c:\temp\Total.jar -jar Client.jar
I realize that I am probably agonizing over this detail too much, but it would be horrible if a submission got rejected because the execution instructions weren't stupid-proof. Likewise, I realize that there is probably a simple, yet clever way to document setting the classpath for all OSs. Ideally, I would like the user to set the classpath as an environment variable and not rely on having to include it in all of my command lines. So if anyone has a sufficient method for documenting this task, I would greatly appreciate it.
Thanks so much.
Steve