*************************************************************************** * * * NLS v1.03 - NodeList Search utility * * * * Written by Robert Nottage * * * * Saturday 31/07/1993 * * * * Distribution and copyright statements inspired by Bob Rye :-) * * * *************************************************************************** -===PLEASE READ EVERYTHING. V1.0+ HAS CHANGED SIGNIFICANTLY SINCE V0.30===- Everything contained in this release of NLS for the Amiga is USE-AT-OWN-RISK. I, the author, make no guarantee as to the fitness for use of this software. I accept no responsibility for possible damages incurred before, during or after execution of this software. *** * **** ** *** **** *** **** ** *** ***** * * * *** * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *** * *** **** **** *** *** *** **** * * * **** * **** * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * **** **** * * *** **** * * **** * * *** * * * * *** * ***************************************************************************** DID YOU PAY MONEY FOR THIS SOFTWARE? NLS is FREE This software is FREE. This software is "F R E E". If you have paid money for this software, then you have been ripped off. I have written this program for you, for free. If you paid for "support" from where you got this file, then you are also being ripped off. There is only one person who can offer official support for this program: ME! (Rob Nottage, the guy who wrote this program.) You cannot obtain support from some unqualified desk-doofus hiding behind the facade of "a support specialist". All that these people are doing is making money from you, the innocent end-user, and ripping me off by immorally making money from *MY* programs. Please take a stand against these companies. Please don't buy *FREE* software from these companies. If you would like copies of any (or all) of the FREE software written by me, you can have them for *FREE*. That's right, for nothing. All I ask for is a blank disk(s), to copy the programs onto, and the cost of return postage (and your address!) or you can usually filerequest them from me at the FidoNet and AmigaNet addresses below. Then if you want "support" for my programs, send Netmail to me or snail-mail me and you'll get real support. STAND UP AND BE COUNTED. Say NO! to costly FREE software. ***************************************************************************** If you represent a PD/Shareware/Freeware library or electronic distribution system, then please feel free to contact me to gain written permission to allow you to legally include this software in your library, for distribution. The "ADS" electronic distribution system, Fred Fish & his excellent AmigaLibDisks and AmiNet have my written permission to redistribute this software. See, it's written just there! You may copy and transfer copies of this package to whoever you like, provided that this package is transferred completely intact, with all documentation and executables unmodified therein (modification of copyrighted works is called "contributory copyright infringement" and persons found infringing copyright are liable to legal action); however, if you represent a registered (or otherwise) company, and you wish to redistribute this package, you MUST obtain my written permission. The copyright to NLS, the documentation, the source-code, and the actual software remains the explicit property of Robert Nottage, (C) 1993. Distributors of this package must cease distributing this package, if and/or when, specifically requested to do so by the author(s). This request will be made in writing. ANY commercial distribution of this package without the prior written consent of the author is expressly prohibited. DISCLAIMER ¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯ ALTHOUGH OUTSTANDING BUGS IN THE CODE HAVE BEEN ELIMINATED, THERE REMAINS THE POSSIBILITY OF UNFORESEEN PROBLEMS. I RESERVE THE RIGHT TO REFUTE THE EXISTENCE OF SUCH 'BUGS', BUT IF FOUND, I WILL ATTEMPT TO FIX SUCH PROBLEM(S). IF, HOWEVER, UNFORESEEN BUGS ARE FOUND TO CAUSE YOU MENTAL AND/OR PHYSICAL ANGUISH, THEN THAT IS AS THEY SAY IN THE CLASSICS, BAD LUCK! I ACCEPT NO BLAME FOR ANY LOSS OR INCONVENIENCE FOUND TO ARISE FROM THE (MIS)USAGE OF THIS PROGRAM. I RESERVE THE RIGHT TO WITHDRAW SUPPORT AND UPGRADES AT ANY TIME. I PROBABLY WON'T DO THIS, BUT I HAVE THIS RIGHT. ALL INSTANCES OF COMPANY AND/OR PRODUCT NAMES ARE (C), (R) AND (TM) RESPECTIVELY, WHERE APPLICABLE. "NLS" AND "NLS.DOC" ARE COPYRIGHT ROBERT NOTTAGE 1993. Minimum requirements -------------------- NLS has been extensively tested on: Amiga 3000/030 (vanilla PAL, 2.04 OS) Amiga 4000/040 (vanilla PAL, 3.0 OS?) NLS will not work with OS version less than 2.xx nor with ReqTools v37 or less. A valid traplist nodelist is required as well as traplist.library. What is it? ----------- NLS is a nodelist search program, suitable for searching virtually anything in a TrapList-compatible nodelist. The minimum requirements are: - An Amiga with Kickstart 2.x or greater - ReqTools.library v38 or greater - A standard TrapList nodelist (ie the files required are: nodelist.???, fidonet.index and any extra network lists you have configured with TrapList. ) How do I use it? ---------------- NLS will run from CLI or Workbench. The CLI commandline options and the Workbench tool-types are basically the same with the normal differences as noted. Tool-type keywords MUST be in uppercase and followed by an equal sign (=) if not a switch. Options: If you type from the CLI 'NLS ?' you will see a template of arguments like this: SEARCH,NODELISTDIR,SHOW/S,BROWSE/S,NOREQ/S,PUBSCREEN,FONTNAME,FONTHEIGHT/N, ICONIFY/S,WINLEFT/N,WINTOP/N,ICONLEFT/N,ICONTOP/N: SEARCH: The most significant argument is SEARCH followed by the search string. e.g: NLS SEARCH "rob nottage" If the search string contains any spaces then enclose the whole string in quotes or replace the spaces with underscores '_' e.g. NLS SEARCH Rob_Nottage The SEARCH keyword may be omitted if you specify a searchstring as the first option. e.g. NLS fidonews There is no Workbench tool-type equivalent for SEARCH. Simply wait for the string requester to open and enter your choice. Note that the search is NOT case sensitive. NODELISTDIR: NLS will default to the current directory to search for the nodelist files. If your files are elsewhere then use the NODELISTDIR argument followed by the full path. e.g. NLS SEARCH SuperNOVA NODEDIR nodelist: A forward slash after a directory path is optional. The WB tool-type would look like this: NODELISTDIR=BBS:nodelist SHOW: This switch causes NLS to show each nodelist entry information as it scans. With the option OFF, you will only see the node address. Displaying the full window of information for each entry slows the scanning down somewhat, so leave this option out for greater speed. Tests on an A3000 showed a difference of approx. 3.7 times! The WB tool-type would be: SHOW BROWSE: This switch will allow you to step through each entry (use the NEXT button) The WB tool-type would be: BROWSE NOREQ: Normally when a match is found, a requester will pop up showing you a lot more information about the node. NOREQ will prevent this from happening. The extra information includes any costing, password and telephone number adjustments you have made with TrapList when last compiled. The WB tool-type would be: NOREQ PUBSCREEN: You can open the NLS window on any public screen. The iconified window and any requesters will also appear on the same screen. Ensure that you enter the correct case for the public screen name. e.g. NLS search Fred PUBSCREEN DOPUS.1 (not 'Dopus.1') The WB tool-type would look like this: PUBSCREEN=TrapDoor FONTNAME: You may, to some degree, use any FIXEDWIDTH font of your choice. The font must be taller than 5 points and the window must be able to open to a predetermined number of characters wide and high. If you omit FONTNAME or the font cannot be used, then NLS will consider opening the window using the default screenfont. If this is also not usable then topaz 8 will be the font used. The '.font' extension is optional. e.g. NLS SEARCH fido FONTNAME cleanibm The WB tool-type would look like this: FONTNAME=jrcibm.font FONTHEIGHT: The font height must be greater than 5 points. If you omit this option when using FONTNAME then the default will be 8 points. e.g. NLS SEARCH fido FONTNAME cleanibm FONTHEIGHT 9 The WB tool-type would look like this: FONTHEIGHT=11 ICONIFY: This switch allows you to open directly into the iconified mode. The search will continue as normal, minus seeing any information. Once a match is found, the window will 'uniconify' and show you the information. e.g. NLS SEARCH joe_blogs ICONIFY The WB tool-type would look like this: ICONIFY WINLEFT,WINTOP,ICONLEFT,ICONTOP: These options allow you to specify the initial position of the NLS window or iconified window on the screen. WINLEFT and WINTOP specify the NLS window left and top position. ICONLEFT and ICONTOP specify the iconified window left and top position. Each defaults to 0. e.g. NLS SEARCH joe_blogs NOREQ WINTOP 11 ICONLEFT 500 ICONTOP 0 The WB tool-types would look like this: WINLEFT=20 WINTOP=12 ICONLEFT=550 ICONTOP=1 The GUI ------- Once NLS is open and searching, you can see information about each node as it is scanned, and optionally, the node's sysop, location, telephone number etc.. To view this information, click on the 'SHOW' button so that it is highlighted. Click it again to stop showing the information. This will speed up the search a lot. As of this writing, the fidonet nodelist was about 2 megabytes in size, so any extra speed gained is a bonus. If you wish to step through each node one at a time then click on the BROWSE button so that it is highlighted. Use the 'NEXT' button to step through each entry. If you are not STEPping and wish to halt the search temporarily, then click the BROWSE button. Click it again to resume. When a match is found for your search string, you will be notified with a 'displaybeep' which will be either a flash of the screen or a BELL sound if you have a patch for displaybeep. NLS will automatically pause so you can view the information. A requester will pop up with more information if you don't use the NOREQ option. You can then click the 'NEXT' button to continue the search. If you wish to skip the current nodelist and try another straight away, simply click on the appropriate entry in the list. You can also click on the current entry to restart the search from the beginning. To alter the search string simply click the string gadget and edit it. Make sure you press RETURN or ENTER otherwise the changed string will not be noticed. To save your current settings, click on the button labeled '!' All settings except the search string will be saved in 'ENV:NLS.Prefs' and 'ENVARC:NLS.Prefs' The next time you use NLS, these settings will be used, but will be overridden by any commandline arguments you use. If you run NLS from the workbench, the saved settings will be IGNORED. Use the tool-types instead. CREDITS & ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ------------------------- Fidonet is a registered name, (C) copyright Fido Software TrapList (C) copyright TrapDoor Developement, by Max and Martin; legends with Fidonet for Amiga !! :-) ReqTools (C) Nico François, the man with the loaded requester. NLS was originally written in Hisoft Basic (C) copyright Hisoft then ported to GFABasic (C) copyright GFA Systemtechnik then ported to Amiga E (Amiga E by Wouter van Oortmerssen) (If you haven't tried Amiga E, you don't know what you're missing! It's even stealing some 'C' programmers :-) Thanx to Dwayne Lindner for beta testing v1.0x and most of my other programs and finding any WB3 & 68040 problems. Thanx to Steve Price and Dave Freeman for some beta testing and suggestions with previous versions. Thanx to Steve Doherty for pointing out why I couldn't get an array of strings to work :-) Thanx to several guys in AmigaNet for showing interest enough for me to continue with this. Sorry the non-GUI version isn't ready just yet. Contacting me ------------- Rob Nottage Please don't use 'Robert', nothing recognizes that name, other than the copyright ownership and distribution restrictions (least of all me :-) Mail: 10 Chilver Street, Kewdale, Western Australia, 6105 Fax : +61 9 458-0154 Fido: 3:690/662.0 AmigaNet: 41:616/662.0 *Mail Only* BBS : +61 9 370-3333 @ 2400 370-3170 @ v.32/v.32bis/v.42bis (Only a user here) History ------- (older versions removed. This is a complete rewrite!) v1.00 30-Jul-93 Started from scratch. I wanted to get better speed and to clean up some messy code after getting a lot more experience with Amiga-E. Much tidier code has given a huge increase in search speed, more reliability and better error checking. The window was rearranged to look nicer (IMHO) and get better space usage. Added proper Workbench support with tool-types. Added public screen and user font support. Tests with NLS 0.3 and NLS 1.0x show an increase in speed of approximately 600%, on my A3000/25! (SHOW turned off) v1.01 31-Jul-93 Added a 'zoom' gadget to the window. Use that to iconify instead of RMB. At the request of Dwayne Lindner (good idea too :-) I have added a 'save config' button, marked '!' This will allow you to save some defaults in 'ENV:NLS.Prefs' (all settings other than the search string actually) Commandline options will override these. Running from workbench will IGNORE these prefs!! Use the tool-types! v1.02 Hmm I seemed to have ignored WB users with the search string. Added a string requester to ask you for the string. Fixed another bug.. (thanx Dwayne, again!) If you wished to use the current directory for the nodelist files, it tried to lock "/fidonet.index" rather than "fidonet.index". v1.03 Dwayne has been busy. Thanx for pointing out that not everyone has ENV: on disk but some use RAM: and therefore lose the prefs after a reboot. Now saves to ENVARC: path as well. (I use a very customized startup.. so sue me :-) Fixed a minor bug with fontheight in prefs. Fixed a bug that didn't show up on my A3000 but did on Dwayne's A4000. It missed some nodelists in the index and left the entry blank.