Test reports

Tests and progress reports

1. Happy days for your Amiga (by Christian Aichinger)

In this section of AMIGA aktuell International I would like to introduce small tools and utilities which make everyday work with the Amiga easier and more comfortable. Most Amiga publications concentrate on the big software packages, so you don't hear about the small ones.

For this issue, I looked at MiraWizARC, Charon, SimpleFind3 and AslPrefs. I was short of time this month, so this article is shorter than usual. I received several suggestions, which didn't make it into this issue. But they will be delivered next time - hopefully! And now enjoy!

MiraWizARC:

For most people, using a command-line-driven archiver program is a horror. Good old "lha" can take over 60 arguments, not much fun if you're the non-argumentative type. But if you are inclined (or forced?) to do a bit of archiving, take a look at MiraWizARC. MiraWizARC uses a MUI-based GUI to deal with the widely used LHA, LZX and ZIP archivers. With this software, it is very easy to create new archives or to handle existing archives. For example, you can extract, delete or add single files from/to archives.

If you want to create a new archive, you can choose the type (LHA, LZX or ZIP). Then you can select the files to be archived from a comfortable requester. MiraWizARC is strong on Drag&Drop support. If you drop an archive or a file over the main window, MiraWizARc displays the contents or adds the file to the current archive. The compression rate is configured in the preferences. After double-clicking on an archive file, it is unpacked and displayed with a program like Multiview. It is not possible to directly convert an archive to another format, but localizations are available in Italian, English and German. The short manual is in English or Italian. MiraWizARC is free, but the author is curious about where in the world his baby is playing, so he invites registrations. When you have registered, it takes a few days (well, actually it took about 4 weeks for me) to receive your personalized version via email. This version is also optimized for your processor.

Charon:

There is plenty of good quality Amiga software for the web....but a really good download manager? Polish author Andrija Antonijevic didn't think so, and so he programmed Charon. I haven't seen a comparable Amiga program, so of course I was interested. There are many ways to get data from the internet: web browser, email, FTP and more, and lotsa basic programs to do the job. But the bells and whistles (like time when a download should be started, an automated resume after a failed download or the limiting of network usage) is not possible in most cases (Ok, there are exceptions). That's where a download manager comes into play. The user collects the sources for the data of interest (the URL or the FTP addresses) and enters it into Charon. Then you configure the additional options and Charon starts to work.

If a download fails due to a bad connection, Charon will try to resume the download. The number of tries is freely configurable. If the server doesn't support resume, you can also configure several "Retries". It offers a search function for MP3s and the Aminet. For connections with a secure server, it supports AmiSSL and MiamiSSL. Among a lot of other options which influence the download, Charon has an Arexx port to integrate it into web browsers like Aweb or Ibrowse (Voyager isn't supported (yet), because of the undocumented Arexx-Port). The freely distributable version is limited to a maximum data rate of 500 characters per second and to simultaneous downloads. Languages other than English aren't yet available for the current version 1.3. The English documentation covers the basic functions well, but you will look in vain for info on the "Schedule" function. Room for improvement here.

SimpleFind3:

The Amiga Workbench always lacked the integrated search function other operating systems have, and now that we all have to cope with multi-gigabyte hard disks it is nearly impossible to find a particular file without a decent search function. Luckily, there are programs like SimpleFind to help out. SimpleFind is not "simple" because it only has a very simple search function, but because it is very easy to use. In the main window, you can configure all kinds of search parameters like Name, Comment, Size, Age and contents of the file. Those parameters can be combined. If you are looking for a file that has been created around a certain time and contains a known text in the filename, you activate both options "Name" and "Between" and enter the known parameters. Amiga pattern matching is supported for names and comments.

After the search process has been started, the files matching the parameter are displayed in the result window. There you can perform simple operations like "Copy", "Delete", "Display", "Unpack" (if it is an archive) and "Archive". The button "Information" opens the icon information window of the Workbench.

SimpleFind can use an index file, which can speed up the search a lot. You can create and manage index files with the integrated index manager. But if you use such files, you should remember to update them regularly. If you use SimpleFind only occasionally, searching without indexes will do the job. SimpleFind uses MUI and makes extensive use of Mui bubble help - in most cases you don't need to read the manual. Supported languages include English, French, German and Spanish. Thanks to the Arexx port, you can integrate SimpleFind into other programs. The installation is done with the Installer and is hassle free. Suitable icons for OS2.0 to 3.5 are included.

AslPrefs:

With Workbench 3.5, the Asl-requesters have been heavily reworked. New menus, new functions, "what" should be sorted "how", new hotkeys, and simple DOS functions like deleting or creating of subdirectories make life easier.

However, some features that the classic ReqTools have always offered, like the positions of the file-, font- and screenmode-requester, which can't be preset, are missing. You cannot change the sort order of files and subdirectories. AslPrefs is a little patch which adds these functions to the Asl system. It consists of a little program in the WBStartup drawer and an editor in the preferences directory. The installation is easy and convenient using the standard installer. If AslPrefs should cause any troubles, it can be removed with a CtrlC-signal (see "Break" in your AmigaOS manual), but I haven't yet noticed it playing up. The preferences editor uses the Reaction GUI system of Workbench 3.5.

Because of a bug in the asl.library, the sort function doesn't work (yet). But you can define the height, width and position of the requester and several standard values.

Okay, that's all for now. I hope you find those programs useful. If you have suggestions or criticisms, or if you have written a short review of a useful tool, then please mail me.

Christian Aichinger <aichi@gmx.de>