home
***
CD-ROM
|
disk
|
FTP
|
other
***
search
/
DP Tool Club 8
/
CDASC08.ISO
/
VRAC
/
CP200.ZIP
/
CP.DOC
next >
Wrap
Text File
|
1993-08-28
|
29KB
|
644 lines
Cherry Picker ■ Version 2.00
August 28, 1993
JSL Software
Jonathan Lang
1542 Pleasant Lane,
Lafayette, Ca. 94549
Copyright 1993
All Rights Reserved
BBS: (510)432-7579 [Jonathan Lang]
FidoNet: Taglines and Shareware Echo
ILink: Tags-R-Us and Shareware Conferences
Netmail: Jonathan Lang @ 1:125/233 (Fidonet)
■ Table of Contents ■
Getting Started ............................................. 3
Introduction .............................................. 3
Notice .................................................... 3
Purpose ................................................... 3
Shareware ................................................. 3
System Requirements ....................................... 3
Installation .............................................. 3
Running as John Hancock ................................. 4
Running from the Editor Command ......................... 4
Using Cherry Picker (CP.EXE) ................................ 5
Command Line Parameters ................................... 5
R - Random ................................................ 5
S - Search ................................................ 5
B - Back .................................................. 5
N - Next .................................................. 5
E - Edit .................................................. 5
Editing Commands ........................................ 5
A - Add ................................................... 6
D - Delete ................................................ 6
Other Commands ............................................ 6
Mouse Support ............................................. 6
Using Cherry Picker Utilities (CPUTIL.EXE) .................. 7
Command Line Parameters ................................... 7
Import .................................................. 7
Append .................................................. 7
Export .................................................. 8
Search .................................................. 8
Sort .................................................... 8
Clean ................................................... 8
DupeKill ................................................ 8
Using Cherry Picker Config (CPCFG.EXE) ...................... 9
Changing Colors ........................................... 9
Tagline Window Frame .................................... 9
Selected Tagline ........................................ 9
Unselected Taglines ..................................... 9
Status Bar Text ......................................... 9
Status Bar Boxes ........................................ 9
Background Lines ........................................ 9
Defaults ................................................ 9
Tagline Style ............................................ 10
Startup Position Mode .................................... 10
Edit CP Signature (REGISTERED USERS ONLY) ................ 10
Registration Info ........................................ 10
Quitting ................................................. 10
Support, Registration and Credits .......................... 11
How I Can Be Contacted ................................... 11
How to Register .......................................... 11
Credit ................................................... 11
■ Getting Started ■
■ Introduction ■
Welcome to the Cherry Picker documentation. This document is
supposed to help you understand how to use Cherry Picker.
■ Notice ■
With Cherry Picker, I am testing built in program integrity
testing. This is to let you know if Cherry Picker has been
modified, such as by a Virus. If you have any problems, or
comments about it, please let me know them. Thanks!
■ Purpose ■
I wrote Cherry Picker when I realized that there were no tagline
managers that currently did what I wanted. I came across a few
good tagline managers, but they imposed limits on me such as 50
character taglines, and tagline files of 1200 taglines or less.
They were also slow, having to load the whole file into memory
before starting. Cherry Picker is an improvement on these.
Cherry Picker supports:
■ Tagline files of up to 64,000 taglines.
■ Taglines up to 70 characters in length.
■ Shareware ■
Cherry Picker is a shareware program which means that it is not
free. The idea of shareware is to allow the user to try the
product for a limited time before actually buying it. Shareware
can be freely distributed by any number of means in its
unregistered and unmodified state. Cherry Picker may be used
for an evaluation period of one month, after which time, you
should either delete it or register it. Please consult
REGISTER.DOC for information on how to register Cherry Picker.
■ System Requirements ■
An IBM compatible computer
An Off-Line Mail Reader
Approx. 135k of free memory
■ Installation ■
Cherry Picker is relatively simple to install. Just copy all
the files to a sub-directory, such as C:\BWAVE\CP Then, you
need to create Cherry Picker's Virtual Array using the
following command:
C\>CP IMPORT [Virtual Array filename] [Your TEXT tagline file]
so, the command line may look something like:
C\>CP IMPORT TAGARRAY.VAR C:\BWAVE\TAGLINES.BW
■ Cherry Picker 2.00 ■ ■ Page 3 ■
■ Getting Started (cont.) ■
■ Installation (cont.) ■
After the virtual array has been created, Cherry Picker may be
used to select taglines. But, now your mail reader needs to
call Cherry Picker. Cherry Picker may be called two ways.
■ Running as John Hancock ■
Many mail readers now support a wonderful tagline manager
called John Hancock. Most of these mail readers will allow
you to enter the commandline to execute. To use Cherry Picker
in the John Hancock mode, your mail reader needs to read John
Hancock's JH?.REP files. If it does, then you can call Cherry
Picker from the John Hancock commandline. This is done with
the following command line:
CP CHOOSE [Name of Virtual Array]
Thus, if using BlueWave in C:\BWAVE, and Cherry Picker and the
tagline file are in C:\BWAVE\CP, and the tagline file is
called TAGARRAY.VAR then the command line would look like this:
C:\BWAVE\CP CHOOSE C:\BWAVE\CP\TAGARRAY.VAR
■ Running from the Editor Command ■
Some mail readers do not support John Hancock, or only support
50 or 57 character long taglines. If your mail reader is one
of those, then you can run Cherry Picker from a batch file.
Most, or all, mail readers allow you to specify the command to
execute for the external editor. In OLX the command would
likely read
OLXED @R
Change that command so that instead it calls a batch file like
EDIT.BAT. Then, create the batch file EDIT.BAT so it reads:
@ECHO OFF
OLXED %1 (The reply file is passed as parameter %1)
CP CHOOSE TAGARRAY.VAR %1
EXIT
When you run Cherry Picker with a reply file specified after
the virtual array, Cherry Picker will add the tagline directly
onto the message, instead of sending it to the mail reader
first. The Batch file will work as it is for systems using
OLXED with just paths added to the filenames. If you are
using a different editor, then you will need to modify the
batch file.
■ Cherry Picker 2.00 ■ ■ Page 4 ■
■ Using Cherry Picker ■
■ Command Line Parameters ■
Cherry Picker accepts two command line parameters that tell it
what to do.
C:\>CP [VIRTUAL ARRAY] <MESSAGE FILE>
All Cherry Picker needs to know to run is the name of the tagline
file. You can optionally add the name of the message file to the
command line. If you don't supply a message file, Cherry Picker
will automatically assume JH0.REP. Once Cherry Picker starts, you
will have a number of commands available to you.
■ R - Random ■
Pressing R for Random when in CHOOSE MODE will cause Cherry Picker
to randomly jump to any tagline in the file.
■ S - Search ■
Pressing S will cause Cherry Picker to ask you for a search string.
You will be allowed to enter a string of text, and then Cherry
Picker will search from the beginning of the file for the Search
String. You can also use the symbols "&" and "!" to do an AND or
NOT search. ('CAT&DOG' will find all taglines with the words 'CAT'
and 'DOG', 'CAT!DOG' will find all taglines with the word 'CAT' but
not the word 'DOG')
■ B - Back ■
B will search for the file backwards from your current position
for the search string you entered with the Search command.
■ N - Next ■
N Will continue searching forward after a Search command.
■ E - Edit ■
If you press E, then you will be allowed to edit the currently
selected tagline. There are a number of editing commands
available while editing a tagline.
■ Editing Commands ■
<CTRL-P> - Pressing Control-P will pop up a menu of extended
ascii characters, allowing you to enter characters that are not
on the keyboard without having to memorize their numbers.
<CTRL-BACKSPACE> - Pressing <CTRL-BACKSPACE> while editing a
tagline will clear the tagline from the editing space.
<CTRL-RIGHT/LEFT> - Pressing <CTRL-RIGHT> or <CTRL-LEFT> will
jump the cursor to the beginning of the next word to the right
or the left.
<HOME/END> - Pressing <HOME> or <END> will jump the cursor to
either the first or last character of the tagline.
<INSERT> - Toggles Insert/Replace mode. A small cursor is used
while in insert mode, and a large cursor is used in replace mode.
■ Cherry Picker 2.00 ■ ■ Page 5 ■
■ Using Cherry Picker (cont.) ■
■ E - Edit (cont.) ■
■ Editing Commands (cont.) ■
<ESC> - Stop editing and leave the tagline unchanged.
<ENTER> - Stop editing and replace the tagline with the new one.
■ A - Add ■
A will allow you to create a new tagline which will be placed
at the end of the tagline file. All the Editing Commands are
usable.
■ D - Delete ■
If you find a tagline you don't like, you can delete it using
the D key. Cherry Picker will ask you if you wish to delete
the selected tagline. If you choose yes, then the last
tagline in the file will replace the current tagline. While
this will eventually leave the tagline unsorted, it is much
quicker than actually packing the tagline file.
■ Other Commands ■
Along with the commands listed above, there are a few other
commands available for moving around the tagline file.
<UP/DOWN> - The <UP> and <DOWN> arrow keys will move the
cursor up or down one tagline.
<PAGE UP/DOWN> - The <PAGE UP> and <PAGE DOWN> keys allow you
to move through the tagline file one page it a time. They
will also move the cursor up or down a page.
<HOME/END> - The <HOME> and <END> keys take you to the first
or last line of the tagline file, respectively.
<ENTER> - Selects the currently selected tagline and writes
it to disk.
<ESCAPE> - Exits the program without choosing a tagline.
■ Mouse Support ■
Cherry Picker offers full mouse support. If you have a mouse,
then you can click on the menu bar at the bottom of the screen
instead of pressing the options hot key. You can also scroll
the screen by clicking on the scroll bar on the right of the
tagline window. Clicking on the bar will take you to the
the tagline that is approximately at that location. Clicking
on the arrows at the top and bottom of the bar will allow you
to scroll through the tagline file much as if you had pressed
the up or down arrow keys. You can also click on the various
buttons in the lower right of the tagline window. When you
are asked various questions by Cherry Picker such as Yes or
No, or Press Any Key, then appropriate buttons will appear on
the lower left of the tagline window, allowing you to use
your mouse to answer the questions.
■ Cherry Picker 2.00 ■ ■ Page 6 ■
■ Using Cherry Picker Utilities ■
■ Command Line Parameters ■
Cherry Picker Utilities takes several commandline parameters.
They change, depending on the mode you select, but they all
have basically the same format. The first four, Import, Append,
Export and Search all take the same parameters.
C:\>CPUTIL [MODE] [TAGLINE ARRAY] [TEXT FILE TO WORK WITH] </O>
The tagline array is your tagline file, and the text file depends
on the mode you have selected. Either taglines will be read from
it (Import and Append) or they will be written to it (Export and
Search) You can add a /O after the textfile name to have Cherry
Picker Utilities assume overwrite whenever it asks.
The other three modes are Sort, Clean and DupeKill. They are all
tagline maintenance modes, and require only one parameter to run,
your tagline file.
C:\>CPUTIL [MODE] [TAGLINE ARRAY] </S>
The tagline array is, again, the name of your tagline file. All
changes are written to the tagline file, so you don't need to
specify any other files. You can optionally add the /S parameter
for when you are sorting to tell it to do a safe sort. This
requires more harddrive space then a normal sort, but doesn't work
directly with your tagline file. Instead it writes a new tagline
file, and replaces the old tagline file with it once the sort has
been completed without errors. If you don't have the room to do
a safe sort, then you should backup your tagline file first.
While Cherry Picker Utilities does a good job at catching errors
before damage is done, if something happens that can't be dealt
with by, or there is a power outage, then the tagline file would
be damaged or lost, unless you had a backup.
■ Import ■
The first mode you will have to use is the IMPORT MODE. This
mode tells Cherry Picker Utilities to import the taglines from
your text tagline file into the Virtual Array. If the Virtual
Array file already exists, it will ask you if you wish to
overwrite it. The IMPORT command line would look like:
C:\>CPUTIL IMPORT TAGARRAY.VAR TAGLINES.TXT
■ Append ■
Append mode is exactly the same as Import Mode, except that
Append Mode will add the taglines onto the end of the virtual
array, instead of replacing it. If the virtual array doesn't
exist, you will get an error.
C:\>CPUTIL APPEND TAGARRAY.VAR TAGLINES.TXT
The commandline is the same as it is for Import Mode, but this
time instead of creating or overwriting TAGARRAY.VAR, it would
append TAGLINES.TXT onto the end of it.
■ Cherry Picker 2.00 ■ ■ Page 7 ■
■ Using Cherry Picker Utilities (cont.) ■
■ Export ■
Export Mode allows you to EXPORT the Virtual Tagline Array into
an ordinary text file for sorting, and major additions. (IE:
Adding two tagline files together) To use the EXPORT MODE, you
would use a commandline similiar to this:
C:\>CPUTIL EXPORT TAGARRAY.VAR TAGLINES.TXT
This will export the taglines in Virtual Array TAGARRAY.VAR to
the text file TAGLINES.TXT. If the file TAGLINES.TXT already
exists, Cherry Picker Utilities will ask you if you wish to
overwrite it.
■ Search ■
The search mode works exactly the same as searching in Cherry
Picker does, except it searches for all the matches and sticks
them into a file. If you wanted to find all your cat taglines,
for example, you could search for the word "cat" and have all the
matches written to CAT.TXT
C:\CPUTIL SEARCH TAGARRAY.VAR CAT.TXT
Notice, though, that the search string isn't on the commandline.
When run in search mode, Cherry Picker Utilities will ask you
for the search string. When it asks, just enter your search
string (ie: CAT) and then it will find all the matches, including
"It's raining CATs and dogs" and "Public Domain Tagline, write for
a free CATalog" You could prevent this by adding an extra space
on the end of the search string, though.
■ Sort ■
Sort mode is extremely useful in keeping your tagline file under
control, or at least a reasonable resemblance of it. Sorting
requires the most in the way of system resources. The more memory
it has, the better, and quicker, it will work. To do a sort, you
need almost as much disk space free as is used by your tagline
file. If you don't have enough, sort will abort. Also, you need
a decent amount of system memory to sort, but this amount varies
with the number of taglines to be sorted. When sorting, it's best
to either use the /S option, to have sort keep a backup of the
tagline file until it's done sorting, or to backup your tagline
file manually first. With the /S option, sort requires about two
times the amount of space taken up by your tagline file be free.
■ Clean ■
Clean is the same as the sort command, except that it performs a
duplicate kill at the same time as the sort. This is faster than
sorting then doing a dupekill seperately.
■ DupeKill ■
DupeKill will go through your tagline file, and remove all the
duplicates. In order for it to work correctly, the tagline file
must first be sorted. When checking for duplicates, it checks only
the characters A to Z, capitalized, so that taglines that are the
same except for punctuation or capitalization are found, too.
■ Cherry Picker 2.00 ■ ■ Page 8 ■
■ Using Cherry Picker Config ■
An utility is included with Cherry Picker. This is Cherry Picker
Config (CPCFG.EXE) and it is used to modify the colors of Cherry
Picker, and install your registration data. When using Cherry
Picker Config, you use the arrow keys to move the cursor up and
down.
■ Changing Colors ■
When you have selected an item to change, you hold down shift
while pressing the <UP/DOWN> arrow keys to change the background
color, and hold down shift while pressing the <LEFT/RIGHT> arrow
keys to change the foreground color.
■ Tagline Window Frame ■
This item determines the color of the frame around the
tagline window.
■ Selected Tagline ■
This item allows you to adjust the foreground and background
colors of the selected tagline.
■ Unselected Tagline ■
This allows you to select the foreground and background colors
or the unselected taglines.
■ Status Bar Text ■
This item selects the color of the text that appears on the
top and bottom of the screen while in Cherry Picker.
■ Status Bar Boxes ■
This item selects the color of the boxes that are in the lines
of text at the top and bottom of the screen in Cherry Picker.
■ Background Lines ■
This lets you change the color of the lines that appear between
the tagline window and the text on the top and bottom of the
screen.
■ Defaults ■
This is actually two options, Color Defaults resets all the
colors to the color defaults, and Black & White Defaults resets
all the colors to the Black & White defaults. (The only
difference is that in Black and White Defaults, the Selected
Tagline appears in reverse, while in color it defaults to
Yellow on Blue.
■ Cherry Picker 2.00 ■ ■ Page 9 ■
■ Using Cherry Picker Config (cont.) ■
■ Tagline Style ■
Selecting this will allow you to select whether or not you wish
to use standard or QWKstyle taglines. Standard taglines just
add a "..." before the tagline (Like Bluewave, and a few
others). QWKstyle adds a tearline "---" and then adds the
tagline using the QWK format " ■ reader ■ tagline" QWKstyle
taglines might cause problems with some readers that add their
own tear line onto the message, thus leaving two tearlines.
Bluewave is known to have this problem. Cherry Picker defaults
to standard taglines. If you use John Hancock compatability,
(JH0.REP) then this option won't make any difference.
■ Startup Position Mode ■
This allows you to select how Cherry Picker chooses which tagline
to put the cursor on when it starts. You have three options,
first, next and random. Selecting first will cause Cherry Picker
to always start on the first tagline in your file. Selecting next
will cause Cherry Picker to start on the first one, then the second
one, and so on, incrementing each time it's run. Selecting random
will cause it to start on a random tagline.
■ Edit CP Signature ■
This option is available to REGISTERED USERS ONLY! This option
allows you remove the CP signature (CP x.xx #xx) from the tagline,
or have it replaced completely with anything you want (13
characters long)
■ Registration Info ■
Once you've registered Cherry Picker, you'll want it to say that
it's registered immediately. This is where you enter your
registration name and code. Cherry Picker Config will show your
current Registration Name and Code on the bottom of the screen,
where you can edit first your registration name, and then your
registration code. The Registration name is whatever name you
registered it under, up to 30 characters, and the registration
code is the code you got back,consisting of 5 numbers, a -, and
15 letters. Cherry Picker needs these to know it's registered.
■ Quitting ■
You have two options to exit Cherry Picker Config. You can
either QUIT without SAVE, or QUIT with SAVE. If you choose
QUIT without SAVE, then any old Config file will be left
untouched, but if you choose QUIT with SAVE, then your new
configuration information will replace the old configuration
information.
■ Cherry Picker 2.00 ■ ■ Page 10 ■
■ Support, Registration, and Credits ■
■ Where I Can Be Contacted ■
I can be contacted by mail at:
Jonathan Lang
1542 Pleasant Lane
Lafayette, Ca. 94549
Or, you can contact me on the following BBS:
Sempervirens BBS (510) 432-7579 as Jonathan Lang
I also participate in both the ILink Tagline [Tags-R-us] and
Shareware conferences, along with both the Fidonet Tagline and
Shareware echoes.
You can also sebd netmail to me as Jonathan Lang@1:125/233 (Fidonet)
If you register, you get my voice phone number to call me for
support.
■ How to Register ■
It would be greatly appreciated if you register your copy of
Cherry Picker. Registration helps keep shareware alive.
Registration for Cherry Picker is only $10. If you want my
Tagline file on disk (44,000+ taglines, ≈2megs text, ≈3megs
Virtual Array) then please send me $15 to cover the disk and
mailing costs. (That includes the $10 registration) To
register, please print out REGISTER.DOC, fill it out and send
it in.
■ Credits ■
Okay, let's give credit where credit is due.
John Hancock is copyright 1992 by The Silicon Frog.
Bluewave is copyright 1992 by Cutting Edge Computing.
OLX and OLXED are copyrighted Mustang Software Inc.
Now, I think that's everyone I mentioned. Now, for the people.
Steven Lang wrote some assembly routines to speed up the sorting
and dupelicate checking. Special thanks to him! His routines are
about four times faster then the same thing is Pascal. It makes
a big difference.
Also, thanks to Nancy H. Miller, sysop of Sempervirens. She
has been a help to me with this and other programs.
And, of course, to everyone who has made comments or suggestions
about Cherry Picker. Without you, I wouldn't kow what to add. ;-)
Thank You for Supporting Shareware!
■ Cherry Picker 2.00 ■ ■ Page 11 ■
