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HISTORY.DOC
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1993-09-12
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Version 1.00 beta 18-Apr-1992
+ Initial release.
Version 1.10 beta 28-May-1992
+ Added FILES.BBS support for file announcements.
The following keywords were added to the configuration
file:
FILESBBS_FileName [full FILES.BBS specification]
FILESBBS_Files [path name of data files]
FILESBBS_AnnounceName [tag name of area]
If FILESBBS_FileName is defined, then this file will also
be searched for new incoming files to announce, in
addition to any .TIC files in the inbound directory. The
format of the FILESBBS file is:
FileName FileDescription
FILESBBS_Files is the directory in which the actual files
reside.
FILESBBS_AnnounceName is the name to use in the
Announcement Definition below when referring to new files
found in the Files.BBS.
If this option is used, ALL FILESBBS_xxxxx statements
must be defined, and in the order of FileName first,
Files, and then AnnounceName.
Up to 40 Files.BBS files may be defined.
+ Added duplicate checking ability via an announce
file. The following keyword was added to the
configuration file:
AnnounceList [full file specification]
This file contains a list of all the files that have been
announced, one file name per line.
It is a good idea to define this if using FILESBBS
statement. It will be checked to prevent duplicate
announcements if you haven't had a chance to move the
files from your "newup" areas since the last run of FAN.
It can be deleted periodically if it grows too large.
Version 1.20 beta 18-Sep-1992
+ Added 'Months' keyword
In order to support multiple languages, each month name
can be customized. See Fan.Cfg for more details.
+ Fixed case sensativity for Area and Announce names.
These names can be any case.
+ Can now define different network addresses on an
area-per-area basis. However, the origin of the
*file* for FILES.BBS files will be the primary
address. For TIC files, it will remain whatever the
'origin' keyword is in the .TIC file.
+ Corrected bug with log levels and log message output
to the screen.
+ Enhanced the description formatting for messages.
Can now specify an optional left and right margin
for the %x token as follows:
%[left_margin:right_margin]x
See Fan.Cfg for more details.
Version 1.21 beta 19-Sep-1992
+ Removed extra carriage-return between announcements
for descriptions using the left/right margin
feature.
Version 1.30 beta 11-Oct-1992
+ Added ability to read *.BAD TICK files and announce
them using the Annouce Name BAD_TICS.
+ Rewrote the documentation FAN.DOC.
+ Removed configuration file keyword 'InboundPath'.
Broke this keyword into the following three paths:
InboundPathTICS
InboundPathFiles
PacketPath
They keyword 'InboundPath' will be obsolete the
first non-beta release. Currently, 'InboundPath'
will be copied to the above three path statements.
Version 1.40 beta 24-Oct-1992
+ Added macro tokens %Y, %y, %M, %m, %D for the year,
month, and day of the actual file being announced.
+ Added 'TickConfigurationFile' keyword to the FAN
configuration file. If defined, FAN will read
information from the Tick's configuration file,
which is necessary if processing *.RAD files.
+ Added 'AnnounceLogFile' to the configuration file.
If defined, all files announced will be logged to
this file.
+ Fixed a bug where FAN became severly confused if
announcing both *.BAD and *.TIC files at the same
time.
+ Changed keyword 'AreaName' to 'MsgAreaName' to
clarify that this is a Message Base area name, and
not a TIC File area name.
The keyword 'AreaName' will be obsolete the first
non-beta release.
+ Added macro tokens %F, %B, %K, and %A for fixed
length strings for filename, bytes, kilobytes, and
TIC area name.
+ Revamped logic when wrapping file descriptions so
that left margin is adjustable for the first line if
other macros force it past the indicated left
margin. Modified example .TPL files to relfect new
changes.
+ Fixed bug where origin line still showed default
address even if the default address was overridden
in the announcement definition.
+ Added 'MaxAnnouncementsPerMessage' keyword to
configuration file. This keyword will limit the
number of files announced in one message. This will
help keep the messages small enough for various mail
processing software.
+ Added 'AppendSequenceNumber' keyword to
configuration file. Some mail processing software
will consider a message a duplicate even if the date
and time stamp is different, but all the other
'header' items are identical. If FAN needs to break
up a message because there are more than
'MaxAnnouncementsPerMessage' files to announce, then
this keyword will instruct FAN to append the phrase
"(n)" (where 'n' is a sequence number) to the end of
the subject line to make the message unique.
Version 1.41 beta 27-Oct-1992
+ Bug fix: was not closing file handle after parsing
Tick Configuration file.
+ Improved error reporting if a file fails to be
opened.
+ Changed default of 75 announcements per message to
40 announcements per message.
+ Bug fix: was incorrectly reporting file open
failure for File Template. Message indicated that
Prefix Template could not be opened. Classic 'cut-
n-paste' error... :-]
+ Added Bill Whitehouse's documented example Tick
configuration file to the FAN archive. This
document helps explain the use of Barry Geller's
Tick configuration keywords.
Version 1.42 beta 30-Oct-1992
+ Bug fix: another error when announcing both *.tic
and *.bad files together. Should now keep track of
correct number of files to announce.
Version 1.43 beta 31-Oct-1992
+ Added %q and %Q macros (total number of all files
announced in bytes and kilobytes, respectively).
Version 1.44 beta 02-Nov-1992
+ Added keyword 'LogStyle' to the FAN Configuration
file. You can now choose between two log formats:
BinkleyTerm or FrontDoor.
Version 1.45 beta 03-Nov-1992
+ Was not initializing 'total bytes' counter in
correct place. This will sometimes give the tokens
%q and %Q an incorrect value.
Version 1.46 beta 09-Nov-1992
+ Was trying to open Tick configuration file even if
it was not defined.
Version 1.50 beta 09-Dec-1992
+ Increased number of FILESBBS areas from 40 to 200.
+ For OS/2, changed the date announced on files from
the access date to the last-write date.
+ Trimmed trailing spaces from FILES.BBS entries
+ Corrected margin error which prevented some
announcement messages from wrapping correctly.
+ Changed configuration verb 'AreaAddress' to
'AddressFrom'. 'AreaAddress' will be obsolete after
beta version.
+ Added ability to send announcements via NetMail.
+ Added configuration verb 'AddressTo'.
+ Added warning message if FAN finds any TIC areas
that are not represented in any Announce Area
Definitions.
+ Added ability to customize the format of the files
log list. This list can now be used as input for
virus scanners or download/upload tracking software.
+ Added new file macro %p. This will insert the full
physical path name of the announced file on your
system.
Version 1.60 beta 13-Feb-1993
+ Bug fix: command line arguments now correctly
override configuration file commands.
+ Added configuration verb [No]PATHkludge. If
defined, the kludge line ^APATH: net/node is written
at the end of *.PKT files.
+ Added configuration verb
[No]PacketEnglishMonthNames. If defined, month
names internal within the headers of *.PKT files
will be forced to English month names. Note:
Squish users should define this verb since Squish
will not correctly identify the date the message was
written if it is not in english.
This does NOT effect the names of the months in the
announcement text of the message itself.
+ Added macro tokens %c and %C which will truncate the
description at the designated left and right margin.
Version 1.61 beta 15-Feb-1993
+ Added ability to expand environment variables within
To, From, Subj, or text body of the announcement
message. New token is: %eVARNAME where VARNAME is
the environment variable name.
Version 1.62 beta 19-Feb-1993
+ Bug fix: If a *.RAD file is created by TIC and the
"hatching file area" is also defined in FAN via the
FILESBBS statements, that file was being announced
twice.
Version 1.63 beta 21-Feb-1993
+ Bug fix: Multiple announcements in one packet were
being written improperly. 4 NULLs instead of 1 were
being written between messages, thus the packet
terminated prematurely.
+ If a file to be announced is in the FILES.BBS file,
but NOT in the directory, it will not be announced.
Version 1.70 beta 24-Feb-1993
+ WARNING!! Your FAN.CFG configuration file is now
broken! The keyword 'Months' now contains an index
number.
This gives FAN the ability to use multiple month
lists. Enables the use of multilingual
announcements using one configuration file or the
use of different month name formats within one
message (i.e., the abbriviation Jan can be used in
the same message with the full name January. See
new format of the 'Months' verb in the configuration
file and the new message tokens %M1, %M2, ..., %M9
for more details. This new capability is also
described in the documentation FAN.DOC.
+ Added new command line qualifier:
/FileAreas = ( Areaname1, Areaname2, ... )
This will restrict file announcements to the areas
listed on the command line, regardless of the file
areas defined within the FAN configuration file.
See FAN.DOC for more details.
+ Clarified a few log messages when indicating which
files are actually announced.
+ Bug fix: file names were being written to the
AnnouceList file over and over again, even if they
had been announced before. This caused the
AnnounceList file to grow much larger than it
should.
+ Revamped the example configuration file (FAN.CFG)
+ New Appendix C added to FAN.DOC. This gives an
example of using environment variables with FAN
announcements.
Version 1.71 beta 25-Feb-1993
+ Added two new keywords: MaximusFileAreaFileName and
MaximusFileArea. The use of these keywords will
allow you to use the Maximus control file for file
area definitions instead of listing each area
separately using the FAN FILESBBS keywords. See the
FAN.CFG example configuration file for more details.
Version 1.72 beta 27-Feb-1993
+ Bug fix: Removed keyword
[no]PacketEnglishMonthNames from the configuration
file. This was in violation of Fidonet *.PKT
standards described within the document FTS-
0001.015. Also fixed bug where MonthIndex was
overriding use of standard month syntax in header
portion of packet. This could create an invalid
packet if the month names were too long. All month
names used internally in the packet are now standard
english 3-character abbreviations.
Please note: you must remove the keyword
[no]PacketEnglishMonthNames from your configuration
file! FAN will report an error and abort processing
if you do not.
Version 1.73 beta 28-Feb-1993
+ Bug fix: Inaccurately checked the trailing
backslash of the Download pathname when reading in
the Maximus file area control file. If there was no
trailing backslash, the last character of the
pathname was truncated.
+ Added support for Opus users when reading the file
area control file. Will check for the keyword
"Download" as well as "Download Path" in the file
area control file.
Version 1.80 beta 03-Mar-1993
+ Added the following keywords to the configuration
file:
DefaultMonthIndex
LogMonthIndex
AnnounceLogMonthIndex
+ Added new special Announce Area Name: ASCII. Any
announcements to this area will be written to a text
file, and not a *.PKT file. Announcements written
to this file will NOT be split if the
MaxAnnouncementsPerMessage is used. This provides
an infinetly flexible way to write file information
into a variety of different ascii text files in a
variety of file formats. This could include usage
from news announcements into QWK messages to input
for virus scanning software. See FAN.CFG for
examples.
+ Bug Fix: freed memory being used by unformatted
text lines from the FileTemplate. If a large number
of files were being announced in many different
message areas, this could have resulted in memory
allocation and/or "out of memory" errors.
+ Added "None" value to the following statements:
PrefixTemplate
FileTemplate
SuffixTemplate
Thus, it is now possible to "undefine" the default
templates for any given Announcement Definition.
+ Bug fix: If an error occurs during the creation of
a *.PKT file (missing template file, invalid tokens,
etc.), the incomplete *.PKT file will be deleted.
+ Added special Announce names ALL_TIC_AREAS and
ALL_FILESBBS_AREAS.
+ Removed the following obsolete keywords from the
configuration file in preparation for the first non-
beta release:
InboundPath (now InboundPathTICS,
InboundPathFiles,
PacketPath)
AreaName (now MsgAreaName)
AreaAddress (now AddressFrom)
+ Bug fix: Added page numbers and headers to the
documentation.
Version 1.90 beta 10-Mar-1993
+ Added new command line flag /TestMode. In test
mode, all *.PKT's will be written to
[MsgAreaName].TST ascii text files instead. No
entries will be written to the AnnounceList file or
AnnounceLogFile, and *.RAD files will NOT be
deleted. If a log file is defined, log entries will
be made to the file TEST.LOG in the current
directory.
+ Added ability to include comments within template
files. Commented many of the template files
included within the distribution archive FAN.
Comment lines are identified by a semicolon in the
first column of the template file.
+ Reconstructed template macro syntax. All % macros
are now replaced with a more flexible syntax:
[macroname, macro options, ...]
Added many more macros and features.
+ New utility: TPLCONV.EXE. This program will convert
old style template files (FAN 1.80/beta or earlier)
to the new style syntax (FAN 1.90/beta and above).
Version 1.91 beta 15-Mar-1993
+ Bug fix: point addressing was not working
correctly. Added fidonet packet kludge lines ^aFMPT
and ^aTOPT.
+ If the description is missing from a *.TIC file, FAN
would abort processing with an error message.
Instead, FAN now will continue processing and use
the description "<No Description Available>" in the
file announcement.
Version 1.92 beta 02-Apr-1993
+ Bug fix: DOS version only. Due to a caveat in the
difference of memory management by DOS vs. OS/2,
some token macros were not being parsed correctly
from the template files (.TPL).
+ Bug fix: if a TIC and/or FILESBBS area appeared
more than once in an Announcement Definition, files
for these areas would be announced multiple times.
This can easily happen if you specify ALL_TIC_AREAS
or ALL_FILESBBS_AREAS and also specify TIC/FILESBBS
area names separately. Now, a warning message will
be logged and files be properly announced once.
Version 1.93 beta 06-Apr-1993
+ Bug fix: I goofed with the version number on the
previous FAN release. THIS one is really version
1.93/beta!
+ Added configuration file keyword
[no]ProcessBadTics.
+ Bug fix: if a template file was not specified for
the AnnounceLogTemplate or FileTemplate, the built-
in template still used the old-style macros.
+ Bug fix: ^aTOPT and ^aFMPT should only be added to
netmail messages, and not echomail messages also.
+ Added configuration file keyword
[no]INTLkludge
Version 1.94 beta 07-May-1993
+ Changed keyword 'Address' to 'PrimaryAddress'. The
keyword 'Address' will be obsolete the first non-
beta release.
+ Added REGISTER program.
+ Added new required keywords in the configuration
file:
RegistrationKey
SystemName
SysopName
Version 1.95 beta 10-May-1993
+ Added two byte zero integer at end of packet file
instead of a one byte null.
Version 1.99.1 beta 1-Jun-1993
+ Added new configuration verbs:
[no]PID
[no]Tear/OriginLines
[no]Seen-Bys
+ Full rewrite of message creation routines.
Supported message formats now include:
*.PKT
*.MSG
Squish
Ascii text files
+ Added new configuration verbs:
DefaultMsgAreaType
MsgAreaType
+ Added new macro [fileareadesc].
+ Added descriptions to FILES.BBS file areas. New
configuration verb: FILESBBS_Description.
+ Added the following optional configuration verbs:
MaximusMsgAreaFileName
SquishCfgFileName
AreasBBSFileName
+ Autodetection for netmail path added. If you use
Squish or Maximus control files, the netmail path
will be read from these. Otherwise, if you write
announcements directly to the netmail message base
(i.e., you do not use *.PKT format), then you will
have to define MsgAreaType and MsgAreaPath in the
Announcement definition for NETMAIL announcements.
+ Restructured FAN.CFG example file.
+ Configuration verb ASCIIFileName is now obsolete.
Use MsgAreaPath instead.
+ Added ability to use wildcard matching on Announce
area names
+ Added new configuration verb within announcement
definitions: Exclude. Since areas can now be wild-
carded, areas can also be specified to be excluded
from the expanded list of areas to announce.
Wildcards can also be used with the 'Exclude' verb.
+ Removed the 32-bit OS/2 version. I found very
little gain in performance and resources to warrant
the time to test and maintain both versions. There
is no longer a FAN16.EXE and FAN32.EXE. FAN.EXE
will run under both OS/2 and DOS.
+ Removed 200 limitation on FILESBBS file area
definitions.
+ Restructured internal handling of file areas in
preparation for changes to support RA's file
database format.
+ Bug fix: When TossLogFile was defined, duplicate
message areas were written to the file. Only unique
message tag names are now written.
Version 1.99.2 beta 2-Jun-1993
+ Removed Tear/Originline configuration verb. This
would produce an invalid echomail message since the
origin line would be missing. Imporved support for
the ^PID construct.
Version 1.99.3 beta 6-Jun-1993
+ Bug fix: Under OS/2, FAN would exit with an access
violation when creating *.PKT type announcements.
Under DOS this could hang the machine. This
happened if the MsgAreaPath is undefined (which it
should be for *.PKT type messages--the PacketPath is
used instead), FAN would choke on the internal zero
address for MsgAreaPath.
+ Bug fix: Internal Announce area tag BAD_TICS was
being ignored.
+ Bug fix: Error in tag name wildcard expansion. If
Tick or Maximus configuration file was not defined
in the configuration file, no Announce areas would
be defined! Orientation recoded to check announce
tag name at time of announcement, and not during FAN
configuration process.
+ Dropped keywords ALL_TIC_AREAS and
ALL_FILESBBS_AREAS. With the wildcard matching
ability now coded into FAN, these two keywords were
causing more confusion than help.
Version 1.99.4 beta 5-Aug-1993
+ Added /[no]LogWarnings qualifier and configuration
file verb. There are several error messages which
are considered "warnings" which can be irritating if
you have configured FAN the way you wanted to, and
yet these messages are continually written to the
log file. An example of such situations are:
- A reference to a FILES.BBS which does not exist.
- TIC file areas which are in your TIC configuration
file, but not within any FAN Announce areas, etc.
A good rule of thumb is to log all warnings while
setting up FAN for the first few days, and then run
FAN with NoLogWarnings when you feel satisfied
things are running smoothly.
+ Clarified and added some messages when using
/TestMode
Version 1.99.5 beta 8-Aug-1993
+ Added [no]VerboseTearLine configuration file verb.
+ Added SortMethod configuration file verb. Files
within announcement messages can now be sorted
alphabetically, or grouped by TIC/FILESBBS area
name.
+ Added GroupTemplate configuration verb. If sorted
by Groups, this template will be used as a header
for each new group.
+ Added support for SEAL (;FileSpec verb used in TIC's
configuration TIC.CFG). If you use SEAL, file area
name descriptions will automatically be filled from
TIC.CFG.
+ Added FileAreaDescriptions configuration file verb.
For non-SEAL users, added ability to read file area
descriptions from a flat ascii text file in
RAID.CFG/FILEBONE.NA format.
+ When using /TestMode, removed "already announced"
check for FILES.BBS areas. The AnnounceList will
not be checked now in /TestMode.
Version 1.99.6 beta 14-Aug-1993
+ Bug fix: Will search for TK*.TIC now instead of
*.TIC. Some BBS front-end programs (such as Portal
of Power) have files with the extension *.TIC that
are not in standard TIC (a la Barry Geller) format.
+ Bug fix: For FILES.BBS processing, FAN will now
ignore counters between brackets (i.e., '[' and ']')
and the special download byte/time tokens "/bt",
"/tb", "/b", "/t", etc.
Version 1.99.7 beta 17-Aug-1993
+ Bug fix: The change to search for TK*.TIC files
broke FAN for other TIC-like processing programs,
such as AllFix (which produces AF*.TIC files). The
configuration verb TickFileMask and BadTickFileMask
has been added to make this user-selectable.
+ Temporary "work-around": If a Squish message base
cannot be locked, FAN will still attempt to open the
area instead of aborting and report a warning that
the message coule not be locked. If the area is
*really* locked, the open will fail. However, for
some un-yet explained reason, the lock on a Squish
message will sometimes fail under MS-DOS. I have
not yet narrowed this phenomenon down to the actual
cause of the lock failure.
Version 1.99.8 beta 21-Aug-1993
+ Bug fix: If description was missing from the SEAL
verb ';FileSpec' in the TIC configuration file, FAN
would exit with an error message. FAN will now
print a warning message and continue processing.
+ Bug fix: If writing directory to *.MSG or Squish
message base, kludge lines (^a) were terminated with
a carriage return (^r). The ^r is only necessary
for *.PKT messages, and have been removed from
*.MSG/Squish message bases when writing kludge
(control information) lines.
+ Bug fix: Zone number was being included in address
on Seen-By lines. Seen-By lines now only include
net/node portion of address.
+ Added new configuration keyword
'DefaultMsgAttributes'. If 'Attributes' are not
defined within an Announcement Definition, then the
attributes will default to 'DefaultMsgAttributes'.
+ Added four new message attributes:
F = Forward
R = Read/Received
S = Sent
X = Scanned (Squish only)
Version 2.00 12-Sep-1993
+ First non-beta release.