PCMania 30/PCMania CD30.iso/sharewar/util/cdscan/cds.doc

Text File | 1993-01-26 | 37KB | 889 lines

CD SCAN Version 3.00

Copyright (c) 1992, 1993
By Joseph Dunn.
All rights reserved.

USER MANUAL
26 January 1993

                           CONTENTS
Chapter                                                   Page

CONTENTS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   1

Foreword . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   2

Credits. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   2

Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   3

1 Installation and System Requirements . . . . . . . . . .   4

2 How Cd Scan Works. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   5

3 Getting Started. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   5

4 Entering a New Cd. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   5

5 Exiting Cd Scan. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   7

6 Browsing Your Cd Collection. . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   7

6.1 Re-sorting the Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   8

6.2 Deleting a Cd. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   8

7 Displaying a Cd. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   8

7.1 Editing a Cd . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   9

8 Tagging Tracks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  10

9 Searching. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  11

10 Print Menu. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  12

10.1 Printing the Cd Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  12

10.2 Printing the Full Catalogue . . . . . . . . . . . . .  12

10.3 Printing a Text File. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  13

10.4 Determining the Output. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  13

10.5 Printer Control . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  13

11 Utilities Menu. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  14

11.1 Optimising the Data File. . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  14

11.2 Undeleting Cds. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  15

11.3 Merging Catalogues. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  15

11.4 Rebuild Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  16

11.5 Calculating Statistics. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  16

12 Errors and Troubleshooting. . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  16

Final Word . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  17



                           Foreword

This project has taken over a year of hard work to complete. I
would like to express my appreciation of your registration of
this software.

A bit about me: I am a blind student studying at The Flinders
University of South Australia. I enjoy listening to music,
playing drums and being a friend. I hope to complete my B.SC.
degree and major in Computer Science and use this as a basis
to  go on writing software to aid the disabled.


                            Credits
Special thanks to:
- The Lord Jesus Christ who is my inspiration and    saviour,
     to whom I owe everything. (Psalm 139, Colossians 3:17)
-  To my family for their support and patience,
- To Rohan Lewis for suggestions and testing of this version
     and for the publication of the print manual,
- To Tony Galliford for his help with colour choices, the
     coding  for the mouse support routines and the
     preparation of    this  manual,
- To Mark George for his help with testing this version,
- To Darrin Smith for his help with debugging some tricky
     pieces of code,
- To you for choosing this software.


IBM is a registered trademark of International Business
Machines Corporation.                         Introduction

Cd Scan is a powerful music cataloguing system specifically
designed for cataloguing a compact disk collection. The
program  has been designed with specific goals in mind: I
wanted quick  access to any track in my collection, I wanted
an efficient means  of browsing titles and artists, to be able
to calculate times for  recording purposes and to readily be
able to print lists of  either full cd data or just artist and
title lists.

Up to 2000 cds each containing up to 40 tracks may be
accommodated on this version.

The program includes a powerful and flexible search facility
and  a quick scan browse facility which allows the index to be
sorted  by either the cd title or the artist name at the press
of a key.  The program also includes a facility to print a
short or long  form listing of all compact disks.

You will never have to guess how many tracks can fit on the
side  of a tape again because Cd Scan also gives you the
ability to  calculate track times for recording purposes and a
special  "Pasting" function is available to aid in creating
cassette  labels.

A Utilities Menu offers maintenance features like rebuilding
the  index if it is corrupted or accidentally deleted,
Optimisation to  ensure the most efficient access to your cd
collection, the  ability to merge two catalogues together and
a function to  calculate some statistics about your collection
like average  track time etc.

You may also "lock" Cd Scan so that if you are using it in a
library or other public display, data may be protected from
unauthorised editing.             1 Installation and System Requirements

To run Cd Scan you need an IBM compatible with at least 384k
ram  and DOS 2.11 or later. A hard disk is recommended for
fastest and  most reliable performance. Cd Scan is distributed
on a single  floppy disk. The files on this disk should be
placed in a  directory by themselves. For the uninitiated, a
directory is a  place on the disk which contains files
belonging to a particular  group, i.e. all these files belong
to Cd Scan and therefore  should be placed in an area by
themselves to distinguish there  function from say your word
processor files. To make a directory  and place Cd Scan into
it do the following:

1.   Exit any application you may be running and get to the
     DOS  prompt. It may look something like:
     C>
2.   From this point type:
     CD\
     (after pressing Enter) type:
     MD CD-SCAN
     (after pressing Enter), type:
     CD\CD-SCAN
     (and press Enter again).
3.   Place the disk with the Cd Scan files on it into drive A
     and  type:
     COPY A:\*.*
     then press Enter again.
4.   Once you have been returned to the DOS prompt, you may
     run  Cd Scan by typing the command:
     CDS


See your DOS manual about creating batch files if you wish to
run  Cd Scan from a batch file or see the appropriate
documentation if  you wish to run Cd Scan from a menu program.

I have included a sample batch file which can be typed in from
the DOS prompt to run Cd Scan from any directory and which
will  start Cd Scan up in monochrome mode. (To start it up in
colour  mode just omit the -m command line option.) I am
assuming you have a subdirectory for your batch files  called
C:\BATS.

cd\bats
copy con cds.Bat
@echo off
cls
c:
cd\cd-scan
cds -m
cd\
^z

(The last line is a Ctrl-z.)                      2 How Cd Scan Works

Cd Scan maintains two special files on disk, one contains the
main text of the compact disk data and the other is an
electronic  index for quick access to the cds. This file
basically contains a  reference pointer for all cds. You, the
user will not directly  come in to contact with either files
but you must be made aware  of their presence and warned not
to modify, move or delete these  special data files. Cd scan
also creates text files for printing or editing and these will
be discussed in a later section.


                       3 Getting Started

Cd Scan supports both Monochrome and colour monitors. If you
wish to start Cd Scan in monochrome mode, suitable for a black
and white monitor or a lap-top, add the -m command line option
to start the program up appropriately.

To run Cd Scan in "Locked" mode, add the -l command line
option. In "Locked" mode, you will not be permitted to modify
any data whatsoever.

Run Cd Scan by typing the appropriate command, e.g. cds -l -m,
or by  choosing it from your menu system.

Your screen will clear and a menu box will appear in the
middle of your  screen with the option "3 Browse Cd Index"
highlighted. By pressing  the up and down cursor keys, or by
using a mouse to point to an  option and pressing the left
button once you can move the  highlight bar to any of the six
options. To select an option, either press the left mouse
button again or press Enter. Alternatively, you can press the
number next to the option to highlight it and select it in one
go. To cancel an option at any time, press the Escape key or
the  right mouse button.

At this point, selecting some of these items will result in a
warning being displayed to the effect that your index is
empty.  This is because your index currently contains no cds.
In fact,  the only options available to you as a new user are
the option of  Entering a New Cd and the option of exiting the
program. Items  may be selected from sub-menus in the same way
as the Main Menu,  the first item of each sub-menu will return
you to the Main Menu  as will the Escape key or right mouse
button. (Options such as  Utilities Menu are examples of sub-
menus).


                      4 Entering a New Cd

Well, lets get the show on the road! Lets begin by entering a
compact disk into the system. Select "Enter a New Cd" by using
the mouse or keyboard as discussed in the previous section. Cd
Scan keeps track of several items of information about your
cds.  These are: The Artist, Title, Track times, Track names,
and a  short comment about the cd. If a cd contains various
artists (such as many compilation cds), these may also be
recorded.


When entering any data, the following keys may be used:

- Left and Right cursor keys: move cursor left or right    one
     space,
- Backspace: move the cursor one space to the left and
     delete  the character there,
- Delete: delete the character at the current cursor
     position,
- Home and End: move the cursor to the first or last character
     in the    field,
- Insert: toggle between insert or over-strike mode,
- Enter/Tab: give completed data to program,
- Escape: quit operation.


Some brief notes:
1. The cursor is the flashing square which appears when you
     are  asked for a response and which indicates where the
     next character  will be placed on the screen.
2. Insert mode is where characters typed are inserted before
     other characters on the line rather than over the top of
     them as  in over-strike.
3. You will notice that all characters typed will be converted
     to  uppercase. This feature standardises all data as many
     publishing  companies can't make up their minds about how
     the information on  cd covers should be printed. If all
     text is in one case it is  faster to search through.
4. The time for a track must be entered in the form mmss (you
     may omit leading zeros, i.e. 355 is the same as 0355 and
     50 is the same as 0050. If you press Enter on a time
     field it will be left blank. Some cds don't have a record
     of the  track times.
5. Text fields may be up to 60 characters in length and the
     comment may be up to 5 lines of 60 characters.
6. The left mouse button is interpreted as the Enter key in
     the  context of editing or accepting default responses
     such as in  filename prompts. The right mouse button is
     interpreted as the  Escape key at all relevant times.


The first item you will be asked for is the Artist's name. If
you are cataloguing a various artist cd, just enter a # as the
artist's name. This tells the program to prompt you for the
artist of each track. After you have typed in the Artist name
and pressed the Enter  key, (as in all cases of data entry),
Cd Scan will then respond  with a prompt asking you to type
the Title of the cd. If you make  a mistake during the entry
of data and don't realise it in time  to correct it, i.e.
you've pressed Enter, don't worry, you can  correct it later.
(see 7.1). After you have typed in the  Title of the cd and
pressed ENTER the screen will display a box  with three
columns in it and the artist and title centred above  the box.
This box will become familiar to you as you use the  program.
This screen will be referred to as the "Display Screen".  The
three columns are the track number (1 to 40), the time
(mm:ss) and the track name. You will be asked to Enter the
second  two pieces of information, i.e. the track duration and
name. If  you don't wish to enter a time in, leave it blank by
just  pressing Enter. (Remember you may omit the colon and
leading zeros when entering a time.) If you specified that the
cd contained various artists by entering a # at the first
prompt, you will also be prompted for the artist of each
track. If you leave this field blank, Cd Scan will record it
as "NONE SPECIFIED".

Once all the tracks have been entered in, press  Enter on a
name field and you will be asked to type in a comment  for the
cd. If you don't wish to include a comment then just  press
Enter until the box disappears or press the Escape key.  Such
information which might be included in the comment box could
be the copyright date, a favourite song or a music category
etc.  Once the data for a cd has been entered, the program
will store  the cd on disk and add its reference to the index.
A Various Artist cd will be denoted by "VARIOUS ARTISTS" when
browsing the index (See chapter 6). Cd Scan will
automatically sort the index each time an addition is made
Repeat  this Enter process until you have several cds in the
index.


                       5 Exiting Cd Scan

If you have had enough for this session and wish to Leave the
program, you may select this option from the main menu or just
press the Escape key or right mouse button until you are asked
if  this is your real intention. If you press Escape again,
the  operation will be cancelled and you will not exit the
program. If  you answer y for yes or hit the left mouse button
you will leave  Cd Scan and return to DOS.

Note: For all (y/n) prompts, the right  mouse button is
equivalent to a negative response, i.e. pressing  "n" or the
Escape key while the left button is equivalent to a  positive
response, i.e. pressing "y".


                 6 Browsing Your Cd Collection

Once the index contains at least one cd you will be able to
browse. Select Browse from the main menu and two boxes will be
displayed, the number of cds in the index will be written
above  these boxes and the bottom line (status line) will
display  several options.

The two boxes (or windows) contain a list of artist names and
cd  titles. A highlight bar will appear marking an artist and
title. You may browse through the cds using the following
keys:

- Up/Down: move the highlight bars up or down one cd,
- Pgup/Pgdn: move the bars forward or backward a page at    a
     time,
- Home/End: move the bars to the first or last cd in the
     index.
- Tab: swap windows and re-sort the index.
- Escape: return to the main menu.


You may also use the mouse to point to a cd and press the left
button to highlight it. To display the previous or next screen
of  cds using the mouse, point to the top or bottom border of
the  windows and press the left button.

Note: the cd highlighted will be referred to as the current
cd.


                   6.1 Re-sorting the Index

When you press the Tab key or press the left mouse button when
pointing to the "tab-swap windows" message on the status line
while browsing the index, the two windows will be swapped  and
the index sorted by whatever is in the left hand window. For
example, if the index is currently sorted by the artist name
(the  artist names being displayed in the left hand window),
then these  will be moved to the right hand window and the
titles will be  moved to the left hand window and the index
re-sorted. The  highlight bar will be placed on the same cd in
its new sorted  position in the index. When you exit the
browse screen, if Cd Scan is not "Locked", any  modifications
to the index will be written to disk so that next  time you
use Cd Scan, it will remember the state of the index.


                       6.2 Deleting a Cd

If you wish to delete a cd altogether, you can do this from
the  browse screen. Just make the cd you wish to delete the
current  one, i.e. highlight it, then either press Ctrl-d or
use the mouse  to point to the option and press the left
button as usual. If Cd Scan is not "Locked", You  will be
asked if you really want to go ahead with the deletion  and
then according to your response, the appropriate action will
be taken. (Don't worry if you delete a cd accidentally, you
will  be able to undelete it later from the Utilities Menu.


                       7 Displaying a Cd

If you press Enter on the current cd or press the left mouse
button while pointing to the highlighted cd, the familiar box
first encountered in the "Enter a New Cd" option along with
several other items will be displayed. The first time of the
first track will be highlighted. This highlight bar indicates
the  current track. You may move this highlight bar up and
down with  the following keys:

- Up/Down: move to next or previous track,
- Pgup/Pgdn: move to the previous or next screen of    tracks
     if  appropriate,
- Home/End: move to the first or last track on the cd.


You can also use the mouse to highlight a time by pointing to
the  track and pressing the left mouse button.

If the cd contains various artists, the usual position for the
cd artist will be replaced by the artist of each track as you
scroll through the tracks. The words "VARIOUS ARTISTS" will
appear above this.


                       7.1 Editing a Cd

Cd scan allows you to edit the contents of a cd. This is
useful if you find that you've miss-typed a name or if you
missed some information. You are even permitted to Reorder the
tracks just in case they were printed on the cd cover in a
different order to what they were actually recorded on the cd.
This option also allows you to add tracks that may have
inadvertently been left off when you initially entered the cd.

The edit options are accessed by pressing Alt+e or by pressing
the left mouse button while pointing to the option on the
status line.

If Cd Scan is not "Locked", pressing Alt-e or selecting this
option with the mouse will  display options corresponding to
the field names that can be  edited and the options of
reordering and adding tracks.

You may select:
- a to correct the artist name,
- t for the title,
- n for the current track name,
- c for the comment or
- l for the length of the current track.
- r to reorder the tracks,
- Enter to Add tracks.
- Remember you can also make a selection using the mouse.


Once a selection is made, you are permitted to edit the
selected  field.

If you delete all the characters when editing the name of a
track, you will be asked if you really want to delete the
track. According to your response, the appropriate action will
be taken. If you delete the track, all other tracks will be
moved up one position. If you delete all the tracks on the cd
then the empty cd will be deleted from the index and obviously
irrecoverable.

If the cd contains various artists then selecting a for artist
will allow you to edit the artist of the highlighted track.

To reorder the tracks, simply highlight the track you wish to
move using the keyboard or mouse, select the edit options,
select reorder, then highlight the track before which you want
to insert, finally, press Enter or press the left mouse button
on the highlighted track. The initial track will be inserted
before the second track you selected and the rest of the
tracks will be shifted appropriately.

You will not be permitted to delete either the title or main
artist of the cd, only edit them. If you attempt to delete
these fields, they will just miraculously reappear when you
press Enter.

When you return to the browse screen by pressing Enter     or
Escape from the display screen, the changes will be    written
to disk. The index will be re-sorted if need be only when you
exit the browse screen. This means that if you edit the artist
or title of a cd which causes them to take a different order
in the index, they will not be moved until you exit the browse
screen and go back in to it.




                       8 Tagging Tracks

Once you have a cd displayed on the screen, you may use Cd
Scan's functions to help you compile a radio program, create a
tape label or just create a list of your favourite tracks from
your collection.

The tag function may be viewed like the Program facility
offered on most Cd Players. If you tag a track, it is marked
for pasting to a text file and its time is added to the Total
Time Box. You may unmark the track and subtract its time just
by tagging the track again. Alternatively, if you wish to
create a label containing all but one or two tracks, you only
need mark those two tracks and then use the Invert function to
invert the status of all the tracks on this cd, i.e. unmark
all marked tracks and mark all unmarked tracks and add the
time of just the marked tracks to the Total Time Box.

To mark a track and add its time to the Total Time Box, simply
make the track the current one by highlighting it and then by
pressing the Space Bar. To unmark and subtract this track's
time, just press the Space Bar again. To perform a tag invert,
just press and hold down the Alt key and press the Space Bar.
As described above, the status of all the tracks will be
inverted.

The tag facility is also selectable via the mouse as usual.

This facility allows the text of the track number, time, name
and possibly artist,  to be added to a text file for later
printing or editing. An asterisk will be placed in the right
margin to  indicate that a track has been tagged for pasting.
When you use the Invert function (Alt-Space), you will notice
the asterisks change to reflect the new status of each track.
When you exit  this screen and return to the browse index, you
will be asked to  enter a filename. A default name will be
offered, either accept  this name or edit the field to change
it. The artist's name, cd  title and all tagged tracks will be
added to this file. To edit this file you must use a text
editor of some sort,  although you can print it as it is from
the Print Menu.

If this file is not deleted, it will be added to each time you
Paste a track to it. You are given the option to delete this
file  from the "Text File" option on the Print Menu.

Times will be accumulated as different cds are displayed. To
clear the time box and unmark all tracks on the displayed cd,
press the Delete, (Del), key.

Note: Times will not be accumulated above 99:59. If an attempt
is  made to add times that total more than this, or to
subtract times  until total is less than 0 then an error
message will alert you.  The Time box must then be cleared
using Del.

Play with this tag function and practice tagging tracks and
creating text files of your favourite songs. Remember you may
even return to the browse screen by  pressing Enter (or
Escape) and selecting another cd. Notice that  the time box is
not cleared. Make sure you clear the time box if  you just
want the total of one cd.


                          9 Searching

Cd Scan allows you to search for any part of any field in the
catalogue. Select "Search Menu" from the Main Menu and you
will be  given the options of searching the different fields.
Select the  field you wish to search and enter the text to be
located. The text may appear anywhere in the field.

If you select Artist, all various artist cds will also be
searched.

Selecting the "Track Length" field allows you to  either
search  for all tracks which are a specific length, which are
in a range  of lengths, less than a given length or longer
than a given  length. Here are some examples of how track
length searches are  entered:

1. 233 - search for all cds containing tracks exactly    02:33
     in length.
2. <30 - search for all cds containing tracks of    length <
     30 seconds.
3. >1000 - search for all cds containing tracks with    length
     >  10 minutes.
4. 233-302 - search for all cds containing tracks    whose
     lengths are in the range 02:33 to 03:02    inclusive.


An example of entering a time specification is given on the
status line when you choose this option.

Note: Searching by artist or title will be remarkably faster
as  these fields are indexed.

Once the search has taken place, the results will be presented
in the same  form as the browse screen. See chapters 6 and 7.


                         10 Print Menu

Printing is very useful because it gets the words out of the
computers grubby hands and onto paper like we are all used to.
The print facility offers you the options of printing an
artist  list containing a list of artist names and titles, a
full compact  disk list containing all the information you
entered except the  comments, the ability to print a text file
like the one you  pasted tracks to (see chapter 8), directing
the output to a file or to  the printer and sending a special
command string to the printer.


                  10.1 Printing the Cd Index

Selecting this option will print a list containing the artist
names and titles of all your cds. The output will be directed
to  a text file or to the printer, as is determined by the
setting of  the option on the "Print Menu". The list will be
printed in a  similar form and in the same order as the browse
presentation,  i.e. if your index is sorted by cd title then
the cd titles will  be in the left column otherwise the artist
names will be in the  left column. The pages will be
automatically numbered and a  heading printed at the top of
each page.


               10.2 Printing the Full Catalogue

Selecting this option will print a full listing of all your
cds,  i.e. each cd will be listed in the order specified by
the browse  presentation. All the information will be printed
except the  comments. Pages will be automatically numbered and
a heading will  be printed at the top of each page. Pages will
be formatted so  that no cds will be printed across a page
boundary. The output  destination will be determined by the
option on the "Print Menu".


                   10.3 Printing a Text File

If you used the Paste Track facility discussed in chapter 8
then you  may print the text file created by selecting this
option. If you  select "Text File", You will be asked for the
filename and  offered a default name. Either select this name
or edit it to  change it. the output will only be to the
printer as the file is  already in a suitable format to be
edited. After printing this  file, you will be asked if you
wish to delete it. If you respond  affirmatively, the file
will be deleted and any subsequent pastes  will be written to
a new file. If you respond negatively or just  press Escape,
the file will be left intact and any subsequent  pastes will
be appended to the end of the old file.


                  10.4 Determining the Output

Selecting this option simply changes the destination of the
print  options, namely "Artist & Title List" and "Full Cd
Catalogue". No immediate action is taken when you press Enter
on this option  except that the option changes to reflect the
current destination  i.e. either "Output to Printer" or
"Output to File".

You will notice the effect of this option when you select the
options that depend on this one. If you have chosen to send
the  output to a text file then you will be asked for the
filename to  write the data to. A default filename is offered,
either select  it or edit it to change it. If you have chosen
to send the output  to the printer then you will be asked to
align the paper to the  "top of forms" position, i.e. line the
paper up so that printing  will begin at the top of the page
so that page numbering and  headings will be printed in the
correct place on the page.

Notes:
1. The print facility assumes you are using A4 paper and
     prints 60 lines to a page.
2. A printer error will result if you  attempt to print
     without paper or if the printer is off line.  Press a
     key when you have fixed the problem or press Escape to
     cancel printing.


                     10.5 Printer Control

When you select this option, you will be prompted to enter
codes  to send to the printer. You will need to refer to your
printer's  documentation to determine what codes to send. Once
you know what  control codes to send, the characters can be
generated by holding  down the Alt key and pressing the
corresponding number on the  numeric keypad. For example, to
send control code 15, hold down  the Alt key and type 15 on
the numeric keypad then press Enter.  You will be asked if you
want to send the string and according to  your response an
attempt is made to send the string to the  printer. This
facility is useful for setting up your printer for  say a tape
label for which compressed print is appropriate. If  you have
trouble generating the characters with the numeric  keypad,
check the state of your Numlock key (it should be on).


                       11 Utilities Menu

This menu offers such facilities as optimisation, undeletion,
merging, rebuilding a corrupt or missing index and statistical
analysis of your collection.

Note: If Cd Scan is "Locked" then the only valid option will
     be Calculating Statistics.


                 11.1 Optimising the Data File

Note: If you wish to undelete any cds, this must be done
before  Optimise is selected, see 11.2.

Before I discuss what Optimisation does, you need to
understand a  bit about the way Cd Scan stores its
information. I mentioned  earlier about an index file, a file
containing a list of  reference pointers to the main text. The
index file is generally  the file which undergoes the most
modification when adding or  modifying data. In fact, when a
cd is deleted, its reference  pointer is just removed from the
index and placed in a special  deletion tracking file allowing
undeletion which will be  discussed soon. The information
stored in the main data file is  not modified in any way, this
eliminates the possibility of disk  error and minimises disk
operations. When a cd is modified, a new  copy of the cd is
added to the end of the data file and the old  pointer in the
index is updated to point to the new copy. After  many
modifications have been made, the speed of the program may  be
affected. This is where Optimisation comes in. What
Optimisation does is reads each cd from the index and writes a
new copy of the data file, writing the cds in their correct
alphabetic order and eliminating obsolete data. Optimisation
need  only be performed when many modifications have been
made.

When Optimise is selected from the Utilities Menu a backup of
the  catalogue is automatically made. You must not disturb the
disk  activity in any way until the Optimisation is complete
or data  may be lost and irrecoverable.

Note: With a large catalogue, an XT type computer or a floppy
disk  system may take a while to perform the Optimisation.
Please be  patient and don't disrupt the operation.

After Optimisation has finished, searching and browsing will
be  more efficient and the main data file will probably be
smaller.  If something does go wrong during Optimisation the
old files  which were renamed with the BAK extension may be
renamed with the  DAT extension and the old catalogue
restored. See your DOS manual  with regard to renaming files.


                      11.2 Undeleting Cds

If you accidentally deleted a cd or you just decide that you
want  back a cd which has been deleted, and if you haven't
Optimised  the catalogue, you may Undelete it. When "Undelete
Cds" is selected  from the Utilities Menu an attempt to locate
a deletion tracking  file is made. If found, you will be asked
if you wish to undelete  any cds contained in this file. If
you undelete the cds at this  point they will be added to the
index again and will be accessible. If you choose not to
undelete the cds at this point  and decide to Optimise the
catalogue they will be lost forever as  the obsolete data will
be removed from the main data file.  (obsolete data includes
deleted cds or old copies of a cd which  have since been
modified). The Deletion Tracking File DELETED.DAT  will be
deleted when the catalogue is Optimised.


                    11.3 Merging Catalogues

This facility allows two catalogues to be merged into one. If
you  know someone who has already catalogued some cds which
you have  obtained and don't wish to re-type all of the
details, you may  incorporate that complete catalogue into
your own.

Warning! Read Carefully to avoid disaster: Rename the
catalogue files to be  merged before copying them into your
CD-SCAN directory as  follows:


REN CD.DAT CD.MRG
REN CD_INDEX.DAT CD_INDEX.MRG


Then copy these files to your CD-SCAN directory as follows:

COPY *.MRG C:\CD-SCAN


Finally, run Cd Scan and select "Merge Catalogues" from the
Utilities  Menu. When you next browse, your index will contain
the new  merged catalogues, sorted the same way as your
original catalogue. You may then delete the .MRG files.                      11.4 Rebuild Index

If your CD_INDEX.DAT file is accidentally deleted or
corrupted,  and results in the message "Index is Empty" when
you know that it  shouldn't be, just select Rebuild Index from
the Utilities Menu  and the Index file will be rebuilt.

Note: if the file is  corrupted rather than deleted, you
should delete it altogether  before rebuilding it. This
process will not work if your CD.DAT file is not present. If
this is missing or corrupt, unless you  have a backup, you're
in trouble!!!


                  11.5 Calculating Statistics

When you select this item from the Utilities Menu, Cd Scan
will  go away and calculate some information about your cd
collection.  (all the vital statistics you just were dying to
know about and  which will cure your insomnia, at least for
tonight). The  following information will be presented in a
table:

     minimum, average (mean) and maximum track length,
     minimum, mean and maximum cd length, minimum, mean
     and maximum number of tracks per cd, number of cds
     in index, total number of tracks and approximate
     playing time.


                 12 Errors and Troubleshooting

If Cd Scan does not run correctly, check the following:

1. Your CONFIG.SYS file contains at least 15 files and
     buffers. (See your DOS manual for more information)
2. Your CD_INDEX.DAT and CD.DAT files are both present in the
     same directory as the CDS.EXE file. If the
     CD_INDEX.DAT file  is missing just rebuild the index
     from the Utilities Menu.  Otherwise, restore a backup
     of your catalogue if you have one.
3. If Cd Scan runs too slow, try Optimising it.
4. If your system locks up on start up, check how much
     memory  your system has free. You may have to get rid
     of a TSR or  something.
5. When the index is either empty or full, you will be
     notified. If full, no more cds may be added and if
     empty,  there will be no data to search, browse or
     print.
6. A printer error can usually be rectified just by
     ensuring  that the printer is on line and that the
     paper is correctly  aligned. If you still have trouble
     printing, consult your  printer manual.
7. Note on Deletion: The deletion tracking file, created
     when  a cd is deleted, is called  DELETED.DAT. Do not
     delete or  modify this file or you will not be able to
     undelete any cds.  Do not try to undelete a cd from an
     obsolete deletion tracking  file as its reference may
     not be valid. Suffice to say, don't  try to do the
     programs work for it or you may find yourself in
     trouble!
8. When Cd Scan is "Locked" via the -l command line option,
     the message "Access denied" will be displayed when any
     attempt is made to modify data.

                          Final Word

This completes the discussion of the Cd Scan cataloguing
system. I  sincerely hope it meets your cataloguing
requirements. All  suggestions are welcome.

For more information about the program or author, all
correspondence should be sent to the address below.

Joseph Dunn:

1/58 Murray Terrace,
Oaklands Park S.A. 5046
Australia

Phone: [phone]

                            THE END