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Software Vault: The Gold Collection
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Software Vault - The Gold Collection (American Databankers) (1993).ISO
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1992-06-06
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Overview
========
B.U.B.B.A is a multi-bulletin board message gatherer and reader for OS/2
Presentation Manager.
It is designed to provide a common message-reader user interface while
allowing access to many different style bulletin boards.
B.U.B.B.A is designed to minimize the number and duration of online
operations. Only selected fora and areas are visited to obtain new subjects
and only messages belonging to marked subjects are downloaded. Subjects are
marked and messages are viewed offline.
(Bulletin boards supporting zipped CAptured mail, such as Multi-Net are
supported. In this case, *all* mail in marked areas is captured and
downloaded in one telephone call. Eventualy, we will plan to add
FIDO .QWK mail.)
B.U.B.B.A allows downloading of new subjects or marked messages from any board
while viewing of previously downloaded messages from that, or any other board.
Currently supported boards are IBM National Support Center, Compuserve and
Fernwood. We plan on supporting many more of the Maximus and Fido style
boards as time permits (and demand dictates).
Under the menu bar is the B.U.B.B.A Button Bar (say that three times fast!).
On the Button Bar is a combo-box and four radio buttons.
The combo-box contains the list of currently accessible bulletin boards.
The currently active bulletin board is selected via this control.
B.U.B.B.A is divided up into four workspaces. They are: Mark, View, Setup
and Terminal. Each of the workspaces is accessed by its radio button on
the button bar. The Mark, View and Setup workspaces reflect the context
of the currently active bulletin board. The Terminal workspace reflects the
current online operation, regardless of what board is selected.
Note that we have adopted the following terminology to describe the
organizational hierarchy of bulletin boards:
FORUM - Highest level division. A forum contains one or more areas.
On some boards this is called a Conference.
AREA - Broad topic such as "OS/2 2.0 Beta". On some boards this is
called a section. Only Forum leaders can create Areas.
SUBJECT - Bulletin board members can create new subjects or reply to
existing subjects by writing messages.
MESSAGE - The text written by the user to describe the subject or reply to
a previous message.
B.U.B.B.A Workspaces
====================
Terminal
========
The Terminal Workspace shows the progress of the current online operation,
regardless of which BBS is currently active.
When you enter the Terminal Workspace, the button bar expands. Located on
the expanded button bar are two icons. The first is a keyboard radio-button.
When selected it allows interactive access to the current online session.
The second button, when pressed, will attempt to break the current online
session.
Setup
=====
The Setup Workspace is divided up into two sections. The top half is common
to all bulletin boards. It contains the communication and modem settings used
to access the board. The bottom half contains non-hardware settings such as
user name and password.
You must enter the appropriate information here before attempting any
online operations with a BBS.
Mark
====
When you enter the Mark Workspace, the button bar expands. Located on the
far right are three radio buttons labeled: Fora, Area and Subjects. Also,
a vertical "Action Bar" appears containing other context-sensitive controls.
The Mark Workspace is where fora, areas and subjects are selected. Selection
means different things for each context.
There are two listboxes. The top listbox contains un-marked items and
the bottom listbox contains marked items. To mark an item, double click
on an item in the un-marked listbox. To un-mark an item, double click on
an item in the marked listbox.
Marking Fora
------------
To mark fora, select the Fora context by clicking on the Fora radio button
on the expanded button bar.
Marking a forum activates it. Only marked fora will be visited to
obtain new area lists and new subjects.
To add a forum, click on the New button located on the Action Bar. You will
be prompted for the BBS specific information necessary to add this forum.
(--Not yet implemented--)
Marking Areas
-------------
To mark areas, click on the Areas radio button on the expanded button
bar. A Combo-box will appear on the left side. This combo-box is used to
select which Fora's Areas to display.
The listboxes will reflect the areas of the currently selected forum only.
To switch fora, use the combo-box or the Up and Down arrows on the action bar.
If you have never visited the selected forum, there will not be any areas.
To get an area list, use the "Join" button on the vertical Action Bar. This
will cause an online operation specific for the active BBS. It will list
the available areas and save them. All areas will be un-marked (inactive).
Only marked areas will be visited when gathering new subjects.
Marking Subjects
----------------
To mark subjects, click on the Subjects radio button on the expanded button
bar. Two Combo-boxes will appear on the left side. The first combo-box is
used to select a forum. The second combo-box allows you to select an area.
The listboxes will reflect the marked and un-marked subjects of the
currently selected forum and area only. (To switch fora, use the combo-box
or the Up and Down arrows on the action bar. To switch areas use the
right and left arrows.)
If you have marked subjects, the "Marked" Button will appear on the
action bar. Pressing that button will cause an online operation that will
gather only the messages belonging to the subjects that were marked.
Note: When an online operation is in progress, you may not access the mark
controls for that BBS. You may, however, perform Mark operations for other
BBSs, go to the View Workspace and view any BBSs messages (even the one
currently online) or watch the progress of the online operation in the
Terminal Workspace.
After the messages have been downloaded, the "Process" Button should appear
on the action bar. New messages are held until you press this button. This
allows you to finish viewing previously downloaded messages in the viewer
before they are replaced by the new messages.
View
====
The View Workspace is where message trees are viewed. There are three
combo-boxes on the expanded button bar. The first selects fora, the second
selects areas and the third selects the current subject. (The current
subject is also selected by using the Up and Down arrows on the action bar.)
It is interesting to see the messages in their from/to relationships.
After B.U.B.B.A reads all the messages of a given subject, it links the
messages into a message tree. This tree is displayed and can be used for
navigation.
The tree and message windows can be sized as necessary. Increasing the
size of one window will decrease the size of the other. As the mouse pointer
passes over the border between the two windows, it changes into a sizing
icon. To size, click the left mouse button, hold and drag the border.
There are two main windows in the View Workspace. When a subject is
selected, its message tree is displayed in the top window. The first
message text is displayed in the bottom window.
You may use the graphic tree to select the next message text to view.
You may also use the left and right arrows on the action bar to scan the
messages in the order in which they were downloaded.
There are other buttons on the action bar. Currently they are not
implemented but eventually you will be able to reply to a message, create a
new subject, search for text, print and file messages.
B.U.B.B.A Bulletin Boards
=========================
IBM NSC
=======
If you want to use CAptured mail. Visit the setup workspace and click the
option for captured mail. You must own an un-zip utility such as PKUNZIP
or X-OS2. In the space provided, type the command line necessary to
call the un-zipper, using the percent sign to act as a marker to tell
B.U.B.B.A. where to place the zipped mail file name.
Compuserve
==========
Fernwood
========