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1997-05-17
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Jump To A Folder
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Version 1.0 (Beta 1)
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
FreeWare - Please Distribute Freely
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
CONTENTS
~~~~~~~~
What Does It Do
How Does It Work
How Near To Finished Is It
Instructions
The Jump Page
The Scan Page
The Options Page
The About Page
Known Bugs
Plans For The Future
Contact Information
Thanks
What Does It Do?
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
This utility allows you to open a folder in Windows directly. Now there is no
need to click on endless folders, or expand many trees, to get to where you
want to go.
Just right-click on a file,
Enter the beginning of the folder you want to go to,
Hit enter... and you are there... instantly!
It doesn't matter if it is a hard-disk, CD-ROM or remote drive, the folder
you want to get to is opened instantly.
How Does It Work?
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
This program works by creating a file on each drive that describes its
layout. When you click "Jump" the file is searched for a folder that begins
with your enquiry. If one is found it is opened, simple as that.
How Near To Finished Is It?
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
This is officially called a beta release. There are a few things that will
be added, listed later, before this utility is officially considered to be
finished. However, it is fully functional and has been already been
thoroughly tested. Hopefully you wont find any bugs in it. If you do though,
PLEASE tell me, otherwise they may never get fixed.
Instructions
~~~~~~~~~~~~
This utility is hoped to be useable straight away. It come with online help
in case you get stuck. However, for more detailed information on how to use
this utility please read the following sections...
The Jump Page
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
This is where you choose the drive that you want to search and enter an
enquiry.
The Search box lists all the drives available on your system. If you launched
the program from within a drive it will automatically be selected. Otherwise
you will have to select a drive by yourself.
When a drive is selected the For box becomes enabled. If you have chosen to
have your last search on that drive remembered, the box will automatically be
filled with the last enquiry you made on that drive.
If you wish to open the root folder of a drive just enter \ and press enter.
Otherwise, enter the beginning of the folder that you want to find. You can
not enter paths, (so "games\qua"), is not valid. If you do enter a path the
program will search for a folder that matches the start of the path,
(i.e. it would search for "games").
When you click "Jump", or press enter, the program tries to find a folder
that begins with your enquiry. For instance, if you enter "Ga", a folder like
"Games" may be found. If the program finds a folder, it opens it.
The search is carried out from the current folder. Therefore you may have to
run the program a few times before you get to where you want to go.
However, if you have chosen to show all matching folders, the program will
display a list of all matching folders. All you need to do is click on
the folder you want opened.
The Scan Page
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
This is where you select a number of drives that you wish to scan.
For this program to work it needs to create a file for every drive you may do
a search on, that describes its layout. However, if this file gets deleted,
or the structure of your drive changes you may wish to scan the drive again,
in order to make sure that the file is up to date. Also if you have opted
to ignore certain folders, you need to scan the drive again in order for
the folders to actually be ignored.
The scanning of a harddisk is quite fast. However be warned that CD-ROMS and
network drives can take considerable longer to scan.
You will have to be patient whilst scanning is in progress, because it cant
be interrupted. However, you benefit from being able to instantly open a folder
later on.
The file that is created is called "TreeInfo.JTF". It is stored in the root
folder of the drive it is associated with. If you scan a CD-ROM the file is
placed in the same folder as the program, with a name that matches the serial
number of the disc scanned. If you uninstalled this program these files can be
safely deleted.
Currently these files are not created with the Hidden Attribute set. This
means that when you look at a root folder in Windows you will be able to
see the file.
You may wish to right-click on it and set the hidden attribute. This will
be done automatically in the full version.
If your try to search a drive which has no associated file then it will
automatically be scanned.
The Options Page
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
This is where you can configure this utility to suit your needs. As you can
see there are quite a few options divided into two panes.
Options in the first pane, "Jumping", affect what happens when you click
jump. Once applied these options take effect instantly.
Open In Explorer -
When a folder is opened it can either be opened in Explorer, (where the
window is divided into a drive pane, and a folder contents page), or in
a plain vanilla window.
Close The Old Folder -
When a folder is opened you can either leave open the folder from which
the program was run or have it automatically closed.
Remember The Last Search -
When your search a drive successfully the text you entered in the "For"
box is remembered. When you next select that drive to be searched the
"For" box is automatically filled with the contents of the last enquiry.
Remind You To Re-Scan A Drive -
Once a drive has been scanned the layout of the folders on that drive
will almost certainly change. As time goes by the information in the
associated file will differ more and more from the actual layout of
the drive. You don't need to re-scan a drive after every change in its
layout but is recommended that you re-scan it periodically. The program
can remind you that a drive needs re-scanning after a given period
of days.
Show All Matching Folders -
Often you will enter an enquiry that actually matches with more that
one folder. If this happens you can have all the matches displayed so
that you can instantly open the folder you actually want. If this
option is not selected you may have to run the program a few times
before you actually get to where you want to go.
Options in the second pane, "Scanning", affect what happens when a drive
is scanned. Once applied any drive that is scanned is affected by these
options. Drives that have already been scanned are not affected until
they are re-scanned.
Ignore Folders Below -
When a drive is scanned you may want to ignore a group of folders. A
good example is the Start Menu. I have found that many people never seem
to want to open any folder in their Start Menu.
The box displays the folders whose children, (i.e. any folders below it),
should be ignored. Only folders below those listed are ignored - the
actual folders in the list themselves are not ignored!
You can click "Add" to select a folder to add to the ignore box or
"Remove" to delete an folder from the ignore box.
Please note that for any of these options to take affect you must click Apply.
Simply adding folders to the ignore box is not enough.
The About Page
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Not that I need to explain what this is...
Click here if you want to get the Version number of this program. This page
also displays details on how to contact me. Note that currently I can only
reply to e-mails during English Term Times. However I hope to remedy that
shortly.
Known Bugs
~~~~~~~~~~
If you find a bug in this program PLEASE tell me.
1) Due to the fact that this program uses long filenames this program may
not work properly on network drives that are configured to use short
filenames. This is only an idea and I have yet to confirm if this bug does
exist.
2) When a list of matches is shown the user must use the pointer to select
the folder he wishes to open. If he presses a key the first option is
selected. WILL BE FIXED!
Plans For The Future
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The following is a list of enhancements that may be made in time for the
release version. If you have anything to add, or any comments to make
please don't hesitate to contact me.
1) Make icons consistent with Explorer
Currently the icons next to the drives in the Jump and Search pages
are fixed. If you have changed your Window's settings you may notice
that these icons don't match the icons displayed by Windows.
This may fixed for the release version. However the load time
of this program may be considerable slower. What do you think I
should do?
2) Improve the loading time of the program
3) Automatically hide the files that this program creates
4) Verify a file when it is opened
Currently this program does not verify a file when it is opened. I choose
to do this because verification takes time, and it is not a bug.
However, if this program were to open an invalid file it may crash. I am
still weighing up the benefits...
5) Include the option to ignore single folders as well as multiple folders
6) Think of a better name for it?
7) Replace the ALM Software logo in the About page with an application
specific logo
8) Include the option to store the image file of slow removable media on the
harddisk - like it already does with CD-ROMS.
9) Opening the match in the current window, (good for open/save dialogs).
10) Able to try again if a search fails - i.e. program wont close.
11) Able to cancel search from the list of matches
12) Able to cancel a scan during scanning
13) Change it from FreeWare to HypnotismWare! That way I can hypnotise you into
giving me a quid - which isn't much to ask:-)
Contact Information
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
This program was written by ALM Software (pronounced like ALMmond),
which... at the moment is basically me.
If you have any comments, suggestions of bug reports please contact me at
Adrian Manic
ALM Software
309 Thorney Leys
Witney
Oxfordshire
OX8 7YT
UK
E-Mail: ALM.Software@bcs.org.uk
(Note that currently I can only apply to e-mails during English Term Times)
Thanks
~~~~~~
First of all I would like to thank the following friends...
Alex Twist
Ben Wesson
Nick McKenna and
Simon Gosney
for giving me ideas and helping me test this program.
One day we will be better Microsoft!
I would also like to say a big Hi to all my friends here at Hull Uni and all
my friends back home in Witney.
Hi also to my Mum and Dad and my sister Andrea - I told you I would write
a program with this language one day!
Also a big hello goes to all my relatives and John, Georgie, David And Niki.
And last but not least... thanks to you... for using this utility
Live Long And Prosper
Adrian
In memory of Jamie - we wont forget you.