Copyright ⌐ 1992 by the VBCT Group. All Rights Reserved.
Contents:
What is Lurker?
Read This First....
Current Features
Known problems
Hardware/Software requirements
What's next?
Revision history
Project Worktable uploads
WHAT IS LURKER?
Lurker is a group project to develop a functional CompuServe access program using Visual Basic. Lurker is freeware--not public domain, but without charge.
The Lurker team began with the two goals of developing a CompuServe program for Windows, and teaching users about Visual Basic. Over the course of the past year we have also learned a great deal about group software development across a computer network. (One of the fascinating aspects of Lurker is that we have almost 30 active members of the team, but we've never had more than 4 together for a meeting.)
Lurker is being developed in the Project Worktable section of MSBASIC, section 9. Membership in Lurker is available to anyone who wants to participate--we have very few rules. We have plenty of opportunities for testers, some opportunities for coders, and *lots* of opportunities for kibbitzers. If you'd like to join up, all we ask is that you get a survey form from Keith Pleas (our Grand Exalted Leader and Panjandrum) and fill it out.
READ THIS FIRST....
Read the Current Features: section below. The *big* improvement in this version is the addition of Brian Stine's really cool Setup stuff. In order to take advantage of the setup stuff, you *must*:
* Remove any section named [Lurker] from your WIN.INI file.
In addition you *should*:
* Download SECTNS.ARC from Lib 1 of the PRACTICE forum
(it's a free download, and will expand to 260K).
* Make sure the MSBASIC.TXT and WINNEW.TXT files are in the default directory you identify for Lurker.
CURRENT FEATURES:
This version adds Brian Stine's configuration information. Brian has done an *exhaustive* job. You'll see the big changes as soon as you start up Lurker.
The new version includes these features:
* Multiple users are supported
* Each user defines his or her own list of forums.
* Multiple "hosts" (CompuServe Access points) are more-
or-less supported
* Main form identifies current User and host
* Lurker checks WIN.INI for configuration and default
directory information at startup. If this is a new
install Lurker will automatically take you through
the startup detail.
* If SECTNS.LST is present Lurker will handle forum
changes with automatic lookup. (Go ahead--try using
Brian's type-ahead feature. Make sure you have SECTNS.LST
in your LURKER directory, and use the Forum Editor to
Add a Forum. You'll get the complete list. Type "R" and
presto! you're off to the R section. Slick, no?)
* User configuration information is written to Lurker.ini.
Note that the password is written in an encrypted
fashion. (See FioEncrypt and FioDecrypt for more.)
In addition, the following minor revisions have been made:
* Lurker automatically centers the Lurker form at startup.
* Sub Main has been altered slightly to make startup
happen a little faster.
* The caption on the command button in the Forums list
box on the Main form has been changed and disabled for
now.
KNOWN PROBLEMS:
* If you add a forum, and then add a duplicate of that
forum, Lurker does not trap the error. If you realize
the error and delete the duplicate Lurker will kill off
that's forum's section. So you'll have a forum showing
in the config stuff, but no forum detail in your Lurker
INI file. (We'll add an error trap. Workaround is to
make a change to the forum that's left--the detail will
be written to the INI file.)
* If the phony messages for Browser are not in the Lurker
directory, you will get nailed with DOS Error #53--File
Not Found. This is a prototype version of Browser, so
we won't fix the bug. We'll add a functional Browser.
(Workaround: copy WINNEW.TXT to the Lurker directory.)
* User Information includes a password field. When adding
a password that's great. But when viewing password in-
formation you are shown the user's current password.
That's not great. (No present workaround. This needs to
be changed.)
* No form controls have Tag properties set for Help doc-
umentation.
HARDWARE/SOFTWARE REQUIREMENTS:
This version of Lurker only requires Windows 3.0 or higher. Two versions will be posted: MAINF.ZIP will include the source code, while LURKER.ZIP will include just the EXE.
This version does not require *any* add-ons to test.
(If you want to peek at some of Brian's code it wouldn't hurt to have a copy of the Windows Programmer's Ref handy.)
WHAT'S NEXT?
At present we have code submitted from the Comm team that will let the user access the Microsoft Knowledge Base on CompuServe. We have to integrate that with the Setup material from Brian, so it'll be a few days before we're ready to put that up. When that goes up you will have to have (at least) the VBComm runtime.
We (the I/O team) are also at work on getting a version of Browser running using indexed file access. Whether that happens before the MSKB reader gets integrated is a good question.
REVISION HISTORY:
Version: Date: Notes:
0.10 6/?/92 Initial posting of MAINF
0.10a 7/13/92 Setup added.
PROJECT WORKTABLE UPLOADS:
As we post more and more stuff for Lurker, there will be more and more files to download. We propose to handle postings in this fashion:
Lurker (in it's entirety) will be maintained in two files. MAINF.ZIP will include the all the source code required for the current level. LURKER.ZIP will include an EXE--no source. Neither file will contain *any* runtimes needed for add-ons. Any add-ons required will be noted in the README.TXT file and in the Library listing.
We will also post a third file that includes all the changed forms and modules for a new revision level. If you're current on Lurker code all you'll have to do is download that file, delete the appropriate files from the Lurker project file and add in the new files.
Please--open up Lurker and try it out. Add users, add forums, try all sorts of stuff. We need to know how it works.
In addition, if you've volunteered for testing--take a good hard look at the routines included in UTILS.BAS. Try them in test code--check them out for completeness, little "features" that crop up, and whether the internal documentation is accurate.
