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Monster Media 1996 #15
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SBNews: News Robot Utility
(C) Scott M Baker
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Note: This program is still in the early beta stages. It hasn't been very
extensively tested and it's very possible that you may experience trouble.
Please report any problems to me at smbaker@primenet.com.
I variously refer to this program under the names "NewsBot" and "SBNews"
throughout the document. You can for the most part consider them to be the
same. Eventually, I plan on including extra utilities in this package, "SBNews"
will be the name of the full package and "NewsBot" will be the name of the News
Robot utility within the package.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Purpose:
The purpose of this program is to automatically download and uudecode files
from newsgroups via a winsock connection. If you've found this program, then
you probably know what this means, so I won't go into detail. Newsbot will
attempt to piece together multi-part files.
If you're new to binary newsgroups, then here are a few G-rated newsgroups that
you might wish to try:
alt.binaries.pictures.astro
alt.binaries.pictures.animals
alt.binaries.pictures.cartoons
alt.binaries.pictures.fractals
There are a wealth of adult-oriented newsgroups, but I'm not going to list them
in this document.
I have included a sample file, SAMPLE_G.TXT, which includes a listing of binary
newsgroups. There are no descriptions, but you can probably find out from the
newsgroup name what subject matter the newsgroup deals with.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Requirements:
* Windows 3.1 or greater
* Winsock connection capability (i.e. SLIP or PPP)
Distribution:
* 16-bit (Windows 3.1) Version: SBNEWSxx.ZIP (xx denotes version number)
* 32-bit (Windows 95) Version: SBN32_xx.ZIP (xx denotes version number
Features:
* Unattended download - do other work (or go out to lunch) while downloads
and uudecoding are all processed for you!
* Automatic HTTP address logging -- NewsBot will keep track of any HTTP
URL's that were found while downloading addresses. These will be saved to
a convenient HTM file, HTTPGRAB.HTM.
* Built in JPEG viewer. Allows you to see postage-stamp size images of the
files you are downloading in progress.
* Delete/View previously downloaded JPEG files.
* Comprehensive logging capabilities - save the subject and from
information for files that you might want to follow up on later.
* Dupe Checkers -- avoid downloading the same files multiple times.
Files Included:
* NEWSBOT.EXE: Executable; what you need to run to get the program to work.
* NEWSBOT.HTM: Documentation in HTML format (read with your browser)
* NEWSBOT.DOC: Documentation in plain-ASCII format (read with any plain
ascii text editor)
* BWCC.DLL (16-bit) or BWCC32.DLL (32-bit): Borlands Custom-Control DLL
library; used to support Newsbot's grey dialog boxes.
* FILE_ID.DIZ: Brief description file; useful for bbs distribution
* SAMPLE_G.TXT: Plain-ASCII listing of binary newsgroups
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Installing and Using the Program:
Here are some very quick notes on installing and using Newsbot:
Installation:
1. Unzip the distribution archive into the directory of your choice.
Running:
1. Run NEWSBOT.EXE -- this can be done in various ways - from the Win-95
command prompt, the Windows Explorer (and/or file manager), the Windows
Run Program command, etc.
2. On your first session, you'll be prompted for a "News Host Name". This is
the name of your news host, and should be given to you by your ISP
(internet service provider).
3. On your first session, you'll be prompted for a "download path". This is
the path where you want the files you download to be placed.
4. Once NewsBot is loaded, you'll want to add some newsgroups. This is done
with the "Add" button. You'll need to know the names of the groups you
want; you might want to consult SAMPLE_G.TXT for some sample newsgroup
names.
5. Press the "CONNECT" button to start everything. All else should be mostly
automatic from here on. Feel free to tinker around with the menu items
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Command Line Parameters
* "-i INI_FILE_NAME". Sets the name of the INI file to use. By default,
newsbot uses the file newsbot.ini in your windows directory. Specifying a
filename here will cause newsbot to use the file under that name in
newsbot's home directory. For example "Newsbot -i news1.ini" would use
the filename "news1.ini" in newsbot's home directory.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Jpeg Viewer
SBNews has a built in Jpeg viewer for viewing JPEG files offline. The JPEG
viewer can be operated in several ways:
1. By double-clicking on a [RECEIVED] entry in Newsbot's log window
2. By single-clicking on one of the preview pictures on the right hand side
of Newsbot's main window.
3. By using the FILE:VIEW JPEG option from Newsbot's pulldown menu.
Once loaded, the JPEG viewer window will display the JPG file selected and
include a listing of filenames and directories on the left-hand side of the
window. This listing is provided to let you easilly select other files to view.
Double clicking on a directory in the directory list will change to that
directory and double clicking on a filename in the file list will display that
file. The CHDIR and VIEW buttons perform the same functions, respectively.
The "<" and ">" buttons will view the immediately previous and next files in
the currently selected directory. You may use these to rapidly view a list of
files that were downloaded overnight for example. The ">" button will activate
a slideshow of the current directory. Each file will be displayed, there will
be a slight delay, and the next file will be displayed.
The FILE menu of the viewer has several options:
* Open File: Allows you to open a new file using the windows common-dialog
open method.
* Delete File: Deletes the current file that you are viewing.
* Save as BMP: Saves the current image as a BMP image, which may later be
used as windows wallpaper, for example.
* Set as Wallpaper: Saves the current file as a BMP and tells window to use
it was wallpaper.
The SlideShow menu has a few options as well:
* Start/Stop: Starts and stops the slideshow, equivalent to the ">" button.
* Set Interval: Sets the amount of delay between slideshow pictures.
* "Normal Mode": Images will be displayed in the jpeg viewers window.
* "Wallpaper Mode": Images will also be set as WallPaper. This sort-of
turns your entire desktop into a slideshow display. You can minimize the
JPEG viewer window and continue to do work while images display in the
background as wallpaper.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Configuration
Host Name:
The host name is the name of the nntp host which NewsBot will connect to. If
you don't already know this, then you may wish to contact your Internet Service
Provider (ISP) or check an existing news program on your system for the name.
Download Path:
The base path where downloaded files will be placed. If you enable any of the
download path expansion (see misc. preferences), then files may be downloaded
into sub-directories of this base path.
Miscellanious Preferences:
Miscellanious preference options are located under the Configure menu under the
heading Preferences.
* Logging: Logging options control the creation of the newsbot.log file.
The log may be useful so that you have more information about the files
that you have downloaded.
* Log Enabled: if checked, then a log file will be written.
Otherwise, no log will be written.
* From user name: records the name of the person who posted the
message
* Subject: records the subject line of the message
* Comments: records the first few non-file lines of the message.
Useful if the sender has prefaced the message with some explanation
of it's content.
* Too Small: Messages that are below the minimum message line limit
(see below).
* Too Long: Messages that are above the maximum message line limit
(see below).
* Dupe File: Files caught by the dupe-file checker.
* Dupe Subject: Messages caught by the dupe-subject checker.
* Mime Headers: Really just debugging info for me....
* Path Expansion: These options will place files from different groups in
different download directories.
* None: Places all downloaded files in the same download directory.
* Group Number: Places files in directories designated by their group
numbers in the group list (i.e. the first group would go in
.../group1/, the second in .../group2/, etc)
* Group Name: Transforms the group name into a download path. For
example, alt.binaries.pictures.astro would go into
.../alt/binaries/pictures/astro/.
* Case Conversion: These options will convert the case of the filename to a
uniform format. Due to limitations in the 16-bit application model,
filenames will probably be always upper case in the 16-bit executable.
* None: Leave filename case as it appears over the modem.
* Lower: Convert all filenames to lower case.
* Upper: Convert all filenames to upper case.
* Disconnect/Reconnect: The disconnect/reconnect system will automatically
disconnect and reconnect the current nntp session in order to abort a
message that is being transmitted. This is used to save time, rather than
downloading entire messages which are not stored on disk. If you disable
disconnect/reconnect, then Newsbot will receive the entire message,
although the message will not be written to disk. You may toggle
disconnect/reconnect on or off for several subcases:
* No-Data: Messages with more non-encoded lines than the no-data
threshold set below.
* Dupe-File: Files caught by the dupe-file checker (not relavant to
the dupe-subject checker, as the dupe-subject checker won't
download the message in the first place)
* No-Mask: Files which do not match an acceptable file mask.
* Current-Delete: Files which were deleted during transfer by a user
request.
* Message Line Limits: Newsbot can limit which messages are downloaded
based on the length (number of lines) of the message.
* Minimum Lines: Messages with fewer than the specified number of
lines will not be downloaded. The rationale is that small messages
do not contain any useful information (pictures are big!) and some
efficiency may be obtained by not downloaded them.
* Maximum Lines: Messages with greater than the specified number of
lines will not be downloaded. The rationale is that really huge
messages are a waste of time. It's usually the case of someone who
scanned in a picture at too fine a resolution.
* "No Data" Threshold: This specifies the number of lines that can be
in a message when no attached files (eg images) can be found before
the message is skipped. For example, if 500 lines are scanned, and
no attached image is present, then the message is probably grunged,
a misplaced part of a multipart encode, or some other useless data.
Lockout Poster List
The lockout poster list is a listing of email names of people from whom you DO
NOT wish to receive news articles from. The customary way to add new posters is
to notice an image you don't like in the JPEG Preview and click the Lockout
Poster option under the Current or Previous menus.
Authentication:
The authentication options are used for news servers which require a user name
and password to access the newsgroups. If your news server does not require a
name and password, then you should leave this option alone. Authentication is
located under the Configure menu.
Acceptable File Masks
Newsbot allows you to specify which types of files will be downloaded.
Specifying "*.*" will enable any file to be downloaded, and this is the
default. For example, if you only wanted to receive images, then you may wish
to remove *.* and add in *.gif and *.jpg. If you only wanted archives, add in
*.zip. etc.
Dupe Checking
Two different types of dupe checking are supported. They may be used
independantly, or you can use both of them at the same time if you wish. By
default, the dupe checkers maintain a list of approximately the most recent
2048 messages received.
* Subject Dupe Checker: Remembers duplicates by keeping track of the
subject and from user name of the message. Thus, if the same person posts
multiple messages with the same subject, the message will be flagged as a
dupe. This is useful for preventing download of crossposted messages
(i.e. identical messages posted in multiple groups)
* Filename Dupe Checker: Remembers duplicates by keeping track of the names
of the files that were downloaded. This is very effective at weeding out
dupes, but has the side effect of sometimes deleting messages that are
not really duplicates. For example, there are a lot of files name "1.JPG"
out there!
Both of the two above mentioned dupe checkers have some options that control
their behaviour:
* Reject Duplicates: If checked, then dupe checking will be performed as
stated above. If not checked, then no dupe checking will be performed.
* Save dupe list: If checked, then dupe information will be saved from
session to session. If not checked, then dupe information will only be
kept for the current session.
* Items to Keep: This is the number of items to "remember" for the dupe
checker. A bigger number here will remember more messages (or files), but
will also require more memory and/or disk space to hold to dupe checker
information.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Statistical Options
There are a variety of options listed under the statistics menu item. Most of
these simply return information that SBNews has collected while processing
newsgroups.
* Similar NewsGroups: Newsgroup headers contain an "Xref:" line which lists
other newsgroups to which a specific article has been posted. Many times,
a poster will "cross-post" an article to multiple groups which share the
same interests. The Similar Newsgroups list will display all of the
accumulated Xref's for the current area.
* HTTP Grabber: The HTTP Grabber automatically keeps a list of any WWW
addresses that are found in the text and/or subject lines of downloaded
messages. In addition, a HTML file called HTTPGRAB.HTM will be written to
the newsbot directory. You may load this file with your WWW browser and
look up any references that SBNews found.
* Dupe File List: The list that the dupe-checker keeps in memory to catch
dupe files.
* Dupe Subject List: The list that the dupe-checker keeps in memory to
catch duplicate subject lines.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Unfinished Stuff
This program is still largely unfinished. There's lots of "bells-and-whistles"
that I'm planning on adding in the future. So don't dispair if a few features
that you'd like are missing. Important things I'm hoping to add are:
* Automatic Connect and Disconnect (i.e. start receiving when it's loaded)
* Ability to download newsrc (the list of newsgroups)
* Ability to specify search filters (i.e. only retrieve messages with xxx
in the subject field)
* Manual toggling of articles you want to download
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Registration
SBNews/Newsbot is a shareware program and as such, you are only granted the
right to operate it for a limited time to evaluate it's performance. Continued
usage requires registration in the amount of $15.00.
The registration policy is as follows:
1. Mail $15 (a personal check made out to "Scott M. Baker" is fine) to my
US-Mail address. Include your EMAIL address with the check.
2. I will generate a registration code that corresponds to the email you
included. I will email this registration code back to you at the address
you provided.
3. Load up newsbot and select Register from the menu. Enter your email and
the code I provided. The program will now be registered.
4. Your registration is good forever, and will be supported under ALL FUTURE
VERSIONS of this program.
Registration entitles you to use of the program (and all future upgrades) for
as long as you wish. The 15-second shareware delay while loading will be
removed. In addition, if I add additional utility programs to the SBNews
package, your registration will entitle you to usage of them as well.
Please do consider registering this shareware if you continue to use it. The
programming is very involved and time consuming, and it really gives me a lot
more incentive to add new features if I receive compensation for my work.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
How to contact me:
US-Mail:
Scott M. Baker
2241 W Labriego
Tucson, Az 85741
My Bulletin board:
The Not-Yet-Named BBS
(520) 544-4655 (USR Dual 14.4k)
(520) 797-8573 (USR Sportster 28.8k)
Email:
smbaker@primenet.com
My Homepage:
http://www.primenet.com/~smbaker
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Revision History
* Version 1.0
* Initial public release
* Version 1.1
* Added about dialog and shareware delay
* Cleaned up (shrunk) main screen and reorganized information
* Added context-sensitive hint text at bottom
* Fixed problem with message pointers not being recorded properly
* Version 1.2
* Added JPG viewer window (supported in 800x600 or above only)
* Probably fixed a nasty stack overflow (Runtime Error 202) bug that
was causing trouble with new users.
* Version 1.3
* Made JPEG viewer more crash resistant
* Increased JPEG viewer read buffer to deal better with images with
large headers
* Added a title to the main window
* Finished registration code system
* Version 1.4
* Added icon
* Version 1.5
* Made sure to free gensock.dll on exit
* Added Configure:Preferences dialog, many new preference options
* Version 1.6
* Raised counter-over threshold from 250 to 1000
* Set update timer at 100ms instead of 250ms
* Added Lockout Poster system
* Revamped dupe checker for better reliability
* Added similar newsgroups list
* Raised maximum number of newsgroups from 32 to 128
* Added view and delete options to current and previous menus
* Fixed problem with crashes on high-ascii characters in lockout
poster list
* Fixed possible bug with long header lines
* Now handles nonexistant newsgroups without halting
* Version 1.7
* Shareware delay now increments by 1 every day Newsbot is used
* Newsbot now stops loading groups from INI file when first blank
entry is found (speedup?)
* Revamped the dupe message checker (again!)
* Fixed bug which was causing unnecessary JPEG error 117
* Fixed problem with decoding lines that started with a double period
* Version 1.8
* Added message when old BWCC found
* Version 1.9
* Change "about" menu to "file" menu
* Added open jpeg viewer option to file menu
* Prevented crash if 0 messages in a group
* Added HTTP URL Grabber
* Fixed problem with long subject/from lines (i.e. >256 chars)
* Double clicking on the log will bring up a viewer
* Made sure files are written to proper directory
* All uudecode filenames are normalized to lower case
* Added dupe file checker
* Revamped dupe subject checker (again!)
* Version 2.0
* Added authentication support (AUTHINFO Original)
* Ability to deal with SOME mime messages
* Added acceptable file mask dialog
* 32-bit version available
* Incorporated gensock code into SBNews; Gensock.DLL no longer
needed.
* Fixed memory leak in jpeg viewer
* Used suballocater to deal with strman hash table nodes
* Added "add" and "refresh" options to similar groups dialog
* Version 2.1
* Spiffed up Jpeg viewer window
* Fixed up error handling on JPEG decoding routines
* Fixed possible error with "Null" strings
* Version 2.2
* Fixed problems with palette in 256 color mode
* More tolerant of uuencoded lines with extra characters
* Made small version of window even smaller
* Dupe File, Delete Current, and No Mask signals will now
disconnect/reconnect the session to keep from having to download
entire message.
* Several user-friendliness improvements
* Included SAMPLE_G.TXT, a list of binary picture newsgroups
* Added "-i [INIFILENAME]" command line parameter
* Added Save as BMP option to JPEG viewer
* Added Set Wallpaper option to JPEG viewer
* Added normal vs Wallpaper mode toggle to JPEG viewer slideshow
* If you drag & drop a JPG file into newsbot's main window, then
Newsbot will launch a Jpeg viewer window to view the file.
* Moved dupe checker preferences to their own menu item
* Added "Items to keep" settings for dupe checkers
* Fixed major distribution problem in hash function
* Added Blank option to Current/Previous menus to blank out the
current picture
* Viewer enable defaulted to active
* Fixed problem with long pathnames in jpeg viewer
* Fallback when improper BWCC.DLL loaded
* Version 2.3
* Fixed GPF on loadup of nonregistered users