RBrowser

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© Copyright Robert Vasvari, 1993-2003.

RBrowser Revision History

3.1.3:

  1. Fixed problem that sometimes got RBrowser to freeze if the transcript window was open.
  2. Added global preference to warn user about open documents and background processes upon termination.
  3. Added new Site preference (under the Limits Tab) to assign permissions for any new files created by the "New File" command.
  4. Bugfix: RBrowser now keeps the computer from going to sleep during longer file transfer operations.

3.1.2:

  1. FTP fixes
  2. Speedup of Local Viewer, avoiding accidental triggering of webdav aliases.
  3. Progress bar in the Dock icon for easy monitoring
  4. su to another user after SSH login.
  5. Full transcript on all remote windows (Command-L)
  6. Site aliases can be saved on the desktop
  7. New Option "Allow Direct Login" on the Preferences/General tab. If enabled, Site
  8. Aliases from the desktop or sites picked from the Go/* menus will launch directly without displaying the Login Panel, provided that host/username/password are all saved. Listview accepts numeric input for permissions.
  9. Local Viewer has a new Toolbar item to show all mounted volumes. This popup button should make it easier to find dmg's, disks, CD's or other items.

3.1.1:

  1. FTP Macbinary downloads add the .bin extension.
  2. Added move operation on the remote host under FTP and SFTP

3.1.0:

  1. Speedup of Local Viewer, avoiding accidental triggering of webdav aliases.
  2. Progress bar in the Dock icon for easy monitoring
  3. su to another user after SSH login.
  4. Full transcript on all remote windows (Command-L)
  5. Site aliases can be saved on the desktop
  6. New Option "Allow Direct Login" on the Preferences/General tab. If enabled, Site Aliases from the desktop or sites picked from the Go/* menus will launch directly without displaying the Login Panel, provided that host/username/password are all saved.
  7. Listview accepts numeric input for permissions.
  8. Local Viewer has a new Toolbar item to show all mounted volumes. This popup button should make it easier to find dmg's, disks, CD's or other items.

3.0.9.4:

  1. Speedup of Local Viewer.
  2. Speedup of FTP displays.
  3. Improvements on the Process Panel.
  4. New Option "Allow FTP Resume" on the Preferences/Processing tab. If FTP resume is not necessary because the internet link is fast enough, this option should be off. It simplifies user warnings when a file is transferred that already exists in the target location. The default is ON.
  5. New Public FTP connections now default to passive FTP.

3.0.8

  1. Easy downloads of URL's right on the Login Panel.
  2. Redesigned Process Panel shows more info on file transfers.
  3. Auto expanding of downloaded files.
  4. RBrowser can be the protocol helper for FTP/HTTP downloads for browsers, etc..
  5. File Overwrite/Transfer Resume warning panels have been fixed.

3.0.7

  1. Added get info and open in app to context menus.
  2. Solved bug that prevented multiple ssh proxy connections.
  3. Fixed filter menu updates in Text mode.
  4. Added -a flag to FTP LIST command as an option (default:ON).
  5. Graceful handling of SSH Key changes of remote hosts.
  6. Symbolic links get downloaded correctly through FTP.
  7. Dock menu is enabled.

3.0.6

  1. Contextual menus have been implemented (Control-click or right mouse button).
  2. Contextual menu added to remove icons from the shelf.
  3. Symbolic Links resolve correctly.
  4. Permissions fixed on new files created in FTP.
  5. Problems with local move operations have been fixed.
  6. RBrowser can now handle unreadable root folders in FTP.
  7. File Transfer Resume is now enabled under FTP.

3.0.5.2
- fixed intermittent crasher connected to warning panels.
- SFTP displays links correctly.
- Minor bugfixes.

3.0.5
- There is a Licensing module in RBrowser: licenses are required for use.
- Text and Automatic FTP Transfer modes have been added. Must read the warning below!!
- FTP URLs are correctly parsed out in the Login Panels FTP URL/Hostname field.
- Interface enhancements:
- 1. Toolbar is fully functional, even in text only mode.
- 2. Added Status Bar which now shows items, available space, load progress and filter state.
- 3. Unreadable files/folders are grayed out in all views. In some cases RBrowser is still able to load the contents of these folders.
- Dragging into the Finder is enabled! Feel free to use the Finder as your local workspace if that suits your taste; RBrowser interoperates with the Finder seamlessly.
- RBrowser no longer uses /tmp on the remote hosts for temporary files, since it is restricted on many hosts. ~/.rbrowser is used instead.
- New defaults added:
- 1. RBDefaultRemoteEncoding (defaults to UTF-8) is the encoding used for new remote logins.
- 2. RBScansLocalMountPoints (defaults to yes). If you have severe problems with automounted filesystems being triggered by RBrowser's Local Viewer, set this to NO. There is currently no GUI for this default; you can reset it using the command line.
- 3. RBFileNamesToIgnore which currently defaults to .DS_Store, and .FBCIndex. These files are ignored on file transfers (except in SSH protocol, since scp does a recursive transfer on its own). There is currently no GUI for this default; you can reset it using the command line (follow the RBNoScanLocalDirs example below).
- There were many changes to improve stability and reduce RBrowser's processor/memory usage.
- Double clicking on standard compressed/archived files (like .tar or .gz) in the Local Viewer uncompresses the file, as opposed to opening (read: corrupting) it in StuffIt.
- Filter and Sort setting persists until you change the current directory.
- Folders with known extensions (like .html) are no longer treated as documents.
- RBrowser's Site Preference format has changed. RBrowser will automagically convert your existing preference files in ~/Library/Application Support/RBrowser. If you have any trouble connecting to any of your known sites, please do a clean log in (blow away its file in ~/Library/Application Support/RBrowser first).
- Go To Folder can correctly handle ~ expansion in both local and remote viewers.
- Improved LINUX connectivity under SSH/UNIX.
- Dragging to the Trash from the Local Viewer is working correctly. The "Move To Trash" toolbar item does the same as the Finder's. There is a new toolbar item "Delete" with a similar but more "intense" icon for the Delete operation, which is destructive and final.

2.9.7.2
- Quick bugfixes for the following problems in 2.9.7:
1. The List view sometimes did not register the selections if it was clicked on while its window was in the background.
2. Connecting to some LINUX servers did not work due to incorrect parsing.
3. On HFS trying to rename foo to FOO failed.
4. Dragging removable files to the Trash tried to delete these instead of unmounting.
5. Double clicking on multiple selections correctly opens all selected files.
- All of the above have been fixed.
2.9.7
- Interface enhancements:
1. The column view shows the icons of files and folders. It also allows drag & drop file transfers between the columns and renaming files in place in the body of the column.
2. Command-clicking in the title bar of the File Viewer window gives the full path of the currently selected file (like the Finder). The Icon Path has been removed to give the File Viewer more space. The Shelf is there as always!
3. Drop zones are now illuminated while dragged over them to clearly show the target for the drag & drop.
4. Toolbar (adjustable) with most-used controls.
5. Alert Sheets and tooltips are used whenever possible.
- New preferences:
1. to set the default protocol for the Login Panel.
2. Overwrite warning: RBrowser will warn and let you know if you are about to overwrite an older/newer version of a file. This can be turned off in the preferences.
3. Define the behavior of the file lists (mixed, files first, folders first).
4. Show/Not to show hidden files (those whose name starts with '.').
5. Set whether or not you want to save passwords. If it is off, passwords have to be entered at every login. For users who haven't set this preference either way, a panel will come up to ask you to do so.
- Port numbers: You can specify a custom port for each connection protocol, and the ssh proxy too, right on the Login Panel. This should give a lot of flexibility to connect to sites where servers run on custom ports for security.
- Remote-to-Remote Transfers:
Stability for direct Remote-to-Remote transfers has been much improved, especially under SSH. Please make sure you read the simple rules for these transfers under Remote-to-Remote Transfer Gotchas.
- Filtering: There is a filter in the toolbar that can be used to show only a subset of the files in the current directory, based on file type or filename extension. This can be very useful in finding and isolating a group of files in a large directory.
- File System Types and Case sensitivity: In the Local Viewer and through the SSH/UNIX protocols, RBrowser detects file system types. They are displayed in the available space text. This information is also used for case sensitivity issues, so that on hfs the filenames foo, FOO and FoO are equivalent.
- Adding Apps: The Inspector now allows to add applications to the list of apps that is presented to open the selected document. However, only lists for documents with filename extensions can be added to. If you want to set the default app for a document with type/creator info and no filename extension, you have to use the Finder.
- Easy download: There is a new menu item for remote files called "Download." By default, it downloads the remote file(s) to the Desktop. If you want to designate another local folder for downloads, use the Preferences/Tools pane.
- Better support for Services: RBrowser now supports services based on strings and filenames properly.
- Keyboard Equivalent for Destroy:
- Command-R has been removed because of incompatibility with MacOS conventions. If you want to use it (or any other character) type in your Teminal:
defaults write com.rbrowser.rbrowser RBDestroyEquiv R

2.9.6
- Fixed compatibility problems with MacOSX 10.1. If .vol or /automount still appears on the shelf, just remove them, they will not come back.
- RBrowser no longer caches icons, so the memory footprint has been reduced.
- File/Eject menu now works correctly on removable disks.
- Login Panel accepts FTP URLs in the form ftp://myhost/dir/dir1/file. This is not an automatic download like wget or curl. RBrowser will log in using the username/password provided either in the URL or in the text fields and load the directory in the URL.
- Progress bar is added to the bottom of all file viewers. It will show the progress of transfers where the target is this particular Site. If there are multiple transfers, the bar will only show general progress.
- In conjunction with the added progress bar, the Process Panel's behavior has been changed. If the global preference "Always Show Process Panel" is off (now the default), the Process Panel will only come up during the login initialization phase, then disappear. The Process panel is now vertically resizable.
- The file system is scanned for Classic and Carbon apps; document-application associations based on type/creator are recognized! This version will require you to run "Refresh App List." You are encouraged to also make it scan your OS 9.x volumes by entering them into the list of directories to be searched.
- New menu item: "Create Link"; it will create a symbolic link to the selected item. This link refers to its target with a full path, so it can be moved anywhere. The other way to create a link (drag-n-drop with the command key down) is also supported.
- The Inspector Panel comes up on CMD-i just like the Finder. CMD-1 still works.
- .smi images are recognized as documents (see below).
- List View now properly sorts open subnodes also.
- The bug preventing RBrowser from recognizing BBEdit as the Default Open Application has been fixed.