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1998-03-14
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13KB
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349 lines
Finger
Version 1.21
Coded by Lonny Pursell
(C)1996 by Lonny Pursell and ENCOM
All rights reserved.
Date: June 2, 1996
** Documentation **
See 'Support' for contacts, credits, and future additions.
See 'Revision History' for a complete list of changes.
Introduction
------------
What is Finger? It's a client program designed to work with the
STiK internet software. It allows you to check e-mail addresses,
get more detailed information on an account, check your own
account for waiting e-mail, search for other users, and more.
Disclaimer
----------
Use this software completely at your own risk.
That pretty much says it all. 8^)
Program Requirements
--------------------
STiK should be loaded and enabled and on-line
at least a resolution greater than st low
some free disk space on your system
Installation
------------
Place FINGER.PRG and FINGER.RSC anywhere you like as it doesn't
matter what drive you execute it form. FINGER.INF will be
created by the program. The drive you select should have some
free space on it.
Program Setup
-------------
Click on the 'Config' button.
The finger line will be used as the default when the program
is first launched.
The server line should be set to your DNS (dynamic name server),
this would be the same as your 'NAMESERVER=' in the STiK config
file.
Click on the 'Save' button.
Due to the way in which the finger protocol works there is no way
to predict how much data will be received from the server. To
get around this the data is dumped to disk into a temporary file
called FINGER.DAT and read back in for display. The drive the
finger program resides on should have some free disk space. The
temporary file FINGER.DAT is deleted after being read back in.
Main Controls
-------------
Main window:
Buttons:
Info credits
Config set and save program configuration to disk
Output send finger data to disk or printer (ASCII output)
Finger opens the finger dialog
Exit exit the program
Arrows:
use the arrows to scroll through the finger data that is returned
double-click the up arrow to jump to the top
double-click the down arrow to jump to the bottom
Config window:
Input:
Finger default finger at program start up
Server your DNS server name goes here
Holist hotlist entries
Buttons:
Cancel exit without saving config
Save save configuration to disk
Finger window:
Input:
Finger e-mail address or name to query server for
Hotlist hotlist entries (double click to query the server)
Buttons:
Finger start the server query
Cancel abort server query
Misc controls:
ESCape key: Aborts the server query.
ALTernate key: Enter debug mode at program startup.
Problems and Errors
-------------------
How to use the debug mode.
When in debug mode a file called DEBUG.TXT will be created in the
default directory where the program resides. When debug mode is
active the temporary file called FINGER.DAT will not be deleted
after being read back in.
If you are having a problem you can duplicate, simply exit the
program, rerun the program while holding down the alternate key.
When in debug mode the title at the top of the main dialog will
indicate you are in debug mode. Now reproduce the error and exit
the program. Send the DEBUG.TXT file and the FINGER.DAT file to
me for inspection. It's very important that you archive these
files and then uuencode them before you send them to me. I need
to see them intact as they were when your system created them.
Mailing them any other way will do me no good since mailers and
such will reformat them and/or add cr/lf or tabs where they may
have been missing before.
It's also possible your server has no finger daemon and in that
case you may get an error message or absolutely nothing from the
server. If this happens you should contact your internet provider
and find out if they support the feature before assuming the
worst.
If you finger an address and you get an error message in the
scroll area this is not an error that I need to know about.
In fact it's working fine and the error was generated by the
server and sent back to you. This means you are definately
communicating with the server only your input was wrong.
The debug mode is for serious errors like crashes, out of memory,
lockups, and those sorta things.
Example Finger Commands
-----------------------
I'll use my own account as an example. The single qoutes should
_not_ be typed as they are included only to highlight the actual
data that should be entered.
Please note that you cannot finger your own account like this
'lp@mail' or 'lp@post' as this program does not attempt to
resolve the host name portion of the finger address into it's
full name. I can finger my own account with my user name
'lprusell' or my full e-mail address 'lpursell@mail.bright.net'.
To finger my own account:
'lpursell' my user name, this works the best
'Lonny' this works, but you might get a long list of Lonny's
' @brutus.bright.net' returns the users on the consoles
(note the leading space is required)
'' a blank line will also return the users on the consoles
If you are looking for 'Steve' you can simply enter 'Steve' and
get a complete list all users with the name 'Steve'.
Keep in mind some servers return very little information while
others return a lot.
Support
-------
This program is FreeWare. There is no fee required to use this
software nor is anything disabled. This is a fully functional
program. However, donations will be accepted.
Contact:
Lonny L Pursell
101 1/2 S High Street Apt C
Columbus Grove OH 45830
USA
E-Mail: lpursell@bright.net
WWW: http://www.bright.net/~lpursell/
IRC: lp on channel #Atari
When reporting bugs please include _detailed_ information about
your system setup and the files generated by the debug mode.
Note: I do not have the time or desire to blindly track what
looks like bugs on non-Atari hardware. If this program fails
on an emulator I suggest you either don't use this program or
get a real computer.
Future Additions
----------------
The main window and info window work as they should however the
configuration and finger windows are still modal. This is due
to the input lines and I have not worked out the code to handle these
properly in a window. Having the main part of the program in a window
was the important part and that I have done.
Credits
-------
I'd like to thank:
Nicholas Flintham (aka Flinny) for sending me the STiK dev kit
Guy Harrison (aka Swampdog) for all his help and suggestions
All the STiK beta testers (you know who you are) ;^)
Ozzy Osbourne --> Ozzmosis <-- This album R-O-C-K-S !
Steve Adam for introducing STiK to the world of Atari
Dan Ackerman for having the nerve to follow in Steve's foot prints
Revision History
----------------
[beta .01]
It seemed to work ok on my system. =)
[beta .02]
If the FINGER.INF file is not found the program will fill in the
cache path with the default path when the program was started.
The program will fill in the server setting with the NAMESERVER
tag returned by STiK if loaded and enabled. If the NAMESERVER
tag is not found then the server setting is left blank. Likewise
the finger setting will be filled in with the USERNAME tag if
found.
The first beta allocated all free ram at startup! It now only
allocates about 32k for itself. It dynamically allocates ram as
needed based on how much data it has transfered from the server.
If for some reason you get an out of memory error, you will not
be able to view the results of the finger.
Tabs are now properly handled in the display area. The progam
currently has a fixed tab size of 8 chars. This may have to be
made configurable. Do all servers use a tab spacing of 8
characters? It's fixed at 8 chars until a bug report comes in I
guess. =)
Improved disk error handling when writing to the cache. No one
reported disk errors however it now handles write-protected and
full disk errors properly.
Minor visual changes to the resource file were made. I removed
the subtitle and moved the server and cache setting to the bottom
of the dialog. The button spacing was adjusted to allow for the
3D effects. This version will display 3D objects if your AES
supports it.
[beta .03]
Hopefully fixed a problem with mouse clicks and key presses
bleeding through to the desktop on the Falcon. Seemed to only
happen with Multi-TOS loaded on my machine. On machines without
the fancy 3D effects the dialog now looks as it did before. The
minor problem with the finger input line not displaying
characters properly is fixed.
[beta .04]
Due to the way GEM interprets the '@' sign as a null it was not
possible to finger something such as '@bright.net'. As soon as
you typed the '@' sign as the first character of the finger GEM
grabs hold of it and messes things up. To get around this I
added a small work around. To finger '@bright.net' you need to
type ' @bright.net' instead. Note the leading space. The
leading space is removed before the finger is sent to the server.
Not the best fix, however it works.
[v1.00]
First public release. Beta .04 with a 1.00 version number.
[v1.01]
Moved the configuration settings to a seperate dialog in order to
simplify the main dialog. Added the default finger setting.
Replaced the silly 'Info' alert boxes with an organized dialog
box. Made some internal changes that will help me later recode
the interface into a window. The cache path is now converted to
uppercase. Updated the doc file too.
[v1.02]
You will have to reconfigure this version. The format of the
configuration file has changed and it's now checked to insure
that it's the correct file. The cache path has been removed
since it seemed to only confuse people. The temporary file will
now be written to the current directory at the time the program
was executed. Now you need only make sure that the drive the
program resides on has some free disk space. I added a debug
routine which is activated by holding down the alternate key
while launching the program. The debug routine will generate a
file called DEBUG.TXT in the default directory. The program when
in debug mode dumps internal data to the file which should be
send to me if a serious problem occurs. When the debug mode is
activated the temporary file FINGER.DAT containing the server
data is not deleted after being read in. Added a 'Cancel' button
to the config dialog. Updated the doc file again.
[v1.03]
The 'Cancel' button in the Configuration dialog is now 3D and the
border is not left behind when the dialog is removed. Selecting
'Cancel' kept the changes you made, but now only selecting 'Save'
keeps them.
[v1.04]
The 'out of memory' bug should now be resolved unless you are
indeed out of memory. For some silly reason I hadn't expected
'zero' data from the server and that's what was causing this one.
The 'end of file' [error #26] bug should also be fixed as well.
I hadn't expected a missing linefeed at the end of the server
data and it seems some servers do this on a regular basis. Both
these bugs where found after reviewing the output from my debug
routine, so I guess it was worth the time I put into it. The
program now compares the screen size (returned from the vdi) to
that of the largest dialog box, if the dialog won't fit in the
given screen size then the program aborts. This change should
allow the program to run on 'Overscan' equiped machines, that is
as long as the overscan patches into the vdi so it reports the new
screen size. Now what was I doing before all this happened? =)
[1.10]
The program now runs in a window. Added the hotlist to the
program which allows 8 entries. The config file format changed
due to the addition of the hotlist. The vdi screen size in no
longer checked, instead the size of the desktop work area is
checked. Added the save to disk option which saves an ASCII text
file. Updated the docs again.
[1.20]
The program now accepts a command line. If a command line is passed
to the program it opens the window and begins the finger. If STiK is
not running or initialized for some reason then the command line is
ignored. Updated and fixed some typos in the doc file.
[1.21]
The contents of the command line and environment strings are now
dumped to the debug file. The command line support only worked on
single-tasking versions of TOS because I failed to support the ARGV
specification. The command line now supports ARGV and I tested it
with Multi-TOS so I know it works now. The command line is also
clipped to fit into the editable object too. Updated the doc file yet
again.
eof