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EnigmA Amiga Run 1996 February
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EnigmA AMIGA RUN 04 (1996)(G.R. Edizioni)(IT)[!][issue 1996-02][Skylink CD III].iso
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--------------------------------------------------
»»» AutoAssign v1.12 «««
"Let's get rid of those damned assigns & mounts...!"
Beetware © 1995 The Beet Research
written by Grzegorz Calkowski
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Disclaimer
----------
The program executable and information above is provided "as is". No
representations or warranties are made with respect to the accuracy,
reliability, performance, currentness, or operation of this software and
information, and all use is at your own risk. The author doesn't assume any
responsibility or liability whatsoever with respect to your use of the program
and information.
Copying
-------
AutoAssign is published under "BeetWare" conception. It's very special
sort of GiftWare. It means you should send a beet to the author (but not a
rotten one! 8). Well, if you run short on beets send a disk or a small
donation or anything else. (Have a hint: a bottle of beer would be
excellent... :)
This program can be freely distributed under following conditions:
1. Everything in this distribution must be kept together and
unaltered. Applies to:
AutoAssign (the program itself)
AutoAssign.info
AutoAssign.020 (68020+ version)
AutoAssign.020.info
AutoAssign.doc (plain-ascii doc)
AutoAssign.doc.info
AutoAssign.guide (AmigeGuide®'ed doc)
AutoAssign.guide.info
MWB-Icons/AutoAssign.info (program's icon in MagicWB style :)
MWB-Icons.info
2. Copyright notices are not removed from executables and
documentation.
3. No more than a nominal fee is charged to cover cost of magnetic
media.
AutoAssign is Copyright (C) 1995 The Beet Research. All rights reserved.
Introduction
------------
Haven't you got tired of those applications which add more and more assigns
to your user-startup? Haven't you got irritated of those hundreds assigns
showing in the requesters? I bet you have. Well, no more...
AutoAssign is a small resident program which automatically makes an assign
when it is requested. It works somehow like DEFER assign but the assign won't
show until it is referenced. It's the feature that such programs like AssignX,
AssignWedge or ReqChange's AssignWedge lack of. Note, that AutoAssign isn't
replacement for them - they are complementary. See The AssignWedge section.
From version 1.10 AutoAssign can also perform "auto" mounts. Effect is
similar to so-called late mount (Mountlist's Mount keyword or DosDriver's
ACTIVATE tooltype set to 0) but it has an important advantage - mount can be
done also when a device is accessed by the volume name! And I think it is far
more convinient to manage late mounts in one file (assignsfile, I mean)
than in several mountlists, dosdrivers and startup-sequences. Even more! You
can put all your devices to the assignsfile and forget about 'Mount' command!!!
Nice, isn't ?
Although AutoAssign is small it occupies about 8 kilobytes of memory, but
the goal was not to save a few bytes but to get rid of those rarely used
assigns. Note, that memory usage doesn't depend on length of assignsfile
- it's accessed every time, when unexisting assign is referenced. It also
allows you to edit the assignsfile without quitting and re-running AutoAssign
(or even worse - rebooting).
AutoAssign propely recognizes "Please insert volume..." requesters even in
localized enviroment. Note, if you change language while AutoAssign is running
you have to quit & rerun it.
AutoAssign is 100% legal and was thoroughly tested with Enforcer &
Mungwall.
Requirements
------------
AutoAssigns requiers an Amiga (surprise?) with at least Kickstart 2.04
(NOTE: tested only on 3.0/3.1!, sorry :). It makes not much sense to use
AutoAssign without harddisk. Memory requirements are negligible.
AutoAssigns requires reqtools.library V38+ installed in your LIBS: to show
'About' requester, but it won't panic if it's not installed (is there anybody
without, really? :-).
The automount feature requires the 'Mount' command installed on your
command path (it's part of Workbench and should sit in C:).
Installation
------------
To have AutoAssign installed every boot you should drag it to WBStartup
drawer. Of course you can put it anywhere else on your harddisk. It such case
you are responsible to run it (for example form your startup-sequence or
user-startup scripts). Note, that there is an alternative icon supplied in
MagicWB style :-).
Note, that there is 68020+ version supplied. If you have 68020, 68030,
68040, or maybe 68060 based Amiga you should use it instead.
Also, you have to make assignsfile which consists all the
assigns. By default it is "S:AutoAssigns".
Usage from Shell
----------------
Although I strongly recommend you to use AutoAssign from Workbench you can
use it from Shell as well (for example, you can put it into your
startup-sequence or user-startup). AutoAssign DOES NOT detach automatically
from Shell so you should use 'run' command:
run >NIL: AutoAssign
As every other standard shell command AutoAssign recognizes the '?' what
brings the options template.
Options are:
ASSIGNSFILE <path> Specifies the path for assignsfile.
It's optional.
Default: S:AutoAssigns
Note, that ASSIGNSFILE keyword can be omitted.
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
IMPORTANT: the path must be absolute, not
relative (i.e. S:MyAssigns not S/MyAssigns).
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
QUIET Switch - if specified the about requester
won't be shown.
Usage from Workbench
--------------------
When lauched from WB AutoAssign looks for following tooltypes:
ASSIGNSFILE=<path> Specifies the path for assignsfile.
It's optional.
Default: S:AutoAssigns
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
IMPORTANT: the path must be absolute, not
relative (i.e. S:MyAssigns not S/MyAssigns).
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
QUIET If specified the about requester won't be
shown.
The assignsfile
---------------
The assigns must be in pure ASCII format. Take a look at following
example:
; AutoAssigns & AutoMounts
DPaint: Work:GFX/DPaint
SC: Work:SAS-C
LIB: SC:LIB SC:LIB2/ Development:store/LIB
Toaster: Work:Raytracing/LightWave
3d: Data:3d ; for LightWave
"My Game:" "Work:Games/My Beloved Game"
FF0: mount FF0:
Xmodules: mount XH1: from DEVS:Mountlist.xpk
Any string begining with a semi-colon (;) is considered to be a comment and
is ignored. Also blank lines or any leading or trailing blanks are ignored.
Each line describes an assign or a device to mount. The second case is
recognized by 'mount' keyword.
The first argument is a normal assign name. The following are the paths
where assignment should be made. For example the first assign would be the
same as:
Assign DPaint: Work:GFX/DPaint
and third is the same as:
Assign LIB: SC:LIB SC:LIB2 Development:store/LIB
Note, that you can specify assigns refering to another (unexisting)
assigns. For example:
AAA: BBB:
BBB: Work:
is correct.
When 'mount' keyword is given it indicates that a mount should be
performed. The first argument is a device or a volume name. The second is the
'mount' keyword followed by arguments for 'Mount' command. The arguments are
directly passed to the 'Mount' command - you can use multiple devices to mount.
Also you can use FORM option to specify optional mountlist.
Important - when you specify automount by a volume name the corresponding
device's mountentry MUST have its 'Mount' keyword set to 1 (i.e "immediate"
mount). Why? Look at following example:
XH2: mount XH2:
XFH_Works: mount XH2:
When XFH_Works: is first refered to 'mount XH2:' will be executed. XH2:
will be mounted but if it's "late" mount volume XFH_Works: won't appear! So
you will get what you wouldn't want to... ('Please insert...').
Note, if either a path, an assign name or device name consists any blanks
it must be enclosed in double-quotes (it's general rule in AmigaDos).
Summarizing - the template for
- assigns is NAME/A,TARGET/M/A
- mounts is NAME/A,MOUNT/S/A,DEVICE/M,FROM/K
VERY IMPORTANT: AutoAssign doesn't make *ANY* checks wether the
assignsfile is correct! Any errors, like missing colon, missing quote,
unexisting path won't be reported! Therefore you should edit the assignfile
carefully.
The AssignWedge
---------------
As I have written above AutoAssign perfectly complements with such "Assign"
commodities like AssignX, AssignWedge or ReqChange's AssignWedge. But to make
it work AutoAssign *MUST* be run _AFTER_ AssignWedge!!! If you put AutoAssign
into WBStartup drawer STARTPRI tooltype should be set to lower value than
STARTPRI value of AssignWedge! (If you are not familiar with STARTPRI tooltype
refer to your Workbench Manual).
For your convinience AutoAssign's icon has STARTPRI tooltype set to -128
(the lowest value).
To Do
-----
o Installer script
o A tool to extract all assigns from user-startup and create (or add to)
the assignsfile (soon :-)
o A hotkey to remove all previously made assigns (ie AutoAssign should
be a commodity)
o Polish and, maybe, French documentation.
o AutoAssign prefs editor (?)
Note, that the last one depends on the feedback I will get from you.
(Just don't be lazy - write few words if you like & use AutoAssign)
For me it's convinient enough to edit assignsfile with an
editor.
FEEDBACK REALLY ENCOURAGED!!! TELL ME YOUR IDEAS!!!
Contacting the author
---------------------
Any *ideas*, *bug reports*, *donations*, hardware (for example Cyberstorm
turboboard for my A4000), etc. will be sincerely welcomed. Just contact me!
My addy:
Grzegorz Calkowski
Rzedowice
ul.Dobrodzienska 8
42-780 Dobrodzien
POLAND
Phone: +48(0)34-575875
E-mail: calkowsk@us.edu.pl
(Sorry, for my poor English...)
Always remember:
Beeting is beliving...
and Amiga is the best computer ever!
Acknowledgements
----------------
Thanks go to:
o Michal "Dixan05" Prochownik for the game idea. Hope we'll realize
the project :-)
o Ryszard "Justus" Baginski for being "Marysia" ;)
o Jacek "Shind" Grzegorczyk for supporting me with additional
340MB harddisk and for loads of hot new stuff :-]
o Pawel Wezgowiec for hard work with downloading Linux for me.
o For develop team at C= (R.I.P) for the wonderful machine.
o ESCom for giving us a ray of hope...
History
-------
v1.00 (06.07.95)
o First release.
v1.01 (07.07.95)
o Doesn't lock the assignsfile for the whole run time. It allows for
editing the assignsfile without quitting & re-entering AutoAssign.
As a side-effect full path to the assignsfile must be given.
v1.10 (25.07.95)
o Auto-mount feature added.
o Support for multi-assigns added. Now uses ReadArgs() to parse.
o Icon's STARTPRI tooltype set to -128 instead of -30. (To be safer :-)
o Documentation reworked a bit.
v1.11 (27.07.95)
Oooopss... 1.10 was an *accidental* release - I forgot to include the
latest compiled executables. (So, in fact, this is what 1.10 should be).
o FROM keyword for mount didn't work. If specified _whole_ mount line
was ignored! Fixed.
v1.12 (23.10.95)
o Recompiled with some compiler's options changed - now ca. 500 shorter!
o Documentation update - included my E-Mail address! (finally, got it %-)
o Expect new _major_ update soon (-: When I finish my current -commercial-
project :-)