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========================================== timEd/beta A message editor for Squish (C) 1992 Gerard van Essen (2:281/527) ========================================== ! timEd uses the Squish MSGAPI by Scott Dudley. ! Squish is a trademark of Scott J. Dudley ! timEd uses Ralf Brown's swapping 'spawn' replacement (SPAWNO) ! timEd's screen writing routines are partly based on code from jim nutt and Erik Vanriper. ! timEd uses Mark Potter's DVAWARE routines. ┌─────────┐ │ History │ └─────────┴────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── (Warning: this part doesn't contain any useful info, 'quick starters' should skip this.. :-) TimEd is one of those program's that 'were never meant to be'. When Scott Dudley released Maximus 2.00 and Squish 1.00, I immediately switched (from Qmail, *.MSG) to the much more advanced Squish message base format. However, initially there were no message editors available, so I had to use Maximus itself to read the mail. Although this went reasonably well, it wasn't really fast and I missed some features ('netmail reply' being the most important one). When Scott released the MSGAPI (and I had just bought my Turbo C compiler :-) I played with it a bit, and decided to make a message viewer (yes, viewer only!). I got carried away. Later several message editors for Squish were released, but I always found reasons not to switch (too large, too slow, too buggy, ugly, whatever :-). I continued working on timEd, other people showed interest, got their copy and some of them even liked it! So.... I decided I would try to make a stable version, that could be released 'to the public' to check out the reactions (if any). Of course, a program is never ready (or without bugs), so I delayed it several times. But this is it! This version has all the features I wanted my editor to have, in order to work comfortably. I am not very fond of programs that are full of 'bells and whistles', and you won't find many gee-whiz-bang features in timEd (although it does have some special things, like a built in personal mail scanner and a nice 'Find' feature). ┌───────┐ │ Beta! │ └───────┴──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── Right! This is beta software (and apart from that: *I* wrote it! :-), so be careful! Before you run it, back up anything that is worth saving, make your will and warn your family and relatives. There are no guarentees that timEd doesn't do something terrible to your setup. Don't say I didn't warn you! This documentation is also beta :-) I'm sure it is missing lots of info you are looking for, but will never find. ┌───────────┐ │ Copyright │ └───────────┴──────────────────────────────────────────────────────── * It's freeware, you don't have to pay me anything. * Nobody should pay for timEd (to anyone!) * Nobody should make money out of it (if you know a nice way to make a fortune out of it, tell me, 'cause I want my cut!) * People are encouraged to reverse-engineer this program. Send me the source you come up with :-) * I would very much appreciate your opinion (either negative or positive) about timEd. Just send me a message (even a very short one!), so I will know what 'people' think of it. ! Any possible further development of timEd depends on that. If nobody ! is interested or enthousiastic, I'll end it right here. Of course, I ! will then try to think of another way to get famous! :-) ┌───────────────┐ │ Setting it up │ └───────────────┴──────────────────────────────────────────────────── Installing timEd is easy. A working setup consists of three files: timEd.exe (yes!) timEd.hlp (the helpfile) timEd.cfg (the configuration file) A sample timEd.cfg is included, edit it to suit your needs. The keywords that can be used in the configuration file are explained below. Apart from that, the sample .cfg file is heavily commented. In timEd, you can press F1 in most places to get help ('context sensitive', as we like to call it :-) TimEd looks for the configuration and help files in the current directory (can be changed with the -C command line parameter). ┌───────────┐ │ timEd.cfg │ └───────────┴──────────────────────────────────────────────────────── The configuration file for timEd should be called timEd.cfg and must reside in the current directory, so timEd can find it (use the -C command line paramater otherwise). It is a plain ASCII file and may contain comments. A comment is a line that starts with a semi-column, like this: ; this is a comment. Blank lines are ignored, all others should contain a keyword. Usually, this is in the form: <keyword> <value> [value value] So first the keyword, followed by the value of that keyword, optionally followed by more values.. The following keywords can be used in timEd.cfg: ADDRESS ======= Use this keyword to let timEd know what your address is. You can enter up to 10 of these, for your main address and AKA's. The first one given will be the default address. If you want to use an AKA for a certain area, you must use the -P switch (see EchoArea keyword). -P switches found in a Squish configuration file will be recognized and used. Example: address 2:281/527 address 2:500/133.999 NAME, ALIAS =========== Type your name (and optionally alias) here. The NAME will be used in the FROM: field of every message you write. The alias will be used as a second name to look for in the personal mail scan (ALT-P from the area selection menu). *Always* put double quotes around the name. Example: name "Gerard van.Essen" alias "Gerard van Essen" NODELIST ======== This tells timEd where it can find a Version 7 nodelist. The nodelist is very useful when entering netmail: timEd can look for addresses and SysOp names in the nodelist, to find the coreesponding data of that node. (So, when entering a name, timEd will try to find the address, when entering an address, timEd will try to find the name..). Example: nodelist C:\Binkley\Nodelist ORIGIN ====== This tells timEd what the default origin is. This line will appear at the bottom of every echomail message you write. You can override this default on a per area basis (by pressing ALT-H in timEd, while you are in message area). *Always* put double quotes around the origin. origin " Contrast BBS, 070-3234903 [V22..32bis] " EDITOR ====== This tells timEd what editor you want to use to edit your messages. Whenever it is time to edit a message, timEd will execute this program. Entering a full path is not required (because timEd will look for the editor in your PATH), but speeds up things. Example: Editor c:\misc\q.exe HELLO, REPHELLO =============== HELLO : This gives the string to start a new message with. You usually say 'hello' before you start a message, so this is called 'hello' and will be referred to as 'hellostring' throughout the documentation. REPHELLO : This gives the string to start a reply with. This is usually something like: 'In a message xxx wrote to yyy'. This will be referred to as the 'rephello string'. *Always* put double quotes around the 'hello' and 'rephello' strings. There are four 'variables' that can be used in this string (and in the 'rephello' string as well): %to : The full name of the person that the message IS addressed to (for a new message) or that the original WAS addressed to (for a reply, the REPHELLO keyword). %fto : As %to, but only the first name of that person. %from : The full name of the person who wrote the original message (in the case of a reply, so the REPHELLO keyword). In the case of a new message this would be the name of the person who wrote (writes) this new message (but that, of course, is you yourself :-) %ffrom : As %from, but only the first name of that person. An example to clear things up: Let's say I'm writing a message to Scott Dudley, so that's a new message, and the 'HELLO' keyword would be of significance here. The header would look like this: -=- From: Gerard van.Essen To : Scott Dudley Subj: Your MSGAPI -=- In this case, %to == 'Scott Dudley' and %fto == 'Scott'. If my timEd.cfg has: hello "Hello %to!" My message would be started with: Hello Scott Dudley! Of course, because we treat everyone like our best friend in Fidonet, I have: hello "Hello %fto!" As a result, my message will start with: Hello Scott! Right, that's the 'hellostring'. Now, let's say Scott receives my message, and decides to write something back. As that would be a reply, the 'rephello string' will be used. Looking at our message again (the same one, as this is the message Scott is writing a reply to..): -=- From: Gerard van.Essen To : Scott Dudley Subj: Your MSGAPI -=- In this case, %to == 'Scott Dudley' and %fto == 'Scott' %from == 'Gerard van.Essen" and %ffrom == 'Gerard' Now if Scott uses timEd, *and* he has this in his timed.cfg: rephello "%from wrote in a message to %to:" His reply would start with: Gerard van.Essen wrote in a message to Scott Dudley: And he can start typing.. SIGNOFF ======= This tells timEd what should be placed at end of every message. Most people always use the same 'signoff', so why not let timEd do it for you.. *Always* put double quotes around the 'signoff' message. Signoff "Groetjes, ....... === Art ===" In adition, you can also use \n in a string, to indicate a newline. So: signoff "Greetings,\n Gerard" expands to something like: -=- Greetings, Gerard -=- Note, however, that strings longer than +/- 70 characters cannot be editted from within timEd (with ALT-H). ECHOLOG ======= Where to put the echotoss.log file (name + path). If this is specified, an echotoss.log file will be written when you exit timEd. An echotoss.log file is a file containing a list with the areatags of areas that contain newly entered messages. You can pass this file to your tosser/scanner to scan out and pack these new messages. (For Squish, this is done using the '-f' command line parameter). Example: EchoLog C:\timEd\echotoss.log SHOWKLUDGES =========== This tells timEd if you want to see the control information in the messages by default (or not..). For this purpose, 'kludges' includes real kludges (like MSGID, REPLY, PID, PATH etc.) but also SEEN-BY lines. This is the setting at startup, you can toggle this setting from within timEd by pressing ALT-K or ALT-V when reading a message. Example: showkludges yes SWAP_ON_EDIT, SWAP_ON_SHELL =========================== These two statements determine timEd's behaviour when it calls other programs. There are two options: Yes : Swap timEd out of main memory when calling the other program. This will only leave about 250 bytes of timEd in main memory, thus freeing up a lot of memory for the other program to run in. No : Don't swap timEd out, load the other program in the memory remaining, with timEd still in memory. The second option takes more memory, but is faster (no swapping has to take place). TimEd will be swapped to XMS, EMS or to Disk if no XMS/EMS is available. Swapping to disk is quite slow, of course.. Swap_on_Edit: Determines if timEd is swapped out when the editor is called to edit a message. This is done a lot of course (especially if you write a lot of mail :-), so if you have enough memory to hold both timEd and the editor in memory (and this is usually the case), I would set this to 'No'. Swap_on_Shell: Determines if timEd is swapped out when shelling to DOS. Usually speed is not really important here, while lots of available can be very useful, so it might be a nice idea to set this to 'Yes'. MACRO ===== Others call this 'alias', but that keyword was already used :-) It works like this: in a netmail message, you enter a (short) name, that was also listed in timed.cfg using a 'macro' statement. TimEd will recognize this statement and expand it for you, saving you a lot of typing. This may include the 'to:' field, the address the message is sent to, and the subject. Examples: macro am,areamgr,2:281/520,my_pass When you enter 'am' in the 'to:' field, timEd will replace it with 'areamgr', and fill in the address (2:281/520) and subject (my_pass) lines for you. So, a total of 3 items were listed after the macro name. macro et,Erik Troost,2:281/527.2 This will expand to 'Erik Troost' with the address filled in. That's 2 items after the macro name. macro rvdn,ROn van der Nagel This will only expand the macro (rvdn) to ROn van der Nagel. Only 1 item listed behind the macro name. Note that spaces are allowed in a macro statement. They are never stripped, so don't put them were you don't want them! COLOURS ======= Lots of colours can be specified by the user. The numbers specify the colour to be used. Note: by default, timEd uses a monochrome colour setup. So if you don't have a colour monitor, you can initially leave all color_... statements out (in fact, you can do that with a colour monitor as well :-). The numbering is as follows: Foreground Background BLACK 0 0 BLUE 1 16 GREEN 2 32 CYAN 3 48 RED 4 64 MAGENTA 5 80 BROWN 6 96 LIGHTGRAY 7 112 DARKGRAY 8 n.a. LIGHTBLUE 9 n.a. LIGHTGREEN 10 n.a. LIGHTCYAN 11 n.a. LIGHTRED 12 n.a. LIGHTMAGENTA 13 n.a. YELLOW 14 n.a. WHITE 15 n.a. BLINK 128 n.a. Now take the preferred colours of the foreground and the background of a certain item, and add them. So, blue (foreground) on black (background) would be 1 + 0 = 1 lightgray on black is 7 + 0 = 7 white on blue is 15 + 16 = 31 etc. Here are the colours you can define, and the keywords to use + my personal setting of these colours. There are three main categories: * color_as... For the area selection screen, where you can select a message area to read. These colours will also be used for the message header list (ALT-L) and the file selection box that will appear when you use a 'wildcard' in the subject when doing a file attach. * color_msg... For the part where you will spend most time: the message reading screen. * color_pop... For popup-screens, like help screens and errors. Area selection screen settings ------------------------------ Area selection 'Title' Bar, at the top of the screen: color_asbar 112 Area Selection Frame, the single line around the total screen: color_asframe 4 Area Selection Normal Text, like the names of the areas: color_astext 7 Area Selection Highlighted bar, the message area that is currently selected: color_ashigh 31 Special colour, currently only used in a msg header list for personal messages: color_asspecial 14 Message reading screen settings ------------------------------- Message reader Header, like the From: and To: fields: color_msgheader 7 Message reader horiz. line, between header and text: color_msgline 9 Message reader quotes, quoted text (starting like GvE> ): color_msgquote 14 Message reader normal text, the body of the message: color_msgtext 7 Message reader 'Status' bar at bottom, with current msg area etc: color_msgbar 31 Message reader origin, the origin of a message: color_msgorigin 15 Message reader kludges (controlinfo like MSGID and SEEN-BY): color_msgkludge 3 Popup boxes settings -------------------- Popup boxes frame, the box around a popup text: color_popframe 121 Popup boxes text, the text inside the box: color_poptext 112 SQUISHCFG ========= TimEd can read the Squish.cfg for you, and get all EchoArea lines from that configuration. Note that Netmail, bad_msgs and dupes are not read; you will have to define those manually, because you might not want them (dupes, bad_msgs) or usually want to specify special attributes for that area (netmail). -P switches found in Squish.cfg will be recognized and used when creating a message. Give full path and name of the file. If it contains a AreasBBS statement, the areas.bbs file will be read as well. Squishcfg c:\squish\squish.cfg ECHOAREA, NETAREA ================= Area definition, Squish alike. You can specify areas in timEd.cfg as well, in addition to the areas found in Squish.cfg. The squish.cfg file is read *after* these are read, however, so you can 'overrule' areas here (areas already defined in timEd.cfg will be skipped in squish.cfg and/or areas.bbs). This is the only place where you can give a 'long' description of an area (can't do that in squish.cfg, of course) and where you can specify 'default message attributes' for newly created messages in that area. It looks quite a bit like definitions in squish.cfg. There are 3 keywords: ■ EchoArea - for echomail areas ■ NetArea - for netmail areas (define as many as you want) ■ LocalArea - for local areas The format of all these: <keyword> <description> <areatag> <location> [-Pxxx -Axx -$] <keyword> is NetArea, EchoArea or LocalArea. <description> is a description of the area, surrounded by double quotes <areatag> is the offical areatag of the area (like: TUB) <location> is the directory/basename where the area resides. And where: -$ is for squish areas -A gives default attributes. (p = private, c = crash, k = killsent). -Pz:nnn/nnn.p is the AKA to use for this area (also active for NetArea). Examples: NetArea "Netmail Area" netmail c:\fd\netmail -Apk My primary netmail area, with a nonsense areatag, is in *.MSG format and all messages get the 'private' and 'kill/sent' bits by default. The 'local' bit is always added to all messages as well. NetArea "Wlink netmail" wlnk_net c:\fd\wlink -Ap -$ -P60:100/112 A second netmail area, in Squish format. Messages get the 'private' bit by default and I use my AKA 60:100/112 in this netmail area. LocalArea "Bad_Msgs" BAD_MSGS C:\Squish\Msgs\Bad -$ LocalArea "Dupes" DUPES C:\Squish\Msgs\Dupes -$ Here I add my bad_msgs and dupe areas. I like to see what's happening. LocalArea "SysOp" Sysop d:\local\sysop -$ -Ap I define my SysOp area, default private messages. EchoArea "Contrast" CONTRAST d:\echo\CONTRAST -$ An echomail area (my local points area, defined here as well as in squish.cfg, but I define it here, because I want it at the top of my area selection screen..) EchoArea "Points Delmare" POINTS.133 c:\squish\delmare -$ -P2:500/133.999 Another echomail area, where I use my AKA 2:500/133.999 ┌────────────────────┐ │ Working with timEd │ └────────────────────┴─────────────────────────────────────────────── Well, if you changed timed.cfg to suit your needs, you can fire timEd up to see if it'll work. At startup, timEd shows an intro-screen where you can see what config files it is currently reading (timed.cfg, squish.cfg and areas.bbs). When the configuration files are parsed, timEd will the take you to the area selection screen. You should see a list of all areas you defined. The first area will be 'highlighted'. If you want to check the intro-screen, you can specify the -p command line parameter. TimEd will then wait for you to press a key, before going to the Area Selection Screen (like: "timed.exe -p".) The Area Selection Screen. ========================== Use the cursor keys (up and down), <page up>, <page down>, <home> and <end> to move around. A quick way to find an area is 'speedsearch'. If you know the official areatag of the area you want to read, start typing that tag. TimEd will try to find the first areatag matching the characters you typed. The characters will also appear at the top of the screen. You can press <ESC> to clear the 'speedsearch string'. To start reading messages in an area, press <ENTER> or the right arrow key. TimEd will then enter that area and display the last read message. On the area selection screen, the following keys are also active: ALT-S : scan areas for new mail. This will determine the number of messages present in every area, and the number of new (unread) messages. ALT-P : personal mail scan. This will scan all areas for mail addressed TO: you or your alias (as defined in timed.cfg). When a personal message is found: ALT-R : reply to the message. ALT-N : reply in another message area. ALT-X : Exit timEd. If specified in timed.cfg, an 'echotoss.log' file will be written at this point. ALT-L : Enter the area, and go directly into the 'List mode', showing a list of message headers. ALT-J : Jump to DOS. F1 : Show a helpscreen with available functions. The Message Reading Screen. =========================== When you enter an area, the lastread message will be shown. You can scroll the message body (if it doesn't fit on one screen entirely) using curor keys (up and down) and <page up>, <page down>, <home> and <end>. <ESC>, '+' or ALT-A will take you back to the area selection screen. Moving around in a message area. -------------------------------- Press the right arrow key to go to the next message, the left arrow key to go to the previous message. Ctrl <END> will take you to the last message in the area. Ctrl <HOME> will take you to the first message in the area. Type a number to go to a specific message. A small box will pop-up, where you can edit the number of the message to jump to. Ctrl <left> will go to the 'original' message, i.e. the message that the current message is a reply to. If you are reading a reply and don't know anymore what the original message was about, use this. Ctrl <right> will go to the reply to this message (if there are any replies already). If there is more than one reply, a list will be shown (with the name of the sender of the reply) so you can choose one. The availability of replies and 'the original' is shown at the top of the message screen. An example: -=- Date : 20-10-'92, 21:38 1744 From : Jan Terpstra 2:280/216.0 To : Hans Boelens Subj : Negeer dit! ───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── -=- Here you can see, that this message is a reply to message 17, and that there is a reply to this message, number 44. If there would have been more replies (and you used a reply linker that is capable of specifying 'multiple uplinks', a feature that is only available for Squish style message bases) there would have been more numbers after the '44'. Entering Messages. ------------------ In order to generate a message, you must use an external editor. TimEd will use the text generated by this editor to create a message. Using an external editor has one big problem: most editors put a 'hard return' at the end of *every* line, not just of line where the user actually pressed <ENTER>. In Fidonet, 'hard returns' should only be present at the end of a *paragraph*. The actual formatting (word wrapping) of the paragraph should be done by the message reader, according to the current screen size (usually, the screen has lines of 80 characters, but that is certainly not always the case!). Placing a 'hard return' at the end of every line (at postion 80), would only use the first 80 characters of a line, even on a 132 character display! So, timEd has to strip 'hard returns'. It tries it's very best, but sometimes fails miserably. One of the 'rules' is, that timEd will strip the 'hard return', if it is found at a postion *after* <length of line> - 20 (so on a 80 character display, it would be 60). 'Hard returns' found after that postion are supposed to be the result of the 'word wrapping' feature of an editor and are stripped. There is a way to prevent timEd from 'intelligently' stripping 'hard returns'. Usually it does what you want, but formatted text can be awfully screwed up, when the individual lines exceed 60 characters in length (for example Binkley logfiles :-). TimEd will then strip 'hard returns' making a mess of your nicely formatted logfile or C-listing. There are 2 methods to prevent timEd from stripping 'hard returns': - Forcing a 'hard return' for one line: Put a ~ at the end of a line. The ~ will be replaced with a 'hard return'. - Forcing 'hard returns' for a sequence of lines: Put ~~ on the beginning of a line (rest of line should be empty!) to start, and another one at the end. All text between those two lines will get a 'hard return' at the end of the line. The lines with the ~~ at the beginning will be stripped from the text. Examples: This line will certainly have a 'hard return' added to it.~ Now look at my nicely formatted logfile: -=- ~~ + 23 Sep 03:23:35 MAX CPS: 231 (52751 bytes) Efficiency: 96% = 23 Sep 03:23:35 MAX DL-Z C:\Files\Tekst\Contrast.Lzh = 23 Sep 03:23:35 MAX Free DL: reimbursed 227 seconds = 23 Sep 03:23:35 MAX Free DL: reimbursed 51 Kb + 23 Sep 03:23:59 MAX Jack Van Leeuwen off-line. Calls=16, Len=6, Today=6 : 23 Sep 03:24:00 MAX End, v2.01 (5) ~~ -=- With this knowledge, we can look at the commands that will let you enter a message, but before that, we'll look at the string editing functions. String editing in timEd ======================= In timEd, there are a few functions that let you edit strings. Some examples inlcude generating a message header (TO: field, address, subject) and the 'write message to file', where you have to enter a filename. All string editing function use the same routine, where the following keys are active: Right arrow, lef arrow : move left and right in string. <end>, <home> : go to the beginning or the end of the string. <ctrl-left>, <ctrl-right> : jump to previous or next word. <ctrl-end> : delete string from cursor position to end. Delete and backspace work as expected. Press <INS> to toggle 'insert mode'. And, very useful: CTRL-Y : Delete entire string. Now the functions to use while you are reading a message: ALT-E : Enter message This will let you create a new message in the current area. TimEd will first let you edit the header, and will then spawn the editor, where you can type in the message text. Save the text and exit the editor. You will then come back in timEd, that will read your message and save it. See also the section 'Creating netmail and file attaches'. ALT-R : Reply to message This will let you write a reply to the message that is currently shown on the screen. TimEd will let you edit the header (press <ENTER> to accept the defaults) and quote the entire message. Then the editor will be spawned.. ALT-N : Reply other area Create a reply, but select another area to put the reply in. This will first take you to the Area Selection Screen, where you can choose the area. ALT-O : Reply 'followup' This will let you quote the message text and add your comments, but will not address the message to the writer of that message, but to the person to whom the current message is addressed to. So, when someone writes a message to John, and you use ALT-O on that message, it will be quoted and also addressed to John. You can then add "I want that too!", or something similar :-) ALT-T : Reply, accept defaults This is the equivalent of ALT-R, but you will go directly to the editor, accepting the defaults for the TO: and Subj: fields. This is a fast way to reply, for lazy people with little time :-) ALT-C : Change message This will let you change the message (header + body). ALT-D : Delete message Delete the current message. TimEd will first ask a confirmation. ALT-W : Write to file Write the current message to a file. TimEd will ask for a filename to write to. You can also put (for example) LPT1, PRN as the 'filename' to send output to the printer. ALT-M : Move, copy, forward This will let you move, copy or forward the current message to another area. It will first show you the Area Selection Screen, where you can pick the destination area of your choice. The 'forward' option will let you edit the header (TO: and Subj: fields) before saving the message. ALT-V, K : Toggle kludges This will let you toggle the display of kludges (for this purpose, that also includes SEEN-BY lines). De default (at startup) can be set in timEd.cfg, using the 'showkludges' keyword. ALT-J : Jump to DOS. This will let you 'shell' to DOS. Type 'exit' to return to timEd. ALT-I : Message & Area info This will show a pop-up box with some info about the current message and the current area. F1 : Help This shows a short help-screen. ALT-X : Exit timEd This will return you to the DOS propmpt. If defined in timEd.cfg, an echotoss.log file will be generated at this time. ALT-H : Edit 'Hello' strings This will show a pop-up box, where you can edit the 'hellostring', the 'rephello' string, your 'signoff' and 'origin line' FOR THE CURRENT AREA ONLY. With this you can customize your setup on a per-area basis. The editted strings will be saved in the message area, so timEd can continue using them at a later time as well. Whenever timEd detects a 'custom setup' file in a message area, it will use the strings contained in that file, instead of the defaults defined in timEd.cfg. TimEd saves the info in: <areaname>.SQT for Squish areas, and timed.dat for *.MSG areas. The origin in saved in: <areaname>.SQO for Squish areas, and origin for *.MSG areas. The List Mode. -------------- ALT-L : List headers This will show you a list of message headers in the current area. Use <cursor up>, <cursor down>, <page up>, <page down>, <home> and <end> to move around through the list. Press <ENTER> to read the highlighted message. <ESC> will take you back to the current message before you pressed ALT-L. Other keys that are active in 'list mode': <Space> : mark highlighted message + : mark range of msgs - : unmark range of msgs This will show a pop-up box, where you can enter the range of messages to be marked. ALT-D : kill all marked msgs. ALT-M : move all marked msgs to another area. ALT-C : copy marked msgs to another area. ALT-W : write marked msgs to file. F1 : Show a short help screen. ALT-J : Jump to DOS. TimEd's Find feature. ===================== ALT-F : Find message This will show a small pop-up screen, where you can set the criteria for the search. It looks like this: ╔════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════╗ ║ ║ ║ ┌─ Areas: ───────────────┐┌─ Search for: ──────── in: ─┐ ║ ║ │ () Current Area only ││ ░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░ │ ║ ║ │ ( ) All Areas ││ │ ║ ║ └────────────────────────┘│ │ ║ ║ ┌─ Messages: ────────────┐│ │ ║ ║ │ () From Lastread ││ │ ║ ║ │ ( ) All Messages ││ │ ║ ║ └────────────────────────┘│ │ ║ ║ │ │ ║ ║ │ │ ║ ║ │ │ ║ ║ └────────────────────────────┘ ║ ║ ║ ║ Press F1 for help ║ ║ ║ ╚════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════╝ Give up to 10 string to search for. This will be an 'OR' search, so if *any* of the strings is found in the indicated location(s) [ F)rom field, T)o field, S)ubject, B)ody ] the message will be shown. You can give more than one location, so for example.. intel SB .. is legal (search for 'intel' in Subject and Body). The search is _not_ case-sensitive. Searching will start when CTRL-ENTER is pressed. ALT-R clears all strings entered. Use the <ENTER> and TAB keys to move around. When a match is found, the message will be shown, and you can use ALT-R and ALT-N to reply, if necessary. Other keys (like cursor right and left) continue the search. You can interrupt the search at any time by pressing <ESC>. Creating netmail and file attaches. =================================== This is a special section on the netmail area. Netmail is different from echomail in many ways, and timEd behaves differently when you enter netmail. While in the netmail area, you will also have to enter a fidonet address, in addition to the name of the recipient. Timed can help you in several ways, especially if a Version 7 nodelist is present. Entering a name: ---------------- When you enter a name (or part of the last name) in the TO: field and press <ENTER>, timEd will try to find that name in the nodelist and when found it will show a pop-up box with found address and other nodelist info. If you then press <ENTER>, timEd will fill in the found address for you. Entering an address: -------------------- In the TO: field, you can also enter an address (!). Again, timEd will try to locate that address in the nodelist and try to fill the name in for you. There are several shortcuts when entering an address. When you don't type in a 3D/4D address, timEd will fill the missing parts in with the default from *your* address. An example: My address is 2:281/527. If I now enter: 281/1, so with a missing ZONE number, timEd will fill in *my* zone number (that's 2, so the address becomes 2:281/1). In this case, I could even have entered: 1, because then timEd would have filled in net 281 (my NET) and zone 2 (my ZONE), producing the wanted address (2:281/1). I can also enter .1, (so missing zone, net and node info) and timEd will fill in my zone (2), my net (281) and my node (527), producing 2:281/527.1. After 'expanding' the address, timEd will try to find it in the nodelist. Generating a file-attach message. --------------------------------- TimEd will try to detect if you entered a path specification in the 'subject' field, and set the file-attach bit automatically if you did. Of course you can also set the file attach bit manually. TimEd will then check if the filename(s) entered on the subject line exist, and if you entered a wildcard and more than one match is found, timEd will show a list with matching files. You can then 'tag' the files you want to attach. If you tag more files than fit on the subject line, timEd will generate extra messages. A file-attach list may look like this: -=- Date : 25-10┌───────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐a Kill Loc From : Gerar│ Current filespec: c:\files\c\t*.* │ To : ROn v└───────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ Subj : c:\files\c\t*.* ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── ┌──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐ │ TABX.C 3 K │ │ TADV2DEM.ARJ 53 K │ │ TC1TUTOR.ARJ 105 K │ │ TC2TUTOR.ARJ 83 K │ │ TDT-2.ZIP 268 K │ │ TDT-3.ZIP 249 K │ └──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ -=- You can now 'tag' files with <ENTER> or <SPACE>, move around with <cursor up> and <cursor down> etc, and accept the currently tagged files with <CTRL-ENTER>. This process will be repeated for all entered file specifications. TimEd's CC: feature. ==================== TimEd can also make 'carbon copies' of netmail messages you write. It can happen that you want to send an exact copy of a message to someone other than the original recipient of the message. For example, when I release a new beta version, I might have to write the same netmail message for every beta tester. Now say I want to write the same message to Kasper Kwant, ROn van der Nagel and Frank Troost. I would enter the message, addressing it to Kasper Kwant, and on the first line of the message I would write: cc: ROn van.der.Nagel, Frank Troost When the message is saved, a copy will be generated for both ROn and Frank. Rules for the cc: line(s): * It must start on the first line of the message. * If all names do not fit on one line, proceed on the next line, and put cc: in front of it again. * You can use a full name (it will be looked up in the nodelist), a 'macro' (it will be expanded) or an address (it will be looked up in the nodelist). This is exactly like what you can enter at the TO: prompt of a 'normal' netmail message. In addition, if you type a full name which is *not* present in the nodelist (or if you don't want timEd to look in the nodelist, for whatever reason, like speed), you can also specify *both* name and adress, separated by a '#', like this: Gerard van Essen#2:281/527 And finally, if you regularly send CC:'s to the same bunch of people, you can put their names, macro's or addresses in a file, one per line, and specify that filename in the cc: line, like this: <c:\timed\names.cc The '<' is chosen as this looks a bit like 'redirection' in DOS :-) The contents of such a file could be: -=- Kasper Kwant ROn van.der.Nagel Frank Troost pietje#2:281/527.29 -=- Of course, you can combine all this. A full example (let's say that I have a macro for my HUB, called 'hub'): cc: 1, hub, Kasper Kwant, <names.cc cc: ROn van.der.Nagel, .23 ■ '1' will be expanded to myzone:mynet/1 (in this case 2:281/1) ■ 'Kasper Kwant' will be looked up in the nodelist. ■ The file 'names.cc' will be read and all persons listed in that file will get a copy. ■ ROn van.der.Nagel will be looked up in the nodelist. ■ 2:281/527.23 will get a copy too. Please don't abuse this feature by sending junk mail to everyone.. ┌─────────────────────────┐ │ Command line parameters │ └─────────────────────────┴────────────────────────────────────────── TimEd knows 2 command line parameters: -c Specify the directory where the config file (and helpfile) can be found, like: timed.exe -cC:\Bbs\timed\ And -p, to let timEd pause at the intro screen (so you can check what config file were parsed by timEd). Like: timed.exe -p Of course, you can combine both switches: timed.exe -p -cC:\Bbs\timed ┌──────────┐ │ Warnings │ └──────────┴───────────────────────────────────────────────────────── Some things you should know about timEd: ■ It doesn't do any zone gating. If you need it, let Squish (or some other program) do it for you. In a Binkley environment, Squish does a fine job at it. I don't know about a Frodo environment (as Squish doesn't really do anything with the netmail there). ■ TimEd uses direct screen writes (either to the physical screen, or to the DESQview virtual screen). There is no special code to prevent 'snow' on older CGA displays. ■ TimEd doesn't really like large messages. Messages larger than 50 - 60 Kb may cause very strange behaviour (anything is possible). ■ Older versions caused problems on *some* systems running DESQview. My own system was one of those, suffering from exception #13 errors every once in a while, usually when spawning the editor (or just before?). On other systems running DESQview everything is fine. TimEd never causes any trouble when running in an OS/2 DOS session. I've been debugging the code for days, but couldn't find any errors in the code. I now suspect the TC++ spawn function in combination with DV to be the cause of the trouble, and replaced the TC++ spawn function with Ralf Brown's spawn replacement. Please report if it's OK now. ┌───────────┐ │ Technical │ └───────────┴──────────────────────────────────────────────────────── TimEd is written using Turbo C++ (second edition), and makes extensive use of Scott Dudley's MSGAPI (thanks Scott!). It was developed on a 10 Mhz 286 (most of the time), and for a while on a 386-40 running OS/2 (also running my BBS) but even OS/2 couldn't protect the BBS from my programming skills (...), causing lockups and even reboots, so I went back to the 286.. If someone is really enthusiastic about this program: I would very much like to use a Watcom compiler, please buy me one! :-) <End of beta documentation>