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DOWNSORT Maximus CBCS DOWNload file SORT and List Utility (OS/2 and DOS) Version 4.7 December 1, 1990 Rob Hamerling Vianen, The Netherlands Phone: ++31-3473-72136 (voice) FIDO-net: 2:512/4.1098 Tested by the author with MAXIMUS CBCS 1.00 and 1.02 Maximus Download File Sort and List Utility (OS/2 and DOS) Maximus Download File Sort and List Utility (OS/2 and DOS) PREFACE DOWNSORT was started a few years ago as a program for my own use when I was SYSOP of the Bulletin Board PC-Square, to get overviews of my download material for the users. At that time PC-Square was running BinkleyTerm and OPUS under DOS. Now PC-Square runs with OS/2, BinkleyTerm and MAXIMUS CBCS, and I'm not the SYSOP anymore, but still strongly involved. As a contribution to PC-Square and the large international Bulletin Board community of MAXIMUS CBCS boards, I decided to upgrade my DOWNSORT program to the current software. DOWNSORT is now developed in an OS/2 environment. But it is distributed as 'family'-application: it runs under OS/2 and DOS. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to thank all users that contributed with constructive remarks and encouraging appraisals. Without doubt Emmanuel Sandorfi of 2:320/5 holds the record in number of suggestions and amount of additionally required programming effort. He also provided the additional title-fonts (2 and 3). REGISTRATION AND SHAREWARE FEE DOWNSORT is a $ 0.00 Shareware Program. Registration is voluntary: please send me a netmail message with your name and (net-)address. That gives me an impression of the usage and the impact of changes to DOWNSORT. WARRANTY None! Preface ii Maximus Download File Sort and List Utility (OS/2 and DOS) CONTENTS DOWNSORT . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 Purpose and Objectives . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 Functional Description . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 ▐ File-dates and HPFS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 ORPHAN report . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 BBS-list . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 NEW-list . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3 ALL-list . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3 GBL-list . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3 FILES.BBS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3 Additional notes about the lists: . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 Usage . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6 Installation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6 Commandline parameters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6 Configuration file . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10 Parameters with global scope . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10 Parameters with a local scope . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10 Usability hints . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11 Specification of AREA.DAT . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11 Location of FILES.BBS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12 Privilege control . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12 Orphan report . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12 Duplicates . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12 List Headers, Titles, Subtitles and Bottomlines . . . . . . . 13 Privileges with File Request . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13 Sample specifications and usage . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13 DOWNSORT specification sample . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13 BinkleyTerm specification sample . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14 Dependencies and restrictions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15 Wishlist . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16 Packaging . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17 Program Information . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18 Development Environment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18 Program Organisation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18 Main Data Organisation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20 Storage and Performance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22 Appendix A: History of changes and version legend . . . . . . . 24 Appendix B: Sample Configuration File . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28 Contents iii Maximus Download File Sort and List Utility (OS/2 and DOS) DOWNSORT DOWNSORT is a utility to make overviews of available download files for Bulletin Board Systems running MAXIMUS CBCS. The overviews differ in sort sequence, purpose of use and size. A report is produced for files that could not be listed for any reason. PURPOSE AND OBJECTIVES DOWNSORT is designed for the following purposes: 1. Produce different overviews of files which are available for download by users of the Bulletin Board and by File Requestors. QUICK and EASY retrieval is the main goal for the lists. Therefore many lists-types and within a type several variations should be available: versatility for SYSOP and users. 2. Report files which are not listed in FILES.BBS, or which privilege (individual or its area) prevents it from being reported. This might be caused by several circumstances: ■ a file belongs to a collection (area) with a higher privilege than the selected report privilege (typically the upload area, but also restricted collections for selected users). ■ a file appears in FILES.BBS after a ^Px-sequence that specifies a higher privilege than the selected report privilege (newly uploaded files in a combined up- and download directory). ■ an typing-error has been made in the filename.ext in FILES.BBS or a file has been renamed without updating FILES.BBS. ■ a file is not listed in FILES.BBS on purpose by SYSOP, to prevent it being downloaded other than by CO-SYSOP. 3. Must be able to run unattended (typically overnight). 4. Should not disclose files to users (file-requesters) without positive agreement by SYSOP. FUNCTIONAL DESCRIPTION ▐ The program DOWNSORT may create several types of outputfiles. ▐ FILE-DATES AND HPFS ▐ One of the function of DOWNSORT is sorting on file date. Since the ▐ introduction of HPFS in OS/2 version 1.2, there is not one single ▐ file-date anymore! A file on an HPFS volume has different values ▐ for: ▐ ■ Creation date ▐ ■ LastAccess date DOWNSORT 1 Maximus Download File Sort and List Utility (OS/2 and DOS) ▐ ■ LastWrite date ▐ The date you see normally in DIR-listings is the LastWrite date. ▐ Most SYSOPs will have noticed that ZMODEM uploads and file-attaches ▐ give file-dates corresponding to the (LastWrite-) date of the sending ▐ system. And most utilities handle only this 'single' date. That ▐ means that 'old' (ZMODEM-) uploaded files are generally not on top of ▐ the acquisition lists. ▐ But HPFS stores the date of arrival on your system (Creation) as ▐ well. DOWNSORT handles this Creation date since version 4.7, ▐ although the lists (see below) contain the 'old fashioned' LastWrite ▐ date. This has the following consequences: ▐ ■ A new acquisition is on top of lists (if that list is sorted on ▐ date), and are marked in the lists as new (flag for an 'age' of a ▐ week or a month). ▐ ■ The listed file-date is the 'ordinary' date. So users can judge ▐ for themselves if the file is 'new' for them as well. ▐ Note: The LastAccess date is not very relevant for the purposes of ▐ DOWNSORT, although SYSOP may see when it was last downloaded. ORPHAN REPORT This is a list of all files in download directories for which there is no entry in the corresponding FILES.BBS file. The report contains date, area-name and area-path of the orphan. The entries are sorted on area and filename. Not reported are MAXIMUS system files like: FILES.?BS, *.BAK, DIR.?BS and SYSTEM*.?BS. Note: If there is an entry for a file in FILES.BBS without a description, the file is NOT considered to be an Orphan. BBS-LIST This is a list of downloadfiles that came recently available (DOWNSORT.BBS). The list may be sorted on date (newest first) or on filename. It contains compiled MECCA control sequences, for direct use in MAXIMUS bulletins: a user-privilege sensitive list! It might be a good idea to put a translated [onexit] string, which translates to [^OFpath] (without the brackets!). When a user exits from the BBS-list bulletin, it will fall back to the exit-bulletin. The length of the file (number of file-entries) may be limited by parameters: ■ file-count ■ maximum privilege (never more than available within the privilege limit). If neither specified it will contain all available files in all download directories. DOWNSORT 2 Maximus Download File Sort and List Utility (OS/2 and DOS) To make it a complete MAXIMUS bulletin-file a user-provided header is included preceding the list and a trailer at the end of the list. Header and trailer can be built by SYSOP, and may contain any information and bulletin-control sequences (a sample is provided). NEW-LIST Basically the same list as above, but in simple ASCII format and without inclusion of header and trailer files. This list is suitable for file-requestors as brief overview of the latest additions, updates or replacements. ALL-LIST A list of all downloadfiles by area in alphabetical sequence (per area) on filename. Files of the same area are listed in groups, separated by imbedded headers with area-name, -description, and -privilege. Actual status information is provided in the area-header as well: area-filecount and -bytecount, and latest acquisition (date and file-name). At the end a SUMMARY report shows per area the area-title, file-count and byte-count, and totals. This list may be limited by the privilege parameter, but is not affected by the specification of filecount-limit. The numbers in area-header and summary report show only what is available for the particular privilege. GBL-LIST A similar list as ALL-list. But where ALL-list gives the files in groups per area, the GBL-list ignores area-boundaries and gives a single group, sorted on filename. For each file the area is mentioned. There is no area-summary. SYSOP may choose which of both is suitable to make available to users, and which to use for himself (or even both). The GBL-list is especially useful to check on duplicates over area's. The GBL-list is not limited by the filecount parameter. FILES.BBS A new "FILES.BBS" type of file may be (re-)created for every area. The contents of the file-information will be about the same as the original FILES.BBS, but with the following notes: ■ A header is generated with area-name, -title, and -privilege. Also the total amount of files and bytes and the most recently acquired new file in this area is part of the header information. DOWNSORT 3 Maximus Download File Sort and List Utility (OS/2 and DOS) ■ The entries are sorted on filename for all files with a privilege up to and including the area-privilege. ■ Files can have a privilege other than the area-privilege when the original FILES.BBS file does contain ^Pp-sequences ('p' being a privilege letter). This construction will be rebuilt by DOWNSORT. Files with a higher privilege than the area-privilege will follow after a compiled MECCA-sequence (^Pp) in the new FILES.BBS. DOWNSORT respects these indicators when reading FILES.BBS, so all file-privilege information is retained. This ensures no accidental loss of file-information, and the regular user won't see more than he should. ■ Wild-card specifications are not propagated to the new FILES.BBS. ■ The file description is kept internally as a single string of maximum 240 characters. When creating FILES.BBS files, this will be the file format (single record per file-entry). The original FILES.BBS may contain a (long) single string description, or multiple (short) multiline descriptions. When encountering multiline descriptions in input-FILES.BBS, DOWNSORT concatenates the separate description lines with a single intermediate space up to a maximum of 240 bytes. This will be the output format if the FIL-list is requested. ■ Comment-lines in the original FILES.BBS are discarded. See for naming conventions and placements "Commandline parameters" on page 6. ADDITIONAL NOTES ABOUT THE LISTS: ■ Dates are marked with a 'new'-indicator: a '*' if the file is only ▐ since a week on this system, and a '+' if it is since a month. ▐ FIledates later than the current system date are marked '-' ▐ (negative age). ■ In every outputfile the filename, MAXIMUS-area name, file-size and -date, and file-description from FILES.BBS is listed. A report-line will never display more than 79 characters. The file-description will be multi-line in ALL-list and GBL-list if it is longer than would fit on the standard 79-position line, a word-wrapping technique is used for readability (line-split on word boundary). The description is truncated at end of line in BBS-list and NEW-list. The -T option will force truncation of the description in all reports, the -W option will allow multi-line descriptions in all reports. If a filename is found in FILES.BBS, but no accompanying description, a "--- no description available ---" will be put in place. Files for which there is no entry in the FILES.BBS (Orphans) are treated as Hidden files, which are only listed in the reports if the Hidden privilege is specified. For a way to override this see: "Orphan report" on page 12. ■ The BBS-list contains MAXIMUS authorisation controls DOWNSORT 4 Maximus Download File Sort and List Utility (OS/2 and DOS) (^PLp-sequences), corresponding to the privilege of the area or the individual file. So it is not necessary to make different files for different categories of MAXIMUS users, even with the default privilege-limit SYSOP a user will not see the files he/she is not supposed to know about. NEW- and ALL-lists do not contain any privilege information, the files (or complete area's) above the specified privilege are simply not listed, however multiple lists can be produced for different categories of users (based on privilege). DOWNSORT 5 Maximus Download File Sort and List Utility (OS/2 and DOS) USAGE INSTALLATION With the following directions you should be able to setup and run DOWNSORT after very short time. 1. Make a separate directory for DOWNSORT, and make it the current default directory every time you run DOWNSORT. The separate directory is a recommendation, not a requirement! 2. Copy the files DOWNSORT.EXE and DOWNSORT.CFG from the DOWNSORT package into this directory. 3. Modify (edit) the file DOWNSORT.CFG to specify your environment and list requirements. The sample file contains comments to help you with this process. Most specifications are obvious. AreaDat is the most important parameter: DOWNSORT won't do anything useful if it cannot find this MAXIMUS file. See "Appendix B: Sample Configuration File" on page 28 for a printed sample. 4. You may give DOWNSORT a first shot by just using its name on the commandline, with the parameter -H. This will show a brief HELP-screen with the possible commandline parameter specifications. 5. All reports will be created in the DOWNSORT directory (unless you specified 'fpath' for the FILES.BBS output). Browse the lists to see if you like the contents and titles, and modify the CFG-file to your convenience. COMMANDLINE PARAMETERS This paragraph deals only with the commandline parameters! NOTE: Parameters from DOWNSORT.CFG (see "Configuration file" on page 10) are processed first, commandline parameters may complete and (partly) override those in the configuration file. Usage 6 Maximus Download File Sort and List Utility (OS/2 and DOS) DOWNSORT [@filespec] [BBS[:p]] [NEW[:pp]] [ALL[:pp]] [GBL[:pp]] [FIL[:fpath]] [nnn] [-T|W] [-A|D] [-H|Q|V] @filespec The character '@' followed by a complete file specification of the DOWNSORT configuration file. See "Configuration file" on page 10 for details. This file will be used to specify processing parameters. If the file cannot be read, only the commandline parameters are used. NOTE: The use of a configuration file is mandatory when the file AREA.DAT is not in the default directory when running DOWNSORT. Default: DOWNSORT.CFG in current default directory. BBS Create the BBS-list: DOWNSORT.BBS. Default: DOWNSORT.BBS will not be created. NEW Create NEW-list(s): DOWNSORT.N~p, where 'p' is the appropriate privilege class (see below). Default: DOWNSORT.N~p will not be created. ALL Create ALL-list(s): DOWNSORT.A~p, where 'p' is the appropriate privilege class (see below). nnn-limit does not apply to ALL-list. Default: DOWNSORT.A~p will not be created. GBL Create GBL-list(s): DOWNSORT.G~p, where 'p' is the appropriate privilege class (see below). nnn-limit does not apply to GBL-list. Default: DOWNSORT.G~p will not be created. FIL Create FILES.BBS type of files for each area. The specification does not apply to FILES.BBS, a privilege-limit cannot be specified and defaults to SYSOP. Another privilege limit can be specified however by means of the configuration file. For each individual area the following convention will be used for the name and place of the FILES.BBS list (in this Usage 7 Maximus Download File Sort and List Utility (OS/2 and DOS) sequence): 1. If the "FIL:" parameter specifies a directory-path, then for each area the output file "FILES.ac" is put in the specified directory ('ac' is 1 or 2 char area-code). Previous files with the same name will be discarded. 2. If "ListFile" is specified in AREA.CTL, then that name and path will be used. 3. Otherwise the file FILES.BBS: will be put in the directory with the download files. For situation 2 and 3 existing files will be renamed to .BAK (older .BAK files will be discarded). Default: FILES.BBS-type of files will not be generated. fpath Optional directory path specification for FILES.BBS-output. See the "FIL:" parameter for usage. Default: none nnn Maximum number of files to be reported in the BBS- and NEW-list(s). A maximum value of 32767 can be specified, it does not apply to ALL-list and GBL-list. Default: all files up to and including the (specified or default) privilege class will be listed for all types of lists. p Single privilege character. Lists only download files with a privilege of up to and including privilege 'p'. The indicator must be the first character of an existing MAXIMUS privilege level (T, D, L, N, W, P, F, E, C, A, S, H). No error-message is given for an invalid privilege character, there will simply be no file-list for an invalid character! For the BBS-list only a single privilege character is allowed, the listfile is always called: DOWNSORT.BBS. Default: S (SYSOP): files of all privilege levels will be listed, except HIDDEN files (with real Hidden privilege or files for which no entry could be found in FILES.BBS). pp Multiple privilege characters (minumum 0, maximum 10). Make for every valid specified privilege level a download-list with files of a privilege of up to and including privilege 'p'. The indicator must be the first character of an existing MAXIMUS privilege level. No error-message is given for an invalid privilege character, there will simply be no file-list for an invalid character! Applies to ALL-lists and NEW-lists, these are called DOWNSORT.A~p and DOWNSORT.N~p respectively, were 'p' Usage 8 Maximus Download File Sort and List Utility (OS/2 and DOS) represents the applicable privilege character. Default: S (SYSOP): files of all privilege levels will be listed, except HIDDEN files (with real Hidden privilege or files for which no entry could be found in FILES.BBS). -T|W Action to be taken if the file description would cause the reportline to exceed 79 characters: ■ T - truncate the description ■ W - wrap the description and provide as many reportlines as needed to show the complete description. Default: -T for NEW-list and BBS-list, -W for ALL-list and GBL-list. -A|D Sort method for BBS-list and NEW-list. ■ A - sort the files alphabetically on filename. ■ D - sort the files on reversed date sequence (newest file on top of list). When the -A option is selected, an additional header-line will appear in the BBS-list and NEW-list, indicating the latest acquisition. This line is not needed when these lists are sorted on date, since the the latest acquisition will be on top of the list! Default: -D -H|Q|V Operating mode ■ H - HELP: display screen with essential information about running DOWNSORT, such as the command syntax. In that case the program will not undertake any other action. ■ Q - QUIET: display only start and finish-message, and error messages which prevent the program from proceeding normally. ■ V - VERBOSE: display a lot of progress messages. If neither -Q nor -V is specified, than the number of console messages will be 'intermediate': more than -Q, but less than -V. Default: none Notes: ■ All commandline parameters are optional, may be specified in any sequence and are case independent. ■ Parameters from the configuration file are processed before those from the commandline. This has some side-effects, like: - If you specify a specific list in DOWNSORT.CFG, it will be created anyhow, whatever you specify on the commandline. - However, if you specify privilege values on the commandline, only the commandline values will be used, and none from the configuration file. Usage 9 Maximus Download File Sort and List Utility (OS/2 and DOS) - Commandline parameters have a global meaning, and are applied to all lists (if applicable). For example: if you specify '-A' on the commandline, all lists will be sorted alphabetically on filename. ■ Parameters that can be specified with the configuration file only, and cannot be overridden with a commandline parameter are: - BLOCK title text, font and BLOCK title suppression - Subtitle lines - Filename and individual list-options - Privilege for FILES.BBS output ■ The Orphan-report is not selectable. However it will be generated only if there are any orphans, and then the specified parameter apply. CONFIGURATION FILE Almost all processing options may be specified in an optional configuration file, which can be specified with a commandline parameter. The configuration file is a somewhat more convenient way to specify processing parameters, and allows even more customisation. It is a good place for the more static parameters of your environment, commandline parameters are nice to create quickly 'another' list or a different format (for example wrapped or truncated descriptions). The parameters are only mentioned here for completeness, see "Appendix B: Sample Configuration File" on page 28 for a documented specification sample of a configuration file. PARAMETERS WITH GLOBAL SCOPE The parameters below influence the execution of DOWNSORT, or have impact on every list (if it is applicable for that list). ■ File Specification of the MAXIMUS CBCS file 'AREA.DAT'. ■ List title with BLOCK-characters. ■ Font for the BLOCK title. ■ Pre-titles, Sub-titles and Bottom-lines in 'text' format ■ Descriptive text of orphans and files without a description in the input FILES.BBS files. ■ Maximum number of entries in NEW-list and BBS-list. PARAMETERS WITH A LOCAL SCOPE The parameters below are sub-parameters of the xxxFileList keyword. ■ Up to 10 privileges for NEW-list, GBL-list and ALL-list (each resulting in a separate list). ■ Alternate output filename (in stead of the default DOWNSORT). ■ Directory for the output FILES.BBS-lists Usage 10 Maximus Download File Sort and List Utility (OS/2 and DOS) ■ Maximum number of file entries in NEW-list and BBS-list ■ File-entry sort sequence (filename or date). ■ Wrapping or Truncation of long file descriptions. ■ Title Font selection. A sample configuration file is provided separately from this document. A listing of this file is imbedded as "Appendix B: Sample Configuration File" on page 28. It contains a complete specification with comments on: ■ which options are available ■ how to specify the options Read and modify the file as you like. Copy the sample file to a save place before you start modifying the original DOWNSORT.CFG! NOTE: The parameters from DOWNSORT.CFG are processed first. Commandline parameters may complete and will (partly) override those in the configuration file. USABILITY HINTS SPECIFICATION OF AREA.DAT The MAXIMUS file AREA.DAT is absolutely required by DOWNSORT. If you run DOWNSORT in directory without AREA.DAT, then you have several options: ■ You might add a COPY statement in your batch-file to copy AREA.DAT with every run into your DOWNSORT directory. ■ You might use the "@path" parameter to specify the complete filespec of AREA.DAT ("drive:\directory\file.ext"). ■ You may use DOWNSORT.CFG for the filespec of AREA.DAT. The latter is recommended. Currently DOWNSORT does not allow to select the contents of the lists on area-code. The '@path' allows you to specify a different AREA.DAT file than the one that is used by your MAXIMUS. With SILT you may build a special AREA.DAT for exclusive use by DOWNSORT, with different, less, or more directories! If DOWNSORT reports a memory constraint (see also "Storage and Performance" on page 22), you may use this technique as circumvention: leave out one or more of the file area's and rerun DOWNSORT with the alternate AREA.DAT specification. Usage 11 Maximus Download File Sort and List Utility (OS/2 and DOS) LOCATION OF FILES.BBS For input DOWNSORT uses either the ListFile specification in AREA.DAT, or the download directory to locate the file with file-descriptions (generally known as FILES.BBS). The destination of FILES.BBS-files is not by definition the same as the origin! When specified with the "FIL:"-parameter (or in the configuration file), the output may be located in a different directory than the original input FILES.BBS. Manual checking or post-processing by some other program may follow DOWNSORT, after which the files might be put back on the MAXIMUS specified position. PRIVILEGE CONTROL The default file privilege to be shown is SYSOP. Files without a matching filename-entry in FILES.BBS are treated as Hidden. That means that by default these files will not be listed, unless the 'H' privilege is used on the report-request specification. All files with a higher privilege than the specified (or defaulted) report-privilege will not appear in the report. ORPHAN REPORT The Orphan report cannot be requested or suppressed. However, a new report will be generated only if there are any orphans detected. In that case it overwrites a possibly present old DOWNSORT.ORP file. A way of suppressing Orphan-reporting is to include a "*.*" entry at the end of FILES.BBS. This has two effects: ■ In the sense of DOWNSORT orphans do not exist anymore: there is a matching entry in FILES.BBS for every file. ■ The description of this entry will replace the hard-code text "----no-description-----". You may enter your own text in the language you prefer. DUPLICATES No test on duplicates is done, this means: ■ If a downloadpath is encountered more than once, the files will appear that many times in the outputlist (depending on the area-privilege!) ■ If a filename.ext is encountered more than once in different subdirectories, it will appear that many times in the outputlist. The file-privilege reflects that of the area where the file belongs to (unless overridden by a ^Px modifier in FILES.BBS). Usage 12 Maximus Download File Sort and List Utility (OS/2 and DOS) LIST HEADERS, TITLES, SUBTITLES AND BOTTOMLINES Only the BBS-list provides a facility to imbed user-provided header and trailer files. The files are unique for the use of the BBS-list, there is no use for it in the other lists. For NEW-list, ALL-list, and GBL-list no header- or trailer-file is imbedded, but a BLOCK-title is generated. A user-title may be specified via the configuration file, otherwise a default title is generated (DOWNSORTxy, where xy stands for the version). The BLOCK-title may be suppressed by specifying TitleFont 0 in the configuration file. For the same lists for which the BLOCK-title applies a 'Pre-title', 'Sub-title' and 'Bottom-title' of each maximum 10 lines may be specified via the configuration file. These lines may contain anything, including MECCA control sequences if you like. The pre-title will be copied immediately before the BLOCK-title, the subtitle immediately after it, and the bottom-title as very last couple of lines in every list. For file-requestors a header with indication that the list comes from your system is highly recommended! With the pre- and sub-titles you may customise the list-header to whatever you like, including empty lines for optical purposes. PRIVILEGES WITH FILE REQUEST If you run a mailer like BinkleyTerm, which makes a distinction between 'unknown', 'known' and 'password-protected' users, you could generate multiple download lists with different privilege indictor, depending if you allow these categories to request different file collections a sample of this kind of environment is given in "Sample specifications and usage". This is not needed for DOWNSORT.BBS, since this file has imbedded privilege control sequences for MAXIMUS users. But you should specify a sufficiently high privilege for the BBS-list to satisfy your most valuable users! SAMPLE SPECIFICATIONS AND USAGE Assume you are runnung MAXIMUS with BinkleyTerm as front end mailer. Suppose you make a distinction for file-requestors between Unknown, Known and Password-Protected (e.g. corresponding to Disgrace, Normal and Privileged MAXIMUS users). DOWNSORT SPECIFICATION SAMPLE You should have a specification like this: Usage 13 Maximus Download File Sort and List Utility (OS/2 and DOS) DOWNSORT bbs new:dnp all:dnp 100 In addition to or in place of the specifications in DOWNSORT.CFG, this specification produces the following lists: ■ Orphan report (only if there are any orphans). ■ DOWNSORT.BBS with 100 entries for MAXIMUS users of category Privil. Users with a lower privilege will actually see a shorter list if the file contains Privil entries. ■ For file requestors of the magic filename FILES a list, a list with all files (with optional titles via DOWNSORT.CFG specifications): - DOWNSORT.A~D for UNKNOWN file-requestors - DOWNSORT.A~N for KNOWN file-requestors - DOWNSORT.A~P for Password Protected file-requestors Note that each list is a complete list of what is available to the user of the specific privilege class, but your system will generally contain more files than listed for UNKNOWN and KNOWN users! ■ For file requests of the magic filename NEWFILES a list of the 100 most recent additions to your system (with optional titles via DOWNSORT.CFG specifications): - DOWNSORT.N~D for UNKNOWN file-requestors - DOWNSORT.N~N for KNOWN file-requestors - DOWNSORT.N~P for Password Protected file-requestors Note that each list is 100 entries long, but the contents will generally not be quite the same. In general: files, which the requestor is not supposed to know about due to his privilege status, will not be on his/her list! Note: The counters on top of the lists indicate what your system has available in total (including higher privileges), so a clever user/file-requester may come up with the question how that is possible: explain that he/she has to earn a higher privilege level! BINKLEYTERM SPECIFICATION SAMPLE In Binkley.Cfg you should specify for requests of FILES: Avail Downsort.A~d KnownAvail Downsort.A~n ProtAvail Downsort.A~p Furthermore you may need to specify different OKFILEs: Usage 14 Maximus Download File Sort and List Utility (OS/2 and DOS) OKFile Download.N KnownReqList Download.K ProtReqList Download.P And in each of the appropriate filerequest authorisation files you should specify the appropriate file-spec: ╔═══════════╦══════════════╦═══════════════╦═══════════════╗ ║ in: ║ OKFile ║ KnownReqList ║ ProtReqList ║ ║ ║ (Download.N) ║ (Download.K) ║ (Download.P) ║ ║ for: ║ ║ ║ ║ ╠═══════════╬══════════════╬═══════════════╬═══════════════╣ ║ ..... ║ ......... ║ ........... ║ ........ ║ ║ @NEWFILES ║ Downsort.N~d ║ Downsort.N~n ║ Downsort.N~p ║ ║ @FILES ║ Downsort.A~d ║ Downsort.A~n ║ Downsort.A~p ║ ║ ..... ║ ......... ║ ........... ║ ........ ║ ╚═══════════╩══════════════╩═══════════════╩═══════════════╝ This will result in sending of the appropriate NEW-list to every requester of the magic filename: NEWFILES. If you use the second magic filename, then the Avail-lines in Binkley.Cfg are not needed, and you might prefer this way. Of course if the privilege level of all download area's is the same, this construction is not needed, but in that case it is unlikely that you have specified KnownAvail and ProtAvail! DEPENDENCIES AND RESTRICTIONS ■ Applies to MAXIMUS CBCS 1.00 and 1.02. ■ Requires OS/2 or DOS 3.0+. ■ The input FILES.BBS files are assumed to contain only filename.ext (the regular 8.3 format, no support for OS/2 1.2+ HPFS format), the remainder of the line is considered as file description. The filename should be left-aligned (start in position 1). If a privilege modifier (^Px) is encountered in FILES.BBS then 'x' will become the privilege of all subsequent files (it assumes ^Px on a SEPARATE line, the REST OF THE LINE IS IGNORED!). Heading, comments and blank lines in FILES.BBS are ignored. The modified privilege might be higher (generally the case) or lower than the area-privilege. Usage 15 Maximus Download File Sort and List Utility (OS/2 and DOS) WISHLIST DOWNSORT is not finished! There are a number of wishes and requirements of users and myself to include in future releases. I list them below not in any particular order, but some seem to be more important than others (but that differs from SYSOP to SYSOP). And some are more easy to implement than others, and that depends mainly on the author! ■ Follow the MAXIMUS development (changing AREA.DAT and other structures), and support several versions simultaneously. I'll try to make DOWNSORT independent of MAXIMUS-versions. I'm thinking of parsing AREA.CTL, in stead of using AREA.DAT, as suggested by Scott Dudley himself. ■ Automatic removal of 'bad' files (like .BAK-files, obsolete files, files that are not in FILES.BBS), maybe move them to a special BAD_FILE directory. ■ User-configurable options for: - week and month indicators - indicator for continuation lines in wrapped descriptions - font in AREA-header and Summary in ALL-list, and in FILES.BBS ■ Add [selectable] MECCA control in FILES.BBS, like in the BBS-list. ■ Logging to file in stead of console, obtaining a history file of DOWNSORT usage. ■ File-selection with MAXIMUS CBCS key/lock parameters in addition or in stead of privilege levels. ■ Selection of files in reports on area, or group of area's. ■ Support for use of 'barricaded' areas and key/lock. ■ Selection of new files on basis of date or period. ■ Preserve storage by not keeping unneeded data in storage, such as information of files that will not appear in any list (high privilege files, when creating low-privilege lists). This is particularly (if not only) important for DOS-users. Usage 16 Maximus Download File Sort and List Utility (OS/2 and DOS) PACKAGING All files of the DOWNSORT package are in a file DWNSRTxy.ZIP. Included are: DOWNSORT.EXE Execution module for DOS and OS/2 (family API). The difference in size between the OS/2-only and family version is relatively so small that I decided not to distribute DOWNOS2.EXE anymore. DOWNSORT.DOC Documentation (this file). DOWNSORT.CFG Sample configuration file. This file contains comment lines with extensive instructions how to specify the parameters in the file. DOWNSORT.HDR Sample BBS-list header. You may use this header, which is only imbedded in the BBS-list, to imbed text and/or MECCA-sequences. A good candidate for the latter would be [onexit], which translates to ^OFpath. See the sample DOWNSORT.HDR file! DOWNSORT.TRL Sample BBS-list trailer. DOWNSORT.C Source of mainline and global variable definitions. DOWNCOL.C Source of data collection functions. DOWNFNT.C Source of font definition and formatting function. DOWNPAR.C Source of parameter processing functions. DOWNRPT.C Source of output report functions. DOWNSRV.C Source of miscellaneous services functions. DOWNSORT.H Header file, with external definitions of global variables. AREA_MAX.H Header file with union specification of AREA.DAT for different versions of MAXIMUS (as far as the layout of AREA>DAT is concerned). AREA_100.H Header file with guessed layout of AREA.DAT for MAXIMUS CBCS version 1.00. AREA_102.H Header file with layout of AREA.DAT of MAXIMUS CBCS version 1.02. DOWNSORT.LNK LINK response file. DOWNSORT.DEF LINK definition file. DOWNSORT.MAK MAKE file (without BIND). README.1ST The actual contents of the package (produced with PKUNZIP /V), added to the ZIP-file after this was created with the foregoing files. This gives at least some authentication. Packaging 17 Maximus Download File Sort and List Utility (OS/2 and DOS) PROGRAM INFORMATION DEVELOPMENT ENVIRONMENT DOWNSORT has been developed with IBM C/2 compiler version 1.1, under IBM OS/2 Extended Edition 1.2 with Program Development Toolkit version 1.2 as COMPACT memory model. DOWNSORT has been tested with MAXIMUS CBCS 1.00 and 1.02 (OS/2). It is in daily use on Bulletin Board PC-Square: FIDO-net address 2:512/4; phone 31-79-424107 (HST-DS). PROGRAM ORGANISATION The program is organised as follows: ■ Initialisation: - Read configuration file. - Process commandline parameters. The commandline parameters will override configuration file parameters. ■ Read AREA.DAT file to collect download pathnames (assumes AREA.DAT is in current directory). ■ For all download path-specs: - Read subdirectory (with find-file-first/next function) Take only Normal files: ignore directory entries, Hidden and System files and volume labels. Also ignore MAXIMUS-files with the following specifications: FILES.?BS, *.BAK, DIR.?BS and SYSTEM*.?BS - For all regular file-entries found in subdirectory: -- Get filename.ext, attribute, date, time, size (timestamp will be 'last-time-written'). -- Get file-description from FILES.BBS file. The path to the FILES.BBS file is (1) obtained from the "ListFile" specification in MAXIMUS AREA.DAT file, or (2) if not specified from the "DownLoad" specification (among the download files). -- Get file privilege 1) from area, 2) from FILES.BBS file. ■ Check for orphans. If any orphan found create the orphan report, with the file-entries sorted on (1) area and (2) filename. ■ For the BBS-list: - Sort the files primarily on descending file-timestamp (and secundary on file-name and area-code). - Resort the first files on filename if requested. - Create output file for sorted list of filenames, -descriptions, Program Information 18 Maximus Download File Sort and List Utility (OS/2 and DOS) etc. The file is placed in the current subdirectory (which generally will be the MAXIMUS directory) with the name DOWNSORT.BBS. - Copy a headerfile (for a customised MAXIMUS bulletin). - Put files in formatted outputfile (filename, area#, date, size, description), but only if description is found in FILES.BBS. Skip files with privilege higher than commandline (or default) parameter. Precede each line with a privilege-control sequence (^PLx string) so that MAXIMUS users below the specified max-priv-level do effectively see only the files they can download. - Include a trailerfile in the outputfile (for a custimised Bulletin). - Report non-listed files on standard output device (which might be re-directed to printer or disk-file). ■ If requested, put the above file collection (also in reverse date-sequence) in DOWNSORT.N~p with similar contents and layout as DOWNSORT.BBS, but without BBS-control sequences, and without including a header and trailer file. Produce a list for the default privilege (HIDDEN), or one for each specified privilege. ■ If requested, re-sort files on area and then filename, and create DOWNSORT.A~p, containing all files (respecting the privilege restrictions!). Area's with zero files within the applicable privilege limit will not be listed at all (will seem non-existing!). Produce a list for the default privilege (SYSOP), or one for each specified privilege. At the end of the list, an area summary report is generated. ■ If requested, re-sort files on filename only, and create DOWNSORT.GBL. ■ If requested, re-sort files on area, privilege and filename, and create for each area a FILES.BBS-type of file. NOTE: the program firstly reads a directory for existing files (not Hidden- or System-files, and not Subdirectory or Volumelabel), and then reads FILES.BBS to assign a description to each file. This means: ■ If more than 1 matching file-specification in FILES.BBS of the involved area is found (note that wild-card specifications in FILES.BBS are supported!), than the first matching description from FILES.BBS will appear in the lists (new in version 4.5, was 'last' previous versions). ■ Files for which no description is found in FILES.BBS will get "---no description available---" in the user reports. ■ Files for which no matching filename in FILES.BBS is found will be listed in the Orphan report (DOWNSORT.ORP). Filenames of Orphans appear only in the reports when the report request explicitly specifies the Hidden privilege. Program Information 19 Maximus Download File Sort and List Utility (OS/2 and DOS) MAIN DATA ORGANISATION Data structure for access to file information via: 1. array of file-pointers (for file-sort!) 2. pointerchain in file-info structures 3. file structure contains pointer to file-description 4. file-structure contains pointer to area-information 5. Array of area-information The structures are shown in Figure 1 on page 21. Program Information 20 Maximus Download File Sort and List Utility (OS/2 and DOS) ╔══════╗ ║ dm ║ ╚══════╝ │ Array of pointers to structures with file info │ ╔═══════════╦════════════╦═════════════ . . . ══════╗ (1) └─────>║ *file[0] ║ *file[1] ║ *file[2] ║ ╚═══════════╩════════════╩═════════════ . . . ══════╝ │ │ │ (2) v v v ╔══════╗ ╔══════╗ ╔══════╗ ╔══════╗ ║ ca ║ ──> ║ next ║ ──> ║ next ║ ──> ║ next ║ ──> . . . ╚══════╝ ╠══════╣ ╠══════╣ ╠══════╣ (first- ║ file-║ ║ file-║ ║ file-║ element) ║ info ║ ║ info ║ ║ info ║ . . . ║ [0] ║ ║ [1] ║ ║ [2] ║ ╚══════╝ ╚══════╝ ╚══════╝ │ │ │ │ wildcard│ │ │ └──┐ │ └──┐ │ │ │ │ │ ┌──────────┘ │ (3) v │ v v │ ┌──────┘ ╔══════╗ │ ╔══════╗ │ │ ║file- ║ │ ║file- ║ │ │(files of ║descr ║ │ ║descr ║ │ │ same area) . . . ╚══════╝ │ ╚══════╝ │ │ │ │ │ (4) v v v ╔════════════╦═════════════╦════════ . . . ══════╗ (5) ┌────────>║ area[0] ║ area[1] ║ ║ │ ╚════════════╩═════════════╩════════ . . . ══════╝ │ array of structures of download info ╔══════╗ ║ area ║ ╚══════╝ Figure 1. Schematic overview of DOWNSORT's in-storage database. Note: Do not sort the area-array: this will invalidate the pointers in the file-information records! Program Information 21 Maximus Download File Sort and List Utility (OS/2 and DOS) The block character image is basically a 10x7 matrix (10 vertical and 7 horizontal 'pixels'). Each pixel is displayed as a solid block. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 ╔═╦═╦═╦═╦═╦═╦═╗ ║-║-║-║-║-║-║-║ line 1 (lower + upper) ╠═╬═╬═╬═╬═╬═╬═╣ ║-║-║-║-║-║-║-║ 2 (lower + upper) ╠═╬═╬═╬═╬═╬═╬═╣ ║-║-║-║-║-║-║-║ 3 (lower + upper) ╠═╬═╬═╬═╬═╬═╬═╣ ║-║-║-║-║-║-║-║ 4 (lower + upper) ╠═╬═╬═╬═╬═╬═╬═╣ ║-║-║-║-║-║-║-║ 5 (lower + upper) ╚═╩═╩═╩═╩═╩═╩═╝ Each line is represented by a structure of seven 3-bit fields Each 3-bit field represents a basic element: value char description 0 (blank) 1 ▄ lower half 2 ▀ upper half 3 █ lower+upper halves 4 ▓ gray pattern 5 ▌ left part of upper and lower half 6 ▐ right part of upper and lower half 7 ▒ gray pattern 8 ░ gray pattern for not-supported characters The pitch is variable ('proportional font': a variable number of horizontal pixels). Three fonts are provided with different character-image and size: 1. 6x5 (three lines of max 5 characters) 2. 10x7 (five lines of max 7 characters) ▐ 3. 8x7 (four lines of max 7 characters) ▐ 4. 10x7 (reversed video image of the 8x7 font) ▐ Not all ASCII characters are represented in the font tables! STORAGE AND PERFORMANCE As a rough estimate of the memory requirements of DOWNSORT, use sum of the following figures: ■ Program: about 70KB ■ Each area: 300 Bytes ■ Each file: 60 Bytes for each file (excl description) ■ The sum of the description texts (on average 80 Bytes?) Program Information 22 Maximus Download File Sort and List Utility (OS/2 and DOS) There is a theoretical limit on the number of files that can be processed by DOWNSORT: about 16000 files. I suppose you'll reach other limits first, for example stack-space. DOWNSORT has been built with a 'guess' about needed stack space. The author would appreciate to receive a report for a better estimate. Processor performance was an issue for large area's before version 4.5 of DOWNSORT in the data-collection process. That has been partly rewritten in version 4.5 and significantly improved. Fastest execution will be obtained when the input FILES.BBS is sorted on filename. Program Information 23 Maximus Download File Sort and List Utility (OS/2 and DOS) APPENDIX A: HISTORY OF CHANGES AND VERSION LEGEND The paragraphs below show a brief history of changes in DOWNSORT. 4.7 ■ Sorting of files on HPFS volumes (OS/2 1.2) now takes into account the file CREATION-date (= arrival date on your system). Sort will take the most recent of Creation and LastWrite. The 'old fashioned' LastWrite date (indicating the age of the file) is displayed in the lists! This feature is only effective under OS/2 from release 1.2 for files on an HPFS volume. ■ Use of DOSOPEN() from OS/2 Program Development Toolkit (allows for better multi-session and LAN support). ■ New font added: reverse video image of font3, and related changes in font generation function. ■ Added separation lines in FILES.BBS like in ALL-list. ■ Tiny adjustment to date formatting: year 2000 and later will be displayed as 2-digit numbers. 4.6 ■ Downsort will try to locate and read a configuration file allowing even more processing options (by default DOWNSORT.CFG in current directory). An extensively documented sample is accompanying the DOWNSORT package. No additional document-reading needed to run DOWNSORT for the first time. The introduction of this feature makes some commandline parameters superfluous, and allows more flexibility, like: - In addition to a number of global parameters, each list has a 'local' set of formatting parameters for sort-sequence, description wrapping, title-font, maximum number of entries (NEW and BBS only). The individual parameters can be set only via the configuration file. - Specification of AREA.DAT and "title" not possible anymore on the commandline, now only by means of the configuration file. - A "@filespec" commandline option now used for specification of the configuration file (makes the use of different files for different purposes possible). ■ Multiline FILES.BBS input now supported. Automatic conversion to long descriptions provided when requesting FILES.BBS (re-)creation. ■ Multiple GBL-lists can now be generated, like ALL-list. Difference between ALL-list and GBL-list is only the grouping by in area's, and the area-summary in ALL-list. SYSOP may decide which of both serves the users best. ■ User supplied pre-title, sub-title and bottomlines now supported for NEW, ALL and GBL-lists, as well as replacement text for '---no-description---' and '---orphan---' in the lists. ■ BLOCK-title font user-configurable and BLOCK-title can now be suppressed. ■ NEW-list and GBL-list have an additional header-line telling the maximum file-privilege shown in the list. Appendix A: History of changes and version legend 24 Maximus Download File Sort and List Utility (OS/2 and DOS) ■ FILES.BBS has now column header, and a user-specified privilege limit applies also to FILES.BBS (orphans now only listed when explicitly requested with 'Hidden'). ■ The HELP-screen is now only shown on request via a commandline parameter (-H). 4.5 ■ FILES.BBS-files may be (re-)created now in DOWNSORT-style (like the ALL-list format). Read carefully the information about this option in the report description! ■ An ORPHAN-report is now produced always (not requestable) and independent from other reports. It replaces the reporting of ORPHANs to the console formerly done during creation of the BBS-list. ■ The BBS-list is no longer produced by default, it should be specifically requested now, like the other user-reports. ■ The BBS-list and NEW-list may now be sorted on filename, and for that reason also these lists will have an age indicator 'week' or 'month' old appended to the file date. ■ 'Verbose' and 'Quiet' operating mode are possible now: many more or much less console messages with one of these specifications, than regularly. ■ Performance improvement obtained in data collection process, significant especially for large area's. ■ Filename matching process changed (one of the reasons of the performance improvement): first matching filename is used now to assign the file description to a file. ■ Title block-font is now proportional, and two fonts are added. The fonts are not (yet) user selectable. ■ A path to the appropriate AREA.DAT file may be specified now (@path). ■ The possible specification of "ListFile" in AREA.CTL is recognised now (in stead of assuming FILES.BBS in the download directory). ■ Added display of an "I-am-busy" indicator during the collection of file information (processing FILES.BBS input). ■ Added display of date and time of report-creation to bottom of file lists (except FILES.BBS files), and also the total elapsed time on console. ■ Fixed bug in detection of newest file, which in rare situations pointed to a file outside the privilege group. ■ Added HELP-screen when no commandline parameters specified, or on request (-H commandline parameter). ■ 'Signature' at bottom of lists extended. ■ Documentation extended for all the new features, and a little re-organised. ■ Internal data structure for file-information changed for improved storage utilisation. ■ Time has come to split source into several modules! 4.4 ■ Support for different versions of MAXIMUS (1.00 and 1.02), with respect to the layout of AREA.DAT. ■ Multi-line file descriptions now supported, with word-wrap and an option to select or deselect it in different reports. Appendix A: History of changes and version legend 25 Maximus Download File Sort and List Utility (OS/2 and DOS) ■ Extended AREA-header in ALL-list with area-privilege indicator, and latest acquisition (date and file-spec). ■ Added indicators '*' and '+' in GBL- and ALL-list for files of 1-week and 1-month old respectively. ■ Added "--- no description available ---" in lists if filename found in FILES.BBS, but there is no description there. ■ Added "****** ORPHAN *******" in description field of files, for which there is no entry in FILES.BBS. ■ Files that are reported to the console as "not listed", now also display the area, (pseudo-) privilege and file description (or "no description" or "ORPHAN" whatever is applicable). ■ Changed default file-report privilege into SYSOP. Hidden files will not show up, unless specifically asked for! ■ More characters supported as BLOCK-characters (including '/' and '\'). ■ Fixed a bug in routines for NEW-, BBS- and ALL-list, which occasionally gave addressing violations (in the OS/2 version). ■ A related change in the data structure of the file-information for the file-description decreases storage utilisation, taking advantage of wild-card specifications in FILES.BBS as supported by MAXIMUS. ■ Fast growing wishlist added to documentation! 4.3 ■ GBL-list added: a complete list of the download base (back from 4.0 and earlier versions of DOWNSORT, where it was called ALL!). ■ An AREA-summary report has been added to ALL-list. ■ ALL-list now also displays total bytecount per area. ■ A default title will be generated if none is specified. ■ Routine for generating block routines replaced. ■ Block character '/' (slash) replaced by '|' (vertical bar). 4.2 ■ DOWNSORT.BBS and DOWNSORT.NEW are not produced any longer by default. Each list-type must now be specifically requested by BBS, NEW, or ALL on the commandline. ■ Multiple ALL-lists and NEW-lists may be produced now. Each of these may contain files of different (maximum) privilege level. This makes it possible to have overviews for different classes of users. ■ A report title for the ALL- and NEW-lists may be specified, and will be printed in BLOCK-characters. ■ A remark has been added to the top of DOWNSORT.BBS that the list may seem shorter due to privilege restrictions. ■ Longer file-description where there is space for it (ALL-list). ■ Requirement of filenames in FILES.BBS to be UPPERcase dropped. ■ Documentation extended and re-formatted. ■ Some more re-shuffling of code (for maintenance purposes)! Appendix A: History of changes and version legend 26 Maximus Download File Sort and List Utility (OS/2 and DOS) 4.1 ■ Bug-repairs in filename-matching routine. ■ SORT changed for DOWNSORT.ALL: sort on name within area, gives an alphabetical list per download area. ■ File descriptions now left aligned, regardless its position in FILES.BBS. ■ Group-title (of file-area) copied from AREA.DAT in ALL. ■ Files excluded from the lists are now more generally: FILES.?BS, DIR.?BS and SYSTEM*.?BS ■ Parameter added to hide files above a maximum privilege-level. ■ Files without description are treated as Hidden, these will appear in the lists when 'H' is selected (note: by default!). ■ Improved sort organisation (pointers in stead of structures). ■ Minor changes and additions to lists (beautification?). ■ Some minor internal re-organisation. 4.0 ■ New setup for MAXIMUS CBCS Bulletin Board environment, this version does not support OPUS' file system! ■ Support of non-numeric (two-character) area code. ■ Support of wild-characters in the file-name part of the records in the description-files (FILES.BBS), as allowed by MAXIMUS. ■ The file DOWNSORT.NEW (not ".TXT") will be produced always (error in previous documentation), but now without TXT2COM formatting characters, since there is not (yet) a suitable alternative under OS/2. DOWNSORT for MAXIMUS CBCS was developed from an OPUS equivalent (by the same author). Its history is not really important here and therefore has been omitted. However the name DOWNSORT has been maintained, so to prevent confusion, the version number is inherited (the last OPUS-verion was 3.1). Appendix A: History of changes and version legend 27 Maximus Download File Sort and List Utility (OS/2 and DOS) APPENDIX B: SAMPLE CONFIGURATION FILE % % ██▐███ █▐███ ██ ██ ██▐███ ██▐████ █▐███ ██▐███ ██▐████ % ██ ██ ██ ██ ██ ██ ██ ██ ██ ██ ██ ██ ██ ▐██ % ██ ██ ██ ██ ██ █ ██ ██ ██ ██▐████ ██ ██ ██▐███ ▐██ % ██ ██ ██ ██ ██ █ ██ ██ ██ ██ ██ ██ ██ █ ▐██ % ██▐███ █▐███ █▐███ ██ ██ ██▐████ █▐███ ██ ██ ▐██ % (font 2) % % % ▄▀▀▀▄ ▄▀▀▀▄ █▄ █ █▀▀▀▀ ▀█▀ ▄▀▀▀▄ █ █ █▀▀▀▄ ▄▀▀▀▄ ▀▀█▀▀ ▀█▀ ▄▀▀▀▄ █▄ █ % █ █ █ █▀█▄█ █▄▄ █ █ ▄▄ █ █ █▄▄▄▀ █▄▄▄█ █ █ █ █ █ ▀▄█ % ▀▄▄▄▀ ▀▄▄▄▀ █ ▀█ █ ▄█▄ ▀▄▄▄▀ ▀▄▄▄▀ █ ▀▄▄ █ █ █ ▄█▄ ▀▄▄▄▀ █ █ % (font 1) % % % █▀▀▀▀▀▀ █ █ █▀▀▀▀▀▀ % █▄▄▄▄▄▄ █▄ █▄ █▄▄▄▄▄▄ % ██ ██ ██ ██ % ██ ██ ██▄▄▄▄▄ ██▄▄▄▄▄ % (font 3) % % ┌─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐ % │ Configuration File for DOWNSORT 4.7 by Rob Hamerling │ % └─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ % % NOTES: Leading blanks are skipped. % Lines with '%', '*' or ';' as first non-blank character are % considered as comment, as well as empty lines and lines with % a valid keyword, but without any parameter-value. % % Don't put a comment string after a parameter specification! % % AreaDat: Complete file-specification of your 'AREA.DAT' % ------- % AREA.DAT is made by MAXIMUS' SILT with -a or -x % option the path is normally specified in MAX.CTL % with the option AreaDat in Session Section. % With the AreaDat you may specify any file that has % the SILT-format. For example you may make a special % file for running DOWNSORT with a subset (selection) % of the normal MAXIMUS file-area's. % This might be useful for special usergroups. % Another reason may be the memory usage of DOWNSORT % under DOS. If you hit the boundary: make a subset. % Standard OS/2 / DOS naming applies. AreaDat g:\c2\downsort\Area102.Dat % TitleFont: Reference number of the BLOCK-font you want for your Title. % --------- % Valid numbers: 1 .. Simple font (5x6 pattern) % 2 .. Pseudo-Stencil Font (7x10 pattern) Appendix B: Sample Configuration File 28 Maximus Download File Sort and List Utility (OS/2 and DOS) % 3 .. ROBoComputer Font (7x8 pattern) % 4 .. Reversed Video RoboComp (7x8 pattern) % % NOTE: The fonts are based on the US-codepage (437). % This will also work properly for 860 (Portugese), % 863 (Canadian-French) and 865 (Nordic). % If codepage 850 (Multilingual) is active, the pattern % will be adapted a little, see if you like it or not. % The differences apply mainly to Font2. % % The heading of this file shows font 2, 1 and 3 respectively. TitleFont 4 % Title: Short string that will be displayed in BLOCK-characters % ----- on top of all FileLists (except BBS-list). % You may specify this parameter also on the xxxFileList % parameter. % % The BLOCK fonts are 'proportional', the following number of % characters will generally fit on a line: % % FontTitle 1 .. maximum characters are 13 % " 2 .. " 10 % " 3 .. " 10 % % Not more than 20 characters are accepted as input. % % If Title isn't specified, it will be DOWNSORTxy by default. % where "xy" stands for the current of DOWNSORT. % Not all characters are supported, and that may vary with % the font itself. All fonts support: % % - UPPER case A..Z % - LOWER case a..z , but will be translated to UPPER case % - Digits 0..9 % % In addition fonts 1 and 2 support the following characters: % % _ * - | . [ ] ( ) / \ % % Not-supported characters are displayed as full-size blank. % The '~'-character (tilde) may be used as required blank. % % If you omit Title, than it will default to DOWNSORTxy, % (where xy represent the version digits of DOWNSORT). Title abcdefghijklmnopqrs % PreTitle Lines to be displayed immediately before the BLOCK-title. % -------- The lines will be copied asis, however leading blanks are % skipped, no wrapping or truncation will be applied for % 'long' lines, '~' (tilde) characters are translated to % blanks. You may specify 10 PreTitles, more are ignored. % Empty PreTitle lines are also ignored and not counted. Appendix B: Sample Configuration File 29 Maximus Download File Sort and List Utility (OS/2 and DOS) % There is no default pretitle. % To create empty lines in your header specify a PreTitle % with a tilde. PreTitle ~~~~~~~~<══════════════════════════════════════════> PreTitle ~ % SubTitle Lines to be displayed immediately below the BLOCK-title. % ---------- Maximum 10 SubTiles are accepted, and exactly the % same rules apply as for PreTitle. % SubTitle ~ SubTitle ~~~~~~~~<══════════════════════════════════════════> SubTitle ~Overview of downloadable files on this magnificent Board SubTitle ~~~~~~~Node number 1.234/5, modemspeeds: V.32/V.22bis SubTitle ~~~~~~~---------------------------------------------- % BottomLine Lines to be displayed after the filelist. % ---------- Maximum 10 BottomLines are accepted, and exactly the % same rules apply as for PreTitle and Subtitle. % BottomLine ~ BottomLine ~~~~~<══════ How do you like this list, folks? ══════> BottomLine ~ % MaxNewFiles Limit the number of file entries in BBS-list and NEW-list(s). % ----------- It specifies the actual number of file entries that may % appear in NewFileList and BBSFileList. % If you specify more than one privilege (for NewFileList), % then each list will contain (max) the MaxNewFiles number % of file entries, but the collection of each may differ due % to Privilege considerations. MaxNewFiles 34 % OrphanDesc Description text of Orphan files. % NotFoundDesc Description text of files without description in FILES.BBS. % ------------ Each description will replace the default text. % Up to 45 characters may be specified. % There is no translation of the '~' (tilde) character. OrphanDesc ---- !!!! Orphelin !!!! ---- NotFoundDesc +++ Ce fichier défie toute description! +++ % ══════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════ % Above were the parameters with a global effect: applicable to all % lists or to the execution mode of DOWNSORT. % Below follow list-specific parameters, which might override some of % the settings of the global parameters. % Leave this sequence: first global, then specific parameters! % ══════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════ % xxxFileList: Create one or more File lists of type 'xxx'. Appendix B: Sample Configuration File 30 Maximus Download File Sort and List Utility (OS/2 and DOS) % % ┌──────────── TWIT % │┌─────────── DISGRACE ┌ FileName of the list % ││┌────────── LIMITED │ (without extension, % ┌── ORP │││┌───────── NORMAL │ maximum 8 characters) % ┌── BBS ││││┌──────── WHORTY │ % ┌── NEW │││││┌─────── PRIVIL │ % ┌── ALL ││││││┌────── FAVORED │ ┌ Additional options for % ┌── GBL │││││││┌───── EXTRA │ │ each list individually: % │ ││││││││┌──── CLERK │ │ % │ │││││││││┌─── ASSTSYSOP │ │ -W - Wrap Description % │ ││││││││││┌── SYSOP │ │ -T - Truncate Descr. % │ │││││││││││┌─ HIDDEN │ │ -A - Alpha sort on name % │ ││││││││││││ │ │ -D - Date sort % │ ││││││││││││ ┌──────────┘ │ nnn - NEW-entries limit % │ ││││││││││││ │ │ -Fn - Title font (0..3) % ││││││││││││ % ═══─═══════ ════════ ════════════════════════════════ % xxxFileList TDLNWPFECASH FileName Option-1 Option-2 . . . Option-n % % If just xxxFileList is specified, the Level by default will be SYSOP % and the filename will be DOWNSORT. % % For NEW-list, GBL-list and ALL-list up to 10 privilege letters can % be specified and for each character a separate list-file will be % generated with the extension ".N~p" (for NEW), ".A~p" (for ALL), % and ".G~p" (for GBL), where 'p' is the privilege character. % For the BBS-list only 1 privilege character will be accepted. % The default filename (DOWNSORT) for each list can be overridden % with the [optional] third parameter on the xxxFileList line. % If you do not specify any xxxFileList, only the Orphan report may be % generated. % % Additionally some other parameters can be specified (in any sequence). % % nnn Limit the number of file-entries to maximal 'nnn' % applies only to BBS-list and NEW-list. % % -A Selects Alphabetic sort on filename (for ALL-list within area) % -D Selects sort on Date/Time of the file ( " " " " " ) % % -T Causes Truncation of long descriptions (to about 50 characters) % so that only 1 line will appear per file-entry. % -W Causes Wrapping of long descriptions: the report will contain % as many lines as needed for the complete description. % % -Fn ListTitle font. Choose for 'n': 1, 2 or 3 (default is 2). % See the example fonts in the top of this file. % If '0' (zero) specified, then no BLOCK title will be generated. % % If an asterisk (*) is used as parameter value character, the hardcoded % default value will be used. If you specify mutually exclusive % options (-A or -D) or (-T or -W), then the last value on the line % will be effective. % Appendix B: Sample Configuration File 31 Maximus Download File Sort and List Utility (OS/2 and DOS) % NOTE: for ORPFileList the privilege parameter does not apply, but at % least 1 character must be specified! AllFileList PCASH Down_All -d -T -f1 BBSFileList C Down_Bbs 23 -a -F1 GblFileList *h Down_Gbl -d -F3 NewFileList h Down_New -d -w -f2 OrpFileList * Down_Orp -a -f0 % FilFilePath Maximum privilege that any FILES.bbs may contain, and the % ----------- path specification of the FILES.bbs type of output. % Specify this in the format: drive:\directory\ % If not specified the MAXIMUS path specification will be % used (ListFile parameter or Download-File directory). ; FilFilePath * i:\ % % ═════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════ % % Commandline parameters may supply additional options, and may % (partly) override the specifications in this configuration file. % Consider this file as your customised default setting for DOWNSORT, % and use commandline parameters only to make other lists on the fly. % There is nothing that you can specify with commandline parameters, % that you cannot specify in this configuration file! % Appendix B: Sample Configuration File 32