home
***
CD-ROM
|
disk
|
FTP
|
other
***
search
/
Cream of the Crop 21
/
Cream of the Crop 21 (Terry Blount) (October 1996).iso
/
comm
/
arf24.zip
/
README
< prev
Wrap
Text File
|
1996-08-24
|
10KB
|
243 lines
ARF
Copyright 1996
by
Bitsafe Computer Services
425 S. Bird St. #110
Sun Prairie, WI 53590
Email: bitsafe@execpc.com
http://www.execpc.com/~bitsafe/arf
All right reserved
-------------------------------------------------------------------
What is Arf?
Arf is a World Wide Web database search and retrieval agent.
Arf searches web databases such as Alta Vista, Lycos, and
Deja News, and retrieves documents that they reference.
How do you use Arf?
Use your favorite browser to do a preliminary search.
Then, once you've narrowed down what your search term should
be, fire up Arf.
Type in your search term and tell Arf which database to contact.
Arf contacts that database and tells it to do a search. The
database sends back lists of web pages (or Usenet posts in
the case of Deja News). Arf goes out on the Internet, gets
those web pages, and copies them to your hard disk.
What are the benefits of Arf?
Get every page. Arf doesn't forget a single one.
Save time. Arf searches faster than any human.
Save money. Connect time is reduced to a minimum.
Do other things while Arf searches for you.
View your search results offline - with no network lag.
Search more than one database at a time
- by starting several copies of Arf.
Arf is great for writers and other researchers.
Installing Arf
1) Put cswsock.vbx in your \windows\system directory.
2) Put arf.exe & Readme in whatever directory you want.
You are now probably done, but check out the next few
steps.
3) Arf needs three additional files to run, cmdialog.vbx,
commdlg.dll, and vbrun300.dll. If cmdialog.vbx and
commdlg.dll are not already present in \windows\system,
then put the supplied copies there.
4) Vbrun300.dll is not included in Arf's zip file because
of its size and because you probably already have a copy.
If you don't, it is available from the Arf site at
www.execpc.com/~bitsafe/arf and from Simtel.net and many
on-line services and BBSs. Just put a copy of it in
\windows\system, if necessary.
5) If you want, you can set an icon to point to Arf by doing:
"File->New->Program item" in Windows 3.1
or
"New->Shortcut" in Windows 95 & NT
6) Arf uses a configuration file to save your favorite settings
(see below). By default this file will be named
c:\windows\arf.ini. You can change this, if you want, by
inserting a line like:
set ARFCONFIG=c:\my_dir\my_config_file
in your autoexec.bat file, but this isn't required at all.
Using Arf
First make sure you are connected to the Internet.
Type a search term in the text box labeled "For:" (try
the word "bitsafe"). Then choose your database in the
box just above it (or leave it at Alta Vista). Then press
the "Start" button. The Start button will change into a
Stop button, and you should start to see informational
messages appearing in the "Messages" box near the bottom
of Arf.
When Arf has finished, take a look in the directory
"c:\arfout". You should see several files named:
page1.htm, page2.htm, etc. These are the html pages that
Arf fetched from the Internet. You can look at these using
any editor or by using a web browser such as Netscape or
Explorer.
You will also find two other files in c:\arfout:
"fetched.htm" and "badlinks.htm". Fetched.htm is an html
file that Arf created. It has html links in it that point
to the "page.htm" files. Try looking at it with your
browser and clicking on the links - you can view all the
web pages that Arf fetched very easily. You can tell Arf
to use another name for fetched.htm in the
"Name of fetched.htm file" box.
The file badlinks.htm contains links to web pages that
Arf was unable to fetch (this can happen when a web
server is down or when the location of a web page has
changed, but the link to it has not). You can try viewing
those pages at some other time.
At the bottom of each fetched page is a link labeled
"original page". If you click on the link and are still
connected to the Internet, you can view the original page
complete with graphics (Arf does not copy graphics).
You can tell Arf to put the "original page" link at the
top of the page instead by using the
"Placement of 'original page' link" box.
If you now do another search with Arf, you will find
that Arf places more web page files in c:\arfout
without deleting or overwriting the web pages produced
by your first search. In addition, Arf adds new links
in the fetched.htm file without destroying the old
links.
If you want Arf to put its results in some other
directory, then change the text box labeled "Directory:".
If you want to change the names of the pages that Arf
fetches, change the text box labeled "Prefix:".
NB: Filename prefixs under Windows 3.1 can only be 8
characters long - Arf truncates the prefix, if necessary,
under 3.1)
The "Max Links" box on Arf limits how many pages Arf can
look for on each search. The free version of Arf is
limited to just ten links. The registered version can do
10,000 links.
Some pages out on the web are enormous. You can limit
how many bytes of a page Arf will download by using
the "Bytes per page"" box. It limits how many bytes
of a page will be copied to your disk drive.
When Arf is doing a search, it has to wait for the
database it is searching to respond with data. You can
tell Arf how long to wait before breaking contact and
maybe trying again. You do this by setting the Database
Timeout text box to the number of seconds you want it
to wait. Similarly, you control how long Arf will wait
for a web server to deliver a web page by setting the
Pages Timeout text box.
You can have Arf not fetch some of the pages it encounters
by setting the "Skip links" text boxes. For example, to
have Arf skip the first ten pages set the "From:" box to
1 and set the "To:" box to 10.
As Arf operates, it tells you how things are going in the
"Statistics" text boxes. The "Links followed:" box tells
you how many database links Arf has followed. The
"Pages fetched:" box indicates how many of those links
Arf was able to follow and successfully retrieve a web
page.
Arf has another way to tell you what is doing. Just above the
Start button is a green square. When Arf is talking to a
database, this square becomes red. When Arf is busy fetching
a web page this square becomes blue. When the square is blue,
you can use your mouse to press on it. This causes Arf to
quit trying to fetch that page and go on to the next one.
This is referred to as skipping a page. If Arf has managed
to transfer part of a page, it will not delete what it has
managed to get. You can, of course, press the Stop button
at any time to have Arf terminate a search completely.
One quick note and then we'll move on to some of the more
advanced facilities in Arf: When you type a search term in
the "For:" text box, you have to use the syntax of the
database you are going to connect to. You can find out what
these syntax rules are by using a browser to contact the
database.
Advanced usage
Arf has the ability to start your favorite browser when you
press the "Browser" button, but first you have to tell Arf
where your browser is. Press the menu "File->Select browser".
This creates a popup box which you use to find your browser.
When you have located it, press the "Ok" button. Now, do