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SAGE/SAFM 1.00/Beta-17
Statistics Analyzer for GEcho and FMail
USER MANUAL
Software and documentation written by Arthur van der Peijl
Copyright (c) 1993-1996 by Arthur van der Peijl & ArtNED
All rights reserved
M A D E I N T H E N E T H E R L A N D S
Table of Contents
1 Introduction. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
1.1 What does SAGE?. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
1.2 Features . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
1.3 System Hardware and Software Requirements. . . . . 5
1.4 The official stuff: License and Disclaimer . . . . 6
2 Technique of storing data . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
3 SETSAGE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
3.1 Main Menu. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
3.1.1 Global Settings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
3.1.2 Output Manager. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
3.1.3 Information . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
3.1.4 Export Data . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
3.1.5 Exit to DOS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
4 Template files. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
4.1 General definitions. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
4.2 Commands for header and footer templates . . . . . 12
4.3 Commands for bodyheader templates. . . . . . . . . 12
4.4 Commands for body templates . . . . . . . . . . . 13
5 Hints & Tips. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
6 Credits . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
7 Copyright notices . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
8 Errorlevels . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
9 Technical Notes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
1 Introduction
1.1 What does SAGE?
SAGE is an advanced analyzer of the echomail statistics
generated by GEcho. SAGE is a standalone program and
it's name is an abbreviation of Statistics Analyzer for
GEcho. This program makes it possible to analyze your
echomail flow with a maximum accuracy of one day.
Users of the FMail echomail processor should look for
the program SAFM, which will be released in parallel
with SAGE.
In this documentation you see everywhere the program
names SAGE, SETSAGE and GECHO. Users of the FMail
program should read SAFM, SETSAFM and FMAIL instead of
it.
1.2 Features
To have an idea of SAGE's power read this list of the
various features:
* Fast analyzing of the SUMMARY.LOG file
* Option to delete the summary.log after scanning. If
not, SAGE will store the date, time and CRC-32 to
prevent double scanning (dupe).
* User friendly setup program. SAGE does not require
any configuration files used by other software,
apart from the setup files of GEcho. For best
performance set the environment variabel GE (for
SAGE) or FMAIL (for SAFM).
* SAGE writes a log file in Frontdoor compatible
format. User definable logging level.
* Support for GEcho v1.02 or higher (SAGE). I
recommend the users of GEcho to register their
software. New releases may use a newer output format
of GEcho which may not be compatible with the
evaluation version of GEcho.
* Support for FMail v0.98g (SAFM). I here also
recommend those who use this echomail processor on a
regular base to register their software.
* SAGE creates report by using templates. Adjust the
templates to your own flavour and personal text.
* Output can be done to textfile, message bases
(*.MSG, JAM, Hudson message base) and even lotus
compatible spreadsheet.
1.3 System Hardware and Software Requirements
Normally it should be no problem to use SAGE with
GEcho, because the echomail-processors requirements are
mostly heavier than those of SAGE.
This software has been successfully tested with OS/2
v2.1 (GA), MS-DOS 5.0 and Desqview 2.6. The systems are
equipped with various processors like Intel's i486 and
AMD's 386/40Mhz. Please report any problems you
experienced with SAGE/SAFM as soon as possible to me.
Software is never finished, it needs updates every
time...
1.4 The official stuff: License and Disclaimer
* "SAGE", "SAFM" and Statistics Analyser refer to all
executables and manuals as distributed in the
compressed file(s) in which this package was released.
* SAGE is copyrighted material by Arthur van der Peijl
(A.A. van der Peijl). This program may only be used
when you agree with the conditions written in this part
of the manual.
* SAGE is a shareware product. You may use this
program, but after you have evaluated this program for
30 days you MUST register or you MUST stop using the
Statistics Analyser (SAGE).
* You are allowed to distribute SAGE as long as you:
1. do NOT modify any files;
2. supply ALL files;
3. you do NOT ask money for it.
* Although care has been taken to write and test a
program that does what this manual states, SAGE is
provided "as is", without warranty or guarantee of any
kind, either expressed or implied, as to the quality or
performance of this program.
* If you use SAGE, SAFM, SetSAGE or SETSAFM you do so
at your own risk. In event shall Arthur van der Peijl
be held responsible if this program will make some
damage to hardware, software or (human)
psychological-ware (eg. your brains :-). The author is
not responsible for any (direct or indirect) damage or
costs, including, but not limited to, lost savings,
lost profits and loss of data, which may result from
the use or the inability to use SAGE.
* You are NOT allowed to do any disassembling, reverse
engineering, creating patches for SAGE and things
alike.
* The author (Arthur van der Peijl) is in NO way
obligated to you, or anyone else, to provide new
versions or support for SAGE.
* Insufficient fees can and will NOT be accepted.
Bounced checks will NOT be sent back to you, unless you
pay for the costs.
* The Statistics Analyser is not functional crippled.
Some features however are restricted in use, but can be
used. The program always reminds you of the fact that
you haven't registrate by displaying no serial number
and name.
* Additional features you can use after registering:
- No restriction to use event in the output manager
- No need to enter somewhere the program name in
the template
* To register SAGE/SAFM, fill out the registration form
"SAGE.REG" correctly and send it to the registration
site, by netmail or by normal snail mail.
* All rights are reserved worldwide.
2 Technique of storing data
Before you start using SAFE on a regular base, it is
important to understand why some things are not
possible to generate.
As you know, GEcho generates a SUMMARY.LOG in which you
can see in what areas messages were tossed into the
message base, how many messages it contains, and how
many dupes were detected. SAGE analyses this output
file of GEcho and stores the information in the file
SAGE.DAT. In this temporary database the conference
data of the current day are stored. With the help of
SAGE.TAB, which contains the area tags, SAGE can take a
look in this data file.
Every new day, SAGE transfers the data of the previous
day from SAGE.DAT into a permanent database file called
SAGE.DBF. The output files of SAGE are always based on
the database SAGE.DBF. So when you start using this
program, you have to wait for at least one day before
you can get any information out of the database. In
this way you are certain that the stored data are of
exactly one day and that the database SAGE.DBF is not
getting to large.
Used files:
SAGE.EXE main program
SETSAGE.EXE configuration program
SAGE.CFG configuration file
SAGE.EVT configuration file for outputs
SAGE.DAY SAGE's database of his latest scan &
report activity
SAGE.DAT messages and dupes of the current day
SAGE.TAB table of area tags (don't touch this
file!)
SAGE.DBF messages and dupes of the previous days
3 SETSAGE
SetSAGE is the configuration program for SAGE. You can
start the setup by entering 'SETSAGE'. SetSAGE will
automatically generate a new configuration file if none
exists. After this you will see the initial screen with
the main menu. It can happen that SetSAGE exits already
with an error, because it couldn't find the SETUP.GE.
In that way you have to specify the right environment
setting for GEcho, eg SET GE=C:\GECHO.
3.1 Main Menu
In the main menu you see the different options you can
choose. In 'Global settings' you define the settings
SAGE needs to operate in a correct way. In 'Output
manager' you can define when and how you would like to
have a report created. The copyright notices are placed
in 'Information'. You can export the setup in 'Export
data' and to exit the configuration you can choose
'Exit to DOS'.
3.1.1 Global Settings
This menu contains some various inputs for a right use
of the Statistics Analyser. Most of the inputs need no
explaination
Site information
Enter here your own name (Name) and BBS-name (System).
Path settings
For a correct functioning of the analyser you have to
specify where SAGE may read and put his needed files.
First of all you have to enter the place where the
echomail processor puts its files (GEcho or FMail).
Mostly this is equal to what you have specified in the
environment variable.
The second input is for a logfile of the analyser. When
you don't want to have any logfile, please do not enter
any value in it.
The third and last value must contain the place where
SAGE may put his databases. For optimal functioning
it's the best to enter the path where you put your
SAGE-files.
Miscellaneous
Date format
Choose the format of date-display.
Days to keep
Specify here the number of days SAGE may keep in his
database. On my system it's 360 days. In this way (and
with the manual generation of statistics) you can
analyse flow of a large periode.
Delete sum
Enter here is you want to have deleted the summary
after scanning by SAGE. If you choose yes, it will be a
little slower (deleting costs time). It's advisible for
FMail users to choose yes. FMail appends always his
summary.log instead of overwriting.
Log options
Here you can choose what kind of info you want in you
logfile (if specified). Choose all options for debug-
purposes.
Security
When you want to protect your configuration file, you
can enter here your password. It will be asked when you
launch your setup program. It's just a simple
protection for kids, etc. Don't put too secure info in
it, you may use Pretty Good Privacy for that :-)
Registration key
Enter here the registration code you got from the
registration site.
3.1.2 Output Manager
Day of output
Frequency
Output type
Filename
Enter $DAY$ and $WEEK$ for repectively the daynumber
or weeknumber. Use $DATE$ if you want a complete
daynumber as filename.
Cluster
Output selection
Sorting routine
Stats of # days
Options
Mail address
Disp orphaned
Disp inactive
High ascii
Force output
Header
Bodyhead
Body
Footer
3.1.3 Information
This option displays the version number and copyright
notices. Yes, you saw it right: it's developed in the
Netherlands too!
3.1.4 Export Data
Enter a filename in which the configuration can be
stored in text format. Press <enter> after input of the
filename and SetSAGE will create an ascii formatted
file.
3.1.5 Exit to DOS
By pressing the <ESC> button or choosing this option by
<enter> you leave the configuration program. If any
settings were changed SetSAGE will ask you if you want
to save the changes. Press 'Y' for Yes or 'N' for No.
4 Template files
SAGE makes use of template files for it's reports. In
the template files you can define at what place you
would like to have your information presented..
4.1 General definitions
The macros that can be used do have some general
structures. Every macro command starts with an '^'.
With this the interpreter recognizes a command. After
the command, which contains of 1 or 2 letters, you can
define the outlining. This can be left (':'), right
('#') or centered ('&'). After the outlining-parameter
you have to specify the number of character this may
contain in the output. For defining the time in an
output you can for example use this: '^T#10', which
means: "place in the output here the current time, and
use right outlining. Using the outline options make it
possible to define complete graphic boxes around the
data, as you can see in the example files.
4.2 [obsoleted by beta-14]
4.3 [obsoleted by beta-14]
4.4 [obsoleted by beta-14]
5 Hints & Tips
See the example templates...
6 Credits
I would like to thank the beta testers who gave me the
advise and support I really needed to complete this
program. The beta testers for this first release were:
* Peter Smink (2:285/1)
* Jan Hoolwerf (2:283/211)
* Henk van de Weerdt (2:283/203)
* Peter Faase (2:512/187)
* Peter Lindeman (2:283/6)
* Nitz Neder-Helman (2:286/0)
7 Copyright notices
To keep the lawyers happy, and those who can't live
happy without it, you find here a list of copyrights.
The brand and product names are Copyrighted (C)
material, Trademarks (tm) or Registered Trademarks (R)
of their respective holders:
FrontDoor Joaquim H. Homrighausen
GEcho Gerard J. van der Land
FMail Folkert Wijnstra
MS-DOS, Windows Microsoft Corporation
OS/2 (just use it!) International Business Machines
Corp.
Borland Pascal,
Turbo Assembler Borland International, Inc.
8 Errorlevels
SAGE/SAFM returns one of the following errorlevels:
0 No errors occurred
Note (taken from the GEcho documentation):
The ERRORLEVEL keyword in a batch file by default tests
if the exit code is greater than or equal to the
specified number. They should therefore be tested in
descending order. The condition "ERRORLEVEL 1" will be
true for all errorlevels.
4DOS allows you to specify a "EQ" (equal) condition,
for example "ERRORLEVEL EQ 249".
9 Technical Notes
SAGE/SAFM is written in Pascal (using Borland Pascal
7.01 with objects) and assembly language (assembled
using Turbo Assembler Version 3.2).
The source code is not available.