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1991-11-20
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MEAL-MASTER IMPORT FILE SPECIFICATIONS
The Meal-Master import function was only designed to import recipes
previously exported from the program. However, the export format is a
simple text file that can be created by most text editor programs.
Many people have found that recipes from other sources can be edited to
look like a MM export file, allowing them to be imported to MM with
little or no retyping. All it takes is some patience, some practice,
and an understanding of exactly what the import process is expecting.
This file won't help with the first two, but here is a description of
what the program expects to see in an importable file:
FIXED FORMAT (LINES 1 THROUGH 6)
Line 1 The first line of a valid recipe is a "recipe header" line.
This line must begin with at least 5 hyphens ('-----'), and
must contain the words "Meal-Master" somewhere on the line.
Any lines found prior to this "recipe header" line will be
ignored by Meal-Master.
Line 2 Must be blank.
Line 3 The word "Title:" must begin the line, in any position, and
followed by one blank space. The recipe title must start
after the blank space, and may be a maximum of 60 characters
in length.
Line 4 The word "Categories:" must begin the line, in any position,
and followed by one blank space. A maximum of 5 category
names may be entered, beginning after the blank space. Each
category MUST start with a capital letter, and all remaining
letters must be lower case. The names must be separated by
one, and only one, space.
Line 5 The word "Servings:" should start the line, but is not
required. A numeric quantity between 1 and 9999 must appear
somewhere on this line.
Line 6 Must be blank.
VARIABLE FORMAT - LINES 7 AND GREATER
Beginning with line 7, Meal-Master will attempt to identify each line
as being an ingredient line, direction line, or the "end of recipe"
trailer line.
If a line is found that starts with 5 hyphens, and contains no
characters other than hyphens and spaces, the program considers this
the "end of recipe" trailer line. It will store the current recipe
and begin searching for another "recipe header" as described in "line
1" above.
If all the following are true, the line will be interpreted as an
ingredient and loaded into Meal-Master:
1) Positions 9-10 contain one of the valid Meal-Master unit of
measure codes. (see list in program or user's manual)
2) Positions 1-7 contain a valid numeric quantity, either
expressed as a whole number, decimal fraction, or common
fraction.
3) Positions 12-39 contain text for an ingredient name.
If the line does not qualify as an ingredient line or end of recipe
line, as specified above, data in positions 3-77 (or 1-75 if
positions 1-2 are non-blank) will be imported as a direction line.
Files can contain multiple recipes, so long as each begins with a
"header line" and ends with a "trailer line". Any text in the file
that is not between the header and trailer lines is ignored.
NOTE: THIS SPECIFICATION IS ONLY VALID FOR MEAL-MASTER VERSION 6.21
AND HIGHER, AND WILL NOT WORK PROPERLY WITH EARLIER VERSIONS.
PLEASE OBTAIN VERSION 6.21 OR GREATER FOR PROPER RESULTS!