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MR/2 PM - A QWK Compatible Mail Reader for OS/2 PM. 07/18/93 Copyright (c) 1992, Knight Writer Software Company. All rights reserved. =================================================================== N O T I C E =================================================================== This IS a shareware package, and does require a registration fee if you choose to continue using it after 30 days. The registration fee is currently $20 US. This will increase to $25 when the final release is officialy distributed. Register now and avoid the price increase! Register MR/2 PM also registers you for MR/2 character mode, and visa versa. Existing MR/2 registered users are automatically registered users of MR/2 PM. The same MR2.ID file can be used by both versions. ------------------------------------------------------------------ CONTACTING THE AUTHOR ===================== You can contact me in a number of ways. Unfortunately, I can't provide a phone number at this time. US Mail: Nick Knight 1823 David Ave. Parma, Ohio 44134 Fido netmail: 1:157/2 to "Nick Knight" Internet: User "Nick Knight", (nick.knight@pcohio.com) Fido Echomail: Echomail messages to me are discouraged, as keeping them "on topic" and interesting to the masses would be difficult. I do read OS2, OS2PROG, C_PLUSPLUS and DR DEBUG daily, though. OFFLINE echo also (deals with mail readers), this might be THE place to ask public questions, eh? I recently have acquired access to a host of other networks with OS/2 conferences. These include RIME, SmartNet, Uninet and some others I can't remember. I also do poll the Fidnet OS2PRODSUPPORT echo. Direct BBS: Leave a message on the Nerd's Nook BBS (1:157/2) at (216) 356-1772, 356-1872 or 356-1431. I check in here multiple times a day. I will also keep the most recent copy of MR/2 posted here. Other boards (non-local) will get updates at my convenience. ************************************************************************** ************************************************************************** ** NOTE: Nerd's now supports an MR/2 conference ** ** and file area. Conference #208 is dedicated to ** ** MR/2 support and files. File area #45 contains ** ** MR/2-related files. Any file uploaded into ** ** conference 208 will be placed in file area 45. ** ************************************************************************** ************************************************************************** Nerd's does support file requests (157/2 or 157/3) Optionally, I call into PC-OHIO regularly. Compuserve: I check in here only when I have to. Try mail to my user ID - 76066,1240, although this isn't the best approach. MR2.INI - your MR/2 PM parameter file ------------------------------------- This is where you tell MR/2 PM all it needs to know about your system and the way you'd like it to work. If you don't have an MR2.INI file from MR/2 classic (character mode), or you've never modified one for MR/2 PM before, MR/2 will attempt to place you into the E editor with a starter INI loaded. Make any necessary changes and save the file. NOTE: Problems ... you'll have to edit MR2.INI, then exit out of MR/2 PM and reenter for any changes to take effect. My "reload INI" code needs some looking at. ** If it can't or doesn't load the editor to create the initial MR2.INI file, it's best that you do this by hand, from the command line: copy mr2ini.org mr2.ini e mr2.ini *************************************************************************** NOTE: You may use an existing MR2.INI file, if you have one. The only change that's really required is that your editor and zipper/unzipper file names be fully qualified. Use a complete path and add the appropriate file extension (e,g, "d:\os2util\pkunzip.exe"). These changes *will* work with MR/2 classic, also. **************************************************************************** Oh yea, I have the thing logging some messages to mr2pm.log. This file may aid me in solving problems that occur in testing. It *will not* be part of the final distribution reader. KNOWN BUGS AND STUFF ==================== THIS IS BETA, PRE-RELEASE SOFTWARE. THE BUG LIST IS QUITE EXTENSIVE AND ALL KNOWN PROBLEMS ARE BEING ADDRESSED. USE THIS PRODUCT AT YOUR OWN RISK - THE AUTHOR ASSUMES NO LIABILITY FOR LOST OR DAMAGED DATA. I've got a big hit-list, and I'm anxious to start hitting. I'd like to get as much feedback as possible while I'm in this process, though. Feel free to report bugs or offer suggestions. MR/2 PM is based on my seemingly solid QWK routines from MR/2 "classic", but the user interface is all new. Changes included in v0.99c -------------------------- o The Reply Header edit form, when selecting an alternate conference. The listbox could only hold a fixed number of conference (1500?). If there were more, you couldn't see them. Instead of *really* trying to solve the problem :), I added a "match" field on this form. This field accepts wildcard characters, like *os2* or pr*. It does ranges too, I'll have to doc these ... something like [A-L]* lists A through L ... Unix-style wildcard matching! Entering just a single character, say "P", works the same as entering "P*". I may make all non-wildcard specs "prefix" matches like this. o Half tones on completely read threads. This should probably be optional. o Save to file: All sorts of keyboard wierdness. Keys being processed by the message window underneath. Fixed. o Message Dialog. There was still a screen flash - pre-sizing the dialog box needed some tweaking, and I had to supress the second painting of the screen when initializing. o ALT-A, ALT-D now functional when a conference name is highlighted. This works from the Conferences w/Message selection screen, as well as on the Conference selection screen attached to the Reply Header Editing screen. Easiest way to ADD conferences is to "Write new", then ALT-C for the conference list. Highlight and ALT-A to your hearts content. o Lots of playing around with parent/owner windows to remove strange occurences and to aid in new CenterSubWindow() call. o I've got code in place to insure that certain message dialogs remain centered inside the "main" window. o INTERNAL: Main dialog proc became too large for ZTC to handle! I split out the whole WM_CHAR processing section into a separate routine. o I think I've finally trapped all the strange keystroke processing that resulted from having dialog boxes pop up on top of the message dialog box. This should end the strangeness with Save, Find, Steal Tag, etc.,. o More mouse pointer to "wait" pointers when needed. o Deferring a message now updates the message status with a 'D'. Previously, message was deferred but the display was not updated. Same thing with (P)rinting a message ... dialog now updates with a "S" status ("Saved" - MR/2 classic has always reported printed messages as being saved ...). o ALT-F is now available from the conference selection dialog to search ALL conferences for text. Just like MR/2 classic. o There was a problem after closing any packet where MR/2 PM would lose track of the correct QWK Packet Path. This occured (I think) only if your Packet Path and MR/2 PM home directory where on the same disk drive. When you close a packet, you are now correctly returned to your previous packet directory. o I added a tiny button on the message viewer screen. I'm not sure where this will end up and/or what it will be labeled, but right now it's the "option" button. The only option at this time is to toggle between MONO and PS fonts for message viewing. The font mode switch is persistant across all future sessions until changed again. This button will probable bring up a much more comprehensive set of options later :) o Open Packet reworked. Changes to the way focus is initialized, order of the entry fields / listbox to be more natural. Bug where selecting certain directory names switched drives. o Save Message: ditto. Also, save path changes are remembered and used across all packets read in that session (reset when you exit out and reenter). o Internal Editor: The state of the font (Mono or PS) and the Word Wrap setting are now saved and restored between sessions. Fixes inherited recently from MR/2 classic: ------------------------------------------- o ADD/DROP conference would not work if a DOOR.ID file was not present in the packet. I now default to QMAIL format in these cases, and create QMAIL-style add/drop messages. o When you would modify a reply and change the header data, the index list would not reflect these changes. The "I"/Insert index list will now accurately match reply header data. o Ooops. "InBasket" Folder was not being packed. In other words, messages that were deferred, then later killed/deleted would still be physically contained in the InBasket.Dat file. They were marked as inactive, so they couldn't be read. Code to pack this file has been reinstituted. o Double oops :) FolderPath was never sufficiently documented as a valid MR2.INI parameter. It was metioned in the read.me file, but was never entered into the MR2INI.ORG file. It's there now, and ... o It never really worked, anyway. It "kinda" worked, as it did everything correctly except allow you to actually read deferred message from anywhere except off of the MR2 home directory. o Modified the origin line find logic. Original code, for some stupid reason, started at the beginning of a message and search forward. I now start at the end and work backwards. This will help prevent erroneous detection of the origin when user-entered dashed lines are entered as section separaters. In addition, I revamped the whole routine. It seems to do a much better job of finding the start of the origin section. o There was a problem on some systems with the personal conference not showing in the selection list. This was when working on an HPFS drive, and the personal.ndx file was unpacked with a lower case file name. When MR/2 scanned conferences, it always matched on capital letters for the personal index. This was never a problem BEFORE long name support, as the names always came back capitalized. Now, they come back as they are on disk. I've fixed this problem and scanned for other possibilities. I think that was it ... time will tell! NOTE: The report I received that finally solved this one specifically mentioned a 32-bit UNZIP.EXE. He mentioned that all worked OK with the -U switch added to the command line. Just FYI. o Message Header Edit screen now allows you to enter conference numbers that are not present within the control.dat master conference list. Maximus QWK doors and PC Board's built-in QWK feature do not supply complete conference lists. Some QWK doors also make this optional to reduce packet size. Previously, you could not post into a conference that was not defined in the contorl.dat file. Now, you may manually enter ANY number. If MR/2 cannot find it in the master list, it will beep and clearly identify the conference number as a possible problem with the tag: "** WARNING: Unknown Conference **". It's the user's resposibility to make sure a message is posted to the correct conference number. Maybe I'll add a user-definable master list later. Changes included in v0.99b -------------------------- o MR2PM.INI, the file that holds window position data now contains a version number embedded within. Any old file found (w/o a version level recorded) will be erased. This is necessary due to the massive changes made to the way positions are recorded. Otherwise, windows end up painting off the screen. You'll have to position windows to desired spots once more. o Internal editor is now available and functional. Set the Editor=INTERNAL. The "Set Color" option does nothing yet. Also, "Set font" merely toggles between mono and ps fonts. There's no provision for changing the file name or importing/exporting text. All this will come with time ... o Sizable windows are started. Size and position of several windows are saved and recalled. In particular, the message viewing screen and conference selection screen are sizeable. There's some tricky code behind these screens to minimize flashing and contorting; let me know if you see anything strange. o No Qwk (entry of message w/o a packet) is now functional. o I added a command line parameter "/defaultpos" or just "/d" to suppress the mr2pm.ini file access. This mode uses default window sizes and positions. ... until I get all the kinks out, this is a safeguard. o Welcome screen now displays in mono font. Looks OK, unless ANSI codes are present :( o Merged most of MR/2 v1.51 features into this EXE. The list of pertainent features follows (in latest-first order): ============================================================================== o RIME routed messages are now recognized as having a "header area" at the top of the message. If the message is "split" due to length, the header area should be automically pasted into the top of each part. o FILE_ID.DIZ files were crossed between classic and PM. Fixed. o OK, I linked in HPFS longname support and modified some code to retrieve and handle long file names. The packet select screen now shows TE/2-renamed files like "pc-ohio.qwk;1". This will need some testing and polish, but it works. FileSpec in MR2.INI should be changed to "*.q*" in order to see these files. o Ooops. I couldn't find a PKUnzip that would work with long names. Even the older OS/2 version puked. This'll definitely be a problem with other DOS based archivers. So, I added a little diddy to unqwk.cmd that, if a long name is detected, will copy the selected file into the tmp$$ directory as MR2$TMP.QWK and unpack this. It then deletes the "temporary" QWK packet. Works great with even the DOS PKUnzip now! If you want to use TE/2 on a HPFS system and unpack the "BBS.QWK;1" type names with a DOS or PK* product, you *must* set your unzipper to unqwk.cmd. o An MR/2 INI file other than MR2.INI may be specified via command line parameter. Use "MR2 /IMR2_ALT.INI" to use a file named MR2_ALT.INI as the global MR/2 INI file. I'm hoping that this helps in allowing multiple instances of MR/2 to be open on the desktop. Needs more testing and experimentation ... Opening two different MR/2 seesion still crashes. o Welcome and Goodbye screen now list on the Bulletins select menu. You can view these, unobstructed and at length, any time you choose. o Minor change to the parsing of the @Fidonet@ variable. Removed any @fidonet suffix that exists in the origin line. o Added code to trim off nulls at end of any message. Was trimming spaces, but Internet messages sometimes had nulls. Messes up the reply file editing. Also, if any embedded nulls are found, these *aren't* written to the reply file OR save file. o Processing for IDATE improved a little. I saw some DATE: lines that started with weekday names like "Sun, ". o New INI parameter - ReplyStripTagline defaulting to YES. Set it to NO if you want to use SmartQuoting (which strips the original messages tagline) but still want the tag quoted. o QuoteStyle now has an optional parameter, which is ON by default. If you specify TagStyle=PCBoard,Autosense, you're saying that quote style can use hi-end ASCII chars, but if it's a Fidonet reply, change to Fidonet mode. I'm not sure if I should include Internet messages as Fido-typed tags ... I probably should. I'll research. Without the "Autosense" keyword, tag style will adhere strictly to what's been specified. o Added new Template file sections: SaveHeader and PrintHeader. Lets you define the header for messages when printed or saved. If these sections don't exist, the old default header is used. o Added more variables to aid in the support of the new header sections: MsgRefNbr, MsgNumber, MsgStatus. In addition, added some more variables to aid in formatting sections. @COL:45@ sets the next column to 45. @RCOL:72@ says to right justify the next variable referenced at col 72. @Center:40@ says to center the next variable referenced over column 40. The @RCOL@ and @CENTER@ variables can be used w/o column specs to right justify at "wrap column" or center the entire line between wrap column and 1. Negative @COL@ specs may be supplied. This will delete the specified number of characters before the variable. For example, @ITIME@@COL:-4@ would change 07:54:30 GMT to just 07:54:30. Messes up, tho, if MSGDATE ends up getting substituted for IDATE (no IDATE is found). See example.tf, at the end. There's a section `unused` with some doc/examples. o The template file now supports comment lines. Simply start the line (very first columns) with ";;" and the line is ignored. o While viewing any message, you can press "~" to rewrap it. This is useful only in USENET (Internet) conferences where sometimes a message gets posted without linefeeds. MR/2 would display it on a single line, but only give you access to the first 160 characters. This rewrapping is quite temporary (if you "go back" later to view the same message, you'll have to rewrap it again), and totally manual; performed by user keypress only. I may INI-ize an automated/detection scheme later. o Added a bunch of code to better detect message display lines that are "quotes" from previous messages. This is not configurable at this time. If I did too much, yell and I'll make this optional. With all the messages I looked at, quoting highlights were right 99% of the time. o New QuoteBody option - Paragraph. If you specify something like: QuoteBody="%i│▌",Paragraph then you'll get a quotes like: MN│▌Yes- DOS 6 upgrade is... (lines chopped for brevity) │▌number of files that... MN│▌And then after your DOS... │▌the manual of files you... │▌release the whole thing... you can do the same thing with "%i>", and secondary lines get just " >". Use the "|" (shifted backslash) and Fidonet sysops may not yell at you :) (it's not hi-end ASCII). Bummer! I just saw someone (a registered MR/2 user using a DOS package, hmmmph!) quote with a technique that this doesn't yet handle :(. Just a minor nit, maybe I'll add something later to do this (YOU CAN'T DO THIS WITH MR/2): MN┤Yes- DOS 6 upgrade is... (lines chopped for brevity) │number of files that... o Modified the logic to pick out the quoting initials to better parse Internet "from" fields. Still needs some other strange-character detection added (nick.knight@pc-ohio should reduce to nk>). o Fixed a bug where internet from fields that were filled to 25 characters resulted in your own last initial being inserted as the senders second initial (Michael.Hagerty@nitelog.com to Nick Knight, reply would be quoted MK>) This *was* fixed in v1.45 but not documented. o I added some things. First SmartWrapping and SmartQuoting have three levels: No, Yes and Full. Full is aggressive, rewrapping all non-quoted text to the defined wrap column (This is the old "YES"). If set to Yes (the "new" option), wrapping occurs ONLY after a line feed has been inserted by MR/2 (an overlength line was detected). The defaults are "YES" ... we'll see if this works any better. Limited testing, but you *can* now shut these off w/o crashing! o Also, add an "~" to the end of any line (before the linefeed) and MR/2 will strip out the "~" and keep the return that follows intact. This is for stubborn wrapping problems. Just in case :) o If the quoting initials ended up longer than 9 characters (FROM name had no spaces), the string was not properly terminated. This resulted in garbage in the initials and in one reported case, a crash. This would occur most often in internet conferences. o New template sections are definable: NewInternet and NewNetmail for creating new messages in these private-mail conferences. o When editing a message header and the conference is the Internet or Netmail defined conference, the "private" flag is set to YES. o New template section: `RIME` can be defined for use when replying to a message in private mode. If a reply is private, and the source message is determined to be from a RIME source (Postlink origin is last line of message), then this section is used in generating the reply. This allows for private, routed mail. Not sure what to do about "new" private, routed messages. o New variables: @RimeIDCode@ and @RimeSiteNo@ for use in the RIME section for "routing" private messages. Will result in blanks unless replying to a message with a Postlink origin line. o New Variables: @RimeIDCode@ and @RimeSiteNo@, defined above. @Version@ for the MR/2 version. @SerialNumber@ is replaced by the registered serial number (empty if not registered). @UserName@ is replaced by your user names as found in the QWK control.dat structure. @IDate@ is replaced with the Internet "Date:" spec, or the the same results as @MDATE@ if a date string is not found. o New template section: `Forward`. If this section is declared, it is used as the template "prefix" for forwarded messages. NOTE: $Body is not required, this section is inserted as a whole. If not declared, the old MR/2 default forward prefix is used. o See EXAMPLE.TF for examples of all new section capabilities. My name and email addresses are plastered all through here. You'll want to, of course, change these to your own :) o When replying into the Internet mail conference, the @INTERNET@ variable will better represent a true Internet address. If the Reply-To: line isn't present, MR/2 then looks for a "From:" line and attempts to parse out an address. If no From: line is detected, MR/2 now looks to the last line of the message. If the sender has included his address inside of parenthesis, then this is used as the INTERNET value. o Modified msg2rep.cmd so that if archiver.id file isn't found, it defaults to pkzip (configurable). If using no packet entry, no unarchiver was called, so no archiver.id is created. We need to be able to specify a packet as a default. o If a local INI specified a value for Internet and/or Netmail, it was not cleared when the packet was exitted. If the next packet opened did not reset these values (or did not have a local INI), then some erroneous detection of network mail would result. Fixed. o I modified the "origin" line finding logic to recognize more common reader/network tearline styles. For instance, MR/2's own TwoLine style tagline is now recognized as the beginning of the origin section (and end of the BODY section). o Started coding of a REXX script to handle detection of the archiver used to pack the mail packet. A code is returned that will be used to branch to the correct command for unpacking. To me, this is the ideal solution, as it is forever extensible. I've got a scheme for a packer script (for replies) that will match the unpacker used. I'm new to REXX coding (this was the perfect excuse to get my feet wet :), so if anyone wants to make improvements and/or enhancements, I'll welcome them. (file is named Unqwk.cmd) o Create msg2rep.cmd - a REXX script for packing replies into a .rep file based on the method used to unpack the original packet. The source packet *must* have been unpacked with unqwk.cmd (or, at least, the file "archiver.id" must exist and identify the correct packer to use). This script opens up "archiver.id" and extracts the id number. Based on that number, a branch is made to the correct packet command. NOTE: You may have to modify these files a tad IF your archivers are not in your "PATH" environment variable. NOTE: These command are useful if you use multiple packet sources (BBS's) that use different compression techniques. If you can get by with a single zipper/unzipper command, the "old" way is OK, and in fact, still more efficient. These new files simply provide additional flexibility for those that frequent a variety of BBS's and need this functionality. INSTALLATION: Modify your MR2.INI file to declare: Zipper=..\msg2rep Unzipper=..\unqwk the default .cmd files depend on all archivers being in your "path". If not, you may modify the path = '' statement at the top of each file to reflect the correct path, or modify each zipper command separately to reflect each's valid path. o The prompt "Work area has an open packet" has been enhanced. You may still see this prompt. However, if the work directory is found to contain replies, the prompt will read "Open packet with REPLIES found". o If an error occurs when unpacking the packet, you will now remain inside MR/2 to select a new packet, or whatever. o IF an error occurs while packing replies, the work directory is *not* purged. Previously, any error while spawning the packer still let the files be deleted. What happens now is, after the command error is reported, you're prompted that an open packet with replies exists. The correct course of action is to go back in the packet (continue working with the open packet) fast exit with ALT-X and correct the zipper problem. o Cleaned up and tested UNQWK.CMD and MSG2REP.CMD. Made sure error codes were properly returned to MR/2. Seems to work well with the new error handling described above. o Added new variable @ISUBJECT@ that resolves to the Internet message subject line (often different than the QWK "subject" field). I hope there's a limit to the size of these things ... I only accomodate "realistic" lengths. We'll see. o Ooops. New template section logic didn't accomodate new messages created w/o replying. The template file can now define a section for `NewMessage`. o The INI parameter SplitLongMessages has been enhanced. YES/NO still function in the old way; YES will cause messages to be split at 92 lines (90 lines of message, 2 lines for the <cont..d> footer). You can now, however, place a number here as an option. This sets splitting to YES, but modifies the line count cutoff to be the specified value (instead of 92). This value *must* be greater than or equal to 10 (I've been told of a BBS system that requires no more than 16 lines <really!>, so I figure 10 will be a "safe" minimum). I would suggest using a reasonable number if you need to change the default at all. o New INI parameters V0 through V9 allow you to set user-defined text strings as template variables. Uses of the strings @V0@ through @V9@ in the tenplate file will be replced with the corresponding defined text string. These variables can contain any other variables, including other "V" variables. This allows for a template to be defined with an attribution line of @V0@, for example, and this line can be changed for each BBS by defining different values to V0 in the BBSs local INI file. The variable replacement is recursive, so any number of replacemnet levels is possible. It's also possible to confuse the system by circularly defining variables. My rule: keep it where it's understandable. For example, if you add a line to MR2.INI that says "V0=1:157/200" and your template file starts "...writing from Fidonet address @V0@", the fidonet node address will be placed in the reply. o New INI parameters "INTERNET" and "NETMAIL". Use these variables to declare which conferences, if any, handle Internet mail and Fidonet netmail, respectively. For example, PC-Ohio has Internet mail in conference 5 and Fidonet netmail in conference 6. My PC-OHIO.INI file has: Internet=5 Netmail=6 Nerd' Nook has Netmail in conference in 139 and no Internet capabilities. My NerdNook.INI file has the lines: Internet=-1 Netmail=139 The "-1" tells MR/2 that there is no Internet support, and makes sure that the Internet section template is not referenced. o New variables @INTERNET@ and @FIDONET@. The INTERNET variable will be replaced with the "Reply-to:" address found in Internet mail. The target address will be stripped of extra verbage and should represent a correct and "ready-to-go" internet address. The FIDONET variable will be replaced with the full Fidonet address found in the origin line of the current message. If either one of these variable can not be resolved, then an empty string is substituted. These variables are meant to be used for personal mail addressing using template "sections". See next blurb. o Sections in the template file `Internet` and `Netmail`. You may now allocate "sections" within the template file. Sections are denoted and named by a string between "accent" characters (`). The first template file section has no name and will be refered to as the "default" section. A section ends at the next section name string, or at the end of the file. When replying to messages targetted for a conference declared to be the INTERNET or NETMAIL conferences, MR/2 will switch template sections to the corresponding section. If ever a section is not found (by name matching), the default section is used. This allows for Fidonet netmail and Internet mail to have templates that correctly set up destination addressing. See the file Example.tf for examples of sections. o Mods to reply creation ... removed the beginning CR/LF when creating the reply file. Made changes to the way the template file handled CR/LF spacing. Template file's allignment matches reply files better now (line spacing/blank lines). o When replying and the FROM user name is an Internet made-up name with periods imbedded, MR/2 nulls-out the quoting initials. The quoted text is simply marked with whatever symbol is defined in the INI, usually a ">" (no initials preceed the ">"). o Oh boy. I modified the Save Reply logic of my QWK class. This is dangerous, simply because it changes the way replies are saved. I'll test it thoroughly before letting it out. *Please* report any problems to me quickly. The change comes when splitting messages (it may effect more, my hope is that it doesn't :). IF you're in sending Internet mail or Netmail, the message "header" will be copied to each split section. In most cases, this will be the correct function. There may be cases where it isn't. Yell at me and I'll make it configurable. In other words, netmail or internet mail that's split will be addressed properly for all "parts" if addressing is done on the first line(s) of the message. o When replying into the Fidonet netmail conference, the source message is first checked to see if the first line starts "From:". If so, and what follows appears to be a Fidonet node designation (it has a ":" and a "/"), then this is used as the value of the FIDONET variable. If not found, the origin line is found. In netmail messages (the ones I receive at least), there is no origin line, just a "From:" identifier on the very first line of the message. o Taglines now are filtered for variables (e.g., @FROM@). o Took template file checking one step further - if file name is empty, processing doesn't even start. o The initial MR2.INI file now specifies that the INTERNAL editor now be used as the default. The initial INI editing is still performed inside the E editor. o New INI parameter: "TemplateFile". This is another one of those features that is merely a starting place and has lots of future expansion possibilities. Place a file name here that defines a template for all message replies. The reply will created using this file as a guide BEFORE you edit it. This allows for any necessary cleanup. The "template" file I used for testing looked like this (note that the variables used will be documented below): ------------------------------------------------------------------- Subject: @Subject@ In a message dated @DATE@, @FROM@ said to @TO@: $BODY Nick Knight From @from@ reading @CONFNAME@ (@CONFNUM@) on @BBSID@, to @TO@ Subject: @Subject@ FidoNet: 1:157/2 Internet: nick.knight@pcohio.com Compuserve: 76066,1240 To First: @tofirst@ To Last: @tolast@ YYMMDD: @yymmdd@ Date: @date@ From First: @fromfirst@ From Last: @FromLast@ Msg Date: @msgdate@ Msg Time: @msgtime@ Day: @Day@ Julian: @Julian@ Time: @Time@ Time 24: @Time24@ AM/PM: @AmPm@ Upper: @Upper@@Subject@ @upper@@day@ Lower: @lOWER@@Subject@ @lower@@day@ Mixed: @mix@@From@ -> @mix@@to@ ------------------------------------------------------------------- The quoted version of the original message is inserted at the $BODY marker, which is required. NOTE that this is not an appropriate template file for use within internationally echoed conferences. It's offered here merely as an example. The section before the $BODY line allows for an "attribution" line or section. The area below the $BODY marker works as a signoff or signature section. AGAIN, this feature is under development and may be changed in the next couple of versions. My idea is to add more blocks to this file. For example, a definition for saved message headers, forwarded header definition, etc.,. I've got plenty of ideas. The reply file generated by my test template file looked like: ----------------------------------------------------------------- Subject: NEW ZOO In a message dated 03/06/93, DAN HANSON said to ALL: DH>I saw this in Time Magazine. The New York Bronx Zoo has been DH>renamed to the International Wildlife Conservation Park. In <My reply would be inserted here.> Nick Knight From DAN HANSON reading Main Board (0) on PC-OHIO, to ALL Subject: NEW ZOO FidoNet: 1:157/2 Internet: nick.knight@pcohio.com Compuserve: 76066,1240 To First: ALL To Last: ALL YYMMDD: 930306 Date: 03/06/93 From First: DAN From Last: HANSON Msg Date: 03-06-93 Msg Time: 14:21 Day: Saturday Julian: 065 Time: 03:08 Time 24: 15:08 AM/PM: PM Upper: NEW ZOO SATURDAY Lower: new zoo saturday Mixed: Dan Hanson -> All ----------------------------------------------------------------- o Variables are available for use in the template file. They are currently only used by the reply file generator. I'll add the capability to other areas as I think of them. The following variables have been provided: BBSID TIME CONFNAME TIME24 CONFNUM TO DATE TOFIRST DAY TOLAST FROM YYMMDD FROMFIRST UPPER FROMLAST LOWER MSGDATE MIX MSGTIME AMPM SUBJECT JULIAN The literals UPPER, LOWER and MIX are not actual variables, but modifiers. They will convert the case of the NEXT variable replacement to either all upper, all lower or mixed case, respectively. Mixed case basically lower cases all letters except the first letter of each word. See the example above for more detail. o GREATER CHICAGO Online BBS is now offering a service called the "OS/2 Shareware Author Support Program". They are willing to handle Visa/Mastercard charges for shareware authors. Starting immediately, MR/2 may be registered by "charging" it! You can register online by calling Greater Chicago Online BBS at (708) 895-4042. Alternatively, you can provide your charge card information to me directly on the MR/2 registration form provided (register.doc). There is a $2.00 handling fee associated with all charged registrations, making the total charged registration cost $22.00 US for domestic orders. Shareware authors may get more information on the OS/2 Shareware Author Support Program by calling the GREATER CHICAGO Online BBS at the number above (leave a note to the sysop) or by Compuserve mail at 70404,3277. Fidonet netmail can be sent to Bill Cook at 1:115/895. ============================================================================== Changes included in v0.99a -------------------------- o Attempting to show the BBS's Welcome screen in the message listbox behind conference select picklist. It isn't pretty (I need a monospaced font) and you can't see much of it. Maybe I'll try something else. o After deferring a message, the message status was not updated with a "D", even though the message WAS deferred. Fixed. o New routine "clear_resulttable()" is called if there is no local INI and a packet is closed. Previously, hit counters for custom conferences would not respresent the correct counts (counts would not be cleared for the next packet). o Index display showed message number with some trailing garbage sometimes. This is fixed. o No QWK Entry code started. o Open by association started (specifying a packet as a command-line parameter). o The spacebar now really does work as in MR/2 classic ... it works like the page-down key until the end of a message is displayed, then like the NEXT key. o When editing the message header, the F10 key now works as it does in MR/2 classic. That is, it works as the "accept" key. I'll leave the F11 key also as an "accept" key for those that got used to it. o Write New: The selected conference would be erased on the "after" header edit. It would be reset to "000". Fixed. o The E editor was demonstrating some very unusual behaviour. When replying, parts of the message would be hidden and unavailable for editing. Yet, they *were* there! There would be no vertical scroll bars displayed, and the horizontal was only in one (the wrong) direction. This ended up having something to do with the program control value I was setting. EPM seemed to work OK, as did text mode edit sessions, but E just croaked. This *seems* to be fixed. o Also, the $ and ! specifiers for DOS and FullScreen sessions added earlier can now be combined in the form $! for both packers and your editor. IE, you can force a DOS session to full-screen. o Tagline stealer had a problem with certain characters (while editing the tagline-to-save) invoked message functions (Reply, for example). This has been fixed ... I need to review all my dialog boxes for the same types of problems. o Sizable message reading screen. It has some painting problems when the screen is resized, but once the size is remembered it works pretty well. You can also size the Conference selection dialog. MR/2 PM now remembers the size of these screens in addition to the position. o The possibility of the message listbox getting the focus has been eliminated (I think? :). When this happened, keys would cease to function as they would normally (X would not exit, F would not find). Changes included in v0.99 ------------------------- o For your archivers: if you wish (or have to :) use a DOS version of PKUnzip, for example, MR/2 PM will now work correctly. This bug was causing lockups (blank screen, no keyboard, manual boot time) on OS/2 2.0 GA and simply failing on the old 2.1 beta. No idea what it did to versions in-between. Now, when a DOS archiver is called upon, MR/2 PM opens a DOS window (in the "background", even) and runs the DOS utility there. Editors may also be DOS-based. o I changed the way that the zip/zipper work. Basically, whether using DOS or OS/2 executables, a new session (windowed usually) is created. I'll have to see if I like this better, and get outside opinions (anybody?). Also, the editor is called with the same logic. This should help with those cases where the reply editor would end up "in the background". That shouldn't happen at all now, as MR/2 PM is suspended UNTIL the editor is terminated. Uh oh, can't have this! o Tagline selection list now has buttons for OK and CANCEL. o Lockups due to missing or unnamed template file (lockup when requesting the editor for a reply) are now fixed. Same problems as with MR/2 classic. o Read markers are back on the message index list, and the read count is now back on the thread selection list. Sorry! o Write button is now enabled and can be used to write "new" messages. I'm getting some random crashing ... more work is needed. o New buttons on Conference selection list: News, Files and Bulletins. Bulletins is still non-functional. Soon. Buttons call your editor accessing the specified file. No checking for non-existent files. o Mods to keep secondary dialog box positions as "relative" to the open/message windows. That means that if you place the conference select window somewhere, then move the message reading screen, the conference select box will move to stay in the same "relative" position. o Cleaned up some of the "extra" little informative dialogs that would end up appearing as independent windows. o The zipper/unzipper EXE is now queried, and if found to be a DOS app, a DOS session is started. No strange "$" specifiers needed :) The window is now opened foreground, though. o The editor call is now handled differently. You editor should now end up with the correct focus, even if windowed. o The conference listbox is now automatically updated if/when the background "custom conference" thread completes. o Edit header now sets the focus to the SUBJECT field. o Cleaned up some of the button resetting to "default" values after some other button is pressed. More to come ... o Removed the makeshift "paging" buttons I had placed on the message reading dialog. Turns out PM already accomodates paging by clicking inside the scrollbar track, above or below the slider. I just recently learned that! o The MR/2 PM version is now part of the packet select dialog title. o The distribution zip now contains a FILE_ID.DIZ description file. o Bulletin button on the conference select list is now functional. It brings up a selection list of available bulletins. Selecting one will load your editor with the appropriate bulletin. Only minimal error checking is performed. Changes included in v0.98 ------------------------- NOTE: Version 0.97 never really made it into distribution. o Relinked with many of MR/2's latest features being added automatically. Others needed some minor code adjustments. Deferred messages are functional, as is the new "template" feature. I'll include MR2READ.ME for anyone that wants to get a feel for what else *might* be new. Also, the "TwoLine" TagStyle is now available. o I played around with saving window positions. It works OK, but isn't quite right, particularly with regards to secondary dialog boxes. Work will continue. MR/2 PM now creates and maintains an "MR2PM.INI" file in the software's base directory. Changes included in v0.97 ------------------------- o Buttons on the Message Index dialog box are now functional. o Removed some unnecessary screen repaints that would occur when a function (e.g., Pick Thread) was canceled and the same message was left on the screen. o If CTRL-PAGEDN was used to page forward by thread, pressing the NEXT button would redisplay the same message immediately afterwards (only once). o Focus for reading messages now starts on the NEXT button. o The SPACEBAR now functions as it does in MR/2 classic (page down, next message if at end of current message). NOT YET !!!! BROKEN o Origin recognition enhancements inherited from MR/2 classic. Custom Conference now recognize the "origin" section of a message better whe using the "check = origin" option. o After "reList"-ing packets, the focus is set on the OPEN button. o Thread summary listbox - sometimes the last entry would be malformed (characters missing from the front of the thread text). Fixed. o You can now (again) double click on a packet name to open it, save file to save to it. o Pressing the Tagline button while editing a reply header would crash MR/2 PM. This now works correctly. o Color is supported in the message viewer listbox. I wouldn't call it pretty, but it's there. A new MR2.INI entry has been added just for specifying PM viewer colors. PMColor=1,2,3 ... where 1 is the color for quoted text, 2 the color for normal text and 3 is the background color. The defaults are half-tone, black and default entry field color (half-tone yellow, sorta). You may specify one, two or all three and let whatever's left default. See the MR2INI.ORG file for colors possible. o Many improvements inherited from MR/2 classic. The speed of conference name sorting has been dramatically improved. Some obscure control.dat file problems cleared up. Personal message beeping problem fixed. Minor tagline problems fixed (?). o Packet selection dialog sometimes had the file date/time clipped. This has been corrected. Changes included in v0.96 ------------------------- o Personal messages now beep if configured to do so. o The "find" text is cleared when a new conference is selected. Old way, the text locator would still be in effect when a new conference was entered. o Packet path was previously lost when a packet was exited, resulting in an empty packet selection list. This has been fixed. o If the FROM user is changed when replying, this change is remembered for all subsequent replies, until a new packet is selected. o Message viewer keyboard interface enhanced. Up/Down arrows now scroll message by line; Page Up/Down by page. Home jumps to beginning, End to end. Insert key calls up INDEX (still trying to stay SLMR keystroke compat for some reason :) Paging improved somewhat. o Added a more direct way to get message lines from the QWK engine. The previous method involved querying the message line by number, walking through increasing number requests. Each call resulted in the entire message being traversed until the line was found. Now, the new call oStart = GetNextMessageLine(char *target, int oStart) speeds this up. Filling the message list box is now faster. o Columnized listboxes now display selected item in a more "correct" color. o Bookmark flags were not getting set and/or being read. This has been corrected. o Message window now displays the bookmark flags in a minimal fashion. If a message has been read, a "√" is displayed next to the reference number. After this, an "R" appears if the message was replied to, an "S" if it was saved, and a "K" if it's a reply that's been killed. o Taglines are now selectable via the "taglines" button. Hot key of F2 not yet implemented. o Save Header button on reply message header now functions. o If using an existing packet, flags to save replies and bookmark flags were not being defaulted to TRUE. This caused problems - now fixed. o When modifying or killing a reply, the message header and message text are now updated on screen when the action is complete. o When spawning to the editor, the path was *not* inherited from MR/2 PM. You would usually end up with a default path of C:\. This cause problems with reply files named "reply.msg" (not fully qualified) to appear to be missing. You now start editing while pathed into the tmp$$ working directory. o Enabled the "T" key when viewing a message. This now steals the current message's tagline. As with MR/2 classic, the arrow keys let you scroll through the message lines. Pushbuttons are also provided for this purpose. o Save-to-file has also been enabled. Press "S" while viewing a message. A file dialog screen comes up for save-file selection. There are some inconsistencies here that I hope to clean up quickly ... but it does work. o Enabled the F2, F3, F9 and F10 keys on the Reply Header Edit screen to function as in MR/2 classic; Pick tag, Toggle to, Save Header Only, Accept, respectively. F10 won't register for some reason (it's a PM special "menu" key - I'll have to read up :), so I've assigned F11 as the "Accept" hot key (in addition to F10, which I hope to get working). o The "Save Header" botton when editing the message header is enabled only when editing an existing reply. This allows you to modify the destination data w/o editing the message content. This makes no sense unless the message already exists. o The "R" replied mark wasn't showing up immediately after a message was replied to. Fixed. o The Page Up/Down "buttons" on the message viewer no longer obtain the focus when clicked on. o Private/Public buttons now work correctly while editing a reply's header. Conference name is now static text - no user editing can be performed. o Expanded the conferences w/mail listbox width a tad. o Most pushbuttons now have associated hotkeys that are underlined. I may have went a little overboard, but I dunno. o When modifying a reply, old tagline is extracted and becomes the default tagline for the "new", updated reply. This was previously broken. o There was some crazyness happening with WM_CHAR messages (keyboard characters) that I've kludged around. For example, with a message displayed and a secondary dialog box up (pick thread, reply header, etc.,.) and a pushbutton highlighted, pressing the "X" key would prompt you to exit. The "S" key would bring up the save dialog. Even stranger things would happen. I'm not sure what I'm doing wrong when nesting dialogs, but I put a simple filter in that disables keystrokes to the message window when another dialog box is on top. o Double clicking on the system menu button, or ALT-F4'ing from either of the programs main screens now exits cleanly. It used to trap. o MR/2 classic uses TAB/BACKSPACE while viewing a message to move forward/backwards an entire thread. Since TAB is used by the PM dialog routines, this key is logically unavailable. I've attached the same functionality to the CTRL-PAGEDN (fwd) and CTRL_PAGEUP (back) keys. These work the same way in MR/2 classic - they're a carry-over from SLMR-compatibility days. o Often MR/2 PM would leave a file or conference unselected by default. When this occurred and ENTER was pressed, the program would process it as if ESCAPE was hit, either closing the packet, or exiting the program. I've now taken steps to always have something selected by default when the dialog box is initially displayed. o Thread summary - message count is now columnized. o Custom conferences now align the line containing matching text on the second line of the message listbox. Also, the alignment process, which is shared with the "Find" search function, now parses compound search strings and matches any one string. (Previously, the PM listbox message LM_SEARCHSTRING was used - this was for straight word-for-word matches only). o The "Find" dialog box now displays any currently active search string. o The "L" key (find LAST search hit) did not function properly. Fixed. o Played around with WinMessageBox to post the "Replies Exist" message. This is what I'll use for most confirmations, since I'm supposed to :) o Played with changing the color of text/quoted text in the message viewer. It worked, but I'm not very happy with it. I'm leaving it at this time to do quoted test in "halftone". I'll make this optional, or allow a wider selection of color options. o The "hit" status (Hit nn/nnn) is now displayed on the message viewing screen if the message is part of the current search results. o Logging of messages (my "remote" debugging trail) is now off by default, but can be invoked by supplying a command-line parameter (anything). o The "Config" button now functions to edit the MR2.INI file. I place a dialog box up that requires an "OK" when editing is complete. This will be removed when I get to reading the editor's exit queue. o If no MR2.INI file exists, an initial one is made and you're placed in the E editor to make any necessary revisions. o If you answer NO to "use the existing open packet?", the packet is actually deleted. Before, this prompt could come up several times. o While building the message header index (short pause on a fast machine, more significant on a slower machine), a "waiting" dialog is displayed. I need to find that snippet about setting the hour-glass mouse pointer. No, actually, I need to add some secondary threads to this stuff ... maybe this weekend. o Most all of the message viewer letter command found in MR/2 classic are now functional in MR/2 PM. The exception seems to be the "B" command, read backwards w/in thread. I'll fix this one soon :) The "Z" key now works (zip to first non-read in conference). o The "B" key (read backwards w/in thread, go to thread summary at beginning of thread) now functions correctly. Note that selecting a thread from the thread summary places you at the FIRST message in a thread, not the last. o There's a new button on the Conference Select dialog box labeled "Write". This is for composing new messages w/o a message to reply to. I just have to put some code behind it now :) o The No QWK button is now operational on the packet select screen. If you depress this button, the "Pick BBS" dialog pops up and allows you to select a BBS. From then on you're in "write new" mode. o The reply header edit dialog now has a "Conferences" button for selecting a different response conference. The MR/2 classic hotkey F4 also maps to conference selection. Also, the conference number may be plugged in by hand. MR/2 now validates the number supplied and displays the conference name, or "Unknown" if a bad conference number is specified. o The Message Index dialog box now has horizontal scrollbar. There's nothing to scroll yet, but the scrollbar's there :) o I changed the way messages are displayed when unpacking a packet and checking for existing replies. This still isn't right, but it's better than it was. I still need to multithread and pipe the PKZip/unzip stuff. That'll be first thing on the list for the next beta. o The Config button now properly resets the packet path, if it is changed in the INI file. Previously, the path would not be changed. o OK, so my message index listing has a horizontal scrollbar, and I've got stuff to scroll. Hmmm, I must have to actually do the scrolling, too. I thought all this stuff was magic? I guess not. o OK, Cancel buttons added to message index dialog. Version 0.95 - Original ALPHA release 10/12/92 Version 0.96 - Second release - BETA 10/25/92 ---------------------------------------------- No ANSI code support exists. Message display is relatively slow, particularly on long messages. No online HELP exists at this time. Just for fun, here's my "to do" list in its current form. Note that these notes aren't intended to make sense to you ... don't worry, they do to me :) Listing these may help identify problems I'm already aware of. There seems to be alot, but the thing works fairly well. To Do's (Bugs/Fixes): ===================== o Long conference lists o Highlight search hits - define a color. o Alt-R & Alt-W inside editor o Reorder Message read buttons? o Expand message index, horizontal scroll bars. o Hit counter for searching (checking ... ) o Online help o Manual o Returning to last read position o Find across ALL conferences o Keep focus out of message box - reset focus to NEXT? o Edit button on Save dialog doesn't work o Save files - remember last path / filename - ditto w/packets o No-file error checking for bulletins. o Config button: editor opens in the background. Wait box is off. To Do's (Long term enhancements): ================================= o Toolbar(s) instead of pushbuttons. o Get rid of listbox for message viewer and write to window myself, paging, scroll bars much faster. o Make 32 bit and use v2.0 controls (eg, settings in a notebook). o Font control - colors? Moveable/sizeable windows?