InterCD 2000 July/july_2000.iso/Site Building/cyberspyder/README.TXT

Text File | 2000-05-02 | 11.7 KB | 225 lines

CyberSpyder Link Test
Version 2.1.10

Version 2.1.10 fixes two problems
    These fixes are:
    - When a HEAD request is made, some servers were responding with
        a '403 Forbidden' message.  A request to the same URL
        made with a GET would succeed.  The program has been
        modified so that if this response is received to a
        HEAD request, it will retry the URL with a GET.
    - The program has been modified to include the 'Referer' in
        requests (the URL of the page containing the URL
        being tested.  It was found that some servers would
        not respond correctly if this field was missing.

Version 2.1.9 fixes two 'bugs' found in Version 2.1.8.

    These fixes are:
    - The fix made in 2.1.8 re the handling of DNS by a proxy server
        caused a bug that would result in the program treating
        non-home hosts as if they were part of the home site
        causing the program to parse non-home pages for additional
        links to follow.  This has been corrected.
    - A bug was found when a redirect response was received.  The result
        message recorded includes the URL of the redirected response
        and this could occasionally result in a message that was too
        long for the database field resulting in a program abort.
        Code has been added to avoid this problem.

Version 2.1.8 fixed 'bugs' found in Version 2.1.7 and adds one new feature.

    These changes include:

    Fix - The format of the request headers sent has been updated to
        conform with current practice so they are compatible with
        HTTP/1.0 and HTTP/1.1. The format of the request has been
        made similar to that used by the latest versions of Netscape
        and Internet Explorer.
    Fix - The "Proxy to handle DNS" option has been removed. The program
        has been modified so that, when a Proxy server is used, the
        DNS operation is unconditionally left to be handled by the proxy
        server. This should eliminate problems some users have had when
        using a proxy server.
    Fix - Validation of the host name in a URL has been added to trap malformed
        URLs and prevent the program from aborting. A new error message has
        been added to identify such errors:
            1021 Host name contains an invalid character
                    (or is missing trailing slash)
    Fix - An anchor that uses only a `#` reference was previously reported as
        an Error (e.g. <a href="#" onClick="...">). This has been
        reclassified and will now be reported as a Warning. The reporting
        has been left in the program to alert users to any cases where the
        reference was intended to include a reference to a name anchor.
        (The "#" form is sometimes used where a link is required but the
        click or mouseover is handled via JavaScript.)
    Fix - An anchor that used a name reference containing a `#` character as
        part of the name was processed incorrectly and cause the program
        to abort. (e.g. a name anchor defined as
        <a ... name="something #more"> and referenced with
        <a href="... #something #more"> cause a program abort). The parsing
        of URLs has been corrected to handle this situation.
    Fix - Added changes to permit the use of `Starting URLs` that contain commas.
        Previously these could not be used as the comma was used when storing
        `Starting URLs` to separate the URL from a possible ID and Password.
        The problem was corrected by encoding the commas contained in such
        URLs to the encoded URL sequence of %2C. The same fix was applied to
        deal with the entry of ID/Password URLs.
    Fix - Corrected problems dealing with comment areas (<!-- ......-->) that are
        longer than 1275 characters. The program will now deal with comment
        areas of any length. The same fix was made to script areas
        (<SCRIPT ..> </SCRIPT>) and the content between select
        (<SELECT> ... </SELECT>) tags.
    Fix - Added additional validation for hrefs. If the reference
        ends with a `#` without the name reference included, an error
        is reported (i.e. if the reference is like
        <a href="...file.html#">). The new error reported is:
            3014 HREF content ends '#' but does not
                        include the 'name' reference

    New feature - Modified the `News` button so that, if a test database is
        open AND a proxy server has been defined for the test, then the
        `News` request will use the defined proxy. This enables users
        who must access the Internet via a proxy server to easily get
        the latest update information from the CyberSpyder site.

Note that some problems with name anchors previously thought to be bugs are not.
CyberSpyder will continue to report these as errors:
    - Name anchors are case sensitive in some browsers. An anchor defined as
        <a ... name="American"> and a reference defined as
        <aáhref="...#AMERICAN"> will not match. While the reference to
        "American" will be found by Internet Explorer, both Netscape
        and Opera will fail.
    - Similarly, an anchor defined as <aá...áname="a&b"> will not be found
        by all browsers if a reference is coded as <aáhref="...#a&b">.
        The reference is found by Internet Explorer and Netscape, but not
        by Opera. Opera also fails to find the item when the reference
        is coded to match (<aáhref="...#a&b">).

Version 2.1.7 fixed a number of minor `bugs` and added an optional parameter to
the command line startup to cause CyberSpyder to terminate when it completes a test.

Version 2.1.6 fixed a problem in handling some incorrect server responses to
a "HEAD" request, an error in storing ID/PW information, a problem in in
retrieving pages from some Apache servers, some cell sizing problems in the
Page Size Analysis reports, the handling of the HTML 4.0 "<HTML" tag, and
added provision for a telnet variation in parsing URLs and added check
boxes to the reports as an aid in working with them.

Version 2.1.5 fixed some errors in the HTML coding of the report pages, an error
in detecting 'cgi' script pages, and a problme ion recording a name anchor reference
(in 'file.html#somename', we are referring to everything after the '#' as the
'name anchor reference')

Version 2.1.4 fixed some problems found in handling the checking URLs contained
within <SELECT </SELECT> statements (the new feature added to 2.1.1).

Version 2.1.3 fixed all known bugs that were reported for Version 2.1 and 2.1.1
and 2.1.2.

Version 2.1.1 included a couple of enhancements:
    - The HTML Page Size Analysis report now uses a table format to improve
        readability as well as to reduce the generated file size for
        the page.
    - And addition option has been added to the Test Options tab of the
        setup screen to allow the testing of URLs that appear within
        <SELECT tags on a page.  See CyberSpyder Help for details.

This 'readme' also contains instructions for installation of the program. Please
check the CyberSpyder Web site for possible additional information that may apply.

CyberSpyder Link Test is a Web site management tool used  to verify that the URLs
on a Web site are not broken.  In addition to reports on the results of a test,
it also produces a number of analysis reports to assist in managing a site.
Analysis reports include site structure and map reports, cross reference reports,
What's New and What's Old reports and page size analysis reports.

The program, intended for sites of all sizes, includes features  found in more
expensive programs, but at a price affordable by the owner of a small business
or personal site.
It is available in 16 and 32 bit versions.
See http://www.cyberspyder.com.

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Update Installation

If you have installed any previous release of Version 2.1, 2.1.1, 2.1.2 or 2.1.3,
then the only files that need to be replaced are the '.exe' file and the 'lnkchk21.hlp'
file.
The zip you downloaded contains this 'readme.txt' and two new files.  The '.exe'
file will be lnkchk21.exe' for the 16 bit release, or 'cyberspyder21.exe' for the
32 bit release.  Copy this file and the 'lnkchk21.hlp' file to the location where
you installed the previous release, overwriting the '.exe' and 'lnkchk21.hlp' files
already there.

Complete Installation

Before attempting to install the program, be sure that nothing else is running
on your system.  The most frequent install problems are caused by something
else running on your system that is using a file that this install needs to be able
to update.  Don't forget to check for programs that are set up to automatically
start when Windows is started, as these are often missed.

Both the 16 and 32 bit releases are standard Windows' installations.  To install
the program, run 'setup.exe'.

16 Bit Installation

There are no special instructions for the 16 bit install

32 Bit Installation

Make sure that the 'zip' file was unzipped with a utility that can handle long
file names.  You can confirm this by looking at the names of the unzipped files.
If you find the file 'cyberspyder21.ex_', then you are OK.  If you do not find that,
but you find the file 'cyberspy.ex_', then your utility does not handle long file
names.  (Suggest you get the latest 32 bit version of Winzip from
http://www.winzip.com/).  The workaround for this install is to rename
'cyberspy.ex_' to 'cyberspyder21.ex_' before proceeding with the installation (it is
the only file that needs the long name in this install.)

Potential problems with the 32 bit install procedure:

Some problems which occasionally occur when installing the 32 bit version are
outlined here:

Sometimes when installing the program, the install will display a message that
it is about to replace a pre-existing file. If you drag the message window out of
the way, the file name shown as the file currently being copied is the file it is
warning about. In actual fact, the install does not replace the existing file unless
the version on your system is older than the one being installed and it is
normally safe to proceed. However, if this problem occurs and you want to play
it safe, proceed as follows:
        1.Make a copy of the existing file on your system, but leave the original in
    place.     The suggested rename is to keep the original file name, and
    just add `.sav` to it.
        2.Proceed with the install and let it replace the existing file (safe, since
    you now have a backup copy).
        3.After the install completes, look in the directory where the program was
    installed and view the file `St4unst.log` (use notepad). Look for the file
    that the install indicated it was replacing. The log clearly indicates
    which files it actually replaced. If it indicates that `File currently on
    disk was already up to date`, then you can delete your backup copy as
    the file was not replaced. If it indicates that `File was not found or was
    an older version -- new file copied`,  then the file was replaced and you
    should retain the backup until you are sure there are no problems with
    your system.

If you attempt to install the 32 bit version, and the setup program will not run,
indicating that it cannot find msvcrt.dll, it indicates that your system is missing
this file. This file is used by a number of programs, but it is possible that it was
inadvertently deleted (possibly by the uninstall of some program). If you get this
message, you can download the file from ftp://cyberspyder.com/msvcrt.zip.
Unzip this file and place the contained `dll` (msvcrt.dll) in your
windows\system directory

For additional information on installation problems, please see the CyberSpyder
Release Notes at http://www.cyberspyder.com/cslnkts4.html


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To get started using CyberSpyder Link Test, start the program, then review the Quick Start
item in the help file for details