PCBoard 15.1 Demo

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Text File | 1994-02-14 | 22.9 KB | 487 lines

| A vertical bar denotes changes since the last posting of the file. | | Current Posting Dated: 02/07/94 The following is a summary of what has changed in PCBoard v15.1 ============================================================================ PCBOARD.EXE ----------- - Modified DIR file processing in the following ways: a) Added IDX support to speed (N)ew and (L)ocate commands - including automatic on-the-fly creation of the IDX files, as well as automatic detection of out-of-sync IDX files and automatic regeneration. b) Modified the DIR title line display so that, if the caller has ANSI, it will no longer scroll the titles up the screen unless a filename is found c) Modified the filename display so that a "more?" prompt does not appear in the middle of a description. d) Modified upload processing so that after posting an upload the IDX file is updated. | **** NOTE **************************************************************** | The new IDX files that PCBoard/PCBFiler create, are not redundant. They | add new capabilities to PCBoard. These new IDX files speed up PCBoard's | ability to locate file DESCRIPTIONS via the (N)ew and (L)ocate commands. | | The IDX files that you create, using MAKEIDX, and put into your DLPATH.LST | file, on the other hand, are used to speed up the search for the PHYSICAL | file. Together, the two IDX files complement each other. | **** NOTE **************************************************************** - Added the ability to scan the users file to set mail waiting flags whenever @user@, @##@, or @##-##@, is used. WARNING: This could take awhile to process. Prior to doing setting the flags, PCBoard will ask you first if you want to. If you do, a percentage display will be shown on screen to let you know how far it has progressed. - Modified the QWK;D and R;C/D/Z/QWK commands so that they will ignore the Show INTRO During R;A setting in PCBSetup. - Added the ability to set the "HAS REPLIES" flag on an upload when using the QWK U command. |- Modified the "QWK D BYE" so that, if you have any files flagged for | download, PCBoard will perform the QWK scan and then immediately jump into | the file transfer, skipping the "Download flagged files?" question. - Added the ability to display a file PRIOR to executing a built-in command. The location of the Command Display Files is defined in PCbSetup. If it is non-blank, then PCBoard will look in the directory specified to see if a file, by the name of the command, exists and display it to the caller prior to executing the command. For example, if the user types the command "U", and a file called "U" is found in the CMDFILES directory, PCBoard will display the contents of the file to the caller. This could be used to inform the caller of upload policies, etc. Several special Command Display Files exists: PREFILE: If this file exists then, prior to commencement of a File Display, for example, the output of an "F 1" command, or an "N A S" command, or a "Z PCB A" command, PCBoard will display the contents of PREFILE. This can be useful in setting up the display requirements for RIP. For example, if PREFILER exists (the "R" means RIPscrip), it can contain any background, buttons, or other RIP "necessities" prior to displaying a file directory. PREEDIT: Similarly, if PREDIT exists then, immediately prior to entering the message editor workspace, PCBoard will display the contents of PREEDIT. PREMSG: If PREMSG exists, then it will be displayed immeidately prior to displaying the message header when reading messages. PREOPEN: If PREOPEN exists, then it will be displayed just prior to running a DOOR application regardless of whether the DOOR is launched by an OPEN or DOOR command versus typing the name of the DOOR at the command line. PREVIEW: If PREVIEW exists, then it will be displayed just prior to shelling out to PCBVIEW.BAT (for the "F;V" command). PREPROT: If PREPROT exists, then it will be displayed before the list of protocols is shown to the user. PROT: If PROT exists, then it will be used INSTEAD OF the built-in list of protocols that PCBoard displays. PRESTAT: If PRESTAT exists, then it will be displayed before the list of settings/statistic are displayed by the (V)iew Settings command. These are also shown, if enabled, during the login process. STAT: If STAT exists, then it will be used INSTEAD OF the built-in settings/statistics display shown by the (V)iew Settings command. | PREML: If PREML exists, then it will be displayed before the list of | languages are displayed, both at login, and when the LANG command | is used. | | ML: IF ML exists, then it will be displayed INSTEAD OF the normal | display of the PCBML.DAT file. NOTE: Other extensions work as well.. Going back to the "F" Command Display File example, you could also have an FG file, an FR file, even files such as F20 or F.FRE (security and language specific versions). - Modified the MESSAGE statement in PPL so that the Mail Waiting flag for the current user can be set. - Modified the bulletin download capability so that it now: 1) no longer needs to have the bulletin listed in the DLPATH.LST file, and 2) but now uses the FSEC file to determine access or FREE/NOTIME status. It will also write an entry to the caller log now to indicate that the bulletin has been read. - Added a few new @-macros: Users's Alias : @alias@ Users's Real Name : @real@ Current DIR Name : @dirname@ Current DIR Number : @dirnum@ # of Flagged Bytes : @fbytes@ # of Flagged Files : @ffiles@ Next File Number : @fnum@ Download File Limit : @maxfiles@ Download Byte Limit : @maxbytes@ Byte Ratio Limit : @ratiobytes@ File Ratio Limit : @ratiofiles@ Credit for Byte Ratio : @bytecredit@ Credit for File Ratio : @filecredit@ No Character : @nochar@ Yes Character : @yeschar@ Pwrd Expiration Date : @pwxdate@ Pwrd Expiration Days : @pwxdays@ Logon Date : @logdate@ Logon Time : @logtime@ Conference Number : @numconf@ Also, in v15.1, is the ability to use DOS's environment variables to store values for macros. To view DOS environment variables, they must begin and end with @. For example, SET @PHONE@=801-261-1686. Then, using the @env@ macro, you would display the phone number like this: @env=phone@. Of course, "env" would have to be typed in uppercase letters. NOTE: The name of the environment variable is surrounded by @ characters (i.e. SET @PHONE@= instead of SET PHONE=). This is to avoid potential security leaks (access to non-@-surrounded variables). - Changed @expdays@ to show UNLIMITED (using PCBTEXT) if no expiration date is defined (i.e. 00-00-00). - Added new command line switches: /CSTR:string the connect string from the modem /CID:string the caller-id string from the modem /DTE:#### the speed at which to open the comm port These are used in connection with the /C: switch, which is used by Front End programs. The /ERR command line switch, normally used with /C:, is not necessary if the /CSTR: value indicates an error corrected connection. | With the /CSTR: and /CID: values, any underscores presented on the command | line will be converted to spaces, by PCBoard, before recording them in the | caller log or making use of them internally. - Added the ability to skip over the protocol selection during the new user login process. It then defaults the protocol to (N)one. This switch is defined in PCBSetup. - Added the ability to skip over the alias selection during the new user login process. This switch is defined in PCBSetup. - Added the ability to force the display of the INTRO file. For example, if a caller types "J;1;Q" he would normally skip the INTRO file. By setting the switch in PCBSetup you can force the caller to see it. - Modified SET PCB=/PORTx so that if "F" is appended, PCBoard/M will use a FOSSIL driver to access the ports. (e.g. SET PCB=/PORT1F) - Added the ability to exit to DOS if a "no carrier" countdown occurs at the call waiting screen. An errorlevel of 8 can be used to detect when this occurs. This switch is defined in PCBSetup. - Modified the password processing (when the Password PSA is installed) so that it is more strict on how it detects a name subset or an old password match. For instance, in v15.0 you could use a password of JOHND because "JOHND" is not a subset of "JOHN DOE". In v15.1, after the first test passes it turns the check around and tests to see if "JOHN" is a subset of "JOHND" (finding the caller's name inside the password in addition to looking for the password inside the caller's name). Also, if the old password was TEST*DUMP, a new password of TEST*DUMP2 will no longer be allowed. PCBoard will check the first "Len-2" characters for a match and call it a "previously used password" if it matches. - Procomm Plus behaves differently for its Ymodem/G as compared to Ymodem protocol when performing an upload. It was not accepting an ACK character and would not be able to start uploading to PCBoard. Modified PCBoard to use the character that Procomm was expecting, which also appears to work with other comm programs as well (the ACK character was not found to be a problem for any other program, nor even for any other protocol in Procomm excpet Ymodem/G). - Added sysop function help (i.e. typing "H 1" will obtain help for sysop function 1). Also added help for the ALIAS command. - NOTE: You need to RENAME your HLPBR file (found in \PCB\HELP) to HLPBRD. PCBoard has been changed so that the help for the (BR)oadcast command does not conflict with the RIPscrip version of the help for the B command. - Modified the multitasker detection so that loading an emulator, such as OS2SPEED, will not cause PCBoard to use DV time slice giveup when running under OS/2. The native OS/2 time slice give up is more efficient. - Modified the 16550A transmit routines so that if OS/2 is used and a comm driver, such as Ray Gwinn's SIO is in use, PCBoard can send more than 16 bytes into the transmit buffer if the driver is ready for them. - Modified the shell to PCBTEST.BAT so that pcboard.sys will be updated just prior to the shell. - Modified the new user login process so that the verification information as well as newask information can be "guaranteed to be answered" before the user record is written to disk. - Modified the "7 F" command so that you can pass the user name on the command line. (i.e. "7 F JOHN DOE" will now work) - Added Password PSA information to the records displayed on the screen via Sysop Function 7 (if the PSA is installed). - Modified the slow drive processing so that, if a "Slow Drive Batch File" is used to modify the file (add a BBS AD, for example) PCBoard will pick up the new file size. - Kind of "in cooperation with" FLAG.PPE, PCBoard has been modified so that it now does NOT display the file listing "more?" prompt unless there are files on the screen. If there are no files on screen, then it displays the standard "more" prompt instead. This gets rid of the need to run FLAG.PPE if there are no files on screen. Then, if, at the end of the file listing, there are still filenames on the screen, the "more?" prompt will be issued prior to returning to the file listing command prompt or even the main board command prompt. This will give callers a chance to use FLAG.PPE to flag files. However, it will not be displayed if the caller was in non-stop mode (i.e. N U S will cause a "more?" prompt to be displayed at the end, but N U S NS will not). - Modified the upload verification procedure so that you may now change the name of the file during the verification process (PCBTEST.BAT). To do so, you must place the new filename in the upload description file (%3) overwriting the old filename. This will allow for archive formats to be changed during the upload verification process. - Modified the upload testing procedure where PCBoard indicates that the test will take awhile and offers the caller the ability to hit "H" to hang up now. This will continue to function as before with one small change. If the caller has requested an auto-goodbye after file transfer, and if the caller does not type anything at the "hit H to hang up now" prompt, then after the prompt expires (10 seconds), PCBoard will hang up and finish the processing. - Modified FILE_ID.DIZ detection so that if the archive has the filename in lowercase letters (i.e. "file_id.diz") it will still be detected. Also, the updated LZH/LHA routines. - Added back into PCBoard a prompt that was in 14.2 but was removed in v15.0. If you are using the R;A command (or R;ALL) to read all conferences, and then you abort the read with an "N" to stop it, when you later do the next "R;A" command PCBoard will prompt you like this: (A)ll Abort Detected. Continue with scan (Enter)=yes If you answer YES to the above question, PCBoard will resume the previous R;A command from where you left off (the conference you were last in). If you answer NO to the question, PCBoard would start a fresh R;A scan from the main board (or your first selected conference). - Similar to the way PCBoard automatically switches a "L WORD WORD A" command into a "Z WORD WORD A" command (because multiple words are not valid search criteria for an L command), PCBoard will now automatically switch a wildcard search such as "Z FILE*.* A" over to an "L FILE*.* A" since the "*.*" is generally not going to be found inside of a file description. Just trying to keep callers from getting frustrated by their mistakes in usage... - Added a SET PCB=/NOCONF environment switch which tells PCBoard to NOT write the conference registration information out to the DOOR.SYS file. This switch is normally not needed. But on a system with a very large number of conferences, it can be used to reduce the size of the door.sys file as well as the time required to create it. - Added a SET PCB=/ISDN switch which tells PCBoard to consider all connections as "error corrected" connections, regardless of the connect string. This makes available the protocols (such as Ymodem/G) which require MNP or v.42. - Added a SET PCB=/CDROM:xx;xx-xx switch which tells PCBoard to avoid writing the new DIR "IDX" files out to CD-ROM drives. - Modified the CMD.LST file so that it can now contain nested CMD.LST files. For example, you might have something like this: Command Security PPE/MNU File -or- Keystroke Replacement ══════════════ ════════ ═══════════════════════════════════════ 1) STATS 0 H:\PCB\PPE\STATS\STATS.PPE 2) DEMO 0 FLAG;PCBDEMO.ZIP 3) SEARCH 0 H:\PCB\PPE\SEARCH\SEARCH.PPE 4) 0 %C:\PCB\LST\CMD.LST The last entry, in the example above, will pull in a second list of commands which could, in turn, pull in another list, and so on. In this manner, you could have conference-specific commands in the top-level CMD.LST file and then simply by include your main commands into the list. - Added an "R" sub-command to the Conference to Join prompt, to re-list the conference menu. - Added "WHO" and "CHAT" sub-commands to the "End of Message Command" prompt. Now a caller can type "CHAT" while reading messages and jump into chat mode and then, upon returning from chat, resume his read display from where he left off. Similarly, typing "WHO" while reading messages will allow him to view who is online without interrupting the message reading process. - Modified the caller log functions so that it will always pick up the caller's real name when writing the logon/logoff records in the log. - Modified the caller log reporting for downloads. If a non-batch (single file) download is performed it will now be recorded in the log like this: (D) FILENAME.ZIP Completed using G T/E=0 CPS=1653 Batch Dnld: 1 Bytes: 705416 Avg. CPS: 1653 While this makes the log a little larger (on single file transfers) it adds the Bytes Transfered to the log making it possible for caller log analyzers to obtain more information. - Modified the login process so that PCBoard writes the language selected to the caller log so that there is no ambiguity what language the caller is using after login. - Added the ability to use environment variables as part of the path for DISPLAY files. For example, in PCBSetup: Name/Loc of WELCOME File : %GEN%\WELCOME or inside of a PCBTEXT record or another display file: %%RIP%\MYFILE !%PPE%\MYPROG.PPE For the above examples to work, you might have the following lines in your BOARD.BAT file: SET GEN=C:\PCB\GEN SET RIP=C:\PCB\RIP SET PPE=C:\PCB\PPE NOTE: This ONLY works on DISPLAY files and PPE files. Files that are either displayed to the caller by PCBoard, or PPE files which are launched by PCBoard. These can be specified in PCBSetup, or they can be %FILESPEC and !FILESPEC.PPE files inside of PCBTEXT records, or %FILESPEC and !FILESPEC.PPE lines inside of *other* display files. But configuration files, such as FSEC, PWRD, your WORK directory, etc, will not be able to use environment variables. - Modified MNU file processing in the following ways: a) Added the ability to force the display file on callers regardless of their expert status. See the FORCE DISPLAY field in MKPCBMNU.EXE. b) Added the ability to utilize hot keys in menus (in other words, the caller simply hits the one letter keyword and it is activated without hitting the enter key). See the USE HOT KEYS field in MKPCBMNU.EXE. c) Added the ability to automatically pass undefined options through to PCBoard (in other words, if the user attempts to select an option that is not defined in the MNU file, it will be passed to PCBoard as though it were defined in the MNU as a STFQ option type). See the PASS THROUGH field in MKPCBMNU.EXE. d) Added support for replacement text file specifications (%filespec) and PPE file specifications (!ppespec) to custom MNU file prompts. e) Added the DORX option type. This option selects a door from the DOORS.LST file for the conference but doesn't restore the MNU afterward. f) Added the PPEX option type. This option starts executing a PPE file and exits the MNU afterward. - Added support for FIDO's CTRL-A lines inside of messages. - Modified the COMMENT subject field so that if you are forcing comments into the main board it will include an extra "(confname)" in the text of the subject to indicate which conference the caller was in at the time the comment was entered. - Added direct support for OS/2 COMM Drivers when using the PCBoard/M software under OS/2. This allows multiport hardware such as the ARNET and DIGIBOARD products to be used by loading their respective OS/2 Device Drivers and then allowing PCBoard to talk to OS/2's Comm API. PCBFILER.EXE ------------ - Added support for IDX files. When moving files between DIR files, they IDX is automatically created or updated. Also, when sorting DIR files. - Added a /INDEX command line switch. This will automatically index all of the DIR files at once. Just issue the command PCBFILER /INDEX. A sub-list of conferences can be specified like this: PCBFILER /INDEX;xx-yy - When moving a FILE DESCRIPTION to a new DIR FILE, if the target DIR FILE was the same file as the source DIR FILE an error would occur and PCBFiler would "back out" all changes that were made thus far. Fixed by allowing the description to remain "in place" since the source and target DIR files are the same. - Extended the number of unique paths allowed in the DLPATH.LST file from 300 up to 512. Also, added a pop-up screen which informs the sysop when that limit has been reached. - In a memory-constrained environment, PCBFiler's "Verify file existence" operation would show non-existent files as existing. Fixed. PCBSETUP.EXE ------------ - Added "Command Display Files Location" in File Locations : System Files. - Added "Drop to DOS on Missed Connect" in Modem Configuration : Switches. - Added "Force INTRO Display on Join" in Configuration Options : Switches. - Added "Skip Protocol When Registering" in Configuration Options : System Control. - Added "Skip Alias When Registering" in Configuration Options : System Control. PCBSM.EXE --------- - Added '!' as a valid character in the printer/file output definition. - Enhanced the ALT-R (repeat search) command so that it remembers the previous answer given for searching into PSAs. - Found that if the users file was encrypted the ALT-S function, to search for text in the users file, would not work. Fixed. PCBPACK.EXE ----------- - Added a /THRESHOLD:nn command line parameter which allows you to set a "Minimum Active Messages" threshold for packing conferences. For example, if /THRESHOLD:100 were used, then PCBPack would skip over any conferences that don't have at least 100 messages in them. |- The /RANGE command, which was documented in v15.0, was never actually | implemented in PCBPack. Now it is. /RANGE can be used to remove a range | of messages from a conference. ZMSEND.EXE ---------- - The time stamp sent was 1-hour previous to the actual file being transmitted. (i.e. a file with a time stamp of 08:00am would arrive on the caller's system with a time stamp of 07:00am) Fixed. - Improved compatibility between ZMSEND and some other popular comm programs. PCBDIAG.EXE ----------- - Fixed a lockup that would occur if the EVENT.DAT file was missing when trying to print the configuration. PCBDESC.EXE ----------- - Modified FILE_ID.DIZ detection so that if the archive has the filename in lowercase letters (i.e. "file_id.diz") it will still be detected. - Improved support for LHZ/LHA.