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PMCAT+ A Disk File Cataloging Program by Patrick Michaud & William C. Scott 1 November, 1989 _______ ____|__ | (tm) --| | |------------------- | ____|__ | Association of | | |_| Shareware |__| o | Professionals -----| | |--------------------- |___|___| MEMBER Copyright 1989 by William C. Scott Page 1 About Our Marketing Process ... (Shareware) The term "shareware" has come to refer to a class of computer software that is marketed, basically, on an honor system. Hopefully you noticed the logo of ASP, the Association of Shareware Professionals, on the cover sheet of this documentation file. <ASP> is an organization that was formed and is supported by software authors and businesses with an interest in seeing shareware remain a viable means of marketing high quality software at reasonable prices. An author's membership in ASP guarantees the end user at least some protection from the vagaries of earlier and present 'public domain' software. By becoming a member of ASP the author has promised his/her intention to support the product after licensing has taken place and already demostrated to ASP the product does in fact do what it is advertised to do and is a fully functional piece of software (not crippled or restricted). (See the file OMBUDSMAN.ASP for further info) The end user benefits by being able to actually try the software before paying for it. This ensures compatibility with the system it is intended for use upon as well as the user. Both the author and the consumer benefit from the fact that neither has had to bear the burden of the enormous cost of adequate advertising. The consumer benefits directly from the lower cost of the software, the author somewhat more indirectly in that he most likely would never have been able to make the product widely available because of a lack of capital. In many cases you will find the support offered by ASP authors more comprehensive than would ever be possible from a large company. Finally, these ASP authors' products, like PmCat+, are not public domain nor intended to be free. They are offered in good faith that they are as good as their commercial counterparts and the authors do expect to be paid for their efforts. Frankly, it is a difficult thing to offer one's work to others with the understanding you will be compensated *only* when the customer is convinced your product is worth purchasing. Please realize that PmCat+ didn't just "happen". We have spent a great deal of money for compilers, language tools and hardware that is specifically dedicated to the development of PmCat+. This does not to even begin considering the many hours of sitting at the keyboard, tearing out hair trying to figure out why the obviously simple, isn't! We must, at the very least, recover our financial investment so that we can continue to develop programs of this quality. Page 2 Strictly speaking, if you do like and use PmCat+, we expect you license the program after a reasonable trial period (about 30 - 45 days). We also realize there are those persons to whom the $15 license fee would be a burden. For those persons, please continue to use PmCat+ for as long as you wish, with our blessing. Obviously, whether or not you can afford to license PmCat+ is not a consideration we would be so bold as to decide. We will trust that everyone is being honest with themselves and us about that matter and will, to the best of our ability, answer any questions by anyone who wishes to inquire. For $15.00 you will recieve: 1. A registered copy of the very latest version of PmCat PLUS on 360K DS/DD 5.25" floppy disk. 2. A copy of PmDelDup, a utility for deleting duplicate or multiple entries of the same filename in a PmCat catalog. 3. A copy of Labelle for making diskette labels and inserts. 4. Placement on our mailing list to be notified of future updates. PLEASE NOTE: We can provide registered copies of PmCat+ on 3.5" inch double density disks or high density disks as well. There is an additional $1 charge for the 720K and $3.00 for the 1.44M because of the higher cost of the 3.5" media. When you wish to register PmCat+, please send check or Money Order to the address below: William C. Scott P.O. Box 474 Coalgate, OK 74538 Ph: (405) 927-3840 See the file PM-ORDER.FRM for an invoice type order form. If you need a copy as a invoice, please include two copies when you order and we will mark it PAID, date it and return it to you with your disk(s). I can be reached on Compuserve and GEnie by the following: CompuServe ID#: 71406,1251 GEnie address : WILLSCOTT I check in as often as the situation permits, but sometimes it is a couple of weeks between (not too often, though) You may feel free to call me at the phone number above at anytime, day or nite. Page 3 COPYRIGHT NOTICE PmCat+, copyright 1989 by William C. Scott PmCat+ is NOT public domain software. You may use, copy and distribute it freely, but you MAY NOT RESELL PmCat+. A modest fee for copying may be charged, not to exceed $3.00 exclusive of the cost of disk, mailer and postage. (See "About Our Marketing Process" for more details) DISCLAIMER: By using this product, the user agrees that neither William C. Scott nor Patrick R. Michaud are severly or jointly liable for any damages, direct or consequential, that might arise from the use or misuse of PmCat+. Page 4 TABLE OF CONTENTS About Our Marketing - Shareware and ASP 2 I. Introduction 5 II. Getting Started A. System requirements. 6 B. Features of PmCat+ 1. List of features 6 2. Explanation of features 7 C. Installation 8 III. Cataloging functions A. Create a new catalog 10 B. Add to existing catalog 10 C. Update an existing catalog 10 D. Save present catalog 10 IV. Browse functions A. File information (InfoWindow) 11 B. Read contents of cataloged files 11 C. Volumes listing 11 D. Directories 11 E. Search 12 F. Sort 12 G. Change catalogs 12 H. Masks 12 V. Printing functions A. Formatting output 13 B. Printing 14 C. Printer set up string 14 D. Saving to ASCII disk file 14 VI. Misc functions A. Delete volume 14 B. Erase (delete) file 14 C. Commenting 15 D. Shell 15 E. Change volume label 15 F. Using the .DEF file 15 VII. Using Wildcards in PmCat+ 16 Page 5 INTRODUCTION PmCat+ is a floppy and hard disk file cataloging and browsing program intended for use on PC/XT/AT and compatible systems. PmCat+ is a direct descendent of PmCat which was a disk file cataloging program intended for use only with floppy disk files. So many users just naturally began using it to catalog their hard drive files that many requests were made for features that were obviously hard drive oriented. So, we decided PmCat+ should accomodate hard drives gracefully. The original PmCat was written by Patrick Michaud for my personal use. Like so many others, I couldn't find a cataloger that addressed my personal habits adequately (simple, fast and useful were some of my prime requisites). When Patrick first wrote PmCat, it was so good we decided to pat it on the rear and send it out into the 'real world' as a shareware product ... as an 'experiment' we decided, just to see what happened. Well, about three months later a phone call came to me from Alfred Glossbrenner who was writing a book about PC shareware products and wanted to include PmCat in his book ... which did occur when it was published. My thought at this point was ... "here's a professional in the PC world who thinks highly enough of PmCat to choose it over all those others...gee whiz!" Both Patrick and I were deeply flattered. We soon realized our experiment had told us we had something in PmCat. So we set about making the necessary improvements to make it palatable to as many people as possible. As it turned out, Patrick's studies kept him from doing much more with PmCat except correcting and cleaning up my early code as I learned to program in Turbo Pascal in order to support PmCat. Since late 1987, most of the changes made to PmCat have been a result of my meanderings through Turbo Pascal and the PmCat code in response to users requests for changes/fixes and improvements. So here it is, PmCat PLUS. I am calling it version 5.0 in deference to its PmCat heritage, but it has been substantially rewritten in many ways, including the use of overlays, but retains the familiar look of the original PmCat. Page 6 Minimum System Requirements: IBM PC/XT/AT or compatible, 384K RAM, one floppy disk drive. Hard drives and subdirectories are supported. Suggested extra system features: More Memory! - PmCat+ *will* run in only 384K but 512K or 640K is strongly recommended. Color monitor - either CGA, EGA or VGA makes fuller use of the different menu options easier. Mouse - these rodents are down in price to about $30 on the bottom line of pricing and make a lazy man's use of a computer much more palatable. Disk caching - these programs are fairly common and many are either public domain or shareware. This can speed up PmCat+ because of its use of overlays. FEATURES * Catalog contents of archived files * View files, archived or not while in PmCat+! * Context sensitive help * Mouse support * Include and/or exclude files (read/view/print) * Delete individual files from catalog * Delete volumes from catalog * Find Free Space on cataloged diskettes * Assign a DRIVE:\PATHNAME to be a VOLUME * Read subdirectories and labels, too * Comment each file with up to 80 characters * "Rubber-stamp" for comments for duplicate files * Sort catalog by filename, ext, size, path or date * Supports WILDCARD ("*" and "?") searches files and comments * User configurable printer formatting * Automatic update of catalog when disks are reread * User customizing of color, catalog name, ASCII filename * Relabel diskette if desired * Create ASCII disk file with user-assigned name * Multiple catalogs with your specified names Page 7 Explanation of features: The detailed explanation of each menu function is listed in the later part of the catalog. This portion explains the general use of the keyboard and/or mouse to access those options. The HELP function is toggled ON/OFF by pressing the 'H' key on the keyboard or the right AND left buttons of the mouse at the same time. This function does not toggle in the shareware distribution copy. Each menu can be accessed through three functions, the HOT KEY, the MENU BAR or the mouse. On each menu item, one letter is capitalized. Pressing that letter on the keyboard will select that menu item and cause it to be executed. On each menu, one item is indicated at a time by the bar selector or MENU BAR. The MENU BAR is moved using the RIGHT and LEFT keyboard arrow keys. When the bar is on a item, pressing <ENTER> on the keyboard will select that item and cause it to be executed. Where appropriate the RT/LT, UP/DN arrows, PgUp/PgDn and Home and End keys are active for the screen, as well as functions available to do the same things on the menu with the mouse. The cursor within the menu area (which you will see if a mouse is present) is the mouse cursor. Use your mouse to select an item by placing the cursor on the item name or within 1 space on either side and pressing the left mouse button. If HELP is turned on, another click of the left button is necessary to execute the function. This was done to allow you to see what the operation does before you execute it. When HELP is turned off, the second click is not necessary. Pressing the RIGHT mouse button is the same as pressing the <ESC> key on the keyboard. Page 8 INSTALLING PmCat+ Two files are required for PmCat+ to run, the PMCATPL.EXE file and the PMCATPL.OVR file. The overlay file, (.OVR extension) must be either in the same directory from which PmCat+ is run or in a directory which is in your DOS path definition. You MUST retain the overlay filename of PMCATPL.OVR. The executable file of PmCatPL.exe may be renamed as you wish. The following items are essential only to the browsing and archive extraction functions of PmCat+. The defaults installed in PmCat+ will look for the other files it may require, in the current directory. (The directory you are in when you run PmCat+). The defaults referred to involve the following programs and locations. 1. Text viewer/editor - PMLIST.COM (which is really a public domain program called R.COM) ( Note use of R.COM -> ) is included for simple viewing of text files. You may be able to use your favorite text viewer/editor in place of this (such as LIST or ML) 2. ARC extractor - program for extracting the contents of .ARC files. ARCE.COM is default. 3. ZIP extractor - program for extracting the contents of .ZIP files. PKZIP.EXE is default. 4. ZOO extractor - program for extracting the contents of .ZOO files. ZOO.EXE is default 5. PAK extractor - program for extracting the contents of .PAK files. PAK.EXE is default 6. LZH extractor - program for extracting the contents of .LZH files. LHARC.EXE is default. 7. Scratch path - a drive/directory path where the files extracted from an archive will be written while you view them. You cannot edit files from within an archive and update the archive with the changed file from PmCat+. 8. Target drive - This is the drive on which PmCat+ will try to find the file chosen, using the pathname information stored in the PmCat+ catalog. The default is drive 'A'. Page 9 NOTE: NO decompressing code is in the PmCat+ program. It is assumed if you have files stored with a compression program, that program can be excuted from the DOS command line and thereby used to extract files. PmCat+ just acts as a messenger between you and the archiving program by sending the filename to extract to the program you have said will extract it. If you don't know how to configure your system using PATH and don't want to deal with it (for whatever reason), just place copies of the appropriate programs from the above list in the same directory as your PmCat+ files and catalog. Page 10 CATALOGING FUNCTIONS CREATE A NEW CATALOG: <R>ead, <W>rite on MENU 1 and MENU 2 Any time PmCat+ <R>eads a catalog from disk, you are shown the current catalog name and prompted for a catalog name. If you wish to use the catalog name shown, just press <ENTER>. If using a mouse, place the mouse cursor on the ENTER menu item and press the right button. To specify a name of your choosing just start typing it in and press <ENTER> or press the left mouse button when complete. A filename with wildcards is acceptable and will place you in the 'pick list' with the appropriate files to choose from. To select a catalog from the files on disk, select or type the asterisk ('*') and press <ENTER>. This will present you with a 'pick list' from which to choose. This sequence of events first occurs when you run PmCat+. It also happens each time you <R>ead from or <W>rite to the disk. ADD FILES/UPDATE CATALOG: pdate menu option on MENU 1 pdate appears only on the first menu (MENU 1) you encounter in PmCat+. Choosing this option takes you to a window where you may 1) Read files from a drive which you specify by pressing the appropriate letter on the keyboard or choosing it from the menu ... or 2) Change the volume label of a disk drive by using the '#' symbol on the menu or from the keyboard. SAVE CURRENT CATALOG TO DISK: <W>rite on MENU 1 or MENU 2 <W>rite will save the current catalog to disk from either MENU 1 or MENU 2. Page 11 BROWSE FUNCTIONS: nfo, <V>olumes, <D>ir, <SPACE> on MENU 2 These are the functions you will use to find files and view their statistics, comments and contents of the actual file if desired. key from MENU 2 will toggle the Comment and Info windows open/closed. The Info window contains such information about the file as the volume on which it is located, the path to it on that volume and its size amd date. If the entry is a directory, it is so indicated and if it is a volume name, the free space on the volume is displayed. <V> menu selection from MENU 2 will cause a list of volumes contained within the current catalog to be displayed. The volumes may be sorted just as though they were filenames (which really is what a DOS volume label is ... with the appropriate attribute set). <D> on MENU 2 will show the list of files contained within that directory-type object. If it is a directory then the files are shown. If it is a compressed file then the contents of the archive are shown if you cataloged the disk with archive reading turned on. <SPACE> - pressing the spacebar will allow you to view the contents of the file that is currently being pointed to by the selector bar in the window. Check to make sure the file is located on the drive indicated on the line just above the menu. If it needs to be changed, just press the appropriate key to select the right drive and then press <ENTER>. What happens at this point is partly dependent on which program you have chosen to run (the text viewer/editor you specified or accepted in the Set Defaults area). Page 12 SEARCH: <F>ind, <N>ext on MENU 2 These functions are used to find files by filename, an entry in the Comments field and they are also used to find free space on a volume when the list of volumes is displayed. SEE NOTE ON PAGE 16 ABOUT SOUNDEX SEARCHES. <F>ind will first prompt you to select whether you wish to search for a file based on filename, comments or free space. The free space choice is an invalid choice if a list of volumes is not being displayed. <N>ext will find the next entry matching the search criterion you provided for the <F>ind command. SORT: <S>ort on MENU 2 <S>ort can be selected from only MENU 2 while PmCat+ is running. However, turning autoSort ON while setting default filenames and paths will cause a sort by filename when you move from MENU 1 to MENU 2 to occur automatically. After selecting <S>ort from MENU 2, you will be prompted to choose among filename, ext, size, date and path as the options on which to sort. Select one.. Then you will be prompted for sort order - ascending or descending. Descending puts the largest value first whick would be appropriate for volume free space (that's the Size of volumes) but not for alphabetically arranged data. CHANGE CATALOGS: <R>ead on MENU 1 This procedure is identical to the initial reading of a catalog when you enter PmCat. It first clears the memory of the existing catalog and then prompts you for a new catalog name which you may enter using the keybored or pick list function. MASKS: <M>ask-set on MENU 1a3 (arrow keys disabled in menu) The Mask function consists of two portions, Include and Exclude and act as a filter. It works on those files you wish to View, Print or Catalog using PmCat+ when either of its actions are turned ON. Include and Exclude may be toggled ON or OFF independently of each other by selecting them from MENU 1a3. Page 13 If both are selected, Include takes precedence. Remember, if you turn both ON, NOTHING will be INCLUDED, except what you specify and the same goes for EXCLUDE. This can be tricky until you get used to it. Page 14 The menu (1a3) for changing the MASK functions is buried with the set colors, set print formatting and set default paths, all of which are accessed thru the <S>et defaults option of MENU 1. At MENU 1a3: Exclude - toggles the exclude list ON/OFF Include - toggles the include list ON/OFF Clear - clears the item pointed to by the bar cursor <ENTER> - allows you to input a new or change the old item. PRINTING: rint on MENU 2, rint on MENU 1a4, <D>isk from print FORMATTING OUTPUT: (arrow keys disabled in menu) rint selected from MENU 1a4 opens a window to allow the format parameters for your printed catalog. Start-col is the column of the printed page on which the field will begin. Width is how many characters the field will occupy on the printed document. This can be any width you desire, but if it is less than required for any field except comments, it will be truncated (chopped off). Comments will print on the next line at the same start col for the width you specify and repeat until all actual comments for that file are printed. Then it will begin printing the next entry. Comments are left justified. Filename is a 12 character field consisting of the filename, a period and the file extension. It is right justified. Size is a number that will occupy 10 spaces. It is right justified. Date will occupy 10 spaces, MM/DD/YY format. Path can be up to 65 characters and is the path to the file on its particular volume. Volume is the volume name from which the file was read. It may be up to 11 chars and is left justified. Page 14 PRINTING: rint on MENU 2 PRINTER SET UP STRING: <*> on Print window menu <*> - will prompt you for a new string of characters which will be sent to your printer before printing of the catalog starts. Each character must be in decimal form and preceded by a '#' and followed by a space. e.g., #27 #15 Up to 20 characters may be used here. ASCII DISK FILE: <D> on Print window menu <D> - will cause the output which would normally go to your printer, to be sent to the disk as a file with the name you specify in ASCII format. It can be easily edited and/or printed at a later time. MISC FUNCTIONS: DELETE VOLUME: <D> - chosen at MENU 1 will open a window with all the volumes in your current catalog. To delete a volume, use the UP/DN arrow keys and select it with the bar and press <ENTER>. You will still be given an opportunity to abort the operation at this point by answering Y/N on the menu. Obviously this operation is not final till you save the modified catalog to disk...but at that point, it is permanent. ERASE FILE: <E>rase a file from MENU 2. It is the same process as deleting a volume from MENU 1. The difference in the two operations is, when you Erase a file, the slot it occupied on the screen is shown >>DELETED<< instead of removed altogether. As with volume deletion, the operation is not final until you save the modified catalog to disk. Page 15 COMMENTING FILE: <C>omments may be added to files *and* volumes. To comment a volume you just select the <V>olume list from MENU 2 and select <C> from the menu. A small editor aids you in the input of your comments. A 40x2 window accepts your comments. The UP/DN arrow keys will move between the lines, the HOME/END keys are active and INSERT is the standard mode (there is NO overstrike mode). DELETE works as well. PgUp/PgDn will accept your comments and immediately place you in the comments field of the preceding or succeeding file, ready to type more comments. OPERATING SYSTEM (Shell): <O> - from MENU 2 will execute a call to create a temporary shell in DOS so you can copy, delete, inspect and otherwise wreak havoc on your poor unsuspecting system. If enough memory is not available, this feature will refuse to work. CHANGING VOLUME LABEL: <#> - chosen when in the pdate section, will read the present disk label, tell you what it is and ask you if you wish to change it. You MUST have a drive selected for this feature to function. USING THE .DEF FILE: This option, frankly can be tricky if you want a different name than PMCAT.DEF. PmCat+ will *always* look for 'PMCAT.DEF' when it is run, if it isn't found the internal defaults are used. The option of providing the alternative .DEF files was to cover the possibility that someone might want an alternative color set or other defaults on occassion. Frankly, I use PMCAT every day and never use this option, but it was an option that was so simple to offer and doesn't get in the way of anything else, that it was put in. Page 16 USING WILDCARDS: PmCat+'s wildcards are a bit more flexible than DOS's. E.g., if you type *ca*.* with DOS's dir command, it will show ALL files. It sees the first '*' and then looks for the '.' and extension wildcard. If you used that same wildcard in PmCat+ it would find all files with 'ca' anywhere in their filename (not extension). When searching for a string in Comments, don't forget to precede it with a '*' unless you are certain the first character of the comments you want will match the first character of the string you search for. Where '*' assumes ALL characters match, '?' assumes the match of only a SINGLE character. SOUNDEX SEARCHES: When you chose the <F>ind option from MENU 2, you will see four options; filename, comments, size and soundex. The soundex search functions only on filenames and from the first character. With those limitations in mind, you can type in a key that simply 'sounds' like the one you want, and PmCat PLUS will locate that file for you. To find a string of characters within a string you must use the wildcards as described above.