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³                        SOURCEWARE ARCHIVAL GROUP                         ³
³                       WHAT'S COMING IN THE FUTURE                        ³
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I  get  mail just  about everyday  from someone  telling me  that SWAG  has
become  an important  part of  their  programming  arsenal. As  I read  the
network mail each day, I'm amazed at  how far and wide SWAG has spread, and
how often it is referred to as a reference source.

It has been and continues to be a  work that I greatly enjoy, and I want to
express my gratitude  for ALL those who have contributed  to the success of
SWAG; the  many network administrators,  snipet contributors, beta  testers
and pundits who have made many suggestions to improve the project.

We are up  to version 2.9 of the  READER.EXE which was released in  July of
1994. Included with that release was the file SWAGCOMP.EXE which compresses
the SWAG files  down to about 70% of their  original size. The only problem
with this approach is that the GREP  function is pretty slow as each packet
must be  unpacked for searches. However,  we think that for  now we can all
live with the speed in order to achieve the savings in valuable disk space.

I  realize that  the problem is much  more basic that just  compressing the
data. What is  needed is a completely new approach  to saving the data, and
accessing it. The .SWG  files are based on the QWK file  format. I did this
for simplicity, and frankly, it was easy.  Therein lies a great deal of the
problem.

So, by  the end of 1994,  I intend to COMPLETELY  rewrite the SWAG project,
with a completely  new file format. Each snipet will  be stored as a packed
KEYED record in  the files, with each having an  UNLIMITED number of search
keys. This  will reduce the  overall size by  greater than 70%,  and should
provide  the speed  that we  all  require.  Additionally, there  will be  a
"WINDOWS"  version  of  READER.EXE.  There  will  definitely  be  other new
features as well.

I welcome ideas that you might have regarding the "NEW" SWAG.

Thanks again to everyone who has made this entire project a success.


Gayle Davis
72067.2726@compuserve.com
August 1994