PU173 HELP File February 13, 1990 * This file can be viewed while using PU173 by pressing the F10 key! * *** NOTICE *** PU173 is hereby released FREE to any/all Sysops who wish to use it. No warranty or guarantee is given and the author will NOT be held responsible for any damage or loss of information caused by the use of this program. Every attempt has been made to ensure this program is free of defects and bugs and works as intended by the author. *** END OF DISCLAIMER *** - Be sure you KNOW the name of your USER file and the SUBDIRECTORY and PATH where it is LOCATED. When entering information at the prompts, leading and trailing "\"s should NOT be entered. Also do NOT enter the USER file name in the PATH. It will be requested after the subdirectory has been verified. If you press RETURN without entering anything else at the PATH prompt, a single "\" will be used for the PATH. That means the USER file will HAVE to be in the ROOT directory for PU173 to find it! Example: C:\RBBS\MAIN\USER.DEF is your complete path and user file "C:" is entered from the Vertical Menu for Drive Selection. Then the PATH prompt box appears. You should enter: rbbs\main [capitalization is not necessary anywhere!] Then you will be prompted for your USER file name, enter: USER.DEF [capitalization is not necessary anywhere!] PU will save the string "C:\RBBS\MAIN\USER.DEF" in a file named PU.CFG for all subsequent use. If at any prompt, the information is entered incorrectly or the subdirectory or file does not exist, an ERROR message will be shown describing the problem. - The F1 Key will pop up the "Quick Help" screen. This screen shows most of the information necessary to operate the program. [ESC will return you to where you were.] - The F3 Key will swap the users first and last name (IE: JOHN SMITH becomes SMITH, JOHN - This is for both screen and printer output) This is shown in a couple of places as the Left/Right Arrow. The Right Arrow means the name will be displayed in normal FIRST then LAST name order. The Left Arrow means the name will be display "backwards" as LAST, then FIRST name order. - The F4 Key will swap between NORMAL [or NOT SORTED] and SORTED. An "N" will be shown for Normal [NOT SORTED] and an 'S' will be shown for SORTED. - The F5 Key will swap between A to Z order (Down Arrow displayed) and Z to A order (Up Arrow displayed) - You WILL NOT be able to select A to Z or Z to A UNLESS the SORT option is selected. (The "S" must be selected using the F4 Key!) - The F10 Key will pop up a window "reader" that will display the PU_HELP.TXT file. (This file!) You can alter/add/change/delete or modify this file in any way you wish. That means you can add your own help notes or whatever you wish. The width of the window is set to 70 columns so you should try to follow that format to make things readable without moving to the right. The file length may be up to 16834 bytes long. - Here is a sample command line call for PU173: C>PU173 1 OFF OFF /B The 1 = LPT1 for Printer Output (Default if NOT selected) 1st OFF = Sound Off 2nd OFF = Sound Off /B = FORCE Monochrome display NOTE: If the LPT port and the NOISE OFF parameters are used they MUST be in the order SHOWN! C>PU173 /b Will start the program with the default of LPT1, all sound on and will force Mono display. Of course just C>PU173 will start the program in color with all the noise included and send output to LPT1. Special Information for CREATE DELIMITED FILE * Please note the information in the file produced by PU173 is NOT in the same order as the info is located in the user file! The USERS ARE listed in the same order as in the USER file. Each users record is written on a single line in this form: "UserName","CityState","PassWord","LastDateTimeOn","UserDnlds" _ If the actual users file contains a "deleted" user or a "NewUser" record, that record is NOT written to the delimited file. Shown here for ease of creating your twenty-four fields for a database with the MAXIMUM width the field COULD have. The ON/OFF switches for many of the users options have been converted to .T. and .F. for use as logical fields in your database. (Those with a WIDTH of '1') FIELD WIDTH 1 UserName - 31 2 CityState - 24 3 PassWord - 15 4 LastDateTimeOn - 14 5 UserDnlds - 4 6 UserUplds - 4 7 SubDateStart - 8 8 SecLevel - 6 9 Graphics - 5 10 Protocol - 8 11 NumOfLogOns - 6 12 RightMargin - 3 13 Echo - 1 14 PromptBell - 1 15 ExpertUser - 1 16 Nulls - 1 17 UpperCase - 5 18 LineFeeds - 1 19 CheckBulletLogon - 1 20 AutoDownDesired - 1 21 ReqQuesAnswered - 1 22 MailWaiting - 1 23 Hilite - 1 24 TurboKeyUser - 1 Here is one line written by PU173 in delimited format: (No "wrapping" is done! The line ends in column 167 - You will have to use the Right Arrow to move to the end of the line if you are viewing this file with the F10 key selection - Ctrl + Left Arrow will move you quickly back to the start of the line!) "GARY PETERSON","MAHTOWA, MN.","XXXXXX","02-10-90 17:26"," 1"," 290","05-30-89"," 10","COLOR","Zmodem"," 741"," 72","T","F","T","F","BOTH","T","F","F","T","F","T","F" The same line broken down as to it's designation in the user file: (Note: The '*' means the NUMBER was converted to a string using the STR$(Value) function. [Easy to tell because of the leading blank!] You may need to know this if you wish to convert them when placed into your database.) "GARY PETERSON", - Users Name "MAHTOWA, MN.", - City and State "XXXXXXX", - PassWord "02-10-90 17:26", - Last Date and Time On the system " 1", - *Number of Downloads (Ever) " 290", - *Number of Uploads (Ever) "05-30-89", - Beginning of Subscription period " 10", - *Security Level "COLOR", - Users Choice (Color, ASCII or None) "Zmodem", - Protocol Choice (Xmodem, CRC, etc. OR (Unk) " 741", - *Number of Calls to system " 72", - *Page Width for Messages "T", - Echo "F", - Prompt Bell "T", - Expert User "F", - Nulls "BOTH", - Upper/Lower Case (otherwise UPPER is shown) "T", - Linefeeds "F", - Read New Bulletins at Log On "F", - Automatic Downloading "T", - Required Questionnaire Answered "F", - Mail Waiting "T", - HiLite "F" - Turbo Key Not ALL information is written in this file or shown by the main program. IF the sysop has chosen to RESTRICT downloads there are fields that contain that information. Personally, I use that option for new users until they subscribe to my system but I did not have any use for the information and that is why it is not included in this program. Also the COLOR choices (by number) are in the users file. Again, I don't care what colors a user selects... I used dBase IV and made all fields CHARACTER fields. I then "imported" the data. Then went back and modified the fields to NUMERIC and DATE for the fields that contained info that I may want to do MATH on... like User Downloads (Ever) etc. I also changed the Begin Subscription Date to a DATE field and it worked fine. I may alter the program to allow you to split the First Name and Last Name into two seperate fields... the same for the users City and State. Also thinking I should allow the program user to select the name for his delimited file.... All comments regarding this program may be left as public messages to the Sysop on: ***BIGTOP*** RBBS Mahtowa, MN. 55762 (218)389-6009 12/24/96 HST 24 Hours a day Gary Peterson, Sysop Thank you!