Neil Nelson wrote:

> But I am interested in and looking forward to your ideas.



Know that I am always looking at easiest ways of managing things. This

includes 1. program location database building on install and 2. data

storing formats.



As it might seem a bit unclear, (1) is a file that contains the

information where specific configuration files are located. It's a neat

language hybrid that I devoloped that solves the problem. Here is the

install batch file for a program I called DllSeek. That program requires

an external program called "Depends.exe".



--- Begin file ---

@Echo off

Echo Install directory: %1

MD %1

Echo ----------	

Echo Copying files...

Copy *.* %1

Echo Setting up component location information...

CD\

Dir /s /b depends.exe > %1\DepWalk.loc

Echo Installation complete!

Echo ----------	

Echo Running ASM DllSeek

CD %1

Pause

Start DllSeek.Exe

---- End file ----



As you probably know, in batch files, %1 is the first parameter, %2 the

next, etc. In this case, the first and only parameter is the install

directory. The file containing the path of the required program is

neatly placed in a file called "DepWalk.loc" in the destination

directory, with the program. The program could then use this pathname to

get a path for where to place files that require to be in the target

program's directory. 



The process takes a while, but since program locations aren't likely to

ever change, it can be done once on install. And there is no help from

the user needed.



The second, (2) is a completely diffirent problem. The trick is to write

something down and make it clear for the other program to read. Possibly

commas (",") aren't too much of a good idea, because the text might

include the comma, so the idea is to keep all information in the header,

then enter a specific symbol to begin the transmited text and then

simply append it. However, if we have more information of a bit more

cultivated appearance, we will definately want to use the following:



--- Begin quote ---



--- Entry: 2F35 

Source = ICI

Destination = 66.51.195.197

Port = 10002

Text = Hello world

--- Entry: 2F36 

Source = ICI

Destination = 66.51.195.197

Port = 10002

Text = Hello again

--- Entry: 2F357

Source = ICI

Destination = 66.51.195.197

Port = 10002

Text = Bye



---- End quote ----



Where a new entry means a new read sesion and each line has a property

behind the "=" and a value behind it. This is, BTW, the Function

Server's way of entering orders. However, this very obviously does not

support multiline entries.



Possibly we could use a hybrid of the two ideas, something like XML,

just readable (use linebreaks instead of "<"s and ">"s). I think you

could copy some source from AIMetaSearch's HTML parser in case coding is

a problem.



Anyway, C'ya!



--



Don't feel bad about asking/telling me anything, I will always gladly

reply.



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