MERGEPRO has had some changes (see below) since its first limited beta release as MERGEPRO v3.00á3. It has now been split into two separate programs tailored for specific purposes: MERGEPRO v1.00á? keeps the original design and MERGESYS v1.00á? has had its defaults changed for PCBoard DIR format files sorted in name ascending order. To merge the default file type of each, all you need is: merge infile1 infile2 outfile Please see MERGEPRO/MERGESYS.DOC for a description of the features. CAUTION: MERGEPRO performs a self-test for viruses and/or tampering on startup to insure that you have an unaltered program. You cannot use an executable file compressor such as PKLITE on MERGEPRO or it will fail its self-check and overwrite itself. WHAT'S NEW 1á3 : 12-05-94 added new "compare" options: /1T writes a "marked" copy of file 1's first occurrence cross file duplicate to the trash file, /1S strips "marked" occurrences from a former trash file, /1K keeps only the records in file 2 that match those in file 1, /1M merges into file 2 only the matches from file 1, allowing records to be replaced, and parameter "E" can be added to any compare option to delete an input file that is also the output file if no records would remain and MERGE's exit code is zero; changed exit codes so when "halt on error" is off, code 0 is only if no errors occur or the only errors are blank records that are stripped (/EA or /EB is selected), code 1 means there are errors but none for out of sequence records, and code 2 is for sequence errors (there may also be others); added new "no halt on error" option /EF which attempts to fix out of sequence errors (a very crude sort); changed Verbose's "1" parameter to follow the "L" for log or "S" for screen only parameters instead of preceding them, separated /V1's operation for the log and/or screen, and /V1 now gives the first occurrence of a duplicate when merging a file on itself; added "+N" for the log option to not write statistics or a header (used with /V1, also omits the "type" of error/duplicate) and expanded the log's first line of an error/duplicate record to 80 characters; added new option /X which eXchanges the output file position when two files are used so file 1 becomes the output file; added new option /P which specifies a Path for the temporary file when an input file is also the output; changed "begin on line" option to permit choice of skipped file heading to write and made the default not writing the skipped lines; expanded allowable key fields from 9 to 40 (option /F); changed the size option so entering a new one cancels the previous setting rather than having to cancel it first; did a major code rewrite and cut over 4K even with all the new features; and made some cosmetic changes. 1á2 : 10-06-94 added control numbers for various distribution sites and detection of F11, F12, and other enhanced keyboard keys, and made a few cosmetic changes 1á1 : 09-23-94 released for general evaluation made two programs with different defaults and renumbered; added /FL to set merge on entire input line (also cancels any previously entered individual merge fields), "RJn" parameter for /F to right justify a field of width "n" in order to handle columnar numerical data delimited only by spaces correctly ("DT" now used for date and "TM" for time fields), and /MD to cancel previously entered delimiters; /S is no longer a "switch" (/S1 replaces /S-); changed exit codes for new features; and updated Help accordingly 3á9 : changed /S so "stop on" character can be on the key line, reduced memory requirements for extra lines of multi-line records, updated Help for new INFOQUEST phone number, and made a few cosmetic changes 3á8 : no new features, but consolidated a bunch of code and made some cosmetic changes, mostly to Help (among others, you can now set most of the Help colors to your own preference) 3á7 : added ability for merging on date and time fields without having to break them down with delimiters, self-check for virus/tampering on startup, and to Help: a sound toggle, a quick reference guide, and printing of the entire help "manual" or individual topics 3á6 : no more /NT for no trash file heading, it's now part of the trash option (/T+N); added /EO to not swap input error records with the output record so the order of a list wouldn't change if error records weren't being stripped, /BN to not write file 1's skipped over heading to the merged list (/BH toggles back to write), and /V1 to give the location of the first occurrence in file 1 of cross file duplicates; removed /^CBR (wasn't necessary anymore); and pushing the highlighted option character in Help jumps to that option 3á5 : basically operational changes, most notably storing two complete records from each file in memory and swapping out an input error record when Halt on Error is disabled for improved error checking 3á4 : no new features 3á3 : first released for testing WHAT'S FIXED 1á3 : fixed a minor bug (?) in discovering duplicates if a file had out of sequence records by making an input record out of sequence if it was less than the output key and equal to or less than the stored key (formerly if it was equal to the stored key, the output record was considered to be out of sequence); the relative positions of /EO /EA if used together determined whether the input file original order was kept; if a multi-line record had a blank/empty key line but there were internal lines with data, it would not be written to the trash file if stripping errors (it was just stripped); fixed bug introduced when added enhanced keys (did not detect CTRL-BREAK correctly and could cause a loop); under certain circumstances some messages that were not supposed to go to the screen in Quiet mode did; and an error was not detected if the last field of an input line was one character and missing key fields were supposed to follow it (the character was added to the key line instead) 1á2 : enhanced keyboard detection fixed a few quirks and fixed a minor bug in first shareware screen 1á1 : fixed bug when individual merge fields were delimited by other than only spaces and merge order of fields was mixed (could not ascertain where field started and ended) and added new /F?RJn feature to correctly merge columnar data 3á9 : fixed a minor bug in Help 3á8 : fixed a few minor bugs and typos, and hope no new problems were introduced with all the code rewriting 3á7 : if /L- was entered, MERGE would halt with file write error; corrected some errors in Help (they weren't errors once, but I missed updating them) 3á6 : if "+" was added to /L or /T, would cause erroneous file error halt; if /S or /M M were last in a config file, would cause an error; corrected erroneous reference to RBBS net in Help "About", should have been FIDO net 3á5 : Help command line editor wouldn't advance if in overtype mode and also changed its operation so wouldn't get highbit ASCII characters if pushed function keys, home, end, etc. 3á4 : fixed bug where MERGE locked the system on DOS versions less than 3 PCBoard is a registered trademark of Clark Development Company, Inc. 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