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└─┴─────┘ ┴─┴ ┴─┴ ┴┴ ┴┴──┘ └──┴┘ ┴┴ ┴┴ o └┴──┘
CopyRight (C) 1991-92 by Max Bernard & Dave Navarro, Jr.
History File
(in reverse chronological order)
Note that many changes are occuring in GIFtest, I think up dimented stuff to
do to it all the time. If you can think of anything let me know. At present,
the DOCs aren't even close to being finished and the utilities mentioned in
ORDER.FRM aren't out of the alpha stages yet, but all seem to work, though
they're buggy. All "official" beta testers will recieve a free registered
copy of GIFtest. Thanks for your help.
Version 5.0 (Not yet. In closed Beta)
As soon as 4.0 is out the door, I will start taking suggestions for the next
version. Already on the list is the ability to read resolutions from .JPG
files created with GIF2JPG. Much thanks to that author for providing me with
the appropriate information. Please see GIFTEST.CRC for more information on
problems with GIFs.
Version 4.0ß
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
■ Ver 4.0ß16f [10-15-92] (Released 10/24/92)
■ Fixed a bug in the routine that removes an existing resolution string
from the caller-provided description
■ Various other minor fixes
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
■ Ver 4.0ß16e [10-10-92] (Not Released)
■ Internal code cleanup and optimization
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
■ Ver 4.0ß16d [10-08-92] (Released 10/08/92)
■ The /E option wasn't actually erasing dupes or bad gifs
The code for this option was commented out during testing and I
forgot to put it back in (Thanks John Blackwell).
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
■ Ver 4.0ß16c [10-07-92] (Released 10/07/92)
■ Fixed a minor bug in the FIXLOG utility that would cause it to try
to fix and already FIXed log file under certain circumstances.
■ New MAKETREE utility added. This necessary utility was accidentally
left out of the earlier ß16 releases. MAKETREE is a utility that you
run *AFTER* your pre-beta 14 log file has been FIXed using FIXLOG.
See MAKETREE.DOC for usage information.
■ There were no changes to the GIFtest program itself from ß16B.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
■ Ver 4.0ß16b [09-27-92] (Released 09/28/92)
■ Fixed a bug introduced in ß15 that caused GIFtest to sometimes ignore
the config file.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
■ Ver 4.0ß16 [09/26/92]
■ Added options 3 and 4 to the /T:x resolution type switch
GIFtest now supports 4 types of resolution information as follows:
/T:1 Full resolution, with brackets [640x480x256] or [1024x768x256]
/T:2 Full resolution, no brackets 640x480x256 or 1024x768x256
/T:3 Abbreviated resolution, with brackets [640x480] or [1Kx768]
/T:4 Abbreviated resolution, no brackets 640x480 or 1Kx768
If the /T switch is not found, GIFtest forces a default of /T:1
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
■ Ver 4.0ß15 [09/08/92]
■ Another increase in speed during dupe checking. In this version, dupe
checking is almost instantaneous. In order to achieve this speed
increase, the way in which the log file is searched for duplicate CRCs
had to be changed. That also resulted in a change in the format of the
log file. So, the same warning that applied to the previous beta (ß14)
applies to this one. YOU MUST use the supplied FIXLOG utility to
convert your log to the new format BEFORE using this version of GIFtest
or it WILL NOT work properly. See FIXLOG.DOC for details.
■ Dupe files are no longer added to the main log file. Instead, they
are sent to another log file named after the main log file but with
a .DUP extension. For example, if your main log file is GIFTEST.LOG,
the dupe files will be logged to GIFTEST.DUP This has the side effect
of reducing the size of the main logfile, resulting in even faster dupe
checking.
■ This version (as well as ß14) has the ability to detect and use any
embedded GIFbrand description found in a GIF file to replace the U/L
description provided by the caller.
■ There are some other internal and cosmetic changes. But the increased
processing speed during dupe checking is the main improvement in this
version.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
■ ß14 [08/25/92]
■ Brand new and improved version. Too many enhancements to list here,
and many more to come very soon. This is an interim release just to
whett your appetite.
■ *IMPORTANT* This version of GIFtest uses a different LogFile format than
all previous versions. This was done for two reasons:
1) To speed up dupe-checking, especially on large systems
2) To provide more meaningful info in the log file
Before you can use this new version, you *MUST* convert your old LOGFILE
to the new format using the included FIXLOG.EXE conversion utility.
FIXLOG will read your old LogFile and create a new log in the format
expected by this version of GIFtest. If this is not done, GIFtest will
not function properly. I may try to automate this process in the
future, but for now, it is done manually.
■ GIFtest will now process both a config file (if found) and command-line
arguments in that order. This way, default behavior can be specified in
the config file but you can always override them with command-line
switches.
■ Registered users can call The TASTE BBS at (718) 252-4529, to get a
ßeta copy of GIFbrand which allows you to BRAND your original GIFs with
up to 5 lines of 45 characters of text. This text will be extracted by
GIFtest upon upload and used to replace any description the uploader
may have typed in.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
■ Beta [01/30/92]: Finally tracked down the problem when dealing with
redirection on Novell networks. Much thanks to the sysop of SPACE BBS
for helping me on this. I also removed all the unnecessary code and
debugging code. If I get no more bug reports this is the release version
(will be recompiled as 4.1 release).
■ Beta [01/25/92]: Changed output from STDOUT to CONS to correct a problem
with redirection on Novell networks. Fixed the problem where GIFtest was
removing all descriptions except for the first GIF tested when testing
multiple files in ProDoor. GIFs are now opened in File Sharing mode, so
SHARE.COM or equivelant must be loaded. This should take care of the
problem reported by sysops running multiple nodes when one user wants to
"test" a GIF while another user is downloading it.
■ Beta [01/22/92]: Thing I've got it! That pesky $DOOR.NAM problem should
be fixed now.
■ Beta [01/19/92]: Had a problem reading the new ProDoor $DOOR.NAM format.
Should be corrected.
■ Beta [01/17/92]: Well, we can thank Sam Smith for the latest beta..
Fortunately, before I got GIFtest out the door as a final product, he got
around to changing the file format for the description files in ProDoor
3.44 dated after 12/31/91. So, with this beta I have added support for
/B:3 which tells GIFtest that you are running ProDoor dated after
12/31/91. What's taking so long is that I had decided to convert the
majority of GIFtest over to assembler to make it smaller and faster (and
take up less memory), and I didn't expect to have to make a change of
this magnitude this soon. It's affected GIFtest and GIFBRAND which were
both converted.. This beta should cover the necessary changes in
GIFtest, but I'll need at least another week and a half to make the
changes in GIFBRAND. Sorry, and I'm just as anxious as all of you to get
this version out and finished with so I can get on to the stuff in
version 5. Once last note.. I'd like to thank Steve Catmull of CDC for
his idea for an option in GIFtest 5.0 of a way to reject untasteful
GIFs... I am thinking about some way to add a "GIF critic" option, but
it may be impossible.. I'll sure give it a try though <grin>. For all
of you who have registered GIFtest (many thanks), I have printed out
postcards for all of you with your serial number and branding information
so that you'll at least have something until I get the disks in the mail.
And last, but not least.. I need some ideas on GIFLab.. My original
intention was to just add ANSI color to GIFtest to make it more colorful
(GIFtest already supports the COM port).. But what do you want? Do you
want it as garish as ZipLab? Let me know.. ** Please Read GIFTEST.CRC
**
■ Beta [01/01/92]: Sigh.. It looks like all the bugs weren't completely
out. GIFtest was not opening the GIFLOG file in file sharing mode so
that was causing a number of problems. That has now been fixed. Note,
however, that you MUST have SHARE.COM or an equivelant loaded for this to
work. Also, a number of people reported some odd behavior under
different situations. I finally tracked it all down to places where I
was using integers when I should have been using long integers. If you
are a beta tester/registered user, GIFSTAT 1.0ß is available for
downloading on The Bard's Lair. This util is for registered users and
approved beta testers only. Do NOT distribute it. GIFBRAND 1.0ß is also
available for beta testing. When you call the system, leave a message to
the sysop to get the password to download these utils.
■ Beta [12/07/91]: Final Beta! Fixed "/R:3" option to place description as
the last line by itself. Fixed problem where 1 out of every 7000 GIFs
wouldn't pass because of an "illegal block". Some program somwhere is
writing a block with a header number of zero, which is not defined in
either the GIF87 or GIF89 standard. VPIC and CSHOW apprently just ignore
this block and continue on processing, so the GIF views perfectly, but
GIFtest would report it as a bad GIF. If you use VPIC to "regif" the
image, VPIC rewrites it without the offending block, which would get you
around the problem. If anyone knows what block type zero is, I'd
appreciate it they'd let me know.. It doesn't seem to be part of the
image. I added the /Z option which display's debug info as GIFtest is
operating. If your having a problem, add /Z to the command line to help
you to see exactly what GIFtest is doing as it processes the file. I am
gonna give this last beta 7 days, and if there are no more reports of
problems, I'm gonna remove all the debugging code and release it as
final. When that happens I'll start mailing disks to all of you who have
already registered GIFtest (if you have registered it and I have NOT
called you or your BBS to give you your serial number, please send me a
note or call my BBS.)
■ Beta [11/23/91]: Added /A option to force upload descriptions to private
(put a "/" in front of them). It's gotten to the point on my BBS where
idiots (you know who they are) upload adult GIFs in my main board public
area for minors to download.. The only way around it is to either stop
letting people upload GIFs, force all uploads private (a major pain), or
have GIFtest force all GIFs to be private uploads. Add /P:n routine
where 'n' is the com port number.. This will have GIFtest send all it's
display information to the specified COM port if carrier is detected.
GIFtest reads the port speed from the com port (only supports COM1:
through COM4: with standard port configurations), so should work with any
BBS software. Fixed resolution insertion problem where GIFtest wasn't
putting the rez on the last line by itself if position is set to 3.
Fixed GTSETUP.COM to reflect the changes in GIFtest 4.0 beta. [Note: Can
someone who is running GIFtest on PCB or ProDoor and not] [ using 4DOS
please upload their PCBTEST/PROUT1 file(s) ]
■ Beta [11/17/91]: Fixed GTSETUP to use GIFTEST.CNF as the default config
filename as opposed to GIFTEST.CFG.
? Beta [11/14/91]: Added the /F:filename option for PCBoard 14.5a sysops.
PCBoard 14.5a will pass the location of the UPDESC[.n] file on the
command line to PCBTEST.BAT as variable %3. This, so you can now use
/F:%3 on the command line to tell GIFtest the location of your
description file. You can then delete all the remaining lines in your
GIFtest.CNF file which did contain the various names and locations of
your UPDESC file. (See sample PCBTEST.BAT file)
■ Beta [11/07/91]: Finally fixed ALL problems with resolution insertion on
PCB systems. Rewrote the whole thing from scratch and tested it for 2
hours. A number of PCB sysops have called me and asked where the heck
the UPDESC file(s) can be found. When a user types in a description of a
file before they upload it, it is put into a file called UPDESC. If it's
a multinode system, the node number is appended as the file extension
(UPDESC.1, UPDESC.2, etc..). If you have NOT specified a word directory
in PCBSETUP, the UPDESC file(s) are kept in the default PCB directory
where PCBOARD.DAT resides. If you have designated a WORK directory, then
you will find the UPDESC file(s) there. If you have PCBoard 14.5a, PCB
passes a third parameter (%3) to PCBTEST.BAT during upload testing. You
can put "ECHO %3> UPDESC.LOC" at the beginning of your PCBTEST.BAT file
and you'll find a file called UPDESC.LOC in your PCB directory which
tells the location of the UPDESC file for that node.
■ Beta [10/07/91]: COM routines are not functioning yet.
? Beta [10/06/91]: GIFtest no longer "automatically" searches path for
GIFTEST.CFG, only if you specift /C or /C:filename on the command line.
Instead of searching the path for GIFtest, GIFtest only searches the
current directory and the directory that GIFTEST.EXE is located in.
Changed /P [rez position in description] to /R. Changed /R [rez type] to
/T. Changed /D [debug on] to /Z. Added /D to turn on duplicate checking
via 32 bit CRC (same CRC used in PKZIP and ARJ). Added /P:n to indicate
COM port number. Note -> GIFtest will send all output to both the local
screen, and the COM port if carrier is detected on the indicated com
port, if no carrier, only the local screen will recieve data. COM ports
supported are 1-4, com addresses 3FB, 2FB, 3EB, and 2EB using IRQ's 3 and
4. COM port addresses are looked up from the BIOS table, so if you have
a program that uses a non-standard port address and changes the BIOS
table, GIFtest will support it. GIFtest automatically reads the baud
rate, parity and stop bits from the port so they do not need to be
passed. This will make GIFtest usable with a wide variety of BBS
programs when not using the resolution insertion functions. Once again,
I fixed the PCBoard description handling routines. I've done extensive
testing with PCBoard this time, so they should be working properly. I
had been working on moving the CRC dupe checking routines into a database
instead of searching the GIFLOG as I have been doing, but I've had too
many problems because of how I've got the code setup.. Since there are
plenty of CRC database programs available right now, I suggest you use
one of those if the dupe checking routines are too slow for you. To
facilitate this, dupe checking now defaults to off and you must include
"/D" on the command line or in the GIFTEST.CNF file. CRC's are still put
in the log even if dupe checking is turned off.
■ Beta [09/15/91]: Fixed PCBoard Description Handling.
■ Beta [08/12/91]: Changed display so that if a duplicate is found, instead
of "Duplicate!!" is says "Duplicates [duplicate filename]".
■ Beta [08/12/91]: Changed the display slightly to better accomodate
PCBoard's PCBVIEW.BAT for redirection to PCBVIEW.TXT [sample PCBVIEW.BAT
file for 4DOS included]. I have changed my BBS to PCBoard, and in doing
so, have discovered the the PCB description routines are not working..
■ Beta [08/10/91]: Fixed the "press any key" bug in the help display for the
unregistered version.
■ Beta [08/07/91]: Changed GIFLOG searching routines to make them faster
when searching for CRC. Added PCBOARD description support. GIFtest now
parses UPDESC[.n] where [.n] is the extension with the node number. If
GIFtest finds the PCBNODE= environment variable then GIFtest uses that
for the node number (ProDoor systems should set this variable for each
node to have GIFtest properly find the right description file if running
multiple node and your using the same PROUTEST.BAT for all nodes.) Made
changes in "alpha" routines for recognizing "branded" GIFs.
■ Beta [07/24/91]: Converted a bunch of routines to ASM to reduce size of
EXE file. Added "alpha" test routines for recognition of GIFs branded
with GIFbrand.
■ Beta [07/23/91]: Fixed logic for finding $DOOR.NAM description file.
■ Beta [07/21/91]: Made changes in sample PROUT1.BAT file. Added
TESTGIF.BAT as a sample GIF testing batch file for ProDoor and PCBoard.
■ Beta [07/20/91]: [04:15am] Added /X:FILENAME option which will log any
internal GIF comments found to FILENAME. All descriptions are appended,
FILENAME is not overwritten.
■ Beta [07/20/91]: Rewrote GIF testing logic to comply 100% with GIF89a
standard. No longer "crops" description fields in GIFs. Added /D option
which will display "debug" information as GIF is processed.
■ Beta [07/19/91]: Fixed bug in /S, skip GIF testing and just add
resolution. Fixed bug in /E option, added "debug" routine to display
where GIFtest "thinks" $DOOR.NAM is located.
■ Beta [07/18/91]: Added ProDoor resolution insertion routines and node
checking routines. GIFtest will now also display the exit code so you
have some idea exactly what is going on. Added CRC test for GIFtest
itself. If you type GIFTEST CRC, GIFTEST will display a CRC of itself.
■ Beta [07/17/91]: It seems that with the GIF89a standard, an image can end
with a "!" as a terminator instead of a ";" which designates an
extension. Prizm BBS uses this to store ASCII text comments after their
GIFs. GIFtest currently truncates this "extension" and replaces the "!"
terminator with the proper ";". At present, VPIC, CSHOW and other GIF
viewers do not recognize any extensions while viewing GIFs so by
truncating this, GIFtest is able to get a more accurate CRC32. This will
not affect your GIFs in any way other that to reduce their size.
■ Beta [07/17/91]: Fixed command line parsing so that it properly
distinguishes between a filename and a command parameter.
■ Beta [07/15/91]: Searches path for GIFTEST.CFG file if not in current
directory. Removed /T option.. when testing GIFs, GIFtest will always
trim off the extra bytes, otherwise the 32 bit CRCs don't mean anything.
Added GTSETUP to the beta zip to help people create GIFTEST.CFG file.
■ Beta [07/12/91]: Does not have routines for placing resolution into
description yet.
? Complete rewrite from scratch. Now 70% assembler to speed up most
functions.
Version 3.4:
Recompiled to use less memory.... Fixed /E (erase) function.
Version 3.3:
Added /L:[filename] option for logging of GIFs. Log entries are
written as:
FILENAME.GIF 999999 01-01-91 [9999xx9999x999] 9999 OK GL FFFFFFFF
─────┬────── ──┬─── ────┬─── ────────┬─────── ─┬── ┌─ ┌─ ┌───────
│ │ │ │ │ │ │ └ 32 bit CRC
│ │ │ │ │ │ └ GIFLITE'd
│ │ │ │ │ └ Status
│ │ │ │ │ OK
│ │ │ │ │ IM Incomplete Image
│ │ │ │ │ IV Invalid Header
│ │ │ │ └ Trimmed Bytes
│ │ │ └ Resolution
│ │ └ Current Date
│ └ File Size
└ File Name
If the filename for /L is left out, then GIFtest assumes the name GIFLOG.
If the log file exists, it's search for the current filename and if found,
GIFtest exits without retesting the file.
Version 3.2:
Fixed resolution insertion (again). 3.0 and 3.1 weren't handling multiple
line descriptions properly, and didn't do ANYTHING with single line
descriptions. When testing, this wasn't caught with the "/D" option because
"/D" printed the description as it was being adjusted and not as it was put
back in $DOOR.NAM so I didn't catch it.
Version 3.1:
Added ability to detect if a GIF has been compressed with the unregistered
version of GIFLITE. If the GIF is valid and it has been compressed with
GIFLITE then GIFTEST will exit with an ERRORLEVEL = 3, which will allow your
batch files to use GIFLITE on uploaded GIFs if you desire. Also added "/S"
option to skip GIF testing alltogether. This was provided for SysOps who
just want the resolution added to their description without all the testing.
Version 3.0:
Rewrote GIF testing routines to test the internal image of a GIF file as
well as the header and terminator. This does not test to see if each pixel
is the correct color, but rather tests to make sure that the correct number
of pixels are represented in the LZW table for the image and that all
internal codes are accurate. Added /P:3 option to place resolution as the
last line of the description by itself. Once again fixed problem with
descriptions not being displayed properly. Also included TESTGIF which
displays techinical information of a GIF file. WARNING! TESTGIF.EXE does
direct screen writes when displaying information about a GIF. This could
cause problems with some multitaskers on non 386/486 machines when used in
the background task.
Version 2.3:
Added /E option to erase Invalid or Incomplete GIFs and fixed problem where
leading "/" was being deleted from description causing private uploads to be
put in the public upload directory. Fixed description duplication problem
when description was the minimum allowed by ProDoor and using the /P:2
option.
Version 2.21:
Minor bug fix in documentation to reflect the change in the switch
charactor. Use "/" instead of "-".
Version 2.2:
Minor bug fix where GIFtest was improperly placing resolution when used with
-p:2 or -p:0 options.
Version 2.1:
Minor bug fix where GIFtest would remove "-"'s from filenames on the command
line causing the GIF to be invalid.
