File submission - ToadNews 1.1

[Info-Mac]

Download: http://archive.info-mac.org/inet/uucp/toad-news-11.hqx

Here's the new released version of my program ToadNews v1.1. Please remove
all previous versions of the software (1.0, 1.1b1, 1.1b2) from your archive.
You have my permission to include the software in any future Info-Mac
CD-ROM.

Thanks,
- John


Version 1.1
Last Revised: June 9, 1994

Brought To You By:
-----------------

John P. Mah
Toilets 'R Us Software
201 Riviera Dr
Thunder Bay, Ontario, Canada
P7B 6H8

Internet E-Mail: jpmah@undergrad.math.uwaterloo.ca


What's New In This Version 1.1?
-------------------------------

- Better SOUP packet support
- Faster performance (especially when expiring)
- Article "junk"-ing now supported
- AppleScript support
- Scheduling of unbatching and expiring of news, as well as the option to quit
afterwards
- Running of specified tasks at application start-up
- Support for external decompressors and threaders (default "uncompress"
external decompressor is also included in the package)
- Interface changes
- Improved error recovery
- Updated online documentation


What Is ToadNews?
-----------------

ToadNews provides Macintosh users with the ability to be leaf-node
Usenet sites. A Usenet leaf-node usually does not relay news other
nodes, with the exception of the node that feeds it news.

ToadNews itself takes newsbatches sent from the newsfeed and then
unbatches and puts the news into the appropriate directory for perusal
by your favourite newsreader or text-editor.

Some other features of ToadNews include:
(excerpts from the "ToadNews ReadMe First" file)

- An unbatcher that can manually unbatch newsbatches (via the File menu
or by drag & dropping newsbatches onto the ToadNews program icon). The
unbatcher can also be configured to look in a user-configurable folder
for new newsbatches and automatically unbatch news.

- Can handle both compressed & uncompressed newsbatches from newsfeeds
running both B-News and C-News software. ToadNews will automatically
determine which type of newsbatch it is dealing with and perform the
necessary operations to extract the Usenet news. ToadNews currently
raw compressed.

- Integrates well with variety of Macintosh-based news transports
(including UUPC and MacSlurp) and newsreaders (ie: rnMac and TheNews).
In addition, users without UUCP or MacTCP connections can use uqwk on
their Unix accounts to create SOUP batches and download them to their
Mac, and then process them withToadNews afterwards.

- Decompression of newsbatches compressed with "compress" is supported
provided that ToadNews can allocate enough memory to perform the
decompression. Users can choose to use an external decompressor to
uncompress newsbatches compressed using compression formats other than
compress.

- A newsgroup expirer which removes old Usenet news from your hard
drive. The expirer can be configured to run automatically at
scheduled times, and/or after the free space on your hard
drive falls below a certain percentage of its total disk space.

- Flexible expiry support. Each newsgroup can be configured to have a
different expire period (in days), independent of other newsgroups.

- An newsgroup list editor, which allows the user to control the
inflow and expiration of news. In addition, this window also presents
important information regarding newsgroups.

- Support for scheduling the unbatching and expiring of news. The user
can also specify when to quit ToadNews when all processing has
finished.

- Can run smoothly in the background under System 7. ToadNews will run
in the background and quietly unbatch & expire news in the
background.

- Cheap software. At the Shareware cost of $25, you get a useable,
useful piece of UNIX/Macintosh interconnectivity. It's even cheaper
than $25 if you choose to exercise the other purchasing options
available.


ToadNews Requirements
---------------------

- Macintosh Plus or newer running System 7, with hard drive.

- A news transport (like UUPC 3.0 OR MacSlurp).

- Or, a Unix shell account, and "UQWK", a Unix-based SOUP packet
generator that collects news online and packages it up for
downloading.

- A Usenet newsreader (or very flexible text-editor), such as Roy
Wood's "rnMac", and Bill Cramer's "TheNews".


+------------------------+-----------------------------------------------+
| John P. Mah | E-mail: jpmah@undergrad.math.uwaterloo.ca |
| Toilets 'R Us Software | author of ToadNews |
+------------------------+-----------------------------------------------+