                             DescEdit 2.02 beta
                             ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
                      Description editor plugin for FAR
         Written by Dmitry Jemerov, 2:5030/654, yole@spb.cityline.ru

                      Release date - 24 Jan 2001

This FAR plugin allows you to use FAR internal editor for editing file
descriptions. It also helps you create new descriptions for files
by providing settings for default descriptions and description
indentation. Another powerful feature is its ability to extract
descriptions from archives, usually stored in file_id.diz.

This plugin is freeware and may be used without any restrictions.
The plugin requires FAR 1.50 beta or higher and has been tested with
FAR 1.70 beta 2.

In order to install the plugin, you should unpack the archive into the
subdirectory Plugins\DescEdit in the main directory of FAR and restart
FAR. After this, the plugin can be invoked by choosing the command
"Description editor" from the plugins menu of FAR. You can create a
macro for running the plugin more quickly.

In the plugin configuration dialog, which is opened by choosing the item
"Description editor" from the "Plugins configuration" menu, the
following options can be configured:

  Description list names     Allows you to specify the names of
                             description files separated with commas.
                             The first existing one will be edited.
                             If none of the files exists, the file
                             with the first name specified will be
                             created.

  Archive description names  Allows you to specify the names of files
                             containing archive descriptions,
                             separated with commas. It is used when
                             the option "Extract descriptions from
                             archives" is set.

  Default description        Allows you to specify the default for
                             new file descriptions. For BBS SysOps:
                             you may enter here a zero download
                             counter (for example, [000]).

                             The default description string may
                             contain the following special tokens:
                             %S - file size;
                             %D - file date (in the format DD-MM-YY);
                             %T - file time (in the format HH:MM).

  Description indent         Allows you to specify the indentation
                             for descriptions. If you leave it empty,
                             the filenames and descriptions will be
                             separated with a single space.

  Long description indent    This option sets the indentation of each
                             line after the first of a long
                             description extracted fron an archive.

  Long description prefix    This option specifies the characters
                             that are added to the beginning of each
                             line after the first of a long
                             description extracted fron an archive.

  Capitalize filenames       If this option is selected, the first
                             letters of filenames for which new
                             descriptions are created will be
                             uppercased.

  Always use short           If this option is selected, short file
  filenames                  names will always be used when creating
                             new descriptions. If it is not checked,
                             the current value of the FAR option
                             "Show long names" is checked to
                             determine whether a short or a long
                             name should be used.

  Extract descriptions from  If this option is selected, the plugin
  archives                   will try to extract the descriptions
                             for archives from the description
                             files they contain (like file_id.diz).
                             DescEdit uses the same archiver
                             configuration and second-level plugins
                             as MultiArc.

  Skip empty lines in long   If this option is selected, the empty
  descriptions               lines in archive description files will
                             not be copied to files.bbs.



This is only a beta version of the plugin. It may contain bugs. Please
send bug reports, comments and suggestions to the author (Dmitry
Jemerov, 2:5030/654, yole@spb.cityline.ru).


What's new in the latest version
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

2.02 beta:
~~~~~~~~~~
[-] Fixed crash when setting the "Extract descriptions from archives"
    checkbox and trying to extract the description from an archive in the
    same FAR session. (Thanks to Ivan Sintyurin and others.)
[-] Fixed crash when no description files were specified in the plugin
    configuration. Now it is mandatory to specify at least one file.
[-] Fixed duplicate hotkeys in the Russian configuration dialog. (Reported
    by Ivan Sintyurin, 2:5020/278.22)
[*] Changed the defaults of some settings to more reasonable values.

2.01 beta:
~~~~~~~~~~
[-] Fixed crash when invoking DescEdit on a directory. (Reported by Slava
    Shalisko, 2:5030/682.12)

2.0 beta:
~~~~~~~~~
[!] The code of the plugin is rewritten using the FAR+Plus C++ classes
    library (soon to be released as a separate product)
[+] Added capability of extracting descriptions from archives.
[+] Now you can specify multiple files in the Description file field,
    separated with commas.
[-] Fixed a bug: if the files.bbs line for a file contained only the
    file name, a new description was created when DescEdit was invoked
    on this file. (Reported by Mike Lykov)

1.3 beta:
~~~~~~~~~
[*] Switched to Visual C++ 6.0.
[*] Now DescEdit works correctly with FAR 1.60. Under this version of
    FAR, it uses the new editor plugin API. Instead of adding
    descriptions to the description file on disk, it modifies the
    description file in memory after it is loaded into the editor.
[*] Now DescEdit updates the panels after changing descriptions.
[*] DescEdit now supports short file names. If the panel is set to
    short file names mode, or if the option "Always use short
    filenames" is set, DescEdit creates new descriptions with short
    filenames.
[*] DescEdit can be activated when multiple files are selected. It
    ignores the selection and always works with current file.
    (Suggested by Andrew Rogov, 2:5080/128.15)

1.2 beta:
~~~~~~~~~
[*] Switched from Borland C++ to Visual C++. The .DLL is now 1/3 smaller.
[*] Now DescEdit works correctly with FAR 1.52.
[*] Now, if after editing descriptions the description file has zero
    size, it is deleted. (Suggested by Alex Kapralov Jr., 2:5030/614)
[*] Added special tokens which can be used in default descriptions:
    %S - file size, %D - file date, %T - file time. (Suggested by Artyom
    Astafurov, 2:5030/654.666)
[-] Now DescEdit doesn't run when invoked from plugin panels. It didn't
    work correctly, anyway.

1.1 beta:
~~~~~~~~~
[-] Fixed a very stupid bug because of which the configuration dialog
    did not function.
[-] Now help is shown correctly when the console width is 80 characters.
[*] Now DescEdit understands filenames which are enclosed in quotes in
    files.bbs, and adds quotes for filenames containing spaces.
