(Note that the Reply-To: of this message has not been set, due to a
small error in the listserver's configuration which would prevent it
from being sent out if it were.)
- Pam Greene
one of the *.answers and faq-maintainers folks
------- Forwarded Message
> From: pschleck@gonix.gonix.com (Paul W Schleck KD3FU)
> Subject: auto-faq User Tips #2
> Date: Sun, 22 Oct 1995 11:00:34 -0500 (CDT)
> Reply-To: auto-faq-maint@novia.net
>
> I was going to wait until my subscription to faq-maintainers
> @consensus.com had finally been established before sending this, but I'm
> having severe and ongoing problems subscribing to that list,
> specifically SMTP 451 bounces (reply: read error) when sending to
> faq-maintainers-request. Ping Huang has been supportive in working me
> through this problem, but he's as dumfounded as I am. In the meantime,
> I'll just Bcc: this one to faq-maintainers-announce@mit.edu.
>
> This is the auto-faq User Tips bulletin #2. The User Tips will be an
> occasional, maybe once every few months, bulletin of subtle hints and
> tricks (as well as bug reports and version updates) for the auto-faq FAQ
> management and posting package. It will be posted to
> auto-faq-users@novia.net and faq-maintainers@consensus.com.
>
> Back Issues
> - -----------
>
> I'm going to make back issues of the User Tips available from the
> auto-faq WWW Page:
>
> http://www.novia.net/~pschleck/auto-faq/user-tips/
>
> anonymous FTP site:
>
> ftp://ftp.novia.net/customers/pschleck/auto-faq/user-tips/
>
> and ftpmail server:
>
> Send a mail message to ftpmail@ftp.novia.net with the following commands
> in the message body:
>
> open
> uuencode
> get /customers/pschleck/auto-faq/user-tips/1
> get /customers/pschleck/auto-faq/user-tips/2
>
> etc...
>
> Watch for this to happen "soon" (i.e., since I'm going to set up the
> archive *after* I mail this message, don't be surprised if it isn't
> there right away :-).
>
> Perl 5.001 Compatible Version
> - -----------------------------
>
> This is the news that many of you have been waiting for. Having finally
> gotten Perl 5 installed at Novia. I discovered that there were actually
> a few incompatibilities between auto-faq 3.2pl1 (and presumably all
> earlier versions) and Perl 5. Fortunately, they were all minor and
> mainly consisted of the following two problems:
>
> - - The '@' character now being a metacharacter in strings, and requiring
> a backslash to use it in a literal context.
>
> - - Precedence problems with calls to "open" without putting the
> parameters in parentheses.
>
> - - Ian's last version, 3.2, also had a bug in the form of incorrect
> parameters to a certain call to open() that Perl 4.036 blissfully
> ignores, but Perl 5 will report as an error. (Interestingly enough,
> Perl 4.019 also found the error, which is what I was using at my site
> a few years ago). This was fixed in 3.2pl1.
>
> The fixes to the above problems resulted in a new version of auto-faq,
> 3.3 Alpha, that is compatible both with Perl 4.036 and 5.001 (I haven't
> tested against any other versions as these are the latest versions in
> both major revision sequences, and it is strongly recommended that your
> site upgrade to one of them. You can verify what version of perl your
> site is running by typing "perl -v").
>
> I've already gotten two reports of sites that are running Perl 5 and
> could use a compatible version of auto-faq (One kind soul actually
> submitted patches to me, albeit *after* I made the changes myself :-).
> What I would like to do at this point is upgrade it to Beta and give it
> out to any interested expert user who wishes to have a Perl 5-compatible
> version of auto-faq and is willing to test and evaluate it.
>
> I'm not yet going to upgrade it to a standard version as there are still
> some changes in the works that I'd like to apply before shutting down
> development on the 3.x major revision branch of auto-faq. These changes
> include:
>
> - - adding a @seq_num()@ dynamic macro to provide a one-up sequence number
> that can be incorporated into any appropriate news header
>
> - - overhauling the Configure script (built by dist-3.0), including
> improvements in how it finds a working copy of inews, and providing
> options to report to me what version you are using and subscribing to
> the auto-faq-users mailing list
>
> The former is all but implemented in 3.3 Alpha (I could use some
> feedback on its use, however). The latter will take a month or two,
> both due to demands on my time and the time of the individual who has
> agreed to help me with dist-3.0. Watch for this to happen by late
> December/early January.
>
> Please contact me at auto-faq-maint@novia.net if you wish to participate
> in 3.3 beta testing.
>
> Configuring Dynamic Header Contents with "macros"
> - -------------------------------------------------
>
> A powerful new capability of auto-faq 3.x is the addition of so-called
> "macros" that provide even further customization of the news headers in
> your FAQ article(s). This additional capability is a strong argument
> for using a tool like auto-faq vs. more static approaches such as using
> inews directly or even post_faq.pl, which only updates the Supersedes
> and Expires headers. Also, if you are using auto-faq 2.4, this might be
> a good reason to consider upgrading to 3.2pl1 or 3.3 Beta.
>
> The macros that are available with auto-faq 3.2pl1 include:
>
> @date()@
>
> Print the date in various formats depending on the parameter in the ().
>
> @posted_header()@
>
> Print the contents of the header name passes as a parameter in the ().
> This macro is only set after the articles are actually posted, so it is
> useful only for logging purposes (auto-faq actually uses this macro
> internally for its status files).
>
> @<config-file-attribute>@
>
> Print the contents of any named attribute in the faq-config file, such as:
>
> @chgctrl-cmd@
> @title@
> @followup@
>
> Examples:
>
> Specifying the title in the faq-config file as:
>
> title="foo.bar Frequently-Asked Questions @date(D)@
>
> prints a Subject line with a mm/dd/yy format date in it, for example:
>
> Subject: foo.bar Frequently-Asked Questions 10/22/95
>
> Similarly, an expires-format of:
>
> expires-format="@date(d)@ @date(b)@ @date(y)@ @date(T)@"
>
> prints an INN-compatible Expires header like the following:
>
> Expires: 23 Oct 95 15:17:02
>
> The format parameters for date are identical to the SysV Unix "date"
> command format letters (although some more obscure ones are not
> supported).
>
> A new macro for 3.3 Beta is:
>
> @seq_num()@
>
> Which provides a one-up sequence number offset by the number in the ().
> If you've already been posting an article that is up to sequence number
> 758, for example, simply specify a title such as:
>
> title="foo.bar Reader Bulletin #@seq_num(759)"
>
> and the subject will evaluate to:
>
> title="foo.bar Reader Bulletin #759"
>
> then on subsequent postings, #760, #761, and so on.
>
> If you are starting from scratch, simply use @seq_num(1)@.
>
> For more information about auto-faq macros, consult the manual,
> available in the README file in the auto-faq distribution, or via
> anonymous FTP from:
>
> ftp://ftp.novia.net/customers/pschleck/auto-faq/README
>
> Coming up in a future auto-faq User Tips:
> - -----------------------------------------
>
> - - Further updates on auto-faq 3.3.
>
> - - Even further header customization of auto-faq using user-supplied
> extension functions written in Perl that can be evaluated by auto-faq
> without modifying the script itself (another powerful capability of
> auto-faq 3.x).
>
> - - Design ideas for auto-faq 4.0, scheduled to begin development sometime
> in the Summer of 1996, and opportunities for users to submit feedback.
>
> - --
> Paul W. Schleck
> auto-faq-maint@novia.net
>
> auto-faq Maintainer
>
>
------- End of Forwarded Message
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