ZDCS Revision History File


Release 2.03
------------

    *** NOTE:  The format of the ZDCS.CFG file has changed!  See the enclosed
               file ZDCSCFG.DSC for the new file format.

    Added a new program is included in ZDCS 2.03: ZDCSULP.EXE.  This provides a
    seamless interface to UpLoadProcessor 1.05+ by Stacy Smith.  The only
    installation required is to have ZDCSULP.EXE in your ZDCS subdirectory and
    toggle the duplication system in ULP to (Z)DCS and provide the path to your
    ZDCS subdirectory.

    ZDCSDB.EXE:

    Corrected a subtle bug in the CRC-32 routine.

    Corrected a problem with processing 'other' files with truncate turned on.

    Finally tracked down the source of most of the complaints regarding other
    file handling!  Score another goof for Microhelp.  I have rewritten the
    appropriate code from scratch and it seems to be just as fast and a sight
    more stable!

    ZDCSFC.EXE:

    Corrected a problem where ZDCSFC would occasionally hang up and seek to A:
    drive.

    Corrected a problem where the ZDCSTEST.CHK file would not be deleted if it
    were not a valid ZDCS pre-test file.

    I finally tracked down the source of most of the complaints regarding other
    file handling!  Score another goof for Microhelp.  I have rewritten the
    appropriate code from scratch and it seems to be just as fast and a sight
    more stable!

    ZDCSDR.EXE:

    Corrected a problem where the temporary work files were not being deleted.
    Added a feature to dump an ASCII list of the archive files present in the
    ZDCS database.  ZDCSDR D


Release 2.01
------------

    Added support for ARJ archive format, both regular *.ARJ archives and the
    self-extracting *.SFX ARJ files.

    Faster operation - 20% faster than ZDCS 1.65.

    Database format change.  Databases now have two files (ZDCS.DAT and
    ZDCS.NDX) and are 30% smaller than in version 1.65.

    The duplicate report format has been changed to present the results in a
    directly readable text file.  In addition to the previous list of all
    duplicates with zipfile and pathname, the report also includes a list of
    all files that are 100% dupes and a list of all files that have at least
    one duplicate and at least one original file.


Release 1.65
------------

    Two late blooming bugs have been squashed.  Please see the ZDCS.NEW file
    for details.


Release 1.64
------------

    The registration key replaces the "unregistered" screen message with
    the "registered to <bbs name>" message, and also allows the option of
    turning off the message entirely for a cleaner screen display.

    The duplicate report generator ZDCSDR has been completely rewritten to
    provide a speed increase of close to 80% in both the duplicate report and
    duplicate purge functions.  A second stage sort has also been added so that
    you can have the list of duplicate files sorted by the CRC32, the
    individual file name, or the name of the zipfile or GIF. The format of the
    ZDCS-DUP.LST file has been changed to CSV (Comma Separated Variable) to
    make it easy to import this file into a database or parse it into a .BAT
    file.

    When an upload contains allowed duplicates, they are no longer counted as
    passed files.  Instead, by popular demand they are now totally ignored in
    the file count.  The ZDCS log accurately reflects this information.

    The bbs ads database builder ZDCSBA, the upload file checker ZDCSFC, and
    the database builder ZDCSDB automatically detect the availability of any
    type of file locking, not just DOS SHARE.  This capability will be added to
    the duplicate report generator ZDCSDR in a future release.

    Earlier, bbs ads weren't being properly subtracted from the total number of
    files before the percent dupes calculation was performed - this has been
    corrected.  New bbs ads designated only by CRC32 can be accepted without
    having either the file name or the original file at hand.

    The database builder ZDCSDB checks to make sure that the data file path
    specified in the configuration file really exists.

    When an uploaded zipfile fails the percent dupes test set by the sysop, new
    information is written to the PCBFAIL.TXT file to be displayed to the
    caller.  This now consists of the name of the duplicated file in the
    uploaded zipfile and the name of the previously existing zipfile on the bbs
    that already contains this dupe, repeated for each duplicate file.  This
    tells the caller where to look for the duplicated files in the zipfiles
    already on the board, the answer to a common question.

    The maximum number of files within a ZIP that can be processed by ZDCS is
    set at 650 for the database build and for the upload file check.

    The previous internal limit of 999 pathnames has been removed.  There is no
    maximum number of paths that may be processed.

    The usual bugcrushing, bombproofing and cosmetic fixing that accompanies an
    extensive beta cycle have gone into ZDCS 1.64.


Release 1.60
------------

    Version 1.60 adds the capability to handle self-extracting EXE files
    created with PKSFX (SFX), and "other" files like GIFs.  There has been a
    substantial increase in the processing speed so that now all files are
    processed about three times as fast as they were under version 1.5x.  As an
    example, ZDCS was run on a 10MBS LAN (where the disk reads across the LAN
    were a speed bottleneck) and it processed 80,894 individual member files
    within 4,734 ZIPs, SFXs and GIFs in 2 hours and 25 minutes.  (Your mileage
    may vary.)

    A pre-test capability has been added to permit bbs callers to pre-test a
    ZIP, SFX or GIF file for duplicates before spending the time to upload the
    full file to the board.  This capability does not require the caller to
    download any special programs or perform any complicated operations.

    A database purge facility has been added to reduce the size of the CRC32
    database *after* the reported duplicates have been cleared from the file
    system.  The maximum number of files within a ZIP that can be processed by
    ZDCS is set at 675 for the database build and 425 for the upload file
    check.

    The sysop has been given the opportunity in version 1.60 to set a text
    message that will be displayed to callers when an upload has been declined.

    Release 1.60 also incorporates an interface to third party applications,
    which has been implemented for EXZIP and EXZTEST.  More technical
    information on the interface is available at The Bloom Beacon-Picayune BBS.

    What was previously available in version 1.5 as a rudimentary test mode has
    been heavily modified to permit the creation of the interface to third
    party applications.  The old test mode is no longer available - the guts of
    it were used to provide a seamless integration with EXZTEST / EXZIP.


Release 1.5x
------------

    In version 1.5 the database builder ZDCSDB15.EXE now handles zipfiles
    stored *with paths* within zipfiles.  The previous internal limit of 99
    pathnames has been increased to 999.  Where the existence of an empty
    subdirectory among the pathnames caused the earlier database builder to
    abort, ZDCSDB15.EXE can now handle an empty subdirectory. The real-time
    upload checker ZDCSFC15.EXE now correctly handles zipfiles stored *with
    paths* within zipfiles.

    Previously, a file listed in the bbs ads database could still be considered
    a duplicate file, which affected the "percentage of new files" calculation
    for an uploaded ZIP.  The bbs ads are no longer counted as duplicates when
    determining the percentage of new files in the upload.

    The database structures used in ZDCS 1.00 have been redesigned for version
    1.5 to cut down on the database size.  At the expense of a little speed,
    the database is now slightly less than half the size it used to be.

    The new option of "allowed duplicates" has been added in version 1.50. This
    is so that files like OMBUDSMN.ASP and VALIDATE.DOC needn't be counted as
    duplicate uploads.  The allowed duplicate files may be designated by either
    filename or by CRC.

    A new test mode has been added for the operation of the upload file
    checker, ZDCSFC15.EXE.  If the word TEST is used instead of the word UPLOAD
    as the second parameter passed to ZDCSFC15, then the upload checker can be
    used to test a specific file for duplicates without causing any updates to
    be written to the database or the logfile and without creating PCBPASS.TXT
    or PCBFAIL.TXT.  Test results will be written to ZDCS-TST.OUT.  The easiest
    and safest way to run such a test on any zipfile FOO.ZIP is to issue the
    command <ZDCSFC15 FOO.ZIP TEST> to test the files within the zipfile
    FOO.ZIP.  I don't expect most sysops to need this capability, but it's
    available.

    There have been numerous beta versions of ZDCS between release 1.00 and
    release 1.50.
