User Guide to AutoUpdate

build 2000/2/9

This Guide should help the users to setup and use AutoUpdate for their own website.

Table of Contents

Configuration of AutoUpdate ... 2

The configuration dialog ... 4

How to use AutoUpdate ... 8

Frequent Asked Questions about AutoUpdate ... 10

Configuration of AutoUpdate

After the first startup, the main window of AutoUpdate will look like this:

The first thing you should do now is to configure the program. Please select The 'File' menu and then select the 'Configuration' menuitem:

After this you will get a dialog with the configuration. It looks like this:

This is the configuration dialog, you will get. Configure your system as you would like and press the 'OK' button in the lower right. For more informations about the configuration options, please look at the next chapter.

You are now done with the configuration. You can now use AutoUpdate. For more informations about the using of AutoUpdate, please look at the chapter 'How to use AutoUpdate'.

The configuration dialog

Here is now an explanation for every page you can configure.

Page: Global

Local FTP Directory
The local ftp directory represents the position of your local copy of your web-page on the your own private system (you know your harddisk). It is not nessary to use this setting unless you would like to get local copies of the currently created html-pages.

Hide in Tray during download or upload
When you check this AutoUpdate hides itself during the upload and download progress, so that the working area is clear for your work. After uploading and downloading when it is ready to process other input, it shows itself on the working area.

Use editor with Syntax-Highlight
This is selected by default. It gives you an editor with syntax-highlighting in the news section. When other section will be availble in future it will also give you this feature to the other editors. This editor is more comfortable than a plain editor without the syntax-highlighting. It is recommed to let this feature enabled. Disable it only if you got problems with the syntax-highlighting editor.

Page: Server

Host
In this line you must type your host.

Username
Here must be typed the username which is used to login to your ftp-space.

Password
This is the password that is used to login to your ftp-space. If this is blank the program will ask you evertime for the passoword you use the program. This will occur only once per session. (evtually this feature is broken in actual version... i don't know... let me know...)

FTP-Timeout
These are the seconds of the timeout. The ftp-client tries to connect the host until the timeout reaches or the host is replying.

Page: News

Datafile
This is the data file for the news section on the server.

Local file
When you want to save the generated newsfile on your local, you can choose here the directory and the filename where it should be saved. This field may be blank.

Name of poster
Here can you write your name. Everytime you write %_poster% in the 'Title defaults' or in the 'Subline defaults', it will be replaced with this name. This field may be blank.

Title defaults
Here are the defaults for a new title that is generated automatically when you press the new news button in the news page. You can use here the %_%-functions. For more help on the functions see below. This field may be blank.

Subline defaults/Footer
This is the footer line for the news. It is also automatically generated by pressing the new news button. You can also use the %_%-function for this line. This field may be blank.

Help for functions
%_hour% - returns the hour from 0 to 23
%_minute% - returns the minute formatted with leading zero from 00 to 59
%_day% - returns the day of month from 1 to 31
%_month% - returns the month of year from 1 to 12
%_year% - returns the year formatted with 4 number like 1999 or 2000
%_time% - returns the time formatted with the time and date formats in the configuration dialog
%_date% - returns the date formatted with the time and date formats in the configuration dialog
%_longdate% - returns the date in a special format i use it. year/month/day where year are 4 numbers, month is written lowercase (no number) and the day is a number from 1 to 31
%_@% - returns the current internet time. Refer to http://www.swatch.com for more informations
%_poster% - returns the poster of this news which is configured in the configuration dialog

Page: Links

Linkdata-file
This file lays also on the server and represents the informations, where the links you are maintaining, are laying around.

Save links in local FTP directory
Check this box to save also the modified link-files in the local FTP directory, which you are configured on the 'Global' page of the configuration dialog.

Page: Time & Date Formats

This page isn't configurable yet. It will be configurable in future.

How to use AutoUpdate

This section will describe how to use AutoUpdate in normal life.

After startup you will see AutoUpdate's main window.

There is a main menu where most of the items are selectible.
The file menu represents three items: Minimize to Tray, Configuration and Exit. The first item will minimize AutoUpdate in the system tray of windows, so that AutoUpdate will lie in background with inactivity. With a double-click you can restore the window. The second item calls up the configuration dialog. Please look at the section 'Configuration of AutoUpdate' in the handbook for more informations. The third and last item is the most importent of the file menu. With that you can exit the program and get back to your normal work. The menu's 'News', 'Links' and 'FTP' are made for the pages in the program, they are explained in the next paragraphs. In the menu 'Help' you will find only one item: The 'About' item. It will display detailed informations about the program.

The News Page

This is the news page. It will enable you to update the news page of your website. This page is easy to use. Press the green play-button in the top-left of the window and AutoUpdate will automatically connect to your ftp and download the news-file. After disconnecting from ftp it will let you edit the news. With the green stop-button you can cancel the complete edited news-file. When you press it you must reconnect the website for editing it again. It will not ask for confirmation! The magical ward right of the green stop-button will post your changes to your website. It will connect via ftp and tries to upload it to the website. If it cannot upload it you aren't getting out of the edit-mode which prevents you from loosing your changes. The other buttons are used to edit the news.
The white page adds a new news-entry. This generates several items for it. There is a name item, which is saved as a name tag in the html-source to link it. You can edit it as your needs. It is not visible during visiting your page. The title and the subline/footer is also automatically generated with the defaults from the configuration dialog. They are visible when you view your page. The only empty item is the text item. This is where you should write your news. The white page button only adds news at the end of list. You cannot insert new item between two news entries, which is also senseless.
When you press the red cross you will delete one news entry. It will not ask you for confirmation!
The red arrows are to view and edit the several news entries.

Frequent Asked Questions for AutoUpdate

Q: Can more than one user use AutoUpdate on one server with the same configuration?

A: Yes and no, more than one user can use AutoUpdate on one server when they are not using it together at the same time. I'm working on a new version which can determine if a user is it currently using it.