6 INTRODUCTION Fast File Find for Windows is a file locating utility for Windows. Some of its features include : Full background processing so you can work on any other application while FFW does the file search in the background. Multiple search specifications allowed. Ability to execute multiple commands on selected files it finds in a DOS window Cut and Copy of found files to clipboard Optional display of file size and file date and time. Easy to use 3D interface. COPYRIGHT Fast File Find For Windows (C) D. Munro 1992,93 DISCLAIMER This program comes with NO WARRANTY written or implied. Use this program at your own risk. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Windows is a registered trademark of Microsoft Inc. REQUIREMENTS 80286 or better Windows 3.1 or better LICENSING This program has been released for distribution as freeware. You may copy it but not sell it or make money out of it in any other way. SUGGESTIONS AND BUG REPORTS If you have any questions, comments, or suggestions, or if you have stumbled across any bugs in FFW, I can be contacted at : Internet : CCAHDM@BELUGA.UPE.AC.ZA Port Elizabeth Technikon BBS (041) 534278 (2400,N,8,1 Full Duplex) P.O. Box 12854 Centrahill PORT ELIZABETH 6001 South Africa FUTURE ENHANCEMENTS Possible future enhancements include : Making FFW a Drag-and-Drop server. At present (Windows 3.1) Windows only supports Drag-and-Drop clients for user applications, the file manager is the only application which can run as a drag-and-drop server. Microsoft claim that the drag-and-drop concept will be generalised in future releases so any application can become a drag-and- drop server. When this feature becomes available FFW will be converted to a drag-and-drop server; which should add to its utility. Adding a archive search feature to allow searching the contents of ARJ and ZIP files. Adding a DDE feature to allow FFW to act as a DDE server with client applications receiving file names from FFW. A possible use for this would be to simulate UNIX style piping. LIMITATIONS FFW cannot find more than 8160 files. This is due to the fact that in 16 bit Windows List boxes contents is restricted to 64K. If FFW used list boxes normally (used LBS_HASSTRINGS style) then it would have supported much less even than the 8160 mentioned above. To get around this the file found list box is implemented as a owner draw list box with the list box only containing pointers to the actual strings displayed allowing 8160 entries (each entry takes 4 bytes for the far pointer, 4 bytes overhead and the list box itself takes another 255 bytes). CONTENTS Introduction Page 1 Description Copyright Disclaimer Requirements Licensing Suggestions and Bug Reports Future Enhancements Limitations Entering Search Specifications Page 4 Selecting Drive to Search Page 4 Starting the Search Page 4 File Selection/Deselection and the Edit Menu Options Page 4/5 Option Menu Options Page 5 Executing commands on found files Page 6 ENTERING THE FILE SPECIFICATION(S) The first step in doing a file search is to enter one or more search specifications in the file specification field. The search specification may be a file name or a MS-DOS wild card file specification. You may enter more than one search specification if you wish to find more than one file or kind of file in one search. Press ENTER after every specification and press TAB or use the mouse when finished entering file specifications to move to the drives selection list. File Specification Examples Entering RUN.BAT in the file specification field will find all files named RUN.BAT on the specified drives. Entering : RUN*.BAT in the file specification field will find all files of the form RUN?????.BAT eg RUN.BAT, RUNME.BAT, RUNOLD.BAT etc. Entering *.C *.H *.RC will find all files with extensions .C, .H and .RC DRIVE SELECTION After entering the search specifications the next step is to select which drives to search using the drives selection list box on the upper right of the FFW window. Press TAB in the file specification field or use the mouse to get to the drives selection list box. This is a multiple selection list box so you may select as many drives as you wish. To select with the keyboard use the arrow keys to move up and down and the space bar to select. With the mouse use the vertical scroll bar to scroll and the mouse left button for selection. STARTING THE SEARCH After entering the file specifications and drive selections you may start the search by pressing the OK button with the green robot on it. To press this button move the mouse cursor over the button and press the left button or simply press the ENTER key (this is a default button). The file search will now begin. The OK button will change to a cancel button (a stop sign bitmap will replace the green robot). To stop the search at any time press this button. You may now continue with other Windows applications while FFW does the search. FFW will place the name of the file and its path and optionally its size and last access date (see option menu options) in the files found list box which occupies the bottom section of the FFW window. SELECTION AND DESELECTION Files in the files found result list box may be selected by the user. When a file is selected it is displayed in inverse video. Certain operations can only be performed on selected files. To select a file with the mouse scroll the files found list box up or down using the vertical scroll bar, move the cursor over the file to select and press the left mouse button. Multiple files may be selected. To de-select a file follow the same procedure. When using the keyboard first press TAB until the files found list box has the input focus (this is denoted by a dotted rectangle around one of the display lines) then use the cursor up and down keys to scroll up and down and the space bar to select or de-select. EDIT MENU OPTIONS The Edit menu options all act on the files found results list box which forms the bottom half of the FFW windows. The options are : SELECT ALL This option selects all files in the files found list box When a file is selected it is displayed in reverse video. UNSELECT ALL This option de-selects all files in the files found windows TOGGLE SELECTIONS This option inverts the current selection status of all files in the files found list box. If a file was selected it is de-selected and vice versa. CUT TO CLIPBOARD The Cut to clipboard option will delete all selected files from the files found list box and place these files in text format in the Windows Clipboard. Another program such as a Word Processor or Spreadsheet may then read these files from the clipboard (normally using their EDIT menu paste option). COPY TO CLIPBOARD The copy to clipboard is the same as the cut option except that it does NOT delete selected files from the files found list box. OPTIONS MENU The option menu has various options affecting the display of files found. When any of these options are selected a check mark will appear next to it on the menu. The options are : DISPLAY FILE SIZE When this option is selected the size of the file in bytes will be displayed next to the filename in the files found list box. DISPLAY FILE DATE AND TIME When this option is selected the date and time of the last change to the file will be shown in the format specified by you in the Windows Control Panel International options. ALWAYS ON TOP When this option is selected the FFW window will always appear on top of other windows . EXECUTE COMMANDS FEATURE FFW provides a feature whereby you may execute multiple commands on files found by the file search. The steps to follow to execute commands on files found are : First search for the files by entering a file specification and selecting the drives to search as described previously. Select the files on which to execute commands or use the EDIT menu option Select All if you wish the commands to operate on all the files found. Enter the commands you wish executed in the optional commands edit control terminating each command by pressing ENTER. To specify the names of files in the commands use one of the substitution characters listed below. Press the Execute button (with the picture of the gallows on it). To press this button move the mouse cursor over the button and press the left button or using the TAB key to cycle through the controls until the EXECUTE button has the input focus (this is denoted by a dotted rectangle around the inside of the button), then press SPACE. EMBEDDED SUBSTITUTION CHARACTERS IN COMMANDS Normally when performing a DOS command on a filename you would specify the actual filename to the DOS command line eg DEL FOO.BAK. In this case however there will be multiple file names which we want to automate the processing of DOS commands on. To do this FFW allows you to specify a substitution character preceded by a &. These are : &p = Substitute full path name eg C:\FOO\BAR\FOO.BAK &f = Substitute file name only eg FOO.BAK &d = Substitute directory name only eg C:\FOO\BAR &l = Substitute drive letter (and colon) only eg C: So now if your command is DEL &P then for each selected file its full name will be substituted instead of the &p when the command is executed. EXAMPLES Example 1 : To delete all .BAK files on drives C, D and E. Specify *.BAK in the file specification and select drives C,D and E to search on using the drive selection list box, then press ENTER to find all .BAK files on the specified drives. Select all the files using the Select All option on the EDIT menu. Now enter del &p in the optional commands edit control and press the EXECUTE button. Alternatively you could enter &L CD &D DEL &F this when substituted for example for C:\FOO\BAR\FOO.BAK would lead to the following sequence of commands : C: CD C:\FOO\BAR DEL FOO.BAK Example 2 To compile selected programs which have a make file called MAKEFILE. on drive C. Specify MAKEFILE. in the file specification and select drive C to search on using the drive selection list box, then press ENTER to find all the MAKEFILE.'s on the specified drive. Select the files you wish to compile. Enter the following in the commands edit control : &L CD &D NMAKE /a /f &F