ZIP ideas

[Tim Baehr]

If you have the ENHANCE stuff and have installed ENHANCE.DLG, here are a couple of things
you can do with the PKZIP shell (in the Advanced pull-down).

1. You can put some of the PKZIP switches in the filename text box at the top of the
dialog box. For instance, if you put

*.* -rp

in the box, you will ZIP all files in the current subdirectory PLUS all files in the child
subdirectories, and you'll preserve the info about the subdirectories. Great for a global
backup of a project that lies in a particular subdirectory and its children. (Warning:
don't do this in the root directory unless you're intending to back up the entire drive!)

When you reissue this command at a later time (and use the same destination filename), the
ZIP shell will instruct ZIP to compress only the files that are new or are newer than the
ones in the ZIP file.

I haven't played with UNZIPping such a file using the shell. If you want to experiment,
put the switch -d (with the hyphen) in the line with the filename to be unzipped (preceded
by a space). I strongly recommend that you read the PKZIP docs before proceeding.

2. You can use the ZIP shell in ENHANCE.DLG to do a kind of crude versioning of the
current file you're working on. Every once in a while, or just before you make a major
change to your file, fire up the ZIP shell and ZIP the current file to something like
VER01.ZIP. Next time, use VER02.ZIP. And so on. You will have created a compressed
record of the various versions of your file. In fact, if you want to save keystrokes, you
can simply name the version files 1,2,3, and so on -- the dialog box routine adds the .ZIP
extension automatically. With 5 keystrokes, you can back up your current file (ALT+Z, Z,
[number], [Enter], [any key to return to XyWrite]).

Note re the DF function in ENHANCE.SET and its failure to display the hyphen and equal
sign: I'm at a loss. The routine works for me with the GT function added, so I can't
test alternatives (and I'm almost out of ideas). You could try putting the FF function
after the GT, or the SH function before it (not recommended; it's a real kludge). Or you
could change the ^DF frame title to ^DM and have the Shift+F3 function (Extend/Shrink
selected area) terminate the new selected area. Or you could simply delete the whole
routine.

Tim Baehr