Annoyances ?

[Anonymous]

When indexing our site, each time a pdf file is scanned the pdf plugin pops up a large black dos box over the top of the indexer scren while the file is being scanned, it closes when that file has been scanned. Next file scanned gets another dos box. Indexing proceeds correctly other than these rather annoying black boxes. Any suggestions ?.

I have also been trying to get the search results to show the "searched for words" from the search form. I've taken a look at Wrensofts' and some of the example sites where the searched for words carry over to the results (what we want).

On looking through the search_template file we require a line where the results are to go - ok, we have this and we get results but no carry over, but that line does not occour anywhere in Wrensoft's search function, so how does it function correctly ?.

Also search_template says

By default, you do not need to place a search form here, the search script will generate one and display it before the search results.
maybe I'm missing something here but this seems a bit catch 22, without a search form you can't call the script ? that apparently generates the form for you ?.

I've gone round and round this one, my head hurts !.
We are at www.mclennan.co.uk, data is indexed locally and uploaded, we use the cgi script in cgi-bin as that's where the server want it.

Many thanks
Mike.

[Ray]

The PDF plugin should not popup a window, and we have not seen this happen before. Check if you are using the latest version of Zoom available at:
http://www.wrensoft.com/zoom/whatsnew.html

Also check if you are using the latest PDF plugin available:
http://www.wrensoft.com/zoom/plugins.html


I have also been trying to get the search results to show the "searched for words" from the search form.
...
maybe I'm missing something here but this seems a bit catch 22, without a search form you can't call the script ? that apparently generates the form for you ?.

I think you are getting a bit confused. You might want to start here:
http://www.wrensoft.com/zoom/support/faq_howto.html#modifyform

Also, refer to the Users Guide chapters on customizing your search page:
http://www.wrensoft.com/zoom/usersguide.html

To summarize, there are basically 2 main ways you can have a search form:

1. Allow the script to generate one automatically. This is the default behaviour, but you can disable it in "Configure"->"Search Page"->"Search form:"->"Do not generate". This search form will "remember" the current search word and fill in the form for you, as you can see on our search page:
http://www.wrensoft.com/search.php?zoom_query=zoom

2. Disable the search form generated by the script, and create your own one in HTML, which you may have added to "search_template.html" or another web page. This appears to be what you have done on your site. This allows you to make more radical changes to the appearance of your search form (in your case, changing the "Results per page" dropdown boxes to radio buttons named "Display lines") but it loses the ability to automatically fill in the search form for you.

If you want the search form to be automatically filled in with the second option, you will need to do this yourself via scripting. There is no way that the search script can predict how to fill in your form for you with this option, since it can be anything at all now (for example, you could have created a form with no search box, for example, and you just pick from a collection of buttons with preset search queries). One common way to do this would be to have a bit of client-side Javascript which picks the values out from the URL and then set the corresponding form values accordingly.

[Anonymous]

Raymond,
Many thanks. We are using 4.1 (1003) and have redownloaded the pdftotext.exe file which had the same date/time info as the one we were using. The problem with the dos box started when we went from 4.0 to 4.1, up till then things had been working fine. The box pops up whilst each pdf file is read, it has a flashing underline cursor only, in the top left position. The task bar places a small box labelled "pdftotext" beside the current one for the running Zoom. If other programs are set running after Zoom the "pdftotext" is always the rightmost, as the dos box appears over everything else.


I think you are getting a bit confused
I certainly am Stanley. We went through the documentation and settled on the "do not generate" way as it allowed us to keep the design of the search page that we had previously used. If that needs a bit of javascript then no probs I'll sort that out a bit later.

Again many thanks for your help.
Mike

[Ray]

We could not reproduce the pdftotext window problem in our testing with Version 4.1.1003. Can you tell us which version of Windows you are using?

[Anonymous]

Ray,

I am using Win 98 (4.10 build 2222) on a PIII 860Mhz 120Mb

I've done a bit of digging to see if it's in the 4.1 version.
1) Uninstall 4.1, reboot machine.
2) Install 4.0 (dir = Zoom Search Engine 4.0), install pdf plugin.
3) Run Indexer (4.0), load cfg file for the site, indexer runs without popping a dos box.
4) Install 4.1 (dir = Zoom Search Engine 4.1), install pdf plugin, copy cfg file to new dir.
5) Run Indexer (4.1), load cfg file for the site, indexer runs and pops a dos box.

So I have 2 installations of the indexer, 4.0 does not pop a box, and 4.1 does. I have also wiped the machine, installed 4.1 only and the box still pops, so it's not some residual from the 4.0 install.

Other than the dos box annoyance, the indexer runs fine and the resulting search functions fine. Still a great product. If it helps I can zip our installation of 4.1 and leave it on our site for you to download and peruse.

All the best, Mike

[wrensoft]

I am using Win 98 (4.10 build 2222)

Build 2222 of Zoom does not exist. I think this must be a typo? Or was this the version of Windows?

We now do 99% of our testing on Windows 2000 / XP / 2003.

So it is no surprise that we haven't noticed this. It probably only happens on Windows 98. We were kind of hoping that Windows 98 would crawl away and die :-)

We'll pull out our old 98 machine next week and do some testing.

---
David

[Ray]

We've confirmed that this is a bug in Version 4.1 build 1003 when running on Windows 98. A black DOS window will appear for a second when indexing files using a plugin. Note that this does not affect the outcome of indexing, and all files are still being indexed correctly. This problem will be fixed in the next build.

[Anonymous]

Build 2222 of Zoom does not exist. I think this must be a typo? Or was this the version of Windows?
That was the version and build of Windows reported on my machine.

We were kind of hoping that Windows 98 would crawl away and die
There is still a lot of us out there. In our company, approx 50 machines, there is only 1 XP machine, and that 1 only because we had to, 2 are still on 3.1, the remainder are all 98

Anyway, I'm glad you found the bug, many thanks for your help.

[Ray]

There is still a lot of us out there. In our company, approx 50 machines, there is only 1 XP machine, and that 1 only because we had to, 2 are still on 3.1, the remainder are all 98

We do understand that there are still 98 machines out there, but they are diminishing rapidly in the overall context. It is also becoming increasingly harder to maintain compatibility with 98 as Microsoft introduces significant changes in each incremental release of Windows. Microsoft themselves have cutoff support for 98, and you can no longer really consider 98 machines as being adequate for a computer that is connected to the Internet - considering the lack of security updates and spyware prevention available for the OS, and the abundance of exploits and problems present.