PicMonger
---------

INTRO:

PicMonger is a program that will connect to your local NNTP server and scan a specified newsgroup for UU- or Base64-encoded files.  When a data file is found, it downloaded to your current working directory and automagically decoded back to its binary form.

Enhancements include generation of HTML pseudo-thumbnailed image previews, ability to pre-screen files by type, ability to (cleanly) abort a scan, and best of all, resume scanning where you last left off in a newsgroup.

REQUIREMENTS:

PicMonger depends on the proper installation of the following on your workstation:

1) GTK+ and GTK--
	
	a) GTK+ and GTK--
	GTK+:  http://www.gtk.org
	GTK--: http://lazy.ton.tut.fi/terop/iki/gtk/gtk--.html
	
	GTK-- is a C++ wrapper for GTK+.  The program gtkmm-config must be
	in your PATH for the program to build correctly.  You will need the
	standard *and* "devel" distributions of Gtk-- and libsigc++ in order
	to compile the package.  (libsigc++ is the signalling library for Gtk--
	and can be downloaded wherever you get Gtk--). 

	***NOTE***
	As of version 0.8, GTK-- version 1.1.8 is needed to compile PicMonger.  A great 
	deal of things have changed in the GTK-- API since the first picmonger release, 
	and trying to keep the code compatible with both the newer API and the older one 
	became too difficult.  You can still use pre-0.8 versions of PicMonger with 
	earlier versions of GTK--, of course.
		
	b) uudecode
	( Comes already installed on most Unix-oid systems. )
	This must also be in your PATH for PicMonger to run.
	
	c) mpack
	ftp://ftp.andrew.cmu.edu:pub/mpack/
	
	Used for decoding of MIME Base64 files, and must also be in
	your PATH.  Latest version at the time of this release is 1.5,
	and the program was written by John G. Myers <jgm+@cmu.edu>
	
Obviously, you will also need to have a working TCP/IP connection and access to an NNTP (news) server.

INSTALLATION:

This distribution is created using the autoconf/automake utilities from GNU.  For general instructions on building/installing the program, see the INSTALL file.

For those who don't want to read too much, you can install PicMonger with these commands:

$ ./configure
$ make
$ su
# make install

You have to "make install" as the superuser on most systems because you need write access to /usr/local/bin and /usr/local/share/picmonger.  

RUNNING:

PicMonger is installed as /usr/local/bin/picmonger by default.  If that's in your path, all you need to do is:

$ picmonger

When you run the program the first time, it will create ~/.picmonger/ and place blank server and group configuration files there.

USING:

You can add/remove/select groups and servers using the combobox, "+" and "-" buttons at the top of the GUI.  These are user-specific and stored in the .mls files for later reuse.  Once you've selected your NNTP server and group, just click the "Scan" button, and the group will be scanned from newest to oldest post available.

If you leave the Html Previews button clicked ( ON by default ) then PicMonger will put HTML previews in your working directory along with your decoded files.  This is most useful if the binaries are images, of course.

If you click on the "Choose File Types" button, you will get a dialog that will allow you to screen files by their extension.  By default, only JPEG files are saved, but most other common Usenet binary types are also available.  If you'd like to see a type added, let me know.

THANKS:

Thanks to Finwaite (Marc A. Brown) for pointing me in the right direction on getting PicMonger to resume scanning groups where it left off.

I'd like to thank Scot Woodyard for his suggestions regarding the HTML preview generation as well.  Scot is the only member of Brains Anonymous besides myself.  ;-)

Thanks also to "igor" for his bugfix patch!

OTHER:

See ChangeLog / NEWS for known bugs and list of features not yet implemented.

CONTACT:

David J.V. Brown <DrDave@penguinpowered.com> with comments/suggestion/bug reports/patches/contributions/whatever!


	
	
