This FAQ deals mainly with Arachne's PC version. ################# Additionanal Information ################# If you require in-depth technical information about Arachne, would like to offer technical insights that may help others or just plain can't find an answer to your question in this FAQ, then drop by Arachne Quick Chat. It receives 30 to 70 posts per day, so check back every so often. AQC can be found at: http://www.cisnet.com/glennmcc/aqc/ See ya there:-) ####################### Drag 'n Drop ####################### Q: Will Arachne ever support Drag 'n Drop? A: No. ####################### Cut-n-Paste ####################### Q: How do I cut and paste in Arachne? A: In brief: "Cntrl-X" cuts whatever is highlighted "Cntrl-C" copies whatever is highlighted "Cntrl-V" pastes whatever was cut or copied The contents of the clipboard can be found in "CLIP.TMP". ##################### Mail Attachments ##################### Q: Will Arachne support browsing for e-mail attachments? A: It does! However, you must browse for the attachment before writting the accompanying letter. When you find the file you want to transfer, hit the "F2" key. ###################### Serious Icons ###################### Q: I've set 'Options: Preferences & Performance (Look & Feel)' to use seriously looking icons, but I still get the buttons with beveled edges. Why? A: To reduce the download size slightly, "serious" ikons are no longer included with the package, so your selection is ignored. There is now a COMPLETE set of "serious" ikons including the XCHlogo (The big ikon). You can download a package called OFFICE.APM which contains the new set. However, if you allow that package to self-install, portions of your personal preferences will be modified (colors etc.). I recommend manually replacing the *.IKN files with the "serious" *.IKN's by simply overwriting all the old *.IKN's with the new ones. - Clarence Verge (NB: Self-installing Arachne Packages or *.APMs are basically self-extracting *.ARJ archives. Just change the file extension to .ARJ then open in the archive program of your choice -PR) ######################### Hotlist ######################### Q: How can I delete entries from my Hotlist? A: At present, the easiest way is to manually delete the list item. 1)Bring up the Hotlist. 2)Press the "F4" key. 3)You will see a page of moderately cryptic code, but fear not; what you are looking for is very easy to spot: a series of lines beginning with "
  • ". There is one line for each entry on your Hotlist. 4)Find the line that mentions the entry you no longer want and delete it! 5)Press the "Save and View" button at the bottom of your screen. ##################### Virtual Screens ##################### Q: What are Virtual Screens and why would one use the option? A: A Virtual Screen is a fully rendered copy, in memory, of the entire page being browsed. Some Arachne functions need Virtual Screens enabled in order to work because they must have all the info on the page available to them. Smooth scrolling is one of these functions and PAGE print (export fullpage .BMP) is another. The drawback is that creating the Virtual Screen must be completed before any part of the page can be displayed - and that increases the initial loading time of the page. "Screen Print" (print screen key) doesn't need Virtual Screens because it exports a *.BMP of whatever the monitor is currently displaying - Arachne included! ################## Search Engine and Page ################## Q: I have just now noticed that in ARACHNE.CFG there are two separate entries pertaining to search pages and search engines. One is an entry for "Search Page". The other is for "Search Engine". Is this some kind of redundancy? Why do we have the two separate entries? Can anyone please explain? A: "Search Page" refers to the page brought up by the "search button" (the magnifing glass). "Search Engine" is the engine querried by arachne's unique "find:" protocol. ########## Arachne and PnP modems, network cards ########## Q: Will Arachne work with my PnP modem? How about an NE2000 compatible PnP ISA network card? A: After the PnP modem (or any other PnP hardware) gets properly configured and initilized (usually by the system's Plug-n-Play BIOS) it behaves as a hardware modem as far as the setting up of Arachne is concerned. -------------------------------- Q: Arachne WILL NOT use my modem! Why? A: Maybe it is a "software modem" (a.k.a. "WinModem") -------------------------------- Q: After swapping out one of my Plug-n-Play cards Arachne no longer detects my modem! Why? Even swithching between a serial mouse and a PS/2 mouse makes the modem dissappear! What's going on!?! A: Most likely the modem is there but is using a different set of resources. One possible explaination: At bootup, resources are assigned to the Plug-n-Play hardware that was found by the Plug-n-Play BIOS. Each type of hardware has a different priority. In this way the PnP BIOS hands out resources to the most important things first. Adding or removing a PnP card might change the modem's position in this queue. PS/2 mice are also connected to the Plug-n-Play system and have a high priority. NOTE: the resources displayed in Windows' Device Manager do not *have* to match the resources listed after booting directly to DOS. They usually do match, but it is not required. -------------------------------- Q: After booting my Plug-n-Play system from a DOS bootdisk Arachne works fine, but if run in a Windows "DOS box" it fails to find the modem... A: *Sometimes* the modem's address is different when running Windows. Why? Well... The Plug-n-Play BIOS uses special means to communicate with PnP hardware. The PnP BIOS translates this into "virtual" resources that that programs can be configured to use. The programs don't know the difference and all is good. Now comes Windows... The PnP BIOS still intercepts all communications to or from the hardware, while Windows intercepts all communications to or from the PnP BIOS. The Device Manager lists the virtual resources that Windows has made available. So... the virtual resources from the PnP BIOS have been virtualized a second time. Why? Since each program is running on a "Virtual Machine" (virtualized set of hardware) when one program crashes it doesn't *always* bring down the whole system. ##################### Memory Settings ##################### Q: Is there some sort of patch to make Arachne work with my Windows memory settings? A: No. For suggestions try visiting either of the Arachne chat/message pages or drop a line to the Arachne mail list. -------------------------------- Q: I have insuffieient memory on a DOS computer... A: As the situation is different with every installation, what follows is an example of changes that made a great difference on this non-Windows computer. -PR *NOTE* For those who are unfamiliar with thier computer's startup files, the *best* advice is to seek the assistance of someone familiar with such important data. Trial and error is *not* a good technique. If your computer has no startup files, installing some will help a lot;-) 1) Don't rely on MEMMAKER. It does not automatically take into account changes to your system. 2) Backup your startup files. 3) Use "DOS=HIGH,UMB" or it's equivalent. 4) Change all occurrances of "DEVICE=" to "DEVICEHIGH=". Make sure that there are no spaces padding the "=". 5) Where possible, use "LH" to load things into upper memory. 6) In DOS, run MEM/C to get an overview of what is using resources and remove unnecessary items from the startup files. If in doubt, drop a line to the Arachne mail-list. ################ Arachne and Text-to-Speech ################ Q: Can I use Arachne with my text-to-speech converter? A: At present Arachne has no specific support for this. Some users *have* carried out experiments in this area, with some success. If enough interest is expressed by users, then the capability will be properly developed. Any questions or comments regarding this freature should be sent to the author or the Arachne mail-list. ###################### TERMINAL MODE ###################### Q: What is Terminal Mode and how do I know if I need to use it to connect Arachne to my ISP? A: When your computer and the computer at your ISP first start "talking" to each other, they each expect certain things to be "said". In most cases the exchange follows a standard pettern, however some ISP computers have unusual expectations. Terminal Mode allows you to manually enter your user-name and password when connecting to the ISP. In most cases that's all there is to it. If in doubt, ask your ISP. As a general rule, if you don't normally have to type anything to connect to the internet, don't worry about Terminal Mode login. -------------------------------- Q: Will Terminal Mode login help me to connect if Arachne doesn't like my modem? A: No. -------------------------------- Q: If I want to connect some other program to the internet, can I open the connection using Terminal Mode? A: "Terminal Mode" is Arachne's manual interface for the Miniterm dialer. What you want to do is run Miniterm from the command line. More info on Miniterm can be found in the Arachne's DOC directory. Note: When Arachne is shut down, the packet driver is not automatically terminated. After your e-mail or surfing session is done, the connection is still there for other programs to use. :-) ########################## Video ########################## Q: I don't understand the video setup screen... A: Most contemporary video systems are compatible with the VESA standards. Without getting too technical, "VESA" allows programs and video cards to communicate using a universal language. As these standards were not fully implemented until the early 1990's, many old cards do not support this. When running setup, see if there is an "Auto-Detected Adapter". *If it says "VESA", you're in luck! Check the "VESA" box, and then try the resolution of your choice. Keep trying if necessary ;-) *If you see the name of a video card, then VESA is out of the question, but Arachne provides support for your particular brand of card. Check its box and proceed to test various screen resolution and color settings. *If the "Auto-Detected Adapter" is blank, Arachne must send video data in a generic format. VESA and manufacturer-specific formats will not work. Simply try a few combinations of video RAM and color quality. If you find that only the lowest settings will work, don't despair; used video cards are quite cheap :-) (NB: "Generic" settings are not logically placed and labeled in Setup!!) -------------------------------- Q: In the Video Setup screen "VESA" shows as the auto-detected adapter, but none of those settings work! >:-( A: Your video card is VESA compatible, but your monitor is not. ############## Using Arachne with a RAM Drive ############## Q: What is a RAM drive? A: A RAM drive is a portion of your computer's memory. The computer handles this storage space just like any other drive; it is assigned a drive letter. You may create and browse directories, copy files and programs to these directories, and edit or run them just as would be done with conventional drives. 1) Since there are no moving parts, RAM drives are very fast. 2) Since data is stored in RAM, everything is lost when the computer is switched off. There are a few computers that use a battery to maintain the data in RAM; don't trust it! 3) Setting up a RAM drive is not very difficult. Instructions can be found on the Arachne Web Browser site and also in Arachne's documentation. -------------------------------- Q: I've never had to resort to using a RAM drive with other DOS programs. Why is Arachne any different? A: She's not. A RAM drive will speed up just about any DOS program :-) Processing web pages involves accessing the drive many more times than other tasks, therefore a RAM drive will help Arachne a lot. One notable exception is when the hard drive uses a *very* large cache, in which case the effect will be minimal. If you tend to use the internet mainly for e-mail, then don't bother with a RAM drive. -------------------------------- Q: Will a RAM drive hasten page and file downloads? A: Any operation which requires accessing the drive will see a speed improvment. -------------------------------- Q: There seem to be several ways to run Arachne using a RAM drive. I need more info. A: See the RAM Drive How-To file for instructions on setting up a RAM drive and ways of configuring Arachne to use it. Also see the Arachne Web Browser site or Arachne's documentation. ################### PostScript Printing ################### Q: Does Arachne include support for PostScrpt printers? A: Yes! Arachne offers support for the printing of text files at this time. I *will* keep the PostScript output, and I would like to enhance it with support for images in addition to plain text, and also to read actual Adobe Font Metric files. It will be there mainly for Linux users. Currently, PostScript output from Arachne is an overlaid module, so it doesn't eat too much memory. For DOS users, who are awaiting enhanced PS functionality, I forsee returning to the concept of lightweight alternative CORE.EXE builds. These upgrades will be available from the web site as self-installing APM files. -- Michael Polak (paraphrased -PR) ################## Undecoded Attachments ################## Q: Sometimes Arachne incorrectly processes e-mail attachments as *.TXT files. How do you make Arachne treat all attachments as files? Is this what "quote" does, and where can I change it? Also sometimes Powermac machines send a series of emails all with undecoded attachments; quoted in garble. A: (RE part 2: Hmmmm... sounds like a case for BINHEX.APM... -PR)