Expanding Listings to show Files and pars

[Mike Hammer]

The left most icon lets you expand the listing to show all the files and pars. Is there a setting that does this for the entire group you may be looking at. Or you have to do each one manually.
I think this was the compact view in version 559, but it was an option. Did i miss it? Sometimes I just like to see everything, files and pars.

Thanks
Mike

[Bazza42]

Mike,

I'm totally with you on this.

If the NewsBin auto repair, which is generally excellent, fails you seem to be stuffed.

I have already had two files where the 'current progress' line was virtually all the way
across the chart but I could find no way of rescuing the file.

The current one, which is still on my system, shows that it has downloaded 557.3 MB of a
615.6 MB file. The file is shown as having 37 rars with 6 pars. The other elements which are
shown, although I'm not sure what they mean, are : D:38 DL:0 In:0 P:5 R:12

I've tried maually instructing an 'assemble incomplete' but that doesn't work - which is fair
enough (In passing does anyone know where the option to make this 'automatic' can be found?)

The 'properties' of this download are shown as 1 complete file and 38 missing files whilst the
source blockcount is shown as 369 and the available block count as 1 which doesn't seem correct
in the light of the amount downloaded even allowing for what is probably an irretrievably damaged set
of rar files.

The problem is that, although the rars are probably in a mess, I can't expand the original 'header'
to see what is actually there. Although I suspect that the auto recovery is better in Version 6 than in 5.59
I was able to make a number of 'manual saves' in 5.59 which recovered files where NewsBin had failed
due to the ability to expand the header to see what was available. I can't see anyway of doing this
under V6.

I think that the NewsBin 'automatic recovery' does an excellent job but, as a passenger, I prefer pilots
to be in the plane with me rather than just relying on an autopilot!

Can we have the ability to expand headers brought back, please.

[Quade]

The problem is that, although the rars are probably in a mess, I can't expand the original 'header'
to see what is actually there. Although I suspect that the auto recovery is better in Version 6 than in 5.59
I was able to make a number of 'manual saves' in 5.59 which recovered files where NewsBin had failed
due to the ability to expand the header to see what was available. I can't see anyway of doing this
under V6.

I'm not following you here. You can expand any set, in the post list or the download list to see what's going on. You can also manually unpause PAR files in the download list to add additional par files to the repair mix.

If you want to PM me some of these problem child sets of files I'll check them out. Sometimes the pars are simply bad.

[Mike Hammer]

PM Sent with screen shot

[Quade]

Defaulting to compacted is how it works.

It'll assemble incompletes when the file calendar age is greater than 48 hours old. I made design assumptions that your server is good enough that the files will all eventually become complete. With the servers I use, this is the case. Maybe I need to revisit that is people are using servers that aren't as good as Astra and Giga. You can change the assembly age to be shorter but, if you make it too short, you'll generate corrupt files that otherwise would have downloaded fine. Servers all get the files at different times and the amount of time it takes to become complete on a server varies.

I can't expand the original 'header' to see what is actually there.

Your picture showed an expanded header and you can expand them in the download list in case you want to manually add pars. I'm not following exactly what you're trying to do. Sometimes the PARS don't compact with the rars and if you sort on size, they may sort someplace else.

You've not actually lost any functionality, you can do pretty much anything in 6 you could with 5. It just defaults to automated download mode.

[Mike Hammer]

Just trying to have everything open up so you could see the entire posts instead of it being compacted. Meaning not click each one to open, have every post open automatically on the page.

[Quade]

I was responding to your previous post, some thing I'd missed originally.

In 5.X, data was stored in an expanded format and compact mode was extra effort. In 6, the data is stored compacted and expanding is extra effort. At best, I'll be able to give you a button to expand everything but, your memory use will go through the roof if you do it to a bunch of files. Just setting expectations, 6 wasn't designed for everything to be expanded, 5 was.

[Mike Hammer]

Ok great , now I understand, I thought I just missed the setting. Will wait for that update. Thanks for the great support!!

[Bazza42]

Quade,

Many thanks again for your response but I remain slightly confused. It may well be that the option is there somewhere
and I've missed it. Mike, who started this thread, rather implies that I have. I do apologize if that is the case but would
appreciate a pointer as to where I can access this option.

In 5.59 I could expand a rar 'set' shown in the search pane and the complete content, broken down into the
individual rar and par files, would be shown in a new subject pane. Is this still possible in V6 as I can find no
such command? If I use 'properties' I get little information, I guess as search shows all such files as having no rars or pars,
presumably to make the search quicker.

The expand option was very useful on two counts.

1. When the post contained something I wanted but also contained stuff I already possessed. To take my favourite
example, and I would emphasize it is only an example. Someone downloads a set of six episodes of a TV program in a
single set of rars with no info file. I have, say, five of these episodes but want to extract the missing one. In 5.59
I used the 'expanded' information to locate the missing file(s) by selecting an individual rar in approximately the right place,
downloading it, extracting the information, which then gave me a good idea in most cases, roughly where the rars I wanted
to download would be located. From then on it was trial and error. I'm not sure how to tackle that in V6 without marking the
entire rar set for download.

2. When, as I indicated before, the rars and pars are in somewhat of a tangle - well beyond the ability of V6 to sort out - I can
possibly find another similar post with the same blocksize - most people tend to use a 'standard' size - and repair the files from
there without having to scrub the original and start again with a different post. You'd be surprised, I suspect, how often
that worked! (Not being on cable or 'fast' broadband I need to husband my download resources)

I'm not expecting V6 to sort that sort of problem out for me, just to give me access to slightly more information so I can do it myself!


Please understand that I consider Version 6 a very considerable upgrade to Version 5 and don't wish to turn the clock back but, equally,
I think that the expand facility was very useful in certain, albeit relatively rare, circumstances.

Many thanks again for your responses: you must have your work cut out until people get familiar with a new release

[itimpi]

In 5.59 I could expand a rar 'set' shown in the search pane and the complete content, broken down into the
individual rar and par files, would be shown in a new subject pane. Is this still possible in V6 as I can find no
such command? If I use 'properties' I get little information, I guess as search shows all such files as having no rars or pars,
presumably to make the search quicker.

If you have a compacted set and click the arrow to the left, then it is expanded "in-situ" to show all the contained files.

Quade has been talking about introducing an "expand all" type comand to avoid having to do individual entries in a compact list, but this is not yet a confirmed feature for a future release. I think he is still concerned about the large performance/memory overhead using such a command could have on a large list.

[Quade]

1. When the post contained something I wanted but also contained stuff I already possessed. To take my favourite
example, and I would emphasize it is only an example. Someone downloads a set of six episodes of a TV program in a
single set of rars with no info file. I have, say, five of these episodes but want to extract the missing one. In 5.59
I used the 'expanded' information to locate the missing file(s) by selecting an individual rar in approximately the right place,
downloading it, extracting the information, which then gave me a good idea in most cases, roughly where the rars I wanted
to download would be located. From then on it was trial and error. I'm not sure how to tackle that in V6 without marking the
entire rar set for download.

You can do this by expanding the sets and only adding just the rar files you want.

[orion2323]

Just found this thread...
Haven't used newsbin much lately and today when browsing through the posts I found myself expanding or reading the compacted posts.
Personally I don't like it. It is much easier to be able to see the entire post with all files even @ the expense of longer group loads.

....Sing me up for a menu option for this....