WODA: The Web Oriented Database

6.003 (September 2005) validated HTML code, DOCTYPE, small fixes

# - generates DOCTYPE tag that can be overriden with new setting doctype
# - WARNING: this may change how your format is interpreted, pages may look different; if in trouble, set to <!-- DOCTYPE -->
# - HTML 4.01 compatibility ... checked for most frequent pages ... could be issues left over on other pages
# - WARNING - potential errors introduced becuase of rewriting of search=italy&format=DEFAULT to search=italy&amp;format=DEFAULT as well as a zillion HREF=x to HREF="x", ACTION=x TO ACTION="x"
# - added link to login record from LoginForm and AboutUser pages
# - handling of robots ... only TOC is at /robots/ ... the rest is dynamic
# - fixed a bug in recAll ... now returns undeleted records only
# - form display - mandatory and optional fields sharding bug corrected
# - fixed handling _id during password recovery (_ids that are usenames must be fixID-ed as well
# - fixed and improved RSS gandling
# - bug ... if database has a title field the printHead takes it as title
# - the /Html security problem fixed.

4.522 (November 2004) RSS feeds, users who showed this record also ...

- Fix: the /Html security problem.
- The submit section in data entry form has A NAME=SUBMIT
- Fields that will be validated are marked so in forms
- _from data (who last modified a record) is hidden by default.
- in advanced search forms ... the default format is DEFAULT
- dot changed to _ in ids ... may cause huge problems if ids are like ziga.turk@command.com
- interface to full text searching with swish
- WBB{similar} setting to display info like "users who put this into basket also put into basket" ... "users who showed this record also showed" ...
- RSS feeds using search?format=RSS

4.500 (December 2003) New Code Layout, Rich Text Editing, Office 2003 Support

# UPDATED: Admin's Manual
# FIXED: Removed -U option with sendmail; improved diagnostics
# CHANGED: support file layout ... icons at URL /woda/icons/default, javascript at /woda
# CHANGED: program file layout
# NEW: WBB{ownerGroup} defines a group with same right in a record as admin
# NEW: WBB{userMenuOther} replaces $SCRIPT with correct value
# NEW: woda can act as a server for the Office 2003 Research Task Pane function. See /Office function.
# NEW: woda is described in WSDL; a host of XML functions available. See below.
# WBB{provider}, WBB{license} and WBB{category} parameters for the above
# NEW: WBB{formatHttpHead1} defines that the user defined format #1 is ouput with a special HTTP header; typically content-type. Terminated by single newline!
# NEW: noform=1 CGI parameter for /Search pages ... prevents that the search form is displayed
# NEW: WBB{'title;Home'} defines a new text for the title of the page /Home ... same goes for any other /Page
# NEW: /Anyfunction?title=New+title will override the title for that page from calling URL
# NEW: &URL function returns URL of related table
# NEW: rich text editing for HTMLAREAs (IE 5.5, Mozilla 1.4) ... if their type par is 'RICH'
# FIX: Handling of " in values of option fields
# HTTP Error Handling ... must write docs about it
# WARNING: changed interpretation of WBB{tables} slightly
# should be backward compatibe
# NEW: built in group 'client' who has access to cgiX functions
# NEW: cgi functions Xget, Xput, XputMany, Xsearch ... allowed from local host only
# relational features are now expanded across several servers
# and may use http as a last resort
# NEW: API function GET to get %rec from a related table (uses http)
# new API function PUT to put a %rec into a (related) table (uses http)
# NEW: ROWS can use http to get related data
# NEW: QRY uses http, not command line, always
# NEW: FLD can use http
# NEW: IDS can use http
# NEW: KEY can use http
# FIX: use of login vouchers was broken
# fetchPage renamed to httpGet

4.310 (August 2003) Multiuser editing, robot unfriendy email addresses, several small goodies

• CHANGE: /Debug is now /AdmDebug
• NEW: the printout of any email addresses is robot-unfriendy
• FIX: WBB{userMenu...} was broken; it is not any more.
• NEW setting WBB{apTitle} ... prints before dbTitle in generated page heads
• better generation of Home page ... if no DATA is to be printed, menu is not on the left but below!
• NEW: WBB{afterRecordModify} setting ... called after a record has been modified and written to disk
• FIX: the user sort bug in advanced form screen
• FIX: if the same record is edited at the same time, only the first edits can be written, the second ones, based on outdated data, are rejected.
• NEW: AdmUploadUserfiles ... allows mass, simple upload of userfiles in tar.gz archives.
• NEW options in basket management
• NEW: title=foo+bar on URL overrides the title of the page with URL suppled title
• NEW new function cgiAppend allows you to Append data to existing record and supply values on URL.

4.300 (February 2003) CSS based formatting, several features for the admin

• For the default formatting or pages, cascading style sheets are used almost exclusively. The default syles may be replaced with WBB{style} (as before) or augmented with WBB{styleModify}. Warning, this may break some designs!
• Locking with flock for all critical write operation
• AZindexMethod allows TITLE case in primitive STEMing
• Primitive file management built in for the administrator.
• Raw data formats (CSV,XML,TAB) are prohibited by default.
• userMenu* settings more intelligent
• Data may be exported as text files for indexing and searching by third party applications (e.g. SWISH, htDIG).
• ? wildcard character in searches to stand for any one character.
• with images ALT= replaced by TITLE= throughout for better browser compatibility.
• new admin's functionality for the basket
• new options on the admin's menu to syncronise userfiles.
• cleaner handling of pageHead and pageFoot (particularly in MINIHEAD situations)
• better functionality for log file processing (includes counting)
• $LOGIN variable availabe from homePageFormat - shows a login dialog.
• fields may have $WBF{change} setting that changes the value of the field after edits and before validation.
• fields may have $WBF{meta} setting. On Show pages, the content of this field will appear as a META tag in the HEAD section of the HTML
• serial emails: CC is optional
• Fixes:
  • Extention-less uploaded files are supported
  • GeneratedHomePage is created regardless of the robots setting
  • Static pages for robots are created only if WBB{robots}
  • Anasty bug that resulted in miss-sorted results on a search that needed to reindex.
  • Many others.

4.260 (June 2002) Saving, restoring forms, sendmail replaced by socket connection to smtp server

• All big forms, such as AdvancedSearch, EditMany etc. forms can be saved and retrieved.
• Agent processing rewritten.
• A couple of new icons.
• RegisterForm is not allowed or denied by default. By doing deny . ^Register registrations will be denied and not shown in Login windows.
• Cosmetic fixes to the login screens.
• Sendmail program not needed; mail is sent using sockets ... you need to configure $SMTPHOST. Faster.
• Minor bugs related to deleting records and afterTableModify fixed
• Browse matrix counts too; cosmetic changes.
• Some improvements on showing who is online and logfile printing

4.250 (May 2002) maybe Perl maybe text, better data management, several new settings

For the administrator:

• Many setting, including head;Page and foot;Page settings may include Perl code or may be constant strings.
• NEW: admin sees the record history button - possible to see how a record did change and roll back to old version.
• more powerful CSV import and merge (new)
• filters can be named through WBB{filterText}
• _from and _at are handled as any other field ... with regards to formats, sees etc. future: have users explicitly define _from field if they need it.
• AdmManyEditForm ... no need to check editable fields printable
• Set one field to some value for many records
• Improved serial email.

Changes related to handling of binary attachments:

• If ID of a record changes all attached files are properly renamed
• The directory for binary attachments gets file index.htm created so that browsing is not possible.
• A random number is added to the file name of IMAGE and USERFILE fields which makes those files more difficult to get to if they are not supposed to be 'seen'.

Entry forms:

• BREAK=x typepar allows to say that OPTION items with a value of x are headers with cannot be selected
• COLS=n typePar works for checkboxed fields
• NOID typepar hides IDs off fields where code is different to displayed text
• $ThisRecordNo available for search result formatting
• forms with just a few fields possible like /cgi/app/EditForm?fields=firstName,lastName possible
• warning screen when deleting records always has one warning/confirmation screen

Searching:

• new search results format PARAGRAPH
• sorting now possible on arbitrary fields (A-Z only), not Z-A, not 1-9, not 9-1.
• some fixes to the handling of basket
• NEW: AZindexMethod setting
• searches from AZindexs paint results
• serial emails are logged
• cosmetic fixes to admin icons in searches

Fixes:

• making serial number record ids with &NEXT() in WBB{key} is much less likely to skip numbers.
• the TMPDIR cleans itself automatically - anything older than a week is erased
• better poweredby icon is distributed
• FIX: MyAction in separate files bug corrected (thanks Jean-Paul.Louis@alcatel.com)
• FIX: a bug related to saved searches
• FIX: a bug in WbReadRecords fixed
• FIX: a bug in rebuildFat fixed (thanks Jean-Paul.Louis@alcatel.com)
• search to frame does it with a simple format
• forced using DES encryption on passwords

4.200 (January 2002) Faster and better support for relational applications, XML, login and may other new features

• Administrator's enhancements:
  • generally much better support for logged in users through usertable
  • more support for the coding of values in OPTION fields (1=red, 2=blue ...) see &DECODE function.
  • {sees} parameter is now obeyed in all search formats
  • new setting WBF{field,adds} allows a field to be entered, but if then WBF{field,modifies} is prohibited, a field may only be created (used to select a username once and or all)
  • LINKOPTION field is now obsolete ... 'options' field of an OPTION field may include an expression to generate the possible options
  • improved login screens through the use of {usertable}
  • with &PIC('lastName') is possible to create a nice picture just for this field.
  • {key} may be &NEXT(100,4) ... ids will start at 100 with a step of 4.
  • data may be exported in XML ... even the XML API may be requested - not in SOAP or WSLD though.
  • smarter handling of robots
  • &ROWS is now much faster - does not spawn a new process any more.
  • new functions &LINK and &RELATED to make links between tables easily.
  • no need to define related tables in {tables} if the are laid out on this in the same way as this table.
  • home page data is considered outdated if older than $SCRIPTFILE
  • if file $DATADIR/../_common.pl exists it is required. This is an easy way to specifiy common feature to several tables.
  • admin functions to restore and backup data and others
  • on disk full conditions, FAT entries may point to non existing records. They would be deleted automatically with a code of -2
  • if reindexing is taking more than 1 hour it is retried, if it takes between 5 mins and 1 hour, the old index is used with a warning.
    
• Userland changes:
  • login across sessions.
  • flipping through records with Go should be faster and use smaller cache.
  • search for "ziga turk (missing closing quote) results in an error.
  • registration becomes only visible if term 'friend' appears in the {rights}setting.
  • password recovery for records that include an email address.
    
  • automatic show of a login box with userTable applications.
  • many friendlier messages
• Bug fixes:
  • {filter} should be much more watertight but slower ... the filter and the search are handled totally separately, error in one will not cause a problem in the other. Note the filter set to ziga has the effect of +ziga
  • {filterText} is a new setting.
  • backslash is properly escaped in keys
  • early validation of search expressions
  • &apos; nuisance
    
• Potential compatibility problems:
  • ROWS does not take into account any kind of filtering, rights etc. Use QRY if you need that, but QRY is slower.
  • ROWS does return rows. To date it did not return newline on the last row.

4.151 Some old and new bugs are fixed; thanks to Xavier and others.

• FIX: BrowseAZ?name='' does not create AZ index of everything any more
• FIX: reports error if one searches like +authors:smith and 'authors' is not a valid field name but (this is new) does not report this error if search is for authors:smith
• FIX: BrowseAZ cleans the index of funny character better
• FIX: AZnot now handled properly
• FIX: Perl 5.6/Unicode annoyance avoided.
• FIX: ModifyStructure - does not display some WBFs twice any longer.

4.150 Painted search results, record locking, URL rights, templates and much more

This is a rather major new release with several new features. The only reson it is not called 4.200 is that there a few more goodies planned.

• Search GUI: painted search results; you serch for 'ziga', ziga is yellow!;
• Search GUI: cosmetic changes of the small search form, link to advanced search
• Security: {rights} setting now handles URL parameters. See documentation of the {rights} setting. For example, you may deny people to search for sex.
• Security: AboutUser is always allowed, About is subject to {rights}.
• Add: when editing records, the step with the verification is skipped by default. See {verifyEdits} setting.
• Add: several methods to lock a record. See setting {recordLock} which is separated words password,user,host,none...
• Add: if a large table is used and frequent reindexing is disabled using cacheExpire then after a user enters some data, she is warned about that and offerend an option to reindex the table manually.
• Add (bulk): when importing data, there is an option to ancrypt the _passwords in the table
• Login: login/register screens are separated and polished up.
  
• Link to home in toolbar is displayed only if allowed.
• Power users: {head} setting inserts text into <head> section of page
• GUI: small change to the default stylesheet
• GUI: {pageTemplate} setting simplifies the use of page designs made with FrontPage, Dreamweaver & co. You just draw an page and Woda makes the corresponding code!
• GUI: new variable $dbTitleLink in {pageTitle}, $toolbar, $toolbarText and $woda in {pageEnd}
• GUI: if a BREAK field starts with " it is removed
• Admin: new submenu to Mange users ...
• Admin: list of registered users is available on admin menu, you can send them email.
• Admin: log files more sophisticated; including showing recent visitors with auto refresh.
• General: more messages and warnings when deleting records
• "contains" in advanced search is case insensitive
• Reply-to header in all emails send by woda
• Reports error if one searches like '+authors:smith' and 'authors' is not a valid field name
• BUG fix: toobar related anoyance in admStatic corrected.
• BUG when last row in rights was ignored if it did not contain newline fixed.
• Install procedure verified.

4.107 Fixes, searching new records, cleaning of _qry, next, previous record (March 2001)

• fix: usage of Woda through command line
• fix: an important security fix
• fix: rebuild from TAB
• fix: export as CSV
  
  
• QRYs are not cached if search is for all items
• _qry directory is cleand according to $WBB{searchCacheAge}
• search cache is only used if less than 1000 records are found
• age of records in days appears as criteria in the advanced search form
• semantics of search slightly changed. Before: days=100&search=turk found records younger than 100 days OR with text turk. Now: 100 days AND text turk
• next, previous record icons are disabled if there are more than 200 records found because it is very slow.

4.105 Modified handling of logins, format of dates, Angie

• how WBB{groups} is processed has changed. The implied relation between password and IP number is now AND. If you used '#' do denote impossible IP, well, these # will be automatically translated to dots, so there should be no compatibility problems this allows for logins without passwords, password and IP or domain, etc. See the new docs of 'groups' setting.
• use of Angie has been cheched and Admin's interface to much improved.
• dates can be formated as you like with $WBB{dateFormat} and $WBB{timeFormat}
• sending of serial email has been fixed
• default stylesheet is much smaller now, does not define font sizes. If you don't like how big is the default Arial in Netscape, use Ctrl-[ in your browser.
• how to validate uploaded files is documented.

4.104 Fixes (January 2001).

A number of fixes including:

• documentation does not print too wide
• FETCH passes Host: as well
• Admin Menu - Modify Structure fixed
• PageCount variable officially available in footer
• workaround: for relational features to work there should be slashes in the {tables} definitions

  .

4.100 Version 4 finally released (January 2001).

Version 4 includes major changes to the WODA engine and the way it lays out the data on the hard disk.Some 30% of version 3 code was rewritten and just as much added. Most of the changes are not visible on the surface, however, they enable future growth of Woda and use in services such as "www.rent-a-db.com". Code needed for that is not freely available and neither does the license allow you to use Woda for services like that.

Migration towards version 4 should occur automatically, however, database administrators are urged to verify if all went OK.

• Not GPL and Artistic licensed any more but still free!
• Core data handling functions rewritten in such a way that drivers for other databases (SQL etc.) are possible.
• Core search functions rewritten.
• Much faster re-indexing of the table.
• Different storage of data - no more .rec files!
• Unlimted rollback, history, undo possible (not implemented in a friendly way though).
• spiderDir and spiderURL settings are replaced by WBB{robots} setting.
• docsDir and docsURL are not available any more.
• Creation of log files WBB{log...}
• User registration; predefined Groups are guest,friend,admin
• Search history, saved searches, angie and basket rewritten so that they are not IP based any more.
• New layout of data for a table. All information related to a table is now organised into several directories. System directories have names starting with _underscore. Read manual about what is in each directory.
• Code optimised for wodad - an http deamon optimised to run Woda applications fast!
• MOD_PERL support discontinued, however, it should still work with uncommenting a few lines.
• New settings {quotaLoad} and {quotaText} and {quotaBin} that can be used to limit the size of tables and usage under heavy server load.
• Rewriten handling of robots; rewritten output of .html files for search engines to find.
• All eval-s are checked for safety.
• typePar CONTINUE does not work any more.
• /Show automatically hyperlinks some fields
• .htaccess file is written to the database's directories automatically to prevent unauthorised access. Host $MYHOST is priviliged.
• Due to public request, the detailed page does page headers again
• Execution of the script is timed, some logfile diagnostics is included in HTML output.
• cgiHtml bug corrected
• joined env and counter into one file
• newlines of all files are written to the UNIX standard
• several small and big bugs corrected and introduced

4.000 not publicly released (spring 2000)

3.505 Last, very stable release of 3rd generation (January 2000)

• minor changes and bug fixes.

3.504 Y2K, freedom with input forms (December 1999)

• another small Y2K bug fixed. If will make sure that stucky fields will work after 1 Jan 2000.
• the input forms can be almost freely defined through WBB{form}
• tBrowseTree's toolbar correctly points back to BrowseTree
• changed cgiSearch so that the format TAB etc is text/plain
• changed cgiSearch so it does not wodaExit any more (concerns experst only); cgiQuery still does wodaExit

3.500 Y2K problem fixed, show HTML via WODA, handling of keys (November 1999)

• Potential Y2K problem fixed; years are 4 digits always!
• Not only if $WBB{key} is undefined, but also if it returns an empty value, a random key is generated for the record.
• $WBB{searchHelp} lets you modify the short search help messages
• new URL /Html?file=dir/file.htm. File dir/file.htm is shown with standard, woda generated headers and footers. For security reasons, the file should be within $WBB{docsDir}. Only the title is used from the head elements, rest of the head is ignored.
• New setting $WBB{docsDir} ... if undefined, equal to dataDir()

3.402

• LoginForm takes parameters.

3.401

• BUG: Admin does not see EDIT buttons.
• Compensation of a Perl bug in wbTab2Rec.

3.400 Much more freedom in formatting records and pages (September 24, 1999)

• Much more powerfull record formatting options. format;DEFAULT can be replaced by three settings (the old one still works to maintain compatibility).
  • formatHeadDEFAULT, formatRowDEFAULT and formatFootDEFAULT define what is printed before found records, for each found record, and below all found records.
  • format;USER* are obsolete
• New setting to change the toolbar and the ends of pages:
  • toolbar
  • toolbarText
  • pageEnd
• WODA looks for SENDMAIL at a few other places but the one specified
• SearchAgain URL works but is not linked to the public interface. It is experimental. WODA now remembers user's previous searches (in fact cookies are used).
• Browsing next and previous detailed record now correctly goes to the next found record.
• Opening of additional windows with setting help or logging in and out has bee changed so that the user stayts inthe same window. This is due to a "feature" on NT versions of MS Explorer where cookies and login information is not passed between different Windows that Explorer opened.
• FIX: Counting of Browse Tree options
• FIX: Minor issues related to user based security
• FIX: 3.305 was not Perl 4.036 compatible. This one is.
• BETTER: 'default' can be eval-ed.

3.305 User based ownership of records, fixes (September 6, 1999)

• A totally new way of handling users and their rights. Until this version, records were protected by passwords, individually. Now they can also get owners and are only available/visible ... to those owners.
• Some bugs in the install procedure fixed.
• FAQ slightly expanded.
• Documentation about configurable parameters is enhanced with examples. It is also structured.
• CSV input uses _id and _at data to reconstruct records. Guesses the delimiter. Does not skip newlines in very long fields any more.
• FIX: how location of Perl is determined
• ENHANCED: rebuild from TBL actions can now be UNDONE; logging of rebuild actions improved; record's last modification time is used when rebuilding records and in CSV input
• NEW: setting $WBB{hideUnless}
• FIX: bug in Add form whne there were lots of checkboxes
• $WBB{agentGroups} is obsolete ... handled with Allow/Deny now

3.303 Installation procedure (July 23, 1999)

• NEW: WODA is packed in a different way, includes a demo and an installation program.
• FIXED: some perl4/perl5 incompatibilities
• NEW: Admin option to temporaly close database (uses files closed.* in _cache). But for any major maintenace you should move the .cgi file somewhere and replace it with one that prints out a short message.

3.302 Improved hierarchical browsing, fixes (July 14, 1999)

• NEW: if WBB{searchCache} is set to non-zero, searches are cached (experimental).
• ENHANCED: BrowseTree also displays a count of matching records and can show full hierarchy (experimental).
• CHANGED: package WODAUK is not the default any more, even for the .pm version. Causes too much problems when one wants to use user defined functions. It should be uncommented for use under MOD_PERL.
• CHANGED: visually ... the AdmCreate options.
• FIX: targets and related frames.
• FIX: A bug in the AdmCreate, the pl version.

3.301 Shopping basket, hierarchical browsing, Windows compatibility (July 7, 1999)

• ENHANCED Windows compatibility; forced to develope on a WIndows notebook for a while I sreamlined WODA so that it works 100% on Windows, Perl 5.003+ and Xitami or Apache Web servers. IIS remains a problem because of its inability to spawn another process.
• NEW options in Admin mneu to check compatibility issues.
• NEW support for shopping basket. Simply set $WBB{basketName} = "My favorite URLs and voila, it works.
• NEW browseTree for fields that are hierarchically composed like europe:italy:rome (e.g. like in Yahoo).
• CHANGED the treatment of word boundaries ... whole words are always assumed unless * is used (e.g. *star finds wordstar).
• NEW: Unused formatting WBB's are shown as HTML comments. View source to see what else you could customise on a page. Use the force, veiw the source also when you wonder how search worked. These comments could break some of your settings if you used them to get rid of some of WODA generated text.
• FIXED so that Woda removes all tags in page titles of printHead.
• NEW Admin options
• CHANGED admin menu.
• NEW self documenting Perl and CGI APIs.
• NEW admin option to update/make records from .tab file. E.g. to search and replace over whole database.
• NEW search expression: /field:value ... matches one whole line in a field.
• CHANGED the main menu. People who maintain translations will hate me for that.
• CHANGED so that all windows and frames used are named like woda_*
• FIXED the up.gif is 21x23 and not 23x21
• Some known issues:
  • there seem to be some Perl related bugs with DOS version of PERL 5.001 and split version
  • if application is password protected, Explorer asks for a password for each new window (how stupid of it).
  • Explorer does not open new windows quite in the same way as Netscape.

3.210 Security fix, visual enhancements (April 1999)

• NEW: several visual enhancements
• NEW: WBB{showToolbar} and WBB{searchToolbar}
• NEW: WBB{openIcon} ... use other icons but the folder
• NEW: nice new icons shown next to userfiles
• CHANGED: toolbars used more
• FIX: passwords used to be lost when there were attachments uploaded to the server
• CHANGE: access to Adm operations is denied by default. It should be explicitly allowed in the $WBB{rights} parameter.
• CHANGE OF NAMES: wodauk.pm ... the big one ... perl5, woda-uk.pl ... the small ones ... perl4 compatible
• CHANGE: myAction is used instead of cgiAction in .pl, if available
• NEW: German version now maintained at http://www.ausschlafen.com/woda/.

3.202 MOD_PERL compatibility, faster searching with grep (January 1999)

• WODA home page is not http://www.fagg.uni-lj.si/woda/
• As you see, version number is now a real number. Minor changes are in thusands, major in tenths, rewrites in wholes.
• WODA is now mod_perl comaptible. Under mod_perl it runs 10-30 times faster. See comparison chart in the manual.
• WODA is now available under same terms as Perl language itself (GPL+Artistic licences)
• On UNIX systems, grep can be used to speed up searches. I suggest you use it for databases where _cache/*.tbl files are over 1M in size.
• Few cosmetic changes.
• WODA code is now renamed from wb* to woda*.
• The suggested location for it on your filesystem is /usr/local/woda/.
• WARNING: 3.202 is not 100% backward compatible.
  • URLs like http://some.doc.com/cgi/wbuk/application/Search does not work any more. Stuff should go through application like http://some.doc.com/cgi/application/Search
  • If you defined your own functions in the definitions and if you use wbuk1.pl (the big version) things will break. A quick temporary fix is to delete the "package WODA" line near the top of the code.
  • There are no other problems.

3.1r4 Fixes, Explorer bugs, JavaScript (November 1998)

• FIX: checkAll, checkNone JavaScript can be disabled
• FIX: Explorer's reading of cookies on pages that have empty query string and pathinfo. Never use $SCRIPT? ... use $SCRIPT/Home for homePage!
• FIX: Modify structure internal links between frames.
• FIX: Wraped INPUT and TEXTAREAS with <FONT FACE="Courier"> Otherwise field width is out of control in Netscape.
• FIX: Wrapped USERFILE with FONT FASE=Courier too!
• FIX: local (*_) = $_main{$var} if Perl 4; local (*_) = $main::{$var} if Perl 5;
• FIX: All Perlish fileglobbs like <$1.*> were replaced by a function that does the globbing without resorting to the shell.
• FIX: option lists can now safely contain spacial characters like ()*.- ...
• FIX: field names like siteURL are now printed correctly in forms
• FIX: spacing of field help in forms corrected
• FIX: funny character in AZindex
• FIX: JavaScript compatible with more browsers.
• NEW: most wanted words of AZindex
• NEW: other
• NEW: $WBF{head} is used in forms as well.
• NEW: function &ID($text) available to convert $text into ID.

3.1r2

• advancedSearch eq problem fixed
• small fixes related to WODA running on DOS boxes
• improved AdmStatus diagnistics

3.1r1 CONTINUE typePar, fixes (July 1998)

• new: CONTINUE typepar places next field on the same line in forms
• new: documentation on how to install WODA on a Windows box
• fix: on some Perls for windows extra newlines get added to fields
• fix: modify structure does not eat up the first field any more

3.1r0 Home Page, Modify Structure (June 1998)

• updated: home page redesign ... more room for your own stuff on the home page, links to system generated WODA pages are placed more discretely
• updated: modify structure redesign via frames ... friendlier
• updated: login/logout goes to new window ... friendlier
• fix: &PIC() function is now available in search formats
• fix: AZindex vs. AZindexes bug fixed
• fix: admin login w/o password fixed

3.0r1 Handling Users, JavaScript, Styles, Automatic Maintenance (May 1998)

• new: AdmPrintVar action prints global variables
• new: ftp access to files
• new: $WBB{agentUsers -> agentGroups}
• new: automatic setting of Cron jobs
• new: automatic maintenance without CRON via $WBB{maintenancePeriod}
• new: using CSS for formatting
  • WBB{font} is ignored
  • WBB{sysTableTags} is ignored
  • WBB{usrTableTags} is ignored
  • WBB{style} is new defined classes are: ERROR, WARN, TABLE.DATA, TABLE.TOOLBAR, TABLE.AD, TABLE.DETAIL, TABLE.SEARCH
• new: userTable, userDefaultGroup and userAllow WBB entries; user level identification of users of this database
• new: JavaScript 1.0 for check all/uncheck all chekboxes
• new: JavaScript 1.2 verification of regexp field data
• new: input forms in terse view, friendlier handling of input errors
• new: command line use change: possible to set username/password on the command line
• new: $savedRec available for field validation ... $savedRec{lastName} eq $_ validates that lastName did not change!
• fix: possibility to disable JavaScript and Stylesheets
• fix: don't show admin buttons in Search when command line is used
• fix: editing records with many attachments - if only one is changed, change that one only
• fix: "update failed" problem if one uses the back key
• fix: warning admin about data entry errors

2.8r8

• new parameter $WBB{detailTitle} evaluates into the title of the default detail page
• fixed bug: $qs = $ENV{QUERY_STRING}; into $qs = &htUnescape($ENV{QUERY_STRING});
• fixed the multiple select statements
• do not display system fields _AT, _FROM, _ID ...
• perl calls for cgiAdmFieldTypes and generate error: Undefined subroutine &main::setTypes called at /usr/local/lib/woda/wbuk.pl line 6
• perl5 hanged on $1='';
• many Angie related problems fixed thanks to <goran.ekeberg@weapon.bofors.se>
• logout works better
• editing by admin now preserves original passwords thanks to "Patrick Riley" <rpr@rlassociates.com>

2.8r3 Improved support for relational features (December 1997)

• OPTION and LINKOPTION fields can now have different values for what is displayed and what is stored in the database
• fixed QRY bugs, better QRY diagnostics
• results of QRY functions are cached for faster processing of queries into other tables
• added &ROWS function to get raw ROWS from another table
• new &TODAY and &NOOP functions can be used in settings

  
   

• searches like +lastName:Turk are now looking for whole words
• search like =lastName:Turk are now looking for exact match

  
   

• new setting 'afterTableModify' defines an action to be teaken after a table has changed. For example an HTML page can be updated
• new setting pageToolbar
• if the DEFUALT output format includes a "THIS" pointer, the open icons are reduced to 1/4 of the size
• angie passwords fixed
• field defaults are EVALed if they begin with &
• login/logout via toolbar and cookies
• automatic environemnt setting on entry to AdmMenu

2.7r0 Support for rings of Web pages (November 1997)

• BrowseRing functionality ... lets you use Woda to create rings of Web pages and lets them quickly browse pages pointed to from a Woda database.
• Even from admin's IP the default are guest priviliges. Add admin: to request to become administrator.
• HIDDEN typePar hides TEXT fields in forms
• changed the handling of toolbar
• browse options on main menu restricted to the possible ones
• some improvements to the documentation of the parameters and field types, more hyperlinks.

2.6r3 Create from data, check directory permissions

• new admin's function allows creating WODA databases from .csv example file
• new admin's function to check directory permissions
• sysTableTags, usrTableTags to define how system and user tables look like

2.6r2 Fixes

• checkbox searches don't work right ... FIXED
• FIX: Angie does not forget about the search parameters any more
• WODA ignores trailing whitespace in OPTION field values

2.6r1 Less Perl overhead, A-Z Index, record filtering, different distribution (September 1997)

• It is broken into library + many cgi files for faster compilation by Perl; compile time overhead is reduced to 30% - 15% of the original.
• Record filtering ... if user is not admin, records with a certain value are not found in searches. Usefull to hide records enetered by users before they are cleared by the administrator of the database. See WBB{filter}.
• Based on field data and definitions in WBB{AZindexes}, WBB{AZnot} Woda can automatically create a-z indexes of words in those fields.
• Woda can be run as a cgi script to create a database from scratch.
• All the files you need are now in the same directroy.

2.5r5

• fixed a bug related to the handling of priviliges
• fixed wrong text in CSV inport and exports
• allowed for WWW server bug when they report script location as a relative path

2.5r4

• minor fixes of the serial email and password handling
• reformat has been disabled
• .csv delimiter by default now , possible is ; also allow, deny bug fixed default long format != user defined long format
• csv import bug fixed
• fixed the bug which failed to find strings like foo:bar where foo is *not* # field name

2.5r0 Browse features, frames, access counter (May 1997)

• Browsing: BrowseOptions, BrowseMatrix, BrowseContents, BrowseMatrixList commands to browse database by OPTION filed combinations
• Can do search results into frames
• &PIC() function creates %pic based on %rec ... for use in 'detail' format.
• New LIST field-type, handles picture of items in a list !
• Bug fixed at wbFixID and intl. characters
• Built in access counter!
• Random keys are exactly 4 hex digits long now
• Win32 compatibility (dir change date, times, pipes); echoes HTTP/1.0 200 OK ... on win32
• New WBF field $WBF{field,head} (field name to display instead of field name)
• Replaced <FORM> with <A> whenever possible to ease the job for robots
• New navigation and Angie icons
• Does not display links which are not allowed (mostly!)
• Escapes () and / in search words
• Available in English, Slovenian, Spanish, German (1) and French (24 strings not translated).

2.3r1 Field search, new request format (March 1997)

• Nicer search syntax now allows fieldname:value type of syntax

  +email:edu ... word edu must be in email field
  -email:edu ... edu not in email field
  email:edu ... same as +email:edu

• May be called as /cgi-bin/wodasi/definition/guest:password/Action ... which allows to compile woda engine once and use it for many databases.
• Some improvements to the documentation.
• TEXTAREAs are now WRAPPED.
• Better diagnostics on write-rights errors.

2.3r0 Expression search, serial email (February 1997)

• Expression search with syntax like {email} =~ /dfsdfsdf/ && {price} <1000
• All search tips available on one page.
• Help on field names etc. available
• New $WBB{font} parameter.
• Administrator can send serial email.
• Mandatory fields in "View/create structure pages" now denoted by '*'.
• Default sort on value of first field.
• Always automatically creates DEFAULT.tab cache file!
• Export exports password as well.
• Fixed problems with passing search parameters to "next" pages.
• Fixed bad behavior of Woda in "disk full" occasions.

2.2r1 Alternative URL calling convention, search tips (January 1997)

• Umask and directory creation mode can be specified as a parameter in this script. No change needed if you are not paranoid.
• Can be called as /cgi-bin/wbuk.pl/b=definition/Action?search=foobar
• Rotating search tips.
• Default field values can be specified on the /Add?reply-to=123211

2.2r0 Some relational features, robots' playground, WODA icon (December 1996)

• $WBB{tables} defines information about related WODA tables. Functions &qry and &fld can be used in expressions to query or lookup data in other databases.
• $WBB{spiderDir} defines directory where all records are set up for web spiders (like Lycos, AltaVista, HotBot ...) to index. $WBB{spiderURL} is the URL of the spiderDir. AdmStatic generates files for the spiders to find
• Options of the OPTION typed fields can now be defined in rows, one per row. Previously | separated.
• $WBB{detail} lets you define how a record's page should look like and replaeced the automatically generated layout, if defined.
• "Open" icons now part of TABLE output format
• New IMAGE data type.
• Quick "create new database" option which only prompts for the vital fields, not the whole intimidating lot.
• WODA icons were designed are a printed at the end of all pages ... linked to WODA home page.

2.1r0 Renamed to WODA, Software Agent, Better International Support

• Main library file was renamed to wb??.pl where ?? stand for language code.
• Agent functionality (allows users listed in $WBB{agentUsers} to order searches they find usefull and have them delivered periodically by email
• User definable collate sequences and character sets. It is now also much easier to translate WODA into foreign languages and incorporate the translations into new versions
• Displays next, previous, first, last buttons on full page html displays
• Different treatment of $WBB{homePage} and $WBB{generatedHomePage}. If you have defined $WBB{homePage} you would need to set $WBB{generatedHomePage} to the same value.
• Different way to define as who to run the program; syntax:

  
  /cgi-bin/foobar/user.password/Action?parameters
  or
  /cgi-bin/foobar/user./Action?parameters
  if the user would otherwise be recognised as admin

• New format of $WBB{users} includes a password column
• New admin menu option displays suggested cron jobs to automatically maintain the database and process agent requests
• Config section of the wbuk.pl has changed

New in 2.0r9 (November 1996)

• admin tool to delete passwords
• next, previous on full page html displays
• collateAfter sequences, translate sequences collateAfter
• toLower how to covert special character to lower case
• different treatment of $WBB{homePage}
• static homePage ... define name of html file
• generatedHomePage ... define name of html file
• /cgi-bin/foobar/user.password/Action ... can specify user on command line
• new password column in the $WBB{users}

New in 2.0r8

• fixed ^M problem in definition files
• new WBB{pageTitle} which lets you customize page title

New in 2.0r7

• removed SI language from cgiAdm*
• added quick icons to delete/edit records to default output format (seen by admin only!)

New in 2.0r6

• bug fixes
• new HTMLAREA type, TEXTAREA rendered as PLAINTEXT!
• tabular is format DEFAULT if DEFAULT is not defined
• links into HELP file

New in 2.0r4

• make uniform use of %Hidden and @Fields as a result of wbSortFields
• make sure that unseen fields cannot be 'seen' in .tab or .csv outputs
• create tabular output format
• in power search made possible to restrict output to some fields

New in 2.0r3

• better diagnostics of fatal errors

New in 2.0r2

• DIFFERENT WAY TO DEFINE DATABASE SECURITY
• admin defined default/max hits per page
• faster searches due to .tbl files
• word bounday searches

New in version 2.0:

• much friendlier data dictionaries
• possible to use from command line
• multiple format and sort expressions
• custom page tops and ends
• fake normal user form super account
• password confirmation
• multiple select OPTION LISTS
• display option list as radio/checkboxes
• custom icon directory
• edit data definition through forms

Woda has been under development since 1995. Records of previous releases are lost.