Next: 4.2.2 Status Information and Up: 4.2 Invoking the parser Previous: 4.2 Invoking the parser Contents Index

##
4.2.1 Control Over the Result

The -c, --update-cache, -f, and --doc-file options allows you to specify if the parser should dump all records in a cache directory or if it shall create a document. For example, the command,

`% Spider.py -c`

tells the parser to dump all records in the cache directory in `$PLUCKERDIR` using the default description file (as you will see below it is possible to change the default description file in Plucker's config file). The --update-cache option works the same way as -c.

If we instead used the following command,

`% Spider.py -f PluckerDB`

the parser would create a document called PluckerDB.pdb and store it in `$PLUCKERDIR`. The --doc-file option works the same way as -f. Either -c or -f must be given unless the document has been specified in the configuration file (see refsec:ConfigFile). The name of the document will default to the same as the name given to -f. If you want to give the document a different name, you can use the -N or --doc-name option,

`% Spider.py -f PluckerDB -N "Home Page"`

This will still create a document called PluckerDB.pdb in `$PLUCKERDIR`, but the name of the document (i.e. the name you would see on your Palm) would now be Home Page.

The file name given to the -f option can contain an absolute or relative path, so if we run,

`% Spider.py -f /home/pilot/.plucker/DB/PluckerDB`

a document called PluckerDB.pdb will be stored in /home/pilot/.plucker/DB and if we run,

`% Spider.py -f DB/PluckerDB`

a document called PluckerDB.pdb will be stored in $PLUCKERDIR/DB (the same as above since `$PLUCKERDIR` in this case defaults to /home/pilot/.plucker/)

To save space on the device all records are compressed and the parser provides two different types of compression, DOC compression and ZLib compression. The ZLib compression gives the best compression, but is only available for Palm OS 3.0 and later devices and also requires a shared library.

You control the compression type by using the --compression=TYPE option. Allowable options are `doc', for Palm DOC compression, or `zlib', for zlib compression. You can also use the --zlib-compression or the --doc-compression option. If neither is given the parser defaults to DOC compression.

To put the document in a specific category by default you can use the --category option. It is possible to give several default categories separated by ";".

Next: 4.2.2 Status Information and Up: 4.2 Invoking the parser Previous: 4.2 Invoking the parser Contents Index