HV
HTML VIEWER
for
HP 100LX / 200LX / 700LX / 1000CX
HV was developed entirely on the HP 200LX.
Freeware by Andreas Garzotto
(c) D&A Software Inc., 1996-1998
HV User Guide
April 15, 1998
Prepared and edited by Avi W. Meshar, D&A Software, Inc.
=============
HV USER GUIDE
=================
TABLE OF CONTENTS
1. HV - HTML Viewer - an introduction
2. ABOUT THIS MANUAL - a review of the contents of this manual
3. Quick Start Guide
3.1 Installing HV - How to put HV on the Palmtop
3.2 Quick Starting HV - Simple directions to start the
program
4. HV - HTML Viewer Usage
4.1 Starting HV - How to start HV
Command Line Parameters, Temporarily change the
initial page
4.2 Keyboard Functions in HV - How to use the keyboard
4.3 HV Menus - How the menus work in HV
File Menu - Managing file functions from this menu
Edit Menu - The editing function for HTML Source
View Menu - Page viewing functions
Option - Other options for displaying pages
4.4 Configuration of HV - Configuration file contents
[System] Section - General pointers and setting
[Fonts] Section - Define the fonts used for text
[Docs] Section - Defines the default document to
display at startup
[Viewers] Section - Define external viewers for images
[Services] Section - External Internet service
handlers
4.5 HV Capabilities - What HV can and cannot do
5. Glossary - Some definition of terms used in this manual
===================
1. HV - HTML VIEWER
HV is a program that displays Web documents on the Palmtop
screen. It can run in a stand-alone mode displaying Web pages
that were copied into the Palmtop, or as part of WWW/LX Plus
where it is part of a Web browser.
HV complies with HTML 3 specifications as published on the Internet.
HV was written by Andreas Garzotto, using the HP 200LX Palmtop
as the development platform. Certain accomodations and
compromises were made in the development of this HTML Viewer
because of the severe limitations of the Palmtop screen.
Despite that, this tool supports visually almost all the
features described in the HTML specifications.
We wish to acknowledge the contributions made by the PAL
Group, led by Gilles Kohl. PAL is a library of routines
utilized in this program which provides a graphical user
interface (GUI) very similar to the GUI implemented by the HP
Palmtop System Manager applications. We thank these dedicated
and talented programmers and their leader.
We also wish to thank Stefan Peichl who created LXPIC and
graciously allowed us to bundle it with HV. This exceptional
program displays on the Palmtop screen graphical images
files types GIFs, BMPs, PCXs, JPEGs, and ICN. The program is
exceptionally fast and small (approximately 15K!). We
recommend using it to display JPEG images with HV. You can
find a link to it in http://www.dasoft.com follow the link
to Support, then WWW/LX FAQ, and look at question number 4
on External Viewers.
====================
2. ABOUT THIS MANUAL
This manual provides information about HV installation and
usage.
Chapter 1 briefly introduces the product.
Chapter 2, this chapter, explains the structure of this
document. We use "manual" and "document" interchangeably in
this text.
Chapter 3, QUICK START GUIDE, explains how to install HV, and
how to start it.
Chapter 4, HV - HTML VIEWER USAGE, contains explanations on
how to use HV.
====================
3. QUICK START GUIDE
_________________
3.1 INSTALLING HV
The installation of HV is quite simple. The required files are:
HVV2.TXT This documentation file
HV.EXE HTML Viewer program
HV.CFG HV configuration file
HELP.HTM HV Help file
HOME.HTM HV's home page
*.HFN font files
The following files may be omitted for a smaller installation:
ONLINE.HTM An HTML file that explains how to order WWW/LX
LXPIC.COM Stefan Peichl's program that can be used to
render images (required for JPEG images)
All the files must be located in the same directory on the
Palmtop. File README contains details about the installation,
and other important information. Please read this file before
the installation.
Omitting the Help file will eliminate the ability to obtain
help at the touch of a key. Omitting the HOME.HTM will open HV
with an empty display. We suggest to use these files, at least
in the beginning.
SETTING UP HV
HV is packaged with a configuration file. This configuration
file should generally work with no modifications. It may be
edited using any ASCII editor, including the built-in MEMO
application of the Palmtop. For specific details about the
configuration file, please refer to Section 4.4 Configuration
of HV.
_____________________
3.2 QUICK STARTING HV
HV may be started as a standalone program to view HTML
documents without connecting to the Web. Such documents
(pages) may have been downloaded by someone else, for example,
and placed on the Palmtop for offline reading.
The help file of HV is an HTML document. It is available by
pressing the F1 key.
To run HV, enter on the DOS prompt:
HV
To open a document, press the F9 key. For more information on
what functions are available, refer to Chapter 4.2 Keyboard
Functions in HV, which explains the usage of the keys in HV,
and to Chapter 4.3 HV Menus, which explains how to use the
menus.
=========================
4. HV - HTML VIEWER USAGE
HV is a program that views HTML documents. To view HTML
documents located on the World Wide Web (WWW), HV uses WWW/LX
to obtain these documents.
_______________
4.1 STARTING HV
As described in the Quick Start for HV, this program can run
in DOS by itself to view HTML documents previously saved on
the Palmtop during an online run. In this mode, there is one
parameter which may be provided to HV on the command line. It
specifies the initial page to display, if different from the
file specified in the [DOCS] Section (in the Home= line) of
the configuration file.
An example for the command line with the parameter:
HV c:\hv\althome.htm
This example specifies that HV should open an HTML document
contained in file c:\hv\althome.htm. This is only effective
during the current execution of HV.
____________________________
4.2 KEYBOARD FUNCTIONS IN HV
The naming conventions we use to name keys:
FN Function key on the Palmtop
DNARROW Down arrow key
UPARROW Up arrow key
LTARROW Left arrow key
RTARROW Right arrow key
SH-xxx Shifted key, e.g. SH-TAB is Shift Tab key
MENU Menu key
Keyboard HV Legend and Function
_____________ _______________________________________________
Space Bar moves forward one screen.
+ Plus key, moves forward one screen, same as
Space Bar.
FN-DNARROW PgDN key, moves forward one screen, same as
Space Bar.
FN-UPARROW PgUP key, moves backward one screen.
BACKSPACE Backspace key, moves backward one screen, same
as FN+UPARROW.
- Minus key, moves backward one screen, same as
FN-UPARROW.
DNARROW
UPARROW
RTARROW
LTARROW Arrow keys, move from link to link in the
direction of the arrow.
TAB Tab, moves forward to the next link.
SH-TAB Shift-Tab, moves backward to the previous link.
CTRL-DNARROW CTRL-DNARROW key, moves down one line.
CTRL-UPARROW CTRL-UPARROW key, moves up one line.
FN-LTARROW HOME key, moves to the top of the current
document.
FN-RTARROW END key, moves to the last page.
+------+ A rectangular border around a word or words
|a link| indicates there is a link to another document.
+------+ (A link is a connection to different document).
Pressing the ENTER key displays the linked
document.
letter Moves to the link which starts with the letter
pressed.
MENU-Q Quit, exits HV.
F1 opens the help document - very similar to this
document.
F2 HOME, displays the home page (the first page
displayed when HV starts).
F3 EDIT, starts MEMO to edit the source of the
current document.
F4 FIND, searches the current document for a word
entered in the prompt window.
F5 HOT List, or "Bookmarks", opens the "hot list".
The hot list consists of a list ("bookmarks") of
documents you visit often.
The list can be navigated by using the UPARROW
and DNARROW keys. The hot list is kept in a file
named HV.HOT in the HV directory.
- To select a document, highlight it, and press
the ENTER key twice.
- To add the current document to the hot list,
open the hot list (F5), then press the "Add
Current" button. (Use the TAB key to highlight
the button.) The title of the page may be
edited before it is added to the hotlist.
- To delete a document from the hot list, select
it, then highlight and press the "Delete"
button.
F6 BACK, displays the document viewed before the
current one.
ESC ESC key, the same as F6, but also terminates HV
if there is no previous document.
F7 FWD, returns to the document before using the F6
key.
F8 INFO, displays:
- the name of the current document
- the name of the document that will be opened
if the ENTER key is pressed (i.e. the current
link)
- the amount of free memory available to HV
- the amount of memory available to DOS
F9 OPEN, opens a specific document to be displayed.
The URL of the document is entered in the prompt
box as shown below.
Documents located on the Palmtop ("local files")
may also be opened and viewed by specifying
their path and file name, instead of a URL.
F10 SAVE, saves the current document as a local file
on the Palmtop. You may edit the path and file
name as needed on the prompt line.
____________
4.3 HV MENUS
Most of the functions described above can also be selected
using the Menus. In addition to these commands, a few
additional functions can be selected only from the menus.
FILE MENU
Open Local File
Opens a file on the Palmtop. Similar to F9 - Open
Document, but refers to files on the Palmtop.
Reload Document
Reads (downloads) the current document again.
Rebuild Index
Deletes the current index and recreates it. (See
Glossary for Indexing topic.)
Clear History
Deletes the history, i.e. the list of documents
which were visited before the current document.
This command may be useful to free up memory.
Shell to DOS Opens a DOS shell to execute DOS commands while
HV is still open. Enter "exit" to return to HV.
EDIT MENU
There is only one item on this menu, Edit Source. This is the
same function as provided by using F3.
VIEW MENU
Goto Page Jumps directly to the page number entered
(within the current document.)
OPTIONS MENU
Display GIF Images
Toggles the indicator to display inline GIF
images.
Do Tables Toggles the indicator whether the HTML tag
<TABLE> and related tags should be processed or
not. These tags are used to present a tabular
display of data.
Generally, it makes sense to enable this feature.
However, many documents on the World Wide Web
(WWW) use the table tags to format the layout of
the page. HV cannot display such tables because
of screen limitations, and it is then useful to
disable the feature.
Please note that the content of the table "cells"
are viewable by highlighting them, and pressing
the ENTER key.
Use ISO Latin 1
Toggles between the ISO Latin 1 character set and
the PC character set (Code Page 850). ISO Latin 1
is the standard used on the WWW, but some
documents created on PCs use the other character
set.
Show Links Toggles between displaying the function key bar
and the currently selected link.
Disconnect WWW/LX
This option appears only when WWW/LX is running
and is connected to an ISP. Selecting this option
closes the connection but leaves HV running.
If a document (Web page) is selected that is not
present in the Palmtop (i.e. it is not a local
file or a document in the cache), then HV will
direct WWW/LX to reconnect and retrieve the
required document from the World Wide Web. This
may be utilized in high cost connections when
browsing a document takes time.
_______________________
4.4 CONFIGURATION OF HV
HV can be configured by modifying file HV.CFG, which must be
in the same directory as HV.EXE. The configuration file
consists of sections. Each section deals with a specific area
of configuration. Each starts with a section name on a single
line enclosed by square brackets ([ ]). In the configuration
file, lines that begin with a semi-colon (;) are considered
comments and are not processed.
[SYSTEM] SECTION
The system section contains general settings for HV:
Root=<path> Specifies the subdirectory where HV is
installed. This is needed only if the files
required for HV were installed in a subdirectory
different than HV.EXE.
Editor=<path to editor>
Specifies which editor should be used to edit the
HTML files. The built-in Memo application will be
used if no editor is specified. (System Manager
must be running to switch to Memo.)
Retain=Yes If this line is present in the configuration
file, HV will save the current position in the
file C:\_DAT\HV.ENV. When HV is restarted, it
will display from the saved location. If this
line is omitted, HV always starts displaying at
the "home" document.
HistorySize=<size>
If Retain=Yes is present, then HistorySize
specifies how many items of the history (visited
documents) will be saved from session to session.
The default value is 1, i.e. only the last item
is saved.
Latin=NO If this is set, the PC character set (Code Page
850) is used instead of ISO Latin 1. ISO Latin 1
is used for all the 8-bit documents in HTML
format found on the World Wide Web. Note that
this setting only determines the start up state.
It can be changed any time through the Options
Menu.
IndexDir=<directory>
Specifies the subdirectory where the index files
will be placed. (See Glossary for the definition
of "indexing".) If no directory is specified,
all index files are placed in the same directory
where the viewed document resides.
CacheDir=<directory>
HV stores ("caches") non-local documents in
local, temporary files. These files are kept, by
default, in the C:\ directory. This parameter
directs HV to another subdirectory on the
Palmtop. The cache helps minimize the download
time by keeping documents in the Palmtop.
NumCache=<number>
This parameter specifies the number of different
documents HV may store on the Palmtop at any one
time. By default, up to 10 non-local documents
are kept in the cache before the files are
reused. For example, if a document is requested
and HV already has 10 different non local
documents stored, the earliest will be released,
and its space used for the latest requested
document.
Download=<directory>
This directory is used as the default directory
to store files downloaded via the Save As command
(F10, or File Menu Save Document As...).
GIF=Yes When this parameter is set to YES, inline GIF
images will be processed and displayed on the
screen. Omitting this parameter will show a link
to the GIF image file. Note that this setting
only determines the start up state. It can be
changed any time through the Options Menu.
Tables=No Setting this parameter to NO directs HV to ignore
the HTML <TABLE> tags. Note that this setting
only determines the start up state. It can be
changed any time through the Options Menu.
Links=Yes If this parameter is set to YES, the name of the
current link is displayed in place of the
function key bar at the bottom of the screen.
Note this parameter may be modified any time in
the Options Menu or by pressing CTRL-L.
PostFile=c:\post.dat
This parameter instructs HV to write data sent
from a Form (using the POST method) to a specific
file (c:\post.dat in this example). This allows
HV to maintain form data that is larger than 512
characters.
If this parameter is omitted, HV maintains the
Form information entered in memory, and limits
the length of that information to 512 characters.
[FONTS] SECTION
This section specifies the fonts utilized by HV to display
the different headers in HTML. HV is provided with a set of
fonts (the PAL fonts files). They may be replaced with other
fonts if so desired.
FontPath=<directory>
This directory name is specified if the PAL font
files are not in the same directory where HV is
installed.
Normal=<font name>
Specifies the font to be used for normal text.
This name can be a PAL font file name or one the
following keywords: Small, Medium, or Large.
These keywords specify the built-in fonts of the
Palmtop.
Bold=<font name>
Specifies the font to be used for boldface and
emphasized text.
Italic=<font name>
Specifies the font to be used for italicized
text.
Fixed=<font name>
Specifies the font to be used for monospaced
text.
H1=<font name>
Specifies the font to be used for level 1
headings.
H2=<font name>
Specifies the font to be used for level 2
headings.
H3=<font name>
Specifies the font to be used for level 3
headings.
H4=<font name>
Specifies the font to be used for level 4, 5 and
6 headings.
[DOCS] SECTION
This section specifies special documents used by HV.
Home=<document name>
This specifies the path and file name of the
document to be displayed when the F2 or HOME key
is pressed.
[VIEWERS] SECTION
This section specifies what action is required if a non-HTML
file is encountered. The action depends on the file
extension. For example:
GIF=C:\BIN\LXPIC.COM %s
If a file with a GIF extension is encountered,
HV is directed to start a program in
C:\BIN\LXPIC.COM and provide it with a file
name (variable %s is replaced with the non-HTML
file name) as an argument. Note that the
specified extension must be in upper case (i.e.
GIF= or JPG=). Any number of extensions may be
specified.
Note that while running an external viewer, HV
remains in memory and requires about 150k. The
external viewer can only be started if there is
enough remaining memory. (See Info Screen F8,
the "Free DOS memory" line.)
[SERVICES] SECTION
In this section there is an entry for other services of
Internet which may be called by the Web pages. HV handles
HTTP and FTP requests (to obtain documents form the Web, or
to download files from the Web.) Other programs are required
to handle such requests as "mailto" (to send email from a Web
page), or "telnet" (to connect to another computer).
mailto=post.exe +%s
This entry tells HV to start a program named
POST.EXE to handle the "mailto" request. This
entry instructs HV to start POST.EXE, and
provide it with information about the content
of the TO: filed (i.e. where to send the email.
___________________
4.5 HV CAPABILITIES
HV supports all the tags in the following list (and their
corresponding closing tags):
<A>
<ADDRESS>
<B>
<BLOCKQUOTE>
<BODY>
<BR>
<CENTER>
<CITE>
<CODE>
<DD>
<DL>
<DT>
<EM>
<FORM>
<H1>
<H2>
<H3>
<H4>
<HEAD>
<HR>
<HTML>
<I>
<IMG>
<INPUT>
<ISINDEX>
<LI>
<OL>
<OPTION>
<P>
<PRE>
<SELECT>
<STRONG>
<TABLE>
<TD>
<TEXTAREA>
<TH>
<TITLE>
<TR>
<TT>
<U>
<UL>
HV does NOT support:
- Alignment attributes in tags
- More than one form per page
- Nested tables
- URLs that are more than 512 characters in length, as used in
FORMS, can be handled only if they use the POST method and
the PostFile= parameter was set.
- Background images
Other HV Limitations:
- TEXTAREAs support only one line of text
- HV supports HTTP, but not S-HTTP (secure HTTP). There are
several other secure communications protocols. HV does not
support any of these at this time, since none has emerged as
a standard.
- The maximum number of inline images that can be displayed
within one non-local document is the number of cached
documents minus one.
- Note: There are two methods used in HTML documents to collect
data in Forms, GET and POST.
HV supports the POST method fully (see PostFile= parameter in
[SYSTEM] Section in the HV Configuration.
The GET method is supported provided the information is less
than 512 characters long. The Forms using GET with more than
512 characters are a rarity.
- Some Web page authors include selectable items lists with a
very large number of items (e.g. all the names of the
countries in the world!) These lists can create memory
problems for HV, and cause it abort.
==========
5. GLOSSARY
BROWSER A browser is a program that browses through a
special kind of data. In this case, the data is
hypertext. The browser visualizes the data as a
hypertext and moves around in the file. HV is
such a browser.
HTML HTML (HyperText Markup Language) provides a
simple but very powerful means of representing
hypertexts. The World Wide Web (WWW) consists
mainly of HTML documents. HTML is basically plain
text, with so called tags enclosed in angular
brackets (< and >) that specify special elements.
For example:
<em>Emphasized text</em>
specifies that the text enclosed in the tags will
be displayed using the emphasized font.
HYPERTEXT A hypertext is an extension to a normal text. In
addition to the textual data, a hypertext also
contains links, which are references to other
documents or other places within the same
document. To read a hypertext, a special browser
is usually necessary.
INDEXING When loading a document for the first time, an
index is generated. Using an index improves
access speed significantly, especially for large
documents. The index is computed once and the
results are placed into two files. Accessing the
same document again does not require computing
the index values again. The index files have the
same name as the HTML document but have a .PAG
and a .LAB extension.
If, for any reason, one of these index files is
corrupted, the index can be rebuilt at any time
by choosing the "Rebuild Index" from the File
Menu or by pressing CTRL-I.
Indexing takes place in the background, but HV
places the text "Indexing" on the title bar
during the process. There is no need to wait for
the indexing to complete, and most operations are
available.
INLINE IMAGES HTML supports two ways to integrate an image
into the WWW:
(1) A link points to an image (much like a link
pointing to a different part of the hypertext. To
see the image, you must follow the link (by
highlighting the link and pushing the ENTER key.)
(2) An Image file name is integrated into the
currecnt page and it "floats" within the text.
This is called also "inline image". The browser
(HV, in this case), will display a GIF image with
the text surrounding the image (GIF display
toggle must be on, of course). HV supports
inline display of JPEG images (with
extension .JPG) by using the API of Stefan
Peichl's LXPIC.COM.
INTERNET The Internet is a worldwide "virtual" computer
network. "Virtual" because it does not consist of
any special type of hardware (many types of
hardware are actually used), but instead a set of
standards defines how data is sent from one
location to another. The most important among
these standards are IP (Internet Protocol) and
TCP Transport Control Protocol). The IP Standard
defines the structure of packets of data, and how
they are transported from the source machine to
the destination machine. The TCP Standard
ascertains that all packets arrive unchanged and
puts the packets together in the correct order to
form one stream of data. Most other Internet
standards are based on TCP and IP.
ISP Internet Service Provider. To gain access to
documents on the WWW, the Palmtop must be
connected to the Internet. ISPs offer the
connection service, most of the time using a dial
up telephone line and a modem.
URL Uniform Resource Locator. A URL identifies a
single document on the WWW. A typical URL may
have this structure:
http://host.name.com/my_dir/my_document
The part which precedes the semicolon (:)
specifies the retrieval method (here http, which
means using the HTTP Protocol.) The part
following the forward slash characters (//)
specifies the machine where the document is
located (here it is host.name.com.) The
remainder of the URL (here /my_dir/my_document)
specifies the path and file name of the document
on that machine.
WWW World Wide Web. The WWW is a worldwide
distributed hypertext that is built upon the
Internet. Each document seen can be located on a
different machine somewhere in the world.
Everyone may contribute a new document, which
then automatically becomes part of the WWW.