Zoom 5 Beta Release questions

[mrwilson74]

Will any of the version ever have the capability to search for ".tif" & ".max" files?

[Ray]

TIFF files are supported by the new Image plugin for V5.

See the thread on the new image and thumbnail features (linked in the original post) for more details.

We do not currently have plans for the .MAX (I presume 3D Studio Max) format. However, there is support for DWF (again, see links above). The former will depend on user demand/interest.

[jefftheman812]

You can already use Zoom with a .NET web site in V4.

THis is true and not true. You can use it but only with the cgi version. This presents the problem that if you are used to modifying the search page that you will find you cannot do this with the cgi version.

I did find a way to use the asp version with .net and can provide that information if anyone is interested. That way I could still modify the search page. The specifid mod I made was creating two copies of the navigation and using CSS to show one at the bottom and one at the top of the search results.

[David]

I think you are confusing the issues. .NET support is really unrelated to the ability to modify the source code of the CGI search script. And it is definitely unrelated to the V5 release.

The CGI is compiled C++ code. This makes it about 20 times faster than ASP, but being compiled code means you can't edit it with a text editor.

If we decided to supply a native .NET control, we would still write it in C++ or C#, and it would still be compiled and you would still not be able to edit it (as it would be a most likely be compiled server contol delivered as a DLL). The performance would be about the same as the CGI.

On the other hand, we hope to release more source code in the future. Probably including the C++ sources. Maybe as part of a SDK.

[iampedro]

That would be great to have a dll that we could use for the search for .net....

[David]

At the moment we can't see much of an advantage in having a DLL vs the existing CGI (which can be used with .NET).

[mrwilson74]

HUH? That was all definitely foreign language to me!

[David]

HUH? That was all definitely foreign language to me!

Welcome to the world of web programming and .NET developement.

[saice]

Css

Hi

I have been working with the new beta and the software is working perfectly. The CSS is important for the layout and while trying to adjust the CSS to the look I noticed that there are irritating <br /> that is hard to get by.

Example:
<div class="summary">
1298 results found. <br />
</div>
<div class="result_pagescount"><br />130 pages of results.</div>

I think it would be a great idea to give control over the look completely over to CSS and give an option to decide on the location of the info lines associated with search results. (searchhead, summary, pagecount, pages etc.,)

In other words. The software is brilliant, but a little bit more flexibility in layout and CSS would be nice. Any tips on getting around the above is appreciated.

Thanks

[Ray]

We put the BR tags there by design to allow for a decent looking set of results even when all the CSS has been removed or omitted (which happens often with beginning web developers less acquainted with CSS). However, we went out of our way to make sure that this would not hinder the flexibility of the CSS for more advanced users either, so don't worry - there is a solution to the above.

The BR tags are enclosed within the DIV tags so that you can hide them specifically if need be. For example, the following two lines in your CSS would remove the presence of the BR tags in the above example.

.summary br { display: none;}
.result_pagescount br { display: none;}

Now, if you are hoping to actually have the two elements on the same line (eg. "1298 results found. 130 pages of results"), you will also need to change the two DIV classes from their default block behaviour to be inline. The following CSS would achieve this:

.summary { font-size: 80%; font-style: italic; [B]display: inline;[/B] }
.summary br { display: none;}
.result_pagescount { font-size: 100%; [B]display: inline;[/B] }
.result_pagescount br { display: none;}

Similarly, you can do this with all other elements of the search result layout and create some diverse designs with some creative CSS use.

[saice]

Well, figured that

thanks for the tips, I forgot this option. This does everything needed.

I have been doing more testing with the V5 and it works extremely fast both for indexing and searching.

I have a question regarding XML output. As I see it one must choose between XML or traditional output. Well, I would like both. I know I can do this by running two data sets, but if you know of any alternative ways then I would appreciate to know about it. A chance for the visitors to grab a feed of their search queries is the perferred use I see for it. That could easily be done if V5 could return the search query in the cgi version for creating XML URLs on the fly.

V5 is overall excellent.

[Ray]

You can switch between XML and HTML output via a HTTP GET "zoom_xml" parameter. For example, linking to "search.cgi?zoom_query=cars&zoom_xml=1" will return the search results for "cars" in XML format. You could also create your own search form with the zoom_xml option as an input parameter (specified by a radio button or checkbox, etc.)

[martyinsf]

Filters Question

Will V5 use the same filter files (for .doc, .ppt, .pdf,, .rtf files) as V4.2 or will a new set need to be downloaded?

[David]

There is an expanded set in V5. There are additional plug-ins for DWF, GIF, JPG (+other image files) & MP3.

The existing plugins stay the same.

[petevick]

Its late October, any news on the final release date chaps ??