Command Line Interface

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AC now supports command line execution to start the application with a specific workspace and a few simple options…

/w Specifies a workspace name (if spaces are in the name, you must put quotes around the name).

/a the action to perform on the workspace (load, process, or burn)

·   load- only loads the workspace

·   process-load and processes the workspace

·   archive-loads, processes and starts archiving the workspace.

/n Specifies a Job name (if spaces are in the name, you must put quotes around the name.)

/q Quit after completed

/c Clear file selection tree

Any other strings found on the command line that are not proceeded by a / or are not data parameters from a previous command line (such as the workspace name) are interpreted as file paths to select. Spaces delimit the paths. If your path has a space in it your entire path string must be quoted. For example, a command line of ...

/w MyWorkspace C:\file1.jpg "C:\My Photos\file2.jpg"

will first open the workspace called MyWorkspace and then select the two files specified. NOTE: the second file has a space in the My Photos path and is quoted.

NOTE: Depending on the operating system. There are limits to how many characters can be on a command line.

There are two other command line commands that determine how to operate on the file paths that are present on the command line.

/u Instead of selecting the files, ensure they are unselected

/i Ignore any files specified on the command line

A command line to load and process a workspace named My Workspace would look like this

C:\Program Files\ArchiveCreator\ArchiveCreator.exe –w "My Workspace" –a process -q

This feature is handy to create shortcuts to load a specific workspace or do some processing that you perform on a periodic basis.

by putting the appropriate text into a windows shortcut you can create desktop or start menu shortcuts to perform specific functions. In the shortcut dialog simply enter the command line string.

NOTE: Any paths or workspace names that have spaces must be surrounded by "" chars as in the example above.

Archive Creator is a "Single Instance Application" meaning that only one instance of the application will run at a time. If a command line is executed, and AC is already running, the currently running instance of AC will receive the command line and process it when it is done with an process currently executing. This allows you to execute multiple command lines, as each is received, it is added to a queue and processed in the order it was received.

Drag and Drop On Shortcut

This command line functionality also allows the ability to "Drop" files on a shortcut to Archive Creator and those files will be automatically selected in the tree.

To try this, create a shortcut to Archive Creator on your desktop. Then open Windows Explorer, select a group of files and drag them to the archive creator shortcut. If Archive Creator is not running it will start automatically and all the files dropped on it will be selected in the tree.

Integration with other Applications

Some applications allow the user to create custom tools or tool bar buttons to perform operations on other external applications. Typically this is done via command line parameters or the use of DDE commands. DDE is a technology that allows applications to dynamically exchange data. Archive Creator supports the following DDE commands

SelectFile()-takes a string with a file path to select

UnSelectFile()-takes a string with a file path to unselect

CommandLine()-takes a string with the exact format of a standard command line string (ie anything you can specify on the command line can be sent in here and processed as if it were a command line string)

The only difference between issuing a DDE Commandline() command and a normal command line is that all DDE functions are processed in full at the time they are received and not added to the processing Queue as described above. Some applications allow for the use of DDE command and typically DDE commands are processed far quicker than normal command line processing.

An example of integrating with another application is shown here using the ThumbsPlus graphics file viewer and organizer from Cerious Software, Inc.

ThumbsPlus allows the addition of custom tool bar buttons to be added by the user. By creating 4 buttons you can browse you photos in thumbs plus, transfer your selections in thumbs plus to Archive Creator and Start the archive process without ever leaving thumbs plus.

We will create 4 buttons

1-To start AC and Clear the File selection tree

2-To Add (select) files or folder selected in ThumbsPlus to the AC file selection

3-To Remove (unselect) files or folder selected in ThumbsPlus to the AC file selection

4-To Start Processing and the files selected.

The resulting thumbs plus tool bar will look like this..

The configuration of each button is a follows

1-Start AC and Clear File Selection List

This will start AC if it is not already running and clear the file selection list. You could also add a /w workspacename to the command line string to open a specific workspace. The /i is there to force AC to ignore any files that happen to be selected. It is always best to use the separate Select button since it used the DDE interface and is more efficient and isn't limited by operating system limits on command line length. The Tool tip sting is useful to help remember which button is which.

2-Select Files

This will cause the currently selected files to be selected in AC. If no files are selected, then all the files in the current folder will be selected in AC. This uses the DDE interface and is much faster and more robust then using command lines. NOTE: This should be issued when AC is already running. It will start AC automatically if it is not running but it will take much longer to process. If AC is already running the processing time is almost instantaneous.

2-Unselect Files

As above except this will unselect the files.

2-Start Processing

This will take the files already selected and start the Layout and Image/Index processing. Alternatively, you can use the following command line ...

/a archive /i

and you will execute a direct archive operation to Layout, Image/Index Process and start the archive automatically.