The -c, --update-cache,
-f, and --db-file
options allows you to specify if the parser should dump all records in
a cache directory or if it shall create a database. 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 database called PluckerDB.pdb and store
it in $PLUCKERDIR. The --db-file option works the same
way as -f. Either -c or -f must be given unless
the database has been specified in the configuration file (see
4.3). The name of the database will default to the same
as the name given to -f. If you want to give the database a
different name, you can use the -N or
--db-name option,
% Spider.py -f PluckerDB -N "Home Page"
This will still create a database called PluckerDB.pdb in
$PLUCKERDIR, but the name of the database (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 database called PluckerDB.pdb will be stored in
/home/pilot/.plucker/DB and if we run,
% Spider.py -f DB/PluckerDB
a database 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 database in a specific category by default you can use the --category option.