For Developers

Developer/Tester Overview

This information is made available for individuals interested in contributing to the development of the Sync Bookmarks Utility. Ordinary end users may not find the following discussion relevant.

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Introduction

This document is an overview of the implementation of the Sync Bookmarks Utility relevant to prospective contributors.

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Technical Background

The Sync Bookmarks Utility is written primarily in Perl, using ActivePerl, version 5.8.0. The graphical front end (TKSYNBMK.EXE) uses the Perl/Tk module. The external subroutine module used for detecting an active Mozilla or Netscape window is written in C, and uses the Windows API. Generation of the Mozilla/Netscape window detection sources into wrapper files and a dynamically-linked library is accomplished using the Simplified Wrapper and Interface Generator (SWIG) tool and Microsoft Visual Studio.

To accomodate users who do not have Perl installed on their systems, and users reluctant to download and install a Perl interpreter and its core modules, the two front ends are distributed as executable files created using Autrijus Tang's Perl Archive (PAR) toolkit (see the PAR home page at http://par.perl.org).

Although Perl programs tend to be cross-platform, the Sync Bookmarks Utility makes use of Windows-specific modules; for example, to display message boxes, and to find the location of the Mozilla user profile directory. As a result, and for the time being, the Sync Bookmarks Utility works on Windows only. However, because Internet Explorer is also available for the Macintosh, modifying this program to work on that platform is a possibility.

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Current Status

Barring any major changes to bookmark structure in the near future, no further releases of Sync Bookmarks are planned at this time.

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How to Participate

Prospective developers interested in contributing to Sync Bookmarks can start by trying it out; download a copy from the Download page. Both binaries and source code are available.

If you are interested in adding new features, submitting patches, and otherwise contributing source code, contact the author, who will provide further guidance and can respond to inquiries.

NOTICE: The Sync Bookmarks Utility may be copied, distributed, and modified under the terms of the GNU General Public License (GPL), version 2 or later. The GPL is also available in text-only format in the file LICENSE.TXT, located in the folder where the Sync Bookmarks Utility is installed.

If you find any bugs, please report it to the Sync Bookmarks Bug Tracker (you can find a link to it on the Sync Bookmarks project home page on SourceForge.net).

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Resources

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