=========================================================================  
                          - S P L I T T E R -

                         v0.4b / February 2000
                Copyright (c) 2000 by Giuseppe Mignogna.
      Freeware utility. All rights reserved. Not for commercial use.
=========================================================================  

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> Disclaimer
-------------------------
Use this program at your own risk! The author has no liability for damages
that may happen using it. Anyway, actually there's no known problem.


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> Introduction
-------------------------
This is a little utility with which is possible to divide a file (maybe
a BIG file..) into a needed number of pieces or make the opposite action,
that is rebuild a file from existing pieces. Who can find this useful?
At least, all people who need to store a file into a media (like floppies)
with a capacity lower than the file size.


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> Usage
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Syntax:        splitter [/?] [/j] [file name] [pieces]

[file name]    Depending on the [/j] option, is the file to
               split or the group of files that must be joined
               to rebuild the original file.
[pieces]       Number of pieces the file have to be split;
               default (and minimum) is 2, maximum is 999.
               Every piece will be named using the given file name
               with a progressive number as extension (the original
               one will be loose).
[/j], [/join]  Join previously created pieces together. Only the name
               in [file name] will be used to collect the indexed
               pieces. The resulting file will be named exactly as
               [file name] (name and extesion).


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> Examples
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Note: here the notation...
        > file.ext     10000
...means a file named 'file.ext' long 10000 bytes.


Example #1
----------
Ok, let's imagine in a directory there's the file:
        > image.pic    200000

To divide it into two pieces, use:
        > splitter image.pic
or:
        > splitter image.pic 2

This will produce two files in the same directory of 'image.pic':
        > image.001    100000
        > image.002    100000

To rebuild the original file, use:
        > splitter /j image.pic
or:
        > splitter /join image.pic

This will produce the file:
        > image.pic    200000

If 'image.pic' already exists, a warning will be displayed, asking if that
file can be overwritten. If you don't want it happen, an alternative
extension may be used, such as:
        > splitter /j image.bak

This will produce the file:
        > image.bak    200000

In both cases, the two files 'image.001' and 'image.002' will be searched
and joined, because only the name is used to collect the pieces. So,
don't split files with the same name even with different extensions in the
same directory, otherwise mistakes will happen! You can avoid this easily 
renaming the files before splitting. 

Example #2
----------
Let's imagine in a directory there's the file:
        > italy.gif    334524

To divide it into five pieces, use:
        > splitter italy.gif 5

This will produce five files:
        > italy.001    66905
        > italy.002    66905
        > italy.003    66905
        > italy.004    66905
        > italy.005    66904

To rebuild the original file, use (with any extension):
        > splitter /j italy.new

This will produce the file:
        > italy.new    334524

In this case, if (for example) the file 'italy.005' is not found, no error
will be displayed and only the first four files will be joined. This happen
because a file is divided in a 'pure' format, without append additional
informations to the pieces. This means that the original file can be
rubuilt using any other program capable to do joins, like the dos command
'copy' with the '+' option (naturally, this way is not automatic and fast
like using Splitter).
Anyway, an error will be displayed if at least the first two pieces (.001,
.002) can't be found, because they're surely the minimum number of pieces
Splitter must have generated at splitting time.


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> Replies
-------------------------
If you find this little program useful, I'll be very happy to receive
some greetings or comments by you, so please write me at:

     raze@iol.it
or:
     <giuseppe>lux@cds.unina.it

or visit:
     http://www.gm.iwarp.com                              

Bug reports and suggestions are welcome too!!

Thanx to Wang Xuan for some English lessons (I need them much, I know :-)!  
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