Howdy All,
I'm going to attempt to give you all a guide on how to best manage
the Images you download from this and other Usenet groups. This will
in no way be an all inclusive guide, since I have MY favorite programs
that I use and cannot possibly cover every piece of software
available. However, the Tips I'm going to give should work across most
applications regardless of vendor.
I started using the Usenet {Newsgroups] back in 1992. It was a
different world back then. We had to use 9600 baud modems to
up/download our pictures, and "Movies where almost unheard of! If you
found an .AVI you usually spent days downloading a file that rarely
worked. PAR's were unheard of; CSV's Ruled and Only the people with
Money for the "Registered Versions" Graphics Software would provide an
Index. I'm Glad those days are over!
To begin with, let's talk about the best way to combat the Scourge of
the Usenet..SPAM! We all hate it, and we deal with it every time we
log on. Spam comes in many forms, and means different things to
different people. For me, Spam is still any Image that contains a URL
watermarked or in any other way imposed UPON the image. However, to
some people URL tagged pics are no longer considered spam such as,
AlsScans, Cent21, In The Crack, and DDF, Just to name a few. For me
it's the Same Old Spammer Shit.
So how do you deal with spammers?
Easy, by filtering out the crap in your News Reader. Granted the
Bastards are quite annoying by changing their E-Mail addresses and
Subject Lines. But you can get the filters to work better by looking
for patterns. Most Spammers use the same key words over and over
again. When you spot that pattern, Use wild cards to block the Subject
line and Poster. It takes a few months, but you will soon notice a
great reduction the amount of Crappy Headers you are receiving.
Also Multi-Sort!!! I cannot stress the importance of sorting the News
Group you are in by Date, then Subject, then Author. By Multi-Sorting
you can see which threads have the best downloads and Series sets.
Multi-Sorting also Identifies Spammers and Regular posters quite
clearly!!
Now for the most important part, grouping.. Every Usenet reader I
have ever used has an option on where to save your files for each
group you are in. USE IT!! Set up a directory tree that you can
understand. For me, I sort by Subject. So my Amateur stuff goes in a
folder called Amateur ,my BSDM stuff goes in a folder called BSDM,
ECT.. Then I subdivide the directories by group, ABNAF for this one,
and finally I download by Author, making a note on which file ends the
set so I can separate them out later. It's not a hard task, and I can
usually get 300 News groups set and downloading in less than two
hours. Sort time takes about another hour if 1/8th of the posters use
CSV's.
Sweet, Now that the News Reader is set up, let's go over how to View
this enormous Collection you have just acquired.
This is the part that usually requires you to spend money. I have yet
to find a good Free Thumbnail reader. If you use M$ Windowz, you can
thumb view your directories, but the Default Viewer SUCKS and Sorting
in any type of logical format or a Multi-Sort is out of the Question!
My Personal preference is Thumbs +, it has a Database with
Customizable Colum and Row functions, it also Multi-Sorts under a wide
variety of values, makes Index files, HTML Gallery's, has Group Auto
Convert, Group Auto Rename, and a Host of other really nice features
so it works the best for ME. However, I also have Firehand Ember as a
backup for the files Thumbs has trouble with. Plus I also use
Photoshop and Paint Shop Pro. Each one has their own function that
makes them worth having.
Now let's go over how to manage your collection. Duplicate images are
a real problem. Many Newbie posters and some experienced ones "Cross
Post" into Multiple groups. This leads to Duplicate files. There are
several ways to combat this. The most basic way is to use you News
Readers Filter Function after each Download Batch you start. Just mark
the Subject line as "Read/Global" and it will filter out each cross
post without deleting the poster.
This works well for a single poster, but what about the files other
posters are copying or reposting? For this you need a Duplicate
manager. there are several that are free, but the free ones work quite
poorly. They do one thing GREAT, but lack all the features you need to
manage a top notch collection.
My Personal Preference is D'Peg. Granted I'm a bit Bias since I did
the Beta and receive a free program license for LIFE! But it works
very well for my needs. It Compares files by a host of resources that
can be Multi-Matched. The two most common are CRC32 and MD5 Hash.
These will eliminate 90% of all dupes on your hard drive since
Renaming a file does not change these values! It also Handles the
Spamming Assholes by using "Fuzzy Logic" to compare files for
alterations like, Resizing, Flipping, Adding a URL or text and adding
Blank Pixels. All of which will not be caught by CRC or Hash! This
program also has some nifty plug-ins that allows you to block
Downloads of files already in the database by the same options you
sort by. It also shows you a side by side preview for every match it
finds, and has an auto Delete function that only works on EXACT
matches, then gives you a "Preview" of close matches that allows you
to choose "Not a Match" or "Delete" for each of the leftover files.
Granted, This is not a QUICK program. It takes me almost 3 hours to go
through a directory structure that has over 100K files. If you do a
Pattern match to get rid of the Spammer Crap.. it's over 6 hours, but
well worth the time if you are in bed sleeping! BTW I use 500G USB
removable drives for storage. On average it takes 26 hours to do 500G
in Pattern mode which equals around 1,659,3824.968 files! It also
works with AVI, MPG, WMV, and other Movie formats and will store
"Off-line" files for comparison on "Live Media". It's a Very Sweet
Program for $30 USD!!
Now for the last installment, Storage. Over the years I have managed
to make over 590 Zip 100's, 350 Zip 250's, 6K CD's, 8K DVD's and I
have filled over 27/500G Removable drives... Now That is A LOT OF
SHIT!! The Sad part is CD's and DVD's Have a tendency to Die or Quit
working after a few years. Also, OS changes make some media
inoperable. In fact I still have a 386, 486, Pentium, Apple B, Apple
2, Mac Book, and a 2600+ Single core AMD so I can access the Media I
have burned over the years.
On a $$ per Bit Raito, the Removable USB drives are the way to go.
Choose your OS, Then Forget about it until the next "Major" OS
rebuild! Of course when the rebuild happens you will have to keep your
current Computer operational to access that content. But in Reality,
there is no other way to do it! If you don't like it, Kill the Forward
Thinking Computer Geeks!! Or Plan ahead and be prepared to follow the
flow!
Well folks that about wraps this guide up. I'm sure I left quite a bit
out, and I'm sorry for that. However, If you feel you can add to this
guide, PLEASE do! All I ask is that you leave the original content
intact and as is. Please Notate any changes you make with your handle
and above all, PASS IT AROUND!!!
Cheers!!
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