LinkScan

LinkScan for Windows. Reference Manual.

Section 19

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LinkScan QuickCheck

LinkScan QuickCheck serves two functions:

  1. It is invoked automatically via hyperlinks from some of the other LinkScan Reports to display a highly detailed report for a single document.

  2. It may be invoked directly from the main LinkScan Reports Menu and used to check (or recheck) an single document or link.

Each QuickCheck Report includes several items of information that are transparently integrated:

QuickCheck has a strong affinity for the LinkScan database. If the data are available in the database associated with the currently selected Project, QuickCheck will seek to ascertain the status of each link using the database and the status found during the last full scan. If this is not available, or the requested document lies outside the scope of the current Project, QuickCheck will perform a full link analysis on that document in real-time.

If QuickCheck has pulled the link status data from the database, the user may force a fresh, real-time scan of that document. This is useful when, for example, you want to recheck a single document after making changes to it. Simply use the Recheck Now option included on each Report.

HTML Syntax Checking

By default, LinkScan QuickCheck will invoke the Weblint program to check for any HTML syntax errors. Weblint validates against the HTML 3.2 specifications.

QuickCheck includes a mechanism that permits integration with other HTML validators and the OpenSP program in particular. The OpenSP program permits validation against any SGML Document Type Definition (DTD). For more on OpenSP, see http://sourceforge.net/projects/openjade/.

LinkScan for Windows includes a copy of the OpenSP program together with a small number of DTD's including HTML 3.2, HTML 4.01 and XHTML 1.0. Unix users must download the OpenSP source code from the above URL and compile it. Additional DTD's are available from many public sources such as the World Wide Web Consortium. One large (but not terribly well organized) collection is known as sgml-lib.

To enable OpenSP, simply add the following commands to the linkscan.sys file, adjusting the file system pathnames as appropriate:

Windows Systems

Checkerpath = C:/LinkScan10/OpenSP/onsgmls.exe
Checkeroptions = onsgmls -s -c C:/LinkScan10/SGML/catalog
Checkerformat = ^.*?:(\d+):\d+:(?:E:)?\s*(.*)

Unix Systems

Checkerpath = /usr/local/bin/onsgmls
Checkeroptions = -s; -c; /usr/local/SGML/catalog
Checkerformat = ^.*?:(\d+):\d+:(?:E:)?\s*(.*)

Note: the Checkeroptions directive may also be overridden on a per-Project basis by inserting a command in the Project linkscan.cfg file. This enables users to use different options and SGML catalogs with different LinkScan Projects.

The Checkerformat command should not normally be changed. It is used to control the parsing of the checker program output. The Perl Regular Expression places line numbers into $1 and the error message into $2.

Additional Background

We also found the following references provided valuable primers on some of the applicable SGML/XML concepts, and the organization of a suitable catalog configuration file in particular:

Some Solaris users have reported difficultly building OpenSP from sources. Jim Clark's SP program will likely prove easier to build. As a pre-cursor to OpenSP, it is largely plug-compatible. However, there is one significant limitation; SP does not support DTDDECL directives in the catalog.

LinkScan QuickCheck Command Line Interface

You may also run LinkScan QuickCheck from the command line in exactly the same manner as the linkscan.cgi program as show below:

web:/usr/www/htdocs/linkscan> perl quick.cgi -help        

LinkScan/QuickCheck Version 12.4
Copyright 1997-2013 Electronic Software Publishing Corporation

USAGE: quick.cgi {-help} {-url URL} {-project name}
                 {-repfile file} {-outfile path} {-tty}
                 {-mailto address} {-format n} {-now} {-http}

-help            Displays this message
-url URL         Specify the URL to be scanned
-project name    Specify a Project. Equivalent to -site
-repfile file    Specify a filename with the reporting options
-outfile path    Specify an output filename
-tty             Output to terminal
-mailto address  Send report to email address
-format n        1=Full HTML; 2=HTML; 3=Plain; 4=text
-now             Perform real-time check
-http            Force HTTP Access

Detailed Help [Y/N]:

Example:

perl quick.cgi -project default -url http://www.example.com/index.html -tty

The above example will run QuickCheck against http://www.example.com/index.html, reading the options from linkscan.rep and displaying the results on the terminal.

LinkScan for Windows. Reference Manual. Section 19. LinkScan QuickCheck
LinkScan Version 12.4
© Copyright 1997-2013 Electronic Software Publishing Corporation (Elsop)
LinkScan™ and Elsop™ are Trademarks of Electronic Software Publishing Corporation

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