RepoParser is a utility to view (or parse) Installer.app Repositories. I started this as a sort of test to get the code down so that I could go about improving (and most likely rewriting) my currently crappy app RepoMaker. I have been extremely pleased with my progress on this application. As of right now, it can parse both XML and Plist repositories with incredible speed. I have not yet started to use VB.NET’s built in tools for managing XML documents so it is required that the repository is well-formed and well-formatted. Becuase of this, I included a Troubleshooting section explaining this and providing a download for the free program XMLSpear which provides a one-click option to format an XML document. The most amazing part, however, is that (after hours of coding and recoding) I have managed to optimize the parsing script to a point where it takes less than half a second to parse an entire 12,000 line repository. Pretty impressive. Features currently include the following:
- When a repository is chosen, a ComboBox is populated with all of the packages found in said repository. Any package can be selected from that drop down list and information about it is displayed.
- For each package you can view the BundleID, Name, Sponsor, Location, etc. in simple text boxes (currently uneditable) without any of the confusion of XML around them.
- Another tab includes a built-in webbrowser that navigates to the “More Info” page of the current package.
- Another tab provides an easy to use interface to create a Debian APT control file for the current package (very useful if you are porting over 12,000 lines of Installer code to Cydia). Once created you have the option to save to desktop in one click or to browse to save.
- Yet another tab allows you to create a More Info PHP page for the current package. This part of RepoParser isn’t really useful to the mainstream because the PHP created is generated specifically for Planet-iPhones.com. Once made, you have the options to save to desktop, browse to save, or upload directly to Planet-iPhones via FTP! Of course, I’ve required a login and password for that section so that everyone can’t go hogwild and start uploading things to P-i with this :).
All in all, I’ve learned TONS with this application. I’ve learned how to create a Class that allows me to download any file from online with the click of a button (with live updates as it is downloading). I’ve learned how to parse huge repository files with speeds I thought to be impossible. I’ve honed my skills with reading and writing files and creating files and much much more. The next step for me is to start learning how to use VB.NET’s built in XML utilities to improve these applications even more.
As I said before, the XML files currently CANNOT be edited by RepoParser… I think that instead of teaching myself to do that the wrong way (IE not using the built-in XML utilities), I’m going to go ahead and learn them and start a new project that will be a full fledged RepoEditor/RepoMaker.
Download below and comment with ideas, suggestions, questions, and requests!
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