FTN::Packet ToDo
General
Add reference to FTN Packet FTSC documentation and/or to the FTSC web site. (http://www.ftsc.org/docs/fts-0001.016)
Use the same key names for the message hash for in the read and write packet functions, so as to avoid confusion; match them up as necessary to the names of the fields in the ftsc document.
The $Origin, $seen_by, & $Path variables at Lines 322-324 in the write_ftn_packet function of Packet.pm. Should that creation of an origin line really be in the packet file creation? Or is that something that should be getting created in the message body and getting passed that way? It also hard codes "1" as the origin point number, when that should be OrgPoint. Same for the $seen_by and $Path variables; they are part of the messages, but shouldn't they already be in the message bodies being passed to the write_ftn_packet function?
Fix the possible ftsc date related issues in the course of creating and using an ftsc_date function.
Add a separate function for reading a packet header when passed the name and path of an FTN packet file. Also add other functions as necessary: like one for generating a serial number, one for generating a name for a standard packet file, one for generating an ftsc standard date.
Clean up indentation/whitespace in README.
In order to provide Object Oriented functions for writing an FTN Packet, start with a merge of FTN::Pkt into FTN::Packet?
write_ftn_packet()
Areas & Tearline hash references should be in the packet_info hash or a message hash? Certainly there is an area field included in the msg hash being returned by the read_ftn_packet.
When doing, for instance, two messages: two messages were making it into the packets but they're both the text of the second message. The "foreach" line at 354 does appear to work (instead of the two commented out versions of initiating a loop at 355-356) because two messages are being put into the packet file, but the message body does not appear to be makeing it in. (Do the two commented out lines after that need to be kept?) The line at 354 should be bringing the Body of the message in; no apparent error when running a test script but is that line correct?
Also the serial number for the MSGID is coming up as the same for both messages. When code a better way of getting a 8 char serial number to use, add it as a function to the module?
The writeup and variable usages for the packet format per FTS-0001 could be rewritten to more closely match the current documentation, esp. the listed order.
Change the name of the appropriate fields in the packet related hashes to being named after how they are named in the FTS-0001 documentation.
read_ftn_packet()
A second tear line of just "---" is showing up in the body of a message.
A period is showing up at the end of the ftscdate variable; is that actually how the ftscdate is in the packet or is that an artifact of the code?
Change the name of the appropriate fields in the packet related hashes to being named after how they are named in the fts-0001 documentation.
The zone number information is not being pulled from what is available in the packet; needed to set the from_node & to_node variables instead of assuming zone 1. It is in the packet header but is not being read in the current code, so at least that part of the packet header needs to be read. Once the separate function to get packet header information is available, will just be able to use that.
Make the message Reply IDs availabe in the same way as the Msg IDs? (Are they in use?)
Provide the message control info as a hash?
Is the name read_ftn_packet too generic for what it actually does, which is only to read messages from an FTN packet file? Perhaps read_packet_messages? (Could then have a similar function named read_packet_header.) Or read_ftn_messages?
Test Scripts
Can or should something else be used for testing the correct number of messages in a packet besides is_deeply()?
SEE ALSO
L<FTN::Packet>, L<FTN::Packet::Examples>AUTHOR
Robert James Clay, <jame at rocasa.us>
COPYRIGHT & LICENSE
Copyright 2012 Robert James Clay, all rights reserved.
This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the same terms as Perl itself.