RandSig

WHAT IS THIS PROGRAM FOR

   Randsig is a simple system to generate random .signature
   (in the home directory of the user using randsig)
   files in order to be able to change our signature daily,
   monthly, or whenever we want. Is for people who likes
   writting small funny sentences (taglines) on their email
   or news signature without having to edit and write the
   taglines each time.

   The user creates 2 files in his HOME directory: a file
   called .signature.main, which will contain the part of
   the signature that never change, but containing some
   special codes (such as [t) that are changed by Randsig
   by taglines or so. The second file is .signature.tags,
   and it should contain all our taglines between [* and
   *] strings.

   Randsig can also use external programs, such as fortune,
   to provide the funny/serious sentences for the .signature
   file.


HOW TO USE THIS PROGRAM

  1- You create a .signature.main text file with the main
     text of you signature, and control codes in the places
     you like to have special features:


       [t
       ============================
        S. Romero Aka NoP/Compiler
       ============================


  2- You create a text file of taglines (short, funny or nice
     phrases said by someone :-) called .signature.tags in the
     following format:


      [*I use Windows95 and works very wel·$%&/# NO CARRIER*]
      [*If something can fail, it will fail (Murphy)*]
      [* hi everybody!
         This is a tag in various lines!*]
      (etc..., every sentence between [* and *])


  Then each time you run randsig you will get a random
  .signature file where the [t code is changed by one
  of the taglines on the tag-file, obtaining something
  like:


       If something can fail, it will fail (Murphy).
       ============================
        S. Romero Aka NoP/Compiler
       ============================


   That's a cheap and easy way of changing your signature
  each month, day or week, just putting Randsig in the
  crontab or running it each time you login (.bashrc file)
  (because email clients do use .signature for the msg end).

  As there can be lots of control-codes, the program can be
  amplified to put dates (using by example a [d tag), files
  (maybe [f), kernel version ([k using uname -a), and so
  on. As this is Open Source code, you can modify it to
  solve your needs. This version will support just the basic
  randsig control-codes, but I have demmand I would write
  a more complex one... just email me. Note too that all the
  characters named ([, *, etc.) can be changed by modifying
  the #define statements in the source code file.

  I've included some example tagline and signature files
  that you can install by executing ./install_examples
  Then edit ~/.signature.main and ~/.signature.tags to
  change your sig and add/delete taglines.

  If you use "randsig -r" or "--rotate", the program will
  take sequentially the taglines from the tag file, instead
  of randomly, and starting from the first tagline. It will
  advance to the next tagline when this is used.

  In the other hand, if you want to use randsig to obtain
  a sentence on screen after each login, use the program as
  "randsig --show" or "randsig -s" to obtain a random sentence
  (from your tagline file). This is nice to add it on the
  .bashrc file on your HOME directory (the contents of that
  file are executed each time you make login).

  My .bashrc contains the following:

    randsig --show
    randsig --rotate --daily

  This way I obtain a funny sentence on screen each login
  plus a new .signature file to sign up my email/news messages
  each day (the --daily option checks the system date and only
  changes the tag each day, no matter the number of logins made).

  If use the [e tag (e=external), then the ~/.randsig.external
  script will be called, so that you can put into it something
  like "fortune -s", and the output of external programs will
  be used as the tagline... This can help you to show people
  your superb uptime, or use fortune or any other program as
  tagline provider.

  Rest of program options can be seen by executing "randsig -h".

DOWNLOAD SECTION

CHANGELOG

 
Version 1.5
 - By petition, added -s (--show) option just to show a
   funny sentence on the screen. Now you can use this
   option on .bashrc or with xchat's /exec -o randsig -s
   (working like fortune).
             
 Version 1.4
 - Added external program (like fortune) support.
 - Added a script to add fortune tags to the .tag file.
 - Changed the docs, and well... if no bugs are discovered,
   this will be the FINAL version, as I don't want to
   convert randsig on an entire O.S. by itself :)
   THANKS Randsig contributors and users for the support!

 Version 1.2:
 - Changed calls to fprintf to fputs to prevent writing
   printf C style strings (the %d's were replaced by
   numbers and so on).
 - Added -d --daily option by Grzegorz Adam Hankiewicz
   (gradha@iname.com)
 - Changed the docs and added this file.

 Version 1.1:
 - Makefile added.
 - Some stupid bugs fixed.

 Version 1.0:
 - That was first release, with some initial problems :)