Thunderstone File URLs

Thunderstone's URLs are just slightly different from the standard file URL and have a service type prefix of tfile:. Thunderstone's URLs have additional information placed at the end of the path and filename that indicate where in the file a to look for hit information.

Suppose there is a Metamorph 80 byte hit at byte offset 1234 in a document called "foobar.txt"; that runnung on a Thunderstone server at port 666 called "thunder.thunderstone.com" in directory "/pub/files". The URL for this file is then:

tfile://thunder.thunderstone.com:666/pub/files/foobar.txt@1234,80

The information after the path-filename has the following syntax :

[@absolute_offset,total_length[,sub_offset,sub_length]...]...

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx = xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx  
TYPE                > MEANING      
@                        > Signal to indicate a following absolute_offset 
absolute_offset   > Number of bytes from the beginning of the file   
total_length      > Number of bytes contained in the total hit 
sub_offset        > Number of bytes from the absolute_offset  
sub_length        > Number of bytes contained in the sub hit   
[]                > Optional parameter 
...               > Optional repetition

For example:

tfile://abc.com:666/tmp/junk.txt@1234,80,3,4,10,5@2048,10

Would be interpreted as:

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx=xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
tfile:         > A Thunderstone file type     
//abc.com      > on the server abc.com 
:666           > listening to port 666        
/tmp/junk.txt  > in the file /tmp/junk.txt                                
@1234          > at offset 1234               
,80            > for a length of 80 characters 
,3             > theres a sub hit at 1234+3 bytes
,4             > that has a length of 4 characters 
,10             > another sub hit at 1234+10 bytes
,5             > that has a length of 5 characters 
@2048          > and another hit at offset 2048   
,10            > that has a total length of 10 characters