AuctionSieve

AuctionSieve

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General

"Why haven't you replied to my email/feedback?"

Probably because I'm swamped! I have a full-time job, a wife and 3 kids. AuctionSieve is currently a side-project for me. I'm hoping to get to the stage where I can work on it full-time. The best way you can help me is to post your questions on the forum - there are many people who will be happy to help!

"Does AuctionSieve support eBay UK or other eBay sites?"

Yes, AuctionSieve supports the following international eBay sites

  • eBay US
  • eBay UK
  • eBay Australia
  • eBay Austria
  • eBay Belgium
  • eBay Canada
  • eBay France
  • eBay Germany
  • eBay India
  • eBay Ireland
  • eBay Italy
  • eBay Netherlands
  • eBay Spain
  • eBay Switzerland

"Why are you giving away AuctionSieve for free?"

I'm part of the eBay affiliates network, so I get a small amount of money from eBay if people view an auction through my program, place a bid and then win the auction. I'm not yet making enough to live off but the more people who use AuctionSieve, the more money I make. If I start making enough, I'll be able to work on it full-time and finally get around to that extensive list of feature requests ya'll have!

You can find out more about the eBay affiliate program here

"I'd like to include AuctionSieve on a magazine cover cd. Can I?"

Sure - I'd love you to! All I ask is that you send me a copy of the magazine.

"My question/problem isn't listed here."

Take a look on the forums - there may be an answer to your question there. If not, feel free to post a question yourself! Or you can always email me but you're likely to get a quicker response on the forums.

Usage

"When I try to Get Auctions I just get errors!"

First, have you just installed AuctionSieve? When you first install AuctionSieve, it will try to download the latest updates to ensure it can talk to eBay. By default, AuctionSieve checks for updates when you run it but if this is turned off, you can simply run AuctionSieve and select Tools->Check for updates.

If you have the latest version of AuctionSieve and you still get the problem, it may just be an intermittent network problem. Try not to Get Auctions for too many sieves at once.

Failing that, eBay may have changed their pages and AuctionSieve is having trouble interpreting them. Post on the forum or email to let me know!

To help me diagnose the problem, do the following :
- perform one of your searches which is having problems
- go to the folder where you installed AuctionSieve
- find a file called lastpage.html
- send it to me

"I don't want to see the auctions from when I ran my sieve yesterday. Can I make AuctionSieve remove them from the results?"

Yes. In the Filters panel on the right, tick 'Ignore auctions already seen'.

"Can I search in all categories?"

Yes! With version 1.2.0 and above you can perform regular eBay searches. You can also combine search results and limit your searches to a list of specific subcategories.

"How do I delete a sieve?"

Go to "File->Select Sieve...", click on the sieve you want to delete and press the delete button.

"Can you add support for sniping?"

No. I'm part of the eBay affiliate network and eBay specifically disallows sniping.

"Can AuctionSieve do xxx?"

Ask on the forums. There's also a special place where you can request a new feature - there's already quite an extensive list!

"Can I become a beta tester?"

Yes! It's easy. In AuctionSieve, select Tools->Check for beta updates.

You can also automate this. When you run AuctionSieve, it always checks for updates but this is just standard updates. You can make it check for beta updates by going to Tools->Options...->Updates tab and select "Check for beta updates on startup"

Windows issues

"I have Windows and clicking the 'View' link doesn't work"

Version 1.2.0 fixed this for most people's setups. If you are still having problems, please email me your operating system and browser details.

"Can I make AuctionSieve use a different browser like Firefox?"

Yes. When you click View, AuctionSieve launches your default browser. To change your default browser in Windows XP go to Start->Set Program Access and Defaults select Custom and click on the dropdown and choose Firefox (or Opera or whatever) as your default web browser.

If that doesn't work, then your Windows may have an incorrect file association. Try finding an html file on your hard drive and double click it to open it. It should launch your browser. If not, you need to view the properties of the file and change the "Opens with".

"I tried getting *lots* of auctions and AuctionSieve froze. What's up with that?"

AuctionSieve is running out of memory. To increase the memory available to AuctionSieve, find the directory where you installed it, and open up the file called AuctionSieve.lax in a text editor such as Notepad. Add the following line to the bottom of the file :

lax.nl.java.option.java.heap.size.max=256000000
save the file, and rerun AuctionSieve.

This will be fixed in future versions.

"How can I backup my AuctionSieve Data?"

Open up the folder where you installed AuctionSieve, usually C:\Program Files\AuctionSieve
- Copy (not move) the following files from that folder to another location for safekeeping:
all .sieve files
auctionsieve.properties
watchlist.txt
pricehistory.txt

Mac issues

"I just upgraded to 1.8.7 (ie reinstalled). Where'd my data go???"

Please look at the special note on the download page.

"I have a Mac and get an error when I try to install. Why?"

This should no longer happen with the latest version. For historical purposes (versions prior to 1.8.7), read on ...

This is a permissions problem. First of all, make sure you're placing AuctionSieve in the Applications folder. If that doesn't help, then the easiest way to get around this is to run the installer as the user 'root' (root is an all-powerful user). Some people have also been able to install it as long as they have Admin rights.

You can find instructions on how to create a root user account here : http://www.osxfaq.com/Tutorials/Root_User_Creation/index.ws

Once installed, you can log out of the root account, log in to your regular account and use AuctionSieve.

"I'm still having problems running AuctionSieve on Mac OS X 3.9. Can you help?"

There's a problem if you've updated to Quicktime 7.0.4 or later. Fortunately, Apple have released an update for Java which fixes the problem - "Java for Mac OS X 10.3 Update 5". Go here to get it :
http://www.apple.com/support/downloads/javaformacosx103update5.html

"I have Mac OS X and clicking the 'View' link doesn't do anything. How do I make it work?"

Go into Tools->Options and turn off the option "Force creation of new browser window when clicking View".

"Can I make AuctionSieve use a different browser like Firefox?"

Yes. When you click View, AuctionSieve launches your default browser. To change your default browser in Mac OS X
- Start Safari (the standard browser).
- From the Safari menu, choose Preferences...
- In the General tab, find the Default web browser pop-up menu and make your selection from the list.

"I get a NoSuchMethodError. What can I do?"

This seems to occur when people have upgraded to Panther (Mac OS X 10.3.3) and get the latest AuctionSieve update. I'm not sure why :-(. A workaround that seems to always work is to uninstall and reinstall AuctionSieve. Then you can get the update successfully. If that still doesn't work, email me.

"I use Mac OS X and it froze. How do I give AuctionSieve more memory?"

Increasing the memory for AuctionSieve on a mac is done in a different way. There's no AuctionSieve.lax file. Instead, do this :
- in Finder, go to the folder where you installed AuctionSieve
- control-click on the AuctionSieve app file and select "Show Package Contents"
- in that folder, find the file Info.plist and open it in a text editor
- search for 122M and change it to 256M
- save the file and run AuctionSieve again

"How can I backup my AuctionSieve Data?"

Open up the folder where you installed AuctionSieve
- Control click the AuctionSieve icon and select "Show Package Contents" from the pop-up menu
- Navigate to the Contents->Resources->Java folder
- Copy (not move) the following files from that folder to another location for safekeeping:
all .sieve files
auctionsieve.properties
watchlist.txt
pricehistory.txt

Linux issues

"I have Linux and clicking the 'View' link doesn't do anything. How do I make it work?"

AuctionSieve contains support for specifying your browser by specifying the -DBROWSER=<browser> parameter
where <browser> is the executable to launch your browser. This value can be set according to the *nix standard - ie any occurrence of %s will be replaced with the url. If there is no %s, then a space and the url is appended to form the command. Example -DBROWSER="/usr/bin/mozilla %s"

How you specify the parameter is up to you at the moment - but I'll probably include a .sh file in future versions.

Here is an example shell script (tested to work on Ubuntu - thanks to Keith!) : 

#!/bin/sh
#Location To AuctionSieve JAR
cd bin/auctionsieve/
#AuctionSieve Launch Parameters
java -DBROWSER="firefox %s" -jar auctionsieve.jar

Note that in versions 1.8.6 and earlier, the browser parameter was specified in the AuctionSieve.lax file

Open up the AuctionSieve.lax file where you installed AuctionSieve, and change this line : 

lax.command.line.args=$CMD_LINE_ARGUMENTS$
to this : 
lax.command.line.args=$CMD_LINE_ARGUMENTS$ -DBROWSER=<browser>

If that doesn't work, try adding this extra line to the file : 

lax.nl.java.option.additional=-DBROWSER=<browser>

Let me know which one works for you. Thanks to Dave Arndt for this suggestion!

"How can I backup my AuctionSieve Data?"

Open up the folder where you installed AuctionSieve
- Copy (not move) the following files from that folder to another location for safekeeping:
all .sieve files
auctionsieve.properties
watchlist.txt
pricehistory.txt
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