Protocol
PADmap format
The PADmap format consists of full PAD URLs in plain text mode, one URL per row. No other types of text (comments, empty rows, html tags, javascript blocks etc.) are allowed. All PAD URLs in a PADmap must be from a single host, such as www.yourdomain.com or subdomain.yourdomain.com. This is to ensure that all PAD URLs belong to the same software developer.
Sample PADmap
The following example shows a PADmap that contains 2 PAD URLs.
http://www.yourdomain.com/pads/software1_pad.xml http://www.yourdomain.com/pads/software2_pad.xml
Specifying PADmap file location
The location of a PADmap file should be specified inside PAD files from the same host using special PADmap extension for PAD generator software. The following node and its sub-nodes will be added to your PAD XML data inside the root <XML_DIZ_INFO> node:
<PADmap>
<PADmap_FORM>Y</PADmap_FORM>
<PADmap_DESCRIPTION>
Link to plain text file containing all your PAD URLs from current host
</PADmap_DESCRIPTION>
<PADmap_VERSION>1.0</PADmap_VERSION>
<PADmap_URL>http://www.padmaps.org/padmap.htm</PADmap_URL>
<PADmap_SCOPE>Company</PADmap_SCOPE>
<PADmap_Location>http://www.yourdomain.com/pads/padmap.txt</PADmap_Location>
</PADmap>
Where <PADmap_Location> specifies the URL of a PADmap containing all your PAD URLs in plain text mode (for other fields please refer to the official PAD extensions specification by ASP-Shareware.org).
Note: if you store all your PAD files in the single directory on your server and have specified your padmap file as the PAD files' directory index, you can specify the path to your PADs directory instead of the full path to your PADmap, e.g. http://www.yourdomain.com/pads/. For further instructions please refer to FAQ.
Notifying download sites
As far as PAD-enabled download site engines do neither crawl the whole sites by following any links, nor even read robots.txt files, the only way to notify download sites about your PADmap location is by using special PAD extension included in PADmap Kit. As soon as you specify your PADmap file location in previously submitted PAD files, all download sites can retrieve it by checking all PAD URLs in their databases for <PADmap_Location> field value, pick up your PADmap file and check the existing PAD URLs against the available PAD URLs to submit missing ones to their databases.
