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Text File | 1996-06-18 | 15.2 KB | 299 lines

Telegard Bulletin Board Software, v3.00 RELEASE Documentation Copyright (C) 1996 by Tim Strike All Rights Reserved. These are just notes that I have compiled over time with regards to the many questions I get asked daily. This is not a F.A.Q., but is a way of explaining how and why certain things work the way they do with Telegard. It will be continually updated. New topics (from release to release) will be marked with a "|" pipe character along the left margin. REFERENCE FILES AND DOCUMENTATION * Telegard includes some small reference files in /notes/, all with the extension of *.REF. These files cover various aspects of the system, included ACS commands, COLOUR commands, MCI codes, MENU commands, SCRIPT commands, SYSOP FUNCTION keys, TEXT files and the command line options for Telegard. * Telegard documentation has not been completed at the time of the release of gamma-3. Our goal is to complete the documentation for the final 3.0 release. In the mean time, Kevin Watkins has done a fine job on the pre-release documentation, which is distributed in it's current form as TELEGARD.DOC. UTILITIES * INDEX.EXE was not designed to be run while a user is online; this is for several reasons, but main reason is it modifies files which the online user will access at some point. Indexing should *ONLY* be run when a user is *NOT* online. This goes for single or multinode setups. * USERS.EXE allows you to pack away deleted users (unlike 2.7, Telegard 3.0 does not automatically reuse deleted accounts). USERS.EXE also allows sorting of the userbase -- first it sorts by security level, and then it sorts by user name within each security level echelon. MAINTENANCE * Telegard is, for the most part, self-maintaining. The index files are designed to work without interruption and most of the data files automatically handle packing and removal of unused records. That said, the Telegard index files do require some maintenance to maintain top performance. It is recommended that you: (i) Run INDEX SORT ALL on a nightly schedule (ii) Run INDEX BUILD ALL on a weekly schedule, if not every couple of days LANGUAGES * Telegard 3.0 no longer has an internal strings list. All strings are stored in an external language file (the default of which is ENGLISH.TXT in /language/). To change this file, use a text editor which does *not* strip spaces from the end of a line (Qedit with said option disabled works well). After changing any language file, you must recompile it. From your /language/ directory, run "C:\BBS\LANGUAGE\MAKELANG <language>" and this will compile your new language strings. * The language system is fairly extensive, and just about every user-viewable string can be configured in any manner you like. For more information, see the header in ENGLISH.TXT, and don't forget about the *.REF files in /notes/. MESSAGES * Telegard uses JAM and Squish message bases because they are standardized. Standardized formats allow external utilities to easily work with Telegard, without the need of a conversion program (/a la TELEMAIL). For these reasons as well, I have not taken the time to develop a message base packer for Telegard -- it's development time that I just don't have. There are several external packers available -- some with freeware/evaluation packages, others with shareware packages: Gecho 1.10+ Registered Only MBUTIL JAM FastEcho 1.45a Shareware FEUTILS JAM Fmail 1.02g Shareware FTOOLS JAM Squish 1.11 Shareware SQPACK Squish * File attaches are enabled in Telegard, but the popular JAM tossers do not support or do not correctly support incoming and outgoing messages. I suggest limiting attaches to local bases *ONLY* for now. * Editing of messages will *not* be added to Telegard. I have my personal reasons, and while I realize that it is an often requested feature, I refuse to submerge my values for others on everything -- I will implement some features I don't agree with, this won't be one of them! Setup an external SysOp editor (TimEd, GoldEd, etc) to the editing of messages if you so desire. Or export/capture the message, delete the post, and resend it. | * Message bases only update the lastread pointer if using the | NEWSCAN option. This is done *on purpose*. Reading forwards | through a base, or for that matter, reverse, would cause the | highread to be set when it wasn't meant to be set. This is not | a bug, and infact, is a rather useful and powerful feature | (which I won't change now or in the future -- sorry). * Internal full screen editing will *not* be added to Telegard in the near future. My development time is limited to new features -- since many FSE programs already exist, some with extended TG3 support, I refuse to re-invent the wheel while I have other areas of concern. * However, Telegard works quite well with external FSE programs! Telegard 3.0 has been tested with IceEdit (v1.50, Ice Technologies, 1:259/912), Gedit (v2.10, The Developers Network, 1:170/303) and QuickEd (v1.nn, Dror Tirosh). Other FSE programs have not been tested, and may not work that well with Telegard (i.e. TopEd and it's awkward multinode configuration/expectations) PROTOCOLS AND ARCHIVERS (and for that matter, MODEMS) * Telegard uses an advanced setup mechanism for protocols, archivers and modems. We provide working setups which have been tested for the most popular products, and allow you to quickly import these setups and us as-is. Most of these setups do not require any form of modification. To import the release setups for protocols, archivers and modems, goto the respective area, select the item to define, select option (!)Definition Files, select (I)mport and select the correct item to import. Telegard gamma-3 also prompts when adding/deleting these items if you wish to import a pre-define definition. If at all possible, DO THIS. It will save you many headaches when trying to setup these external programs on your system. * LHA troubleshooting -- If you are using LHA/LZH on your system, make sure you run a version which is compatible with extracting to a specific path. I personally use LHA 2.05. If you have problems unpacking mail/files from an LHA archive -- then try changing ~AP to ~AP\ in the definition, and if it *still* doesn't work, try removing ~AP entirely from the definition. * RAR troubleshooting -- RAR encrypted archive handling (archives w/ file passwords) is _very_ poor. To ensure that RAR does not mess up files on your system, use the RAR definition included with Telegard -- it has been tested with version 1.54/1.55. * DSZ/GSZ configuration -- If you are using non-standard port setups for your communications, then you will need to update your DSZ/GSZ protocol definitions. Change "PORT ~CP" to "PORTX ~CJ,~CI" and that should alleviate the problems. Make sure that within Telegard you have your modem BASE I/O ADDRESS and IRQ set properly as well (single nodes -> Config.Modem, multiple nodes -> Manager.Nodes.Modem). * BIMODEM troubleshooting -- don't bother. BiModem is *not* worth the effort because it has poor error handling and is prone to problems. If you really must use BiModem, then set it up from the docs as if you were using DSZ compatibility, and then use the DSZ definition as a base definition, updating only the protocol command lines and description. * Protocol troubleshooting, in general -- There are several things to check when troubleshooting protocol problems: (i) Are you using non-standard ports? If YES, you will likely need to modify your protocols so they know this. (ii) Have you set the log options correctly? Check by looking at a imported definition for examples -- or better yet, *use* an imported definition. If you have a SET DSZLOG= statement *outside* of Telegard, remove it so as not to interfere with protocol SET statement. (iii) Is your environment size big enough for the SET= statement used by the protocol? DOS defaults the environment to 256 bytes. If you have increased your environment or are getting close to the 256 byte mark outside of Telegard, then you need to increase the environment *inside* Telegard -- setup environment size under SystemConfig.e(X)ternal. MULTINODE CONSIDERATIONS | * When loading Telegard in a multinode environment from a batch | file, I suggest including the -O command line parameter. This | assumes that the node specified on the command line *is* the | correct node number, and will override any previous node status | left from a system crash or whatnot. | The main reason that -O was *not* made the default, was that it | was assumed that the batch files could easily pass -O to | override, while a local user typing 'TELEGARD -Nnn' to boot the | system would not neccessarily type the correct node number, thus | overriding an active node, and killing the process. Thus, | automated processes like .BAT files loading Telegard on a known, | specific node, should use -O to override the settings. | * Door drop files are stored in /TEMPnnn/ under multinode systems. | When running doors under a multinode system, it is suggested | that you look at several things: | (a) Can the door handle more than one node at once? If | not, you will need to use the script SINGLE.SCR -- read | it for implementation instructions. | (b) If the door can handle more than one node, it *should* | have the ability to point to the directory containing | the door drop files -- use /TEMP%1/ with the ~CN | command in your batch file to pass the node directory. OPERATING SYSTEM LIMITATIONS * DOS directory limits - DOS and most operating systems can't handle a large number of files in any given directory. Remember this and try and keep your directories limited to a smaller number of files; each JAM/Squish area requires 5 data files, and thus storing 100 areas in one directory results in 500 files. Separating the files into categories (most notably, Networks) can cut down on access time for those files. It's more significant on multinode systems, but I suggest keeping the number of files to somewhere between 100 and 150, meaning keep the number of areas per directory to around 30. | * Telegard has very much been designed for DOS 8+3 filename type | systems. To change this would require some of the guts of the | system to be removed and reworked, and in all honesty, I'm not | going to make the effort. File systems which use longer | filenames can also use 8+3 format -- so use that format for BBS | related files. Windows '95 users can use the SHORTFILE name for | backwards compatibility. | OTHER ISSUES | | * There is no shuttle logon menu, nor will I ever add one to the | Telegard code. It's a personal issue, and I just don't agree | with shuttle logon processes. If you wish to add a shuttle | logon, use a script file (top of LOGON.SCR, or a seperate | shuttle logon), or use a logon menu. Please do not ask me to | code one into Telegard; your message will be deleted and I will | not respond. Sorry. INTERESTING TID-BITS * So you want to display certain files on certain dates (01/01, 12/25, etc.) -- well, this is very easy with Telegard and the scripting file. For instance, adding the following line to your LOGON.SCR will allow you to display these timely files automatically: | FILEDISPLAY ~EP/-~EL5~SJ Will then display any file in the form of mm-dd.* on that particular date. So 01-01.* is display on 01/01, 12-25.* is displayed on 12/25, etc. | * To parse IF/IFNOT statements for empty strings (""), try | putting a dummy character on either side of the test: i.e. | IF "!~&1" "!" will parse only if ~&1 == NULL, and replaces | the logical statement of IF "~&1" "" which most of us would try. | This is similar to the logical problems in .BAT files and the | token based parsing of the current script language. * To reset your time logging graphs, delete the file TIMELOG.DAT when no user is online and all nodes are sitting in DOS. This will start new graphs the next time a user logs on. Regards, Tim Strike Fidonet 1:259/423 Internet ts@gryn.org *or* 4ts2@qlink.queensu.ca WWW http://qlink.queensu.ca/~4ts2 FTP ftp://filebank.com/telegard BBS (905)820-7273 2400-16,800 Dual Standard (HST/V32bis) 24 hours, except ZMH (4:00-5:00pm)