DIPS (Dynamic IP Server) - visit http://DIPS.home.ml.org/ to find out more...

Advanced Users

NetMeeting SpeedDial

(credit for some of the following information goes to Bruce Winter)

If you're using Microsoft's NetMeeting (which is also free) then you might be interested in how you can use DynamIP to automatically update your Speed Dial file. This is particularly useful if your web pages contain links to your Speed Dial file so that people can call you by simply clicking on an icon in their browser (hey, not everybody wants to be listed on those ULS servers...). On the other hand, the combination MS Internet Explorer and NetMeeting version 2.x allows for a more elegant solution with the tag callto.

* note that the above is only a sample (the link does NOT work!)

Here's how to do it:

1. Download the file NetMeetingCNF.txt which looks as follows:
   [ConferenceShortcut]
   ConfName=NOT.ON.LINE.NOW
   Address=NOT.ON.LINE.NOW
   CallFlags=65539
   Transport=1
   `
2. Put this file into your DynamIP directory (it could actually be anywhere, but let's assume that you put it into the DynamIP directory for the sake of this example).
   `
3. Start DynamIP and define a new connection handle that looks as follows:
   
   The entries for all the other fields are to be filled in the same way you would do it for any other file you want to upload. Do NOT check HTTP Server and FTP Server and leave the DateTime field alone as well. Note that you can change the entry for IP, but then you must also edit the file NetMeetingCNF.txt and adapt the entries for ConfName and Address accordingly. Don't forget to check the Active box!
   `
4. Now you only have to add a bit of HTML code to your web pages (basically a link to the file SpeedDial.cnf). The following code produces the example above and assumes that the icon (netmeetingicon.gif) and the file SpeedDial.cnf are both located in the same directory as your web page on the server:

<table border="1" cellpadding="6" cellspacing="1">
  <tr>
    <td width="160">MS NetMeeting</td>
    <td>
      <table>
        <tr>
           <td rowspan="2" width="40"><a href="SpeedDial.cnf">
               <img src="netmeetingicon.gif" align="bottom"
               border="0" width="36" height="36"></a></td>
           <td><a href="SpeedDial.cnf">click to call!</a>*</td></tr>
        <tr>
           <td><font size="1">the message <strong>NOT,ON,LINE,NOW
               could not be found</strong><br> means that I'm not
               accepting calls at the moment...</font></td>
       </tr></table></td>
  </tr>
</table> 

<a href="SpeedDial.cnf">click to call!</a> 

Note that you don't have to upload web pages containing the above links every time you go online/offline. It's the file SpeedDial.cnf that contains the relevant information (and hence you should upload that one whenever your IP address changes). That's the reason why you had to define a new connection handle in step 3 above.

Anybody who has MS NetMeeting 1.0 (or NetMeeting v2.0 beta x) and MS Internet Explorer 3.0 installed will now be able to call you directly from their browser. With Netscape, unfortunately, this will only work if the web server that hosts your pages is set up such that it will treat files with the extension CNF properly (MIME type), otherwise you will just get a text file...

NetMeeting callto

The combination MS Internet Explorer and MS NetMeeting version 2.x supports the tag callto. If you add the following HTML code to your template, DynamIP will automatically update the tag so that people can call you directly from your web page:

click <a href="callto:NOT.ON.LINE.NOW">here</a> to call me

Note, however, that you must upload this template each time your IP address changes. If you want to add a "clickable" NetMeeting link to a lot (or all) of your pages, it is probably more efficient to use this alternate method (SpeedDial).

Vocaltech IPhone iphone

The combination MS Internet Explorer and Vocaltech IPhone supports the tag iphone. If you add the following HTML code to your template, DynamIP will automatically update the tag so that people can call you directly from your web page:

click <a href="iphone:NOT.ON.LINE.NOW">here</a> to call me

Note, however, that you must upload this template each time your IP address changes.

Use WEBchat without uploading files

All right, the task at hand is to get WEBchat running without uploading any web pages to other servers. The "ingredients" are as follows:

• DynamIP installed (version v3.0 Final Release or newer).
• A Web server (HTTPD) running on your own computer. If you're on Windows95 you can download Microsoft's Personal Web Server 1.0a for free! If you have MS FrontPage installed, you can obviously use the HTTPD that comes with it. And thanks to a healthy competition in this area there are many other servers available. A good place to check them out is Chris Wagner's SlaughterHouse at http://www.slaughterhouse.com/server.html. If you have WindowsNT you can obviously use the built-in services.
• A working DIPS account (DIPS - Dynamic IP Server - is absolutely free and does exactly what we need to get WEBchat working!

And here are the instructions:

1. If you don't have a DIPS account yet, connect to http://DIPS.home.ml.org/ and get your own DIPS account (you may want to read the FAQ some of the information available there to familiarize yourself with DIPS). Also, if you get your DIPS account now, you should have the password in your e-mail box by the time we need it.
   `
2. Install and configure the Web server of your choice on your computer (all servers come with plenty of instructions and tips, so please don't send me e-mail if you can't get it to work - dump your questions on those who wrote the manuals...). If you have a choice, you should make sure that the Web server uses port 80 (this is the standard port for HTTPD). As for the root directory, the default settings should be ok. Just make yourself a note of the root path of your web as you will need this information later on. Note that the root path of your web is most likely not the same as the path of your Web server!!! The root path of your web points to the directory on your computer where the root page of your web (or the main page, e.g. index.html) resides, whereas the path of your Web server points to the location where you installed the Web server (the program).
   `
3. Once you have your Web server installed, you should verify that it works correctly. Start your browser (Netscape, Internet Explorer, ...) and load the page http://localhost/. If everything is configured properly this should load the root page of your web (note that some servers need a few additional configuration steps to have them load the default page automatically - until you've figured out those details you might have to load one of the following pages into your browser:
   - http://localhost/index.htm
   - http://localhost/index.html
   - http://localhost/default.htm
   - http://localhost/default.html
   - ...
   For the rest of these instructions I will assume that your Web server is configured in such a way that the page index.html gets loaded automatically whenever you load the page http://localhost/ in your browser and the root path of your web is C:\WWW (that is the directory WWW on your C:\ drive).
   `
4. Now we are going to set up DynamIP so that it "uploads" the WEBchat page to your local Web server. Start DynamIP and then choose the menu Setup|Uploader. Enter information into the various fields so that it matches the following display:

   `

   Explanations: ` The entry in the field Remote Host is <!--skip--> and it tells DynamIP to skip uploading the file to the remote host. The entries in Template ONline and Template OFFline assume that you installed DynamIP into the default directory. If you installed DynamIP into some other directory then you have to adapt these entries (use the file dialog box to select the template file DynamIP_.htm). The entry in the field Local File is the root path of your web and the file name (if you don't have any other pages on your web, you can obviously have DynamIP create your default page - the entry would then be C:\WWW\index.html). `

5. Now you click the button "OK" and choose the menu File|Save Configuration to store these new settings.
   `
6. Test whether all this works by choosing the menu File|ONline in DynamIP. If DynamIP doesn't generate the file DYNAMIP.HTM in your directory C:\WWW you might have to enable logging to find out what's wrong (Setup|Options and then click LOG Connection . Refer to the Uploader trouble-shooting section for help). Note that DynamIP will only generate this file if you're connected to the Net.
   `
7. Now we are going to set up the DIPS client in DynamIP. You will need your DIPS password (the one that was e-mailed to you after you signed up for an account with DIPS). Start DynamIP and then choose the menu Setup|DIPS. The latest setup info for DIPS is always available at http://DIPS.home.ml.org (they have screen shots there), so please refer to their page (things are still changing and I want to avoid having outdated information on this site...). Once you've entered all the information you click the button "OK" and then choose the menu File|Save Configuration to store these new settings.

That's it! If you have DynamIP running, it will automatically upload all the necessary information to the DIPS server as soon as you're connected to the Net and your local Web server is running. You can add your fixed DIPS URL to your e-mail signature or distribute it otherwise to let people know how they can find out whether you're online and where they can start a real-time WEBchat with you. As an example, my personal WEBchat page is available from http://hut.stanford.edu/dips/cmu/DYNAMIPCMU.HTM if I'm online. Feel free to check it out, but please don't waste my time by initiating chat session just for fun...

DIPS (Dynamic IP Server) - visit http://DIPS.home.ml.org/ to find out more...

e-mail

cmu@bigfoot.com http://cmu.home.ml.org

hits since February 01, 1996
Last modified: June 07, 1997