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ARTICLE.012
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1993-11-15
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__________________________________________
An Introduction to Fido-Type Nets
Written by Pazuzu - November 15, 1993
(C) Copyright 1993 Digital News Associates
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
With everyone and their uncle wanting to join a net these days, and with 95%
of the nets out there using the Fido networking standard there needs to be a
tutorial on setting up on one of these nets. The terminology and volume of
software required to run on a Fido net can be quite daunting to the newcomer.
And nowhere does a complete guide to setting up on one exist - the info you
need is scattered across several software docs, and also in FTSC files which
no human can understand. It seems the only way to get going is just to "hack
it out" - with weird and often very negative results, or to get someone to do
it for you. Well, now there is hope! After running nets for 5 years now,
I've learned quite a bit about operating them and I've decided to share my
knowledge via this article.
The first thing you need to understand is how systems on a Fido-style net are
addressed. The official address format is Zone:Net/Node.Point. Now, this
terminology is a bit confusing at first, because the "Zone" part is actually
the net, while the "Net" part is really a "Sub-net" or region. Each separate
network is a different zone - CyberCrime is zone 69, Platinum is 93, and so
on. Within these nets, there are "sub-nets", usually individual area codes,
such as 5714 in CyberCrime. Some nets don't use the area code as the "Net"
entry, especially not FidoNet itself, but most of the underground nets do.
The "Node" part is just the individual number assigned to each system within
that Zone and Net. So Node #2 in the 5714 Net of Zone 69 would be 69:5714/2.
The "Point" part is a creation of Satan and only crack smokers mess with them
- they're basically "Sub-nodes" leeching off a main node. Don't worry about
points - they're being phased out anyway. Systems with a node number of 0 are
almost always hubs - this 0 address makes it easy to spot them - 69:5714/0 is
my CCi node number.
After you understand addressing (which is really rather simple, see?) the
next thing that confuses people is the volume of software required to operate
on the net. There's really not much REQUIRED (besides your BBS) - just a
mailer and most likely an echomail processor, but there is SO MUCH accessory
software out there that a lot of people get very confused. Don't worry too
much about all the other junk besides your mailer and echomail processor.
The mailer is definitely the most important part of your Fido networking
software - without it, you are NOTHING. There are several mailers available -
FrontDoor, Intermail, D'Bridge, etc. I prefer Intermail - it's easy as hell
to get going. Anyway, what your mailer does is run your entire system. You
will no longer load your BBS software to put your board up - you'll run a
batch file which runs your mailer. The mailer answers the phone, determines
if the call is a mail call or BBS call and reacts appropriately. If the call
is for your BBS, it exits with the errorlevel you specified for BBS calls,
which hopefully you have trapped in the batch file to load the BBS. If it is
a mail call, it receives the mail and waits for another call. It is very
important to understand the DOS errorlevel when setting up a mailer - most,
if not ALL, of them use errorlevels to control everything. Get a basic DOS
book if you don't understand ERRORLEVEL. The mailer also executes any nightly
events you have configured it to - usually polling your hub is one of them.
If you have any other nightly events your BBS was running - like packing
message bases, on-line game daily maintenance, etc - you now have to
configure these events into your mailer because your BBS isn't running unless
someone is on it!
The other piece of software you'll need is an echomail processor (unless your
mailer has one built it). My favorite is GEcho. In order for me to explain
why one is needed, I'll have to explain the way echomail works. Echomail is a
Fido standard for networked message bases. In this standard, each message
base has a separate directory on disk, and each message is a single file in
that directory with the name #.MSG ... Message #1 would be 1.MSG, #2 would be
2.MSG, and so on. This is a very simple concept, and one that works well. In
order to get the messages sent out to wherever they're going (most likely
your hub), they have to be packetized. What this means is that something
needs to gather them all up into one big file, and then .ZIP (or .ARJ, etc)
this file, and get it sent out. This needs to be done for EACH system your
system is feeding. This is what the echomail processor does. You also have to
have a third program, which comes with most BBS packages. This program is the
BBS's toss/scan program. What it does is take the new message from the BBS's
message data files, and create the *.MSG files in the proper directories.
This is called "SCANNING". It also takes incoming *.MSG files and puts them
into the BBS's message data files. This is called "TOSSING". Some BBS
packages do this automatically, without running a separate program, but most
don't. The program is usually called <something>mail.exe. Renegade's is
RENEMAIL, Celerity's is CELEMAIL, and so on.
Notice before I said " ... and get it sent out". How does this happen?
Well, the Fido standard was VERY limited in its early days - it supported
only messages between different persons on the net. However, each message
could have several attributes set in it - Crash, Private, etc. One of the
attributes is "File Attached". This is how echomail works - when the echomail
processor packetizes the messages, it creates a message addressed to the
SysOp of each system the messages go to (each system gets a separate packet,
too of course) from "ArcMail" with the File-Attached attribute set - then the
mailer knows to send that message (with the attached file of course) to that
system. On the other end, the receiving system's echo processor looks for all
messages from ArcMail, and then uncompresses the attached files, and places
the individual messages into the proper directories, then the BBS's tosser
runs and tosses the messages into the BBS's data files.
Because of the intimate interaction between the all these pieces of software,
it is important to make sure all of the programs are looking for stuff in the
right directories. Both the echomail processor and the BBS need to be set to
look for the *.MSG files in the same directory for each base. So, if INF-BBS
is set in the BBS to be in directory "C:\RG\ECHO\INF-BBS\", you had better
make it the same in the echomail processor so it can find and place the files
into the directory. Both the mailer and the echo processor - and sometimes
even the BBS - need to know where to store netmail messages. The echo
processor needs to know so that it creates the attach messages in the right
directory and of course the mailer needs to know so that it finds these
messages, and sometimes you may want the BBS to import netmail to you into
your private mail on the board - I don't, but some people do. So always make
sure your directories match - NON-MATCHING DIRECTORIES ARE THE BIGGEST CAUSE
OF NETS NOT WORKING!
You will also most likely see stuff in mailers and echo processors about
"Hudson Message Bases" - ALWAYS DISABLE THIS FEATURE - Set it to *.MSG or
"Nothing" if there's no *.MSG option. Hudson bases are used by some BBS's and
external editors, but they are evil and should be avoided by sane people.
Another thing you'll have to do is tell your hub which echoes you want. If
you're lucky, your hub will have AreaFix capability so you can do this at
will - automatically. If not, you'll have to email or call the SysOp of the
hub and tell him what you want. With AreaFix (or AreaMgr), all you do is send
a message to "AreaFix" at your hub, with your password in the subject line,
and a list of echoes you want, one per line in the body. You'll be
automatically added to the echoes. Much easier and faster than calling the
SysOp.
After you've got all this software configured and running, you'll have to
create a batch file which will automatically manage all this software. Below,
I've included my batch file, which I have named FRODO.BAT because I used to
run FrontDoor, and never got around to changing the name. I've included
enough REM statements for you to figure it out, and change it to work with
your setup. Good luck! - Next month, I'll go into more detail on some of the
things you can do with this versatile networking standard.
<pazuzu@netcom.com>
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