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1993-09-06
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ChatterBox V2.01
Copyright 1993, Greg Ratajik.
September 5, 1993
Genie : G.RATAJIK
CompuServe: 74555,542
Internet : G.RATAJIK@genie.geis.com
or : 74555.542@compuserve.com
Voice : (301)/916-0018
To register, send $20 check or money order, payable
to Greg Ratajik, to:
Greg Ratajik
1722 Forres Ave.
St. Joseph, MI 49085
-------------------------------------------------------------------
ChatterBox is a Shareware program. If you find ChatterBox
useful, please send $20 to the above address (And if you find it
VERY useful, feel free to send what you think is a fair price.)
Registering ChatterBox will remove the 12-31-93 end date, and will
allow you to receive notification of changes and any updates up to
version 4.0. If you intend to have more than 10 nodes on a site,
please send a message to any of the contact address, to negotiate
an on-site contract.
I hope you find ChatterBox useful, but (DISCLAIMER) I am
in no way responsible for any damages the use of ChatterBox may
cause.
If you have any questions, comments, ideas, etc, feel free to
contact me. I'm always looking for ways to improve my software!
Enhancements since Version 1.0
------------
Version 1.05
o Fix of modeless dialogs (Chatter was creating a new
instance of a dialog each time the user pressed a
push-button. This eventually caused the Graphical push-
button API to fail.)
Version 2.00 - Shareware version level 0.01 (Not released)
o Addition of GATEWAY (Multi-LAN and Domain) See
information below on how to use.
Version 2.01 - Shareware version level 0.02 (Released 9-5-93)
o Fixed INI corruptions.
o Auto-detect INI problems.
o Added 5-message review scroll bar.
o Enhanced Graphical push-button API's
o Enhanced NET API Errors (If you installed DB2/2, but were
not on a LAN, ChatterBox would not give errors, and would
sometimes TRAP-D. )
-----------------------------------------------------------------
I. General
ChatterBox allows you to enter a message that will be
displayed on anyone's computer that is running ChatterBox, on
your LAN.
The original idea for ChatterBox was a program that
displayed and changed cute little sayings on your screen,
based on text in a file. This just carries the idea another
step.
I've found ChatterBox useful for sending non-critical
messages, and those that not everyone MUST see, to other
people that I work with. (i.e. If someone brings a cake in
for everyone, you don't really need an actual electronic
message sent out, you really don't want to annoy everyone with
a Net Message, but something non-intrusive like ChatterBox is
just right.)
II. Operation of ChatterBox
To send a message, Click on the ChatterMouth push-button.
This will bring up the Send Pop-up. Type in whatever message
you like, and click on the send push-button. If you are on an
IBM-LAN, everyone on that LAN will see the message you type
on their Chatter Screen. If you are just local, only you will
see the message.
To control the speed, Beeps, and Gateways of ChatterBox,
click on the ChatterEye pushbutton. This will bring up the
Control Pop-Up. From this pop-up, you can change the scroll
speed by selecting a new number in the speed combo-box. (0 is
stopped, 10 is the fastest, etc.) If you want to change what
level of tone/beep you hear when a new message comes in, click
on the ChatterSound pushbutton.
For information on ChatterBox, click on the ChatterInfo
pushbutton.
To scroll the last five messages you have received, click
on the scroll bar next to the ChatterMouth.
GATEWAY Information - One of the problems in the original
version of ChatterBox was that you could only send messages to
those that were are your LAN/Domain. Version 2.0+ of
ChatterBox allows you to set up something called a GateWay.
These gateways allows you to designate a computer to send
messages to whenever you receive them. This allow to send to
any LAN or domain you have access to.
Example: User 1 is on LAN A. User 2 is on LAN B. User 3 is
on LAN B. If User 1 sets up User 2 as a GateWay,
and User 3 sets up user 1 as a GateWay, this is
what would happen:
User 1 Sends a message. This message gets relayed
to user 2. ChatterBox detects this is a message
from a gateway, so sends the message to everyone on
LAN B. User 3 is on LAN B, so he'll get the
message. He will, in turn, send the message back
to User 1 on LAN A, as user 1 was set up as a
gateway. ChatterBox will detect this is a message
from a GateWay, but that he's already processed
that message, so will do nothing.
If User 2 sends a message, it will go to User 3,
who will in turn send that message to User 1, who
will broadcast it to his LAN.
Yes, this is somewhat complex. I've had a total of 6 LAN's,
from all over the U.S. hooked up in the above manner. It does
work, it seems to work well, but it's not very elegant. I
hope the next version will either be CPI-C or NetBios, which
could bypass this problem.
I would suggest you be very careful in setting up these
gateways. I could see where if a lot of people are using
ChatterBox, and everyone has GateWays to everyone else,
problems may arise.
The BEST way to use ChatterBox on a large scale is to set it
up on each Server, and have the GateWays point to each Server
that you want to communicate to. This way, only one computer
on a LAN would have gateways, and the gateways could be
planned out a little better.
(NOTE: The Machine name can be found in the IBMLAN.INI file
or through Net Requester.)
III. Technical information.
ChatterBox was written and tested using:
486DX 33 Mhz Clone
SuperVGA Monitor
IBM OS/2 Lan requester 1.3 CSD 5050
OS/2 1.3
LAN Server for 1.3
This has also been run on machines and OS's other than
the above configuration (Including under OS/2 2.1, OS/2 2.0,
and several beta's between). If you're using something other
than SuperVGA, some of the custom pushbuttons may be slightly
off (but still usable.)
ChatterBox uses something called a MailSlot. These
Mailslots are available to anyone with a IBM LAN card on their
machine. You don't have to be logged on to a LAN for
ChatterBox to work (But you do have to have Net Requester
installed, and a card on your machine.)
Mailslot are the same thing that Net Massaging uses to
send messages. As you may know, there is no way to guarantee
that a broadcast message is received. While under normal
conditions I have not had a problem with ChatterBox users not
getting messages, it is possible for them to get lost en-
route, or overwritten if there is a lot of local traffic to
the same mailslot. This is, unfortunately, a limit of the
technology being used. If you have a problem getting
messages, you can increase the NUMDGRAMBUF parameter in your
IBMLAN.INI file. This increases available Local Mailslot
space, and may alleviate some local traffic problems.
IV. Other IBM-LAN Based software on it's way....
o NetChat - This program allows many users to have Chat
sessions over the LAN. It allows each user to set
up Conference groups and security levels. Each
Conference can have as many users as you want
Chatting. This is similar to CompuServer's CB, or
a BBS's multi-node chat area. (This will be released
Sept. '93.)
o NetMail - Improved net massaging (i.e. "Blue Boxes")
This program gives you better control of
system level LAN messages. You can enter message
subjects, set priority levels, and type in longer
messages.
NetMail allows each user to set up their own
message groups, along with global message groups.
Each user can choose which groups to receive
messages from, and what groups to send messages to.
NetMail also let's you choose whether to get
the message in the traditional VIO BlueBox (but
better looking!), a PM Message Box, or to display
no message but to retrieve it at a latter time.
This program makes Net Massaging easier to
use, and less annoying to the recipients.
ADDITIONAL NOTE:
I've had reports that the CHATTER.INI file is sometimes
getting corrupted. I have not been able to reproduce this problem.
(I'm only able to run in a local loop. My server got fried a
couple of weeks ago.... Hopefully, if enough people register
ChatterBox, I'll be able to buy a new server machine...) I would
suggest that if you are using gateways that you back the
Chatter.ini file up. ChatterBox will detect that the INI file has
been corrupted, and will DELETE it (Which can really be a pain, if
you don't back the INI file up and you don't remember the machine
names of your GateWay's)