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- .TOPIC:
- Optimizing VBBS
-
- VBBS 6.12 Documentation -- 8-1
-
-
- ╔════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════╗
- ║ CHAPTER EIGHT OPTIMIZING VBBS ║
- ╚════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════╝
-
- Running a BBS -- and VBBS is no exception here -- is a
- major source of hard-drive wear and tear. This is not to put
- down any BBS software; it's just the nature of the beast. There
- are several steps you can take to optimize VBBS so as to minimize
- hard-drive abuse.
-
- "Defragging" Your Hard Drive
- ════════════════════════════
-
- One piece of maintenance you should run periodically is a
- program designed to de-fragment files on your hard drive. Daily
- maintenance erases the oldest messages on your hard drive, lea-
- ving "gaps" where those messages used to be. After several days
- of this, a map of your hard drive utilization can look like some-
- one took a shotgun to it -- empty sectors/clusters scattered all
- through your data.
- "Defragging" your hard drive puts your data into contigu-
- ous (adjacent) sectors/clusters, thereby reducing the amount of
- time it takes the read/write heads to access a particular piece
- of information. Utilities such as Norton's SPEEDISK accomplish
- this quite well; be prepared, though, to spend several minutes
- watching the process when you run it the first time.
-
- --> IMPORTANT NOTE: Just to be on the safe side, you SHOULD NOT
- run a disk defragmentation program from
- within VBBS or from WFC; always EXIT the
- BBS prior to running the program.
-
- Using a RAMdrive
- ════════════════
-
- Another means of optimization is to place the most fre-
- quently accessed files -- menus and such -- into a RAMdrive
- (virtual disk). By loading the most frequently accessed files
- into RAM, many systems will realize system speedup ranging from
- modest to substantial.
- VBBS textfiles and menus within the \TXT directory pro-
- bably benefit most from being placed in a RAMdrive; these would
- be the .MNU, .ANS/.ASC, and .TXT files. Because they are acces-
- sed often, having them in RAM can substantially decrease hard-
- drive access. Another group of files suitable for placing in a
- RAMdrive are your script files -- the .V, .COD and .LIT files.
- This speeds the process of loading the scripts, since no disk
- access is performed.
- To install a RAMdrive, include the following in your
- CONFIG.SYS file:
-
- DEVICE=RAMDRIVE.SYS 80 /E
-
- This command line creates an 80-kilobyte RAMdrive; the "/E"
- switch tells DOS to place the RAMdrive in EXTENDED memory.
-
- VBBS 6.12 Documentation -- 8-2
-
-
- In addition, the default limit on the number of files that can
- be placed in a RAMdrive (as would be the case in the above ex-
- ample) is 64; if you want to place more files than that in the
- RAMdrive, you need a command line similar to this:
-
- DEVICE=RAMDRIVE.SYS 128 128 /E
-
- The above command line would create a 128K RAMdrive with a maxi-
- mum of 128 files in extended memory. For more information,
- please consult your DOS manual or reference book.
- To make the best use of a RAMdrive, you need to be run-
- ning a 286 or 386 computer with at least 1 Mb of RAM and the
- DOS device HIMEM.SYS (an extended memory manager) loaded. If
- you're running a 386, you might consider QEMM386 as your exten-
- ded memory manager.
-
- --> IMPORTANT NOTE: It is recommended that you do NOT assign
- your VBBS \TEMP directory to a RAMdrive.
- .TOPIC:
- Security
- ╔════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════╗
- ║ SECURITY ║
- ╚════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════╝
-
- VBBS provides a high level of security. One of the most
- significant security features of VBBS is that it will not allow a
- remote user to drop to DOS through internal functions. If you
- would like to enable a remote drop-to-DOS capability, you will
- need to install DOORWAY or V-SHELL (both shareware programs)
- as a door from VBBS. This is generally a much safer method, and
- in the case of using DOORWAY, provides a much more powerful re-
- mote interface than a built-in remote DOS access routine could.
- By using a program such as this, you may also run VBBS utilities
- such as VCONFIG remotely.
- In VCONFIG, you have the option of allowing remote sysops.
- Allowing a remote sysop will let a user with a SL of 255 who
- knows the system password to access the sysop functions of VBBS.
- Pressing [S] from the sysop menu will show all users on the sys-
- tem who have security level access. Although a user may view
- an archive, there is no function that will allow him or her to
- extract an archive. As with all BBS software, it is recommended
- that you register DSZ (ZModem) for maximum security.
- VBBS uses a \SYSOP directory which stores all files up-
- loaded to the system and files sent that were attached to E-mail.
- Here, the sysop has the ability to view, scan and move the files
- and file listings to the appropriate directory after review. Be
- sure to leave the maximum settings for this database at 0 (zero)
- and make sure that DSZ.COM is in your path (a common mistake
- when setting up for the first time).
- VBBS features a special exclusion file, EXCLUDE.TXT, in
- which you define whole filenames, partial filenames, or DOS
- extensions that you wish VBBS to NOT allow upload of (such as
- .GIF). It is highly recommended that you do NOT delete any of
- the lines in the default EXCLUDE.TXT provided.
-
- VBBS 6.12 Documentation -- 8-3
-
-
- VBBS allows you to automatically check for archive
- integrity and viruses. See Automatic New Upload Scanner
-
- Upload Security
- ═══════════════
-
- Traditionally, virused programs or hackers attempt to access
- a bbs by uploading a bogus file. Batch upload protocols are
- especially useful to hackers due to their inherent structure
- for handling uploads. To prevent this, take the following
- advice:
-
- 1. Don't allow users to upload to your main VBBS directory;
-
- 2. Don't put upload directories in your PATH;
-
- 3. VBBS runs from its main directory at all times except during
- non-VXY uploads. If VXY is being used, VBBS stays at its main
- directory. If DSZ (for example) is being used, VBBS will CD
- to the target upload directory just long enough to run
- DSZ.COM to do the upload, and then CD back to the main VBBS
- directory immedaitely thereafter. It is important that the full
- path to DSZ be specified in one's upload configuration.
- Eg: c:\dos\DSZ.COM etc etc
-
- 4. If using DSZ, use the 'restrict' command on its command line
- to prevent redirection of directories, and install it in its
- own directory off of your root directory, e.g. c:\dsz, but
- do not put it in your path statement.
-
- IMPORTANT NOTE --> Full paths for download protocols is not
- required, only for uploads. Do not specify
- the full path for VXY.EXE as this will confuse
- VBBS, and is not needed anyway since VBBS stays
- at its main directory during VXY execution.
-
-
- VBBS 6.12 Documentation -- 8-4
-
-
- ╔════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════╗
- ║ MAINTENANCE ║
- ╚════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════╝
-
- Much of your system's maintenance is performed automatic-
- ally by VBBS each day. Database "packing" occurs as the primary
- event where your system's databases are compacted and old mes-
- sages are removed according to the limits you set in VCONFIG.
- System logs are then compacted as well and the daily log cycles
- into another log file that shows a log of the last five days of
- system activity. Many sysops run other maintenance as well.
- Backing up certain important system files each day is common.
- There are several VBBS-specific utilities as well as
- several general-use utilities that can be valuable for the VBBS
- sysop. Some of these utilities, such as those by Neil J. Mar-
- shall and other VBBS freeware utility programmers, perform such
- tasks as searching out duplicate posts and files, removing users
- who have not called for a specific time, printing reports, etc.
- There are several shareware utilities available that will
- allow you to automate periodic batchfile events so that they run
- on a daily or weekly (or other interval) basis.
-
-