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NEWS.DOC
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1993-03-02
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-=( LiveSystems News )=-
What is it?
News is an utility to show messages to the user. Big deal
uh.. I wrote it to serve as a message to next user/ user
bulletin utility. Using the msgbase give the user all the
advantages of the BBS, fullscreen editor, maintaining, security
about who may write and who not and upload a bulletin.
Of course there's a small disadvantage too. It has to search
through the messagebase. But as it uses the same files as the
newmail scan, this can be done very fast!
Disclaimer.
Don't make me laugh...;) Use it at your own risk. It's
reasonal well tested, I use it myself, but that's it! Oh
well, I wouldn't release a program that's not up to my idea
of good software. (At the moment I release it, that is.
Things change and bugs appear from no-where....;) Anyhow, no
guarantees what so ever.
Money.
This door is shareware. Until now my experiences with Shareware are
good. I never crippled a door in any way and still got registrations!
Please keep up the good work. And show that shareware can work! If
you continue to use this door after a reasonal evaluation period a
shareware fee of 10 dollars or 10 guilders would be appriciated.
I know, this is very cheap.. So just smile and pay..;-)
Giro 1806776 (for the dutch ppl)
Gerhard Hoogterp
Kremersmaten 108
7511 LC Enschede
Holland.
For burning questions, remarks and wishes you can reach me
on
FidoNet 2:283/702.2
2:512/54.6
BitNet HOOGTERPG@UTWENTE.NL
What wishes concern, no guarantees they are implemented, but
who knows....
All my programs are requestable and downloadable at the LiveSystems
support board. See the file SUPPORT.DOC for more info.
You can also drop questions and remarks there.
Installation.
The News utility is not too difficult to install. First you have to
decide what you want to use it for. As a Message to next user door,
A userbulletin door, a SysOp bulletin door, or whatever you dream up
as usage. The main point is that you decide where to put the call to
the utility.
To install the program all you have to do is to call it with a type 7
menu entry somewhere in the login sequence. The program accepts up to
5 parameters, the Optional dataline should have the syntax:
NEWS.EXE -AREA:<AreaNr> [-T:*T] [-N:*N] [-U:<SearchName>]
[-ASK] [-FORCE[:<MAX>]] [-P:*P]
-T: Gives the remaining time the user has left
-N: Gives the current nodenumber (default 1)
-P: Gives the used portnumber. (Default to the one in the config.sys)
AreaNr is the number of the area you devote to the News program
SearchName is the username the program searches for and displays.
The -ASK forces News to ask if the user wants to read the
bulletins. News tells the user if there are new bulletins.
(or if there are only old ones..) If there are new bulletins, the
default answer is Yes. If not, the default answer is No
The -FORCE toggle forces the user to read ALL the new bulletins OR
to hang up. The [S] Stop simply isn't shown. If News finds that the
next to show bulletin is an old one, the [S] Stop option apears again.
You can give the FORCE parameter a Max value. When a new user logs on
only that number of bulletins are concidered new, after the max value
he get the oppertunity to quit.
f.e. News.Exe -T:*T -N:*N -P:*P -AREA:200
Would cause News to show all the messages to ALL in area 200.
When you installed the program, you have to prepare a way to enter
bulletins. You can use the normal PostMsg menu entry with the /T
parameter. F.e. If you use the default name 'ALL' and area 200 it
should look like:
Type PostMsg
OpData 200 /T=ALL
The SearchName is used case insensitive. Spaces in the searchname can be
replaced by underscores. All like RA itself. Of course you also have to
set the appropriate flags and security level if needed.
As News uses a normal msgbase area, maintainance is done by RAMsg
or some other program. If something is entered which you dislike, just
fire up your message editor and remove the message.. It's simple like
that.
Since I'm a RA sysop myself, all the defaults and installations are
for RA. For extra info about how to use this door under SBBS or
QBBS (2.75!) see the extra doc files.
Some other features:
News has also some of the features of my other programs:
- Desqview awear
- Uses the user toggles for screenlength and ansi
- Reads the BBS configfiles for easy installation
- Opens the files in readonly, share deny none mode,
so it is usable on multiline systems.
- Uses AVATAR codes if the uses has AVATAR selected.
- IEMSI support. If the user makes an IEMSI connection, his
IEMSI parameters are used instead of the parameters in his
UserRecord. If the IEMSI NEWS flag is on, new news is always
shown without asking. EVEN if you use the -ASK parameter.
- Multilanguage. See the DEF files in the SLANG.ZIP file
for what you can translate.. Compile the DEF files with
COMPLANG <FileSpec> and copy the resulting file into the
same directory as the EXE OR the directory where the
NEWS= environment variable is pointing to..
Honor for the brave!
Special thanks for Jos Bergman and Frank Hemmelder for testing this
version of News! Mucho gratias guys..
Enjoy!
Gerhard