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The Internet Connection 4.0 "Closing the Gap between Internet and Fidonet mail systems" Copyright (c) 1994-1995 Mark Williamson 1. CREDITS...........................................................3 2. WARRANTY AND REGISTRATION.........................................3 3. LICENSE INFORMATION...............................................3 4. SHAREWARE REGISTRATION............................................5 5. INTRODUCTION......................................................5 6. NEW FEATURES......................................................6 7. TERMINOLOGY.......................................................7 8. INSTALLATION......................................................9 9. REPLYING TO INTERNET MESSAGES....................................13 10. CONFIGURING THE INTERNET CONNECTION.............................14 11. USING REPLYCHK TO REPLY TO INTERNET MESSAGES....................15 12. USING THE INTERNET CONNECTION...................................17 12.1. ADDRESS BOOK MENU ...........................................17 13. LOCATION OF FILES...............................................19 14. FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS......................................19 15. WHERE TO GO IF YOU NEED HELP....................................22 16. CONTACTING THE AUTHOR...........................................22 1. Credits I owe a great deal of thanks to James Goldbloom of Access Denied Message System. James has helped immensely with his coding of the ReplyCheck utility used by Inet to process incoming internet messages. His efforts have taken a load off of me, allowing me to concentrate on Inet. If you've ever wanted to see a very successful message-only system, call his board today! James Goldbloom is an official support site for the Internet Connection. He can be reached via Fidonet netmail at 1:109/611. Registrations are handled by the author, Mark Williamson. I can be reached at Fidonet 1:202/750. Use the online registration feature in Inetutil.exe to fill out the registration form. There is no registration form file, so use the program to do it for you! To provide you with the very best possible customer support, I have established a customer support echo, OMEGA_SOFT, which is now on the Fidonet zone one backbone. Please request this echo from your mail hub so we can keep in touch, and you can stay abreast of new release information. 2. Warranty and Registration Inet is not FREE. In order to use it beyond the 30 day evaluation period, you must register it. The registration form is produced by the INETUTIL program. There are a number of ways to register Inet. The most convenient for you is to use the Easy-Reg system in the InetUtil program. Just answer Yes to the question _Fill out the registration form_ and the program will collect your information, and give you the option of netmailing it to me, or printing it out and sending it via postal mail. You may also register Inet with your credit card online! Call the Omega Software BBS, login as Guest, and select Online Registration from the menu. It's easy, fast, and secure! 3. License Information This is a license agreement between you, the end user, and Mark Williamson, hereafter "the author". The Internet Connection software and information attached hereto, hereafter "INET", is the property of the author. Read the terms and conditions of this license agreement carefully before using the software. If you for any reason, whatsoever, cannot accept the conditions in this agreement, you are not permitted to use INET. 3 You acknowledge and agree that INET is a proprietary product of the author, protected by applicable copyright laws and international treaty provisions. You further acknowledge and agree that all rights, title, and interest in and to INET are and shall remain with the author. INET may be used for a period of thirty (30) days on a trial basis to allow you to determine its suitability for your particular application. After this period you MUST register each copy of INET that you use simultaneously. If you have a multinode system, you are only required to register ONE copy of INET for use on a SINGLE BBS system. If you run more than ONE BBS system, you are required to register ONE copy PER system, not node. Registration entitles you to a non-transferable license to use INET and any future versions of INET for as long as you wish, subject to any special licensing conditions and/or applicable upgrade fees attached to future versions. In the event that you are in violation of this license agreement, you agree and accept that the author may cancel your registration and any rights to use INET that you may have. In the case of a dispute over the license agreement, you further agree and accept to fully reimburse the author for legal and other expenses resulting from the dispute, should the dispute be decided in favor of the author. INET is provided "as is", without warranty of any kind or fitness for a particular purpose, either expressed or implied, all of which are hereby explicitly disclaimed. The author only guarantees that INET will occupy disk space. The author's liability resulting from your use or inability to use INET is limited to the amount that the affected party has paid for it, or in the event that INET was registered with a third party for payment to the author, liability is limited to the amount that was received by the author from that third party. Neither the author nor any of his employees, agents, or other representatives are in any way obligated to provide future versions of, or support for, INET. You may freely distribute and copy INET provided that no fee is charged and the INET distribution archive contains unmodified copies of the original files as produced by the author. Pay Bulletin Board Systems may, however, charge their normal fee provided that no additional charge for INET is levied. No part of INET may be modified, altered, reverse engineered, sold, or distributed in any form whatsoever which would involve some sort of trade without prior written permission from the author. 4. Shareware registration 4 The Internet Connection is being distributed as a Shareware program. Shareware is a unique concept in program distribution in which the customer has the opportunity to try the program before actually purchasing it. This concept will only work if all those who use Shareware programs uphold the principals of try-before-you-buy. This means that if you like a program, you must purchase it. If you use a program beyond a reasonable evaluation period, you are in essence violating the principles of the Shareware concept. The Internet Connection version 4.0 costs $25.00 to register. Owners of older versions of Inet are not required to pay an upgrade fee at this time. However, this could change in the future as demands for more features and more development goes into the program. A great deal of development, research, and long distance phone calls have been expended in bringing Inet to you. I fully support my software and your comments are taken to heart. Compromising on price compromises my ability to further develop the product. I hope you support the Shareware concept and further encourage you to register the Internet Connection. Upon registration, you will begin a long-lasting relationship with the author, who not only appreciates your thoughtfulness in registering, but also never forgets a customer, and never second-guesses a customer's needs. Thank you for using the Internet Connection! I also offer a discount if you can get several sysops in your area to register Inet at the same time, so inquire within! 5. Introduction The Internet, also known as the Information Superhighway, has always been somewhat out of reach by most Fidonet users and Sysops. Unless you had a full Internet account, sending and receiving messages between the two networks was a chore. Until now! The Internet Connection provides the necessary link between a Fidonet style message and a message acceptable to the Internet host gateway software. In order to send a message from a Fidonet system to an Internet gate, also known as a UUCP gate, special formatting restrictions must be followed, or the message will be returned to the sending system. These formatting rules, although easy enough to conform to, were somewhat confusing to the BBS caller, who really had no idea what Fidonet or Internet messages are, or what the formatting rules were. The Internet Connection alleviates this responsibility and does the necessary formatting in real time. All the user must do is provide a valid Internet address, a subject line, and then they type in their message using your favorite external message editing program. It's really that simple! The Internet Connection provides many more tools than this simplicity to make it an attractive addition to any BBS software. 5 Recent changes in the Fidonet organization have eliminated the default gateway, which used to be 1:1/31. What this means is that in order for you to receive Internet email, your net must have a gateway registered with the fidonet.org domain if you wish to use the `fxxx.nxxx.zx.fidonet.org' addressing method. You can check this by looking in your nodelist for GUUCP, and sending the sysop of that system a message inquiring the status of his gateway. Otherwise, mail sent to an address such as `me@f750.n202.z1.fidonet.org' would get returned to the sender. The address `f750.n202.z1.fidonet.org' gets translated into your gateway's internet address by the software running on the fidonet.org server. If your local gateway doesn't have a entry in the database at fidonet.org, then you will not be able to receive mail using the addressing method described above. However, your gateway may have a different default address for you to use, so you must check first with the operator of the gateway. 6. New Features This version of the Internet Connection is the most potent and feature-rich to date. If you are new to the Internet Connection, you will find its simple user interface a blessing, and its functionally will (hopefully) impress you enough you won't hesitate to register! Below is a short list of features and enhancements this version contains: Full standalone capability. This is the single most important feature for many BBS sysops. Inet can now be used to read a Fidonet standard *.MSG directory. Features such as read, reply, write new, delete, and more make the Internet Connection the only solution for offering complete Internet email to your users! Internal ANSI and ASCII message editors. The internal editors can be used instead of your current editor if you desire. However, the built in editor lacks some features you will surely find in many of the full-featured editors available for almost any BBS system. Added support for the RFC-822 _Reply-To:_ field. This field specifies the reply address of the sender. This could be used when you have an Internet account for your BBS. The information placed in this field is obtained from the Your Domain entry in InetUtil. Intelligent handling of Internet message replies. The Inet configuration utility, INETUTIL, is the single program required to manage your Internet Connection system configuration. In addition to setting up options for Inet and Replychk, INETUTIL also manages the address books and user database. Address limits file, BADADDR.CTL, can be used to limit a user's 6 access to internet addresses according to their security level. For example, if you want to restrict access to LISTSERV addresses to your paying callers, you may add LISTSERV to the BADADDR.CTL file, along with the desired security level, and Inet will not allow messages to be sent to any address which contain the word LISTSERV unless the user has sufficient security access. Replychk 4.0, by James Goldbloom. Advanced message handling features allows easy integration into your BBS. Replychk is required when Inet is not run in standalone mode. See the included documentation for Replychk, and the online help in INETUTIL. 7. Terminology MSGINF This refers to the Message Information File created by your BBS system when replying to a message, or when creating a new message. This file is not normally read back into the BBS, however is created as a convenience to the external editor to display pertinent information concerning the message being written. This file name will vary depending on the BBS system you are using. The format of this file is described below: Line # Contents 1 Sender's Name 2 Recipient's Name 3 Subject Line 4 Message Number 5 Conference Name 6 YES = Private Message, NO = Public If you are using a BBS system which does not create or use a temporary message file similar to the one described above, you may not be able to utilize the /REPLY feature. You should consider using Inet's /READ mode to handle reading and replying to internet messages. Since you can specify the actual order of the lines described above, you may be able to specially configure Inet to work with your system. If your BBS system does not support an external editor, or does not support MSGINF/MSGTMP files, then we recommend using Inet as a standalone reading door for your internet email, and leaving this line at its default format. More on this later! MSGTMP This refers to the Temporary Message Text file. This file is created by your BBS when replying to an existing message. During a reply, the BBS will write the contents of the original message to this file. The editor may then be able to quote this text, usually via the Control-Q key. This 7 will vary depending on the editor you are using. This file name will vary depending on the BBS system you are using. UUCP This is the term used to refer to the computer software which translates Internet messages to a Fidonet format, and vice versa. To save yourself some phone bill money, you may wish to route messages to this system through your hub. Consult your mailer documentation on how to do this. NOTE: Throughout this document we will be referring to some two- character commands, referred to as Optional Data Commands, or macros. These are used by BBS systems like RemoteAccess, Proboard, QuickBBS, and many others. Since every BBS system is different, and no two commands may mean the same thing across platforms, we will describe here what these commands are intended to mean so you can determine the equivalent command or option for your BBS software. These commands are described below: *P Represents the communications port Inet is operating on. This information is obtained from the BBS Door Information File (DOOR.SYS, DORINFO1.DEF, etc.). Inet will recognize this command when placed on the Editor Command Line field in INETUTIL.EXE and substitute the actual port in place of *P. *B Represents the actual baud rate the communications port is operating at. This information is also obtained from the Door Information File. Inet will recognize this command when placed on the Editor Command Line field in INETUTIL.EXE and substitute the actual baud rate value in place of *B. *# or *N Represents the node number which Inet is operating under. This information is sometimes retrieved from the Door Information File, but this is not totally reliable. To be sure, you should always specify /NODE*N on the INET.EXE command line in your RemoteAccess or QuickBBS optional data field. For Proboard users, this option is *# on your Type 7 Optional Data Field command line. Inet recognizes both *N and *# when placed in the Editor Command Line field in INETUTIL.EXE and will substitute the actual node number in place of *N or *#. The only * commands that Inet understands are *P, *B, *#, and *N. Inet does not make use of *X or *M. Remember, the only useful place for these commands WITHIN Inet is the Editor Command Line. When configuring Inet within the BBS, you need only specify the node number (/NODE*N or *#) and enable memory swapping (*M or *X). Please keep this in mind! *X or *M This is not an Inet command, however, is used by RemoteAccess to inform RemoteAccess that it must perform a swap to disk or EMS when executing Inet. For Proboard 8 Sysops, this command is *X. For QuickBBS sysops, you must enable the Swapping option in QCONFIG when setting up Inet to handle replies. For the /POST mode, QuickBBS sysops will use *M on the Optional Data Field. 8. Installation Inet's functionality is controlled in two ways: By the configuration file INET.CFG and by command line parameters. Complete details on each configuration option can be found in the INETUTIL.EXE online help system by pressing F1 at any time. Each command line parameter is described below: Parameter Sample usage Description /READ= /READ=C:\NETMAIL Tells Inet to load in READing mode and loads the first message in the directory. /REPLY /REPLY Tells Inet to load in REPLY mode and that it should read the MSGTMP/MSGINF files for message data. /POST /POST Inet loads in post new mail mode and the user can then write a new internet message. Inet prompts for the To: and Subj: prompts. /PERSONAL /PERSONAL Used only with /READ mode, Inet will now only look at messages destined for the current user. /NEW /NEW Used only with /READ mode, Inet will now only look for new messages found in the specified directory. Inet will check the message attribute to determine if the message has already been read by the recipient. If it has, then it will be skipped in a /NEW mail scan. /FROM= _/FROM=JOHN DO_ Forces the From: line to that of the text immediately following the /FROM=. Note! You MUST enclose entire line inside quotes. It is an error to put only the text in the quotes, it must also encompass the /FROM= portion as well. /TO= _/TO=JOHN DOW_ Forces the contents of the _T0_ field to that of the text 9 following the /TO: field. /SUBJ= _/SUBJ=TEST" Same as above except dealing with the subject line. /NODE /NODE4 Forces the node number to Inet. /L or /LOCAL INET.EXE /L Enables Inet to run from the command line. Whenever INET is run without parameters (or with only the /L parameter), it will first check for a MSGINF/MSGTMP file which is created by the BBS (and INET) when replying to a message. If these files are found, Inet will look for the @INETADDR marker in MSGTMP to determine if the message is an internet reply, and will handle the reply appropriately. The most important thing to remember is regardless of your BBS system software, you can now use Inet to BOTH post and reply to internet mail. The only minimum system requirement is that you are using a Fidonet compatible network mailer. This is the `front end' of your BBS where your Fidonet mail packets come in. Beyond this, there is no limitation to using Inet as your email program! The first step to installing the Internet Connection (Inet) is to obtain the netmail address of a UUCP gateway host near you. Keep in mind that you can route mail to the gateway if you do not want to call long distance, or the gateway nearest you has a slow response time. See the documentation on your mailer, or the Frequently Asked Questions at the end of this documentation. Perhaps the easiest way to do this is use a nodelist viewing program and look for GUUCP in your region. The closer you can get to your local calling area the better. Jot down the address, as you will need to enter it into INETUTIL.EXE. Please see the file called UUCPHELP.TXT in your Inet archive for detailed information on locating a UUCP host near you. There are three distinct modes that Inet can operate in, each of which is controlled by a command line parameter. Note: Only one mode is available at a time. The command line switch for each mode is described below: /POST Used for writing a new message. This mode is most often used as a menu option from your BBS system's message menu, for example: _(W)rite an Internet message_ which would execute INET.EXE /POST /REPLY Enables reply mode. Inet checks for a valid email address (provided by the @INETADDR line added by Replychk). If the @INETADDR line is present, Inet goes into internet reply mode, otherwise, the 10 message is treated like a normal message. This mode is recommended when installing Inet into your BBS as an external editor in place of your existing one. Using Inet in this method ensures a seamless transition when a user selects <R>eply when reading messages. This option is only available to sysops whose BBS software supports the MSGIN/MSGTMP format and an external editor. /READ Enables the reading mode. This parameter must be followed by the directory where the .MSG files to be read are stored. Inet will load the first message found in the directory and display it to the user. The actual command line for this parameter is: /READ=<PATH>, where <PATH> is the directory to read from. You should design a menu option within your BBS System, perhaps naming this new option '<I>nternet Email'. In this example we will use 'I' as the hot-key. The most logical place for this new option is on the Message Menu, but its location does not matter. Below we will provide two examples for the command lines, one for just posting a new internet message, and the other for using Inet in standalone /READ mode. You will use a Shell to DOS menu function to call Inet. The Optional Data Line, or Command Line, will contain the following: (Load Inet to post a new message) C:\INET\INET.EXE /POST (Load Inet in standalone, reading mode) C:\INET\INET.EXE /READ=C:\EMAIL NOTE: It is very important to force your BBS software to swap out of memory when running Inet. Usually this is done by using a command line option like *M or *X (RA/QBBS/Proboard). Refer to your BBS documentation to determine how to force the BBS to swap out of memory when running Inet. This is very important, due to the memory requirements of Inet and your external editor (if applicable). Of special note is the need to have your BBS software generate a door information file (drop file) that Inet can use. To be on the safe side, try using DOOR.SYS (standard PCBoard 52 line format). This has been tested on many systems and seems to work just great. If you can force your BBS to generate this file, all the better. Remember, the BBS platform Inet is running on is irrelevant when using the standalone option, as long as a door information file is available. For QuickBBS sysops, you will need to enable the memory swapping function in QCONFIG instead of using *M on the optional data line. 11 Of course you may need to adjust the path for your installation. /POST tells Inet it is to startup in POST mode, prompting the user for the address. This is all that is required to install Inet into your system! Your users will now be able to send Internet messages from your system, without worrying about frustrating formatting rules! Additionally, since Inet allows up to 70 characters for the actual To: address, even the long Internet addresses may be used, instead of the previous limitation of 35 characters for most BBS systems. But there is much more to Inet than this! The following command lines should be used to run Inet from the BBS: RemoteAccess: /REPLY MODE: C:\INET\INET.EXE /NODE*N *M /POST MODE: C:\INET\INET.EXE /POST /NODE*N *M /READ MODE: C:\INET\INET.EXE /READ=C:\EMAIL /NODE*N *M Proboard: /REPLY MODE: C:\INET\INET.EXE /NODE*# *X *D /POST MODE: C:\INET\INET.EXE /POST /NODE*# *X *D /READ MODE: C:\INET\INET.EXE /READ=C:\EMAIL /NODE*# *X *D QuickBBS: /REPLY MODE: C:\INET\INET.EXE /NODE*N (For REPLY mode: be sure to enable swapping in QCONFIG!) /POST MODE: C:\INET\INET.EXE /NODE*N *M /READ MODE: C:\INET\INET.EXE /READ=C:\EMAIL /NODE*N *M If you are not using one of the above mentioned systems, please send me information on your BBS system and how you have Inet setup. I would like to include as much information about using Inet on various platforms to make the Sysop's life a little easier! 9. Replying to Internet Messages NOTE: Included in this version is a program called REPLYCHK.EXE. Please read the documentation for this program. It has been developed by James Goldbloom, and all support questions should be directed to him. For all practical purposes, this program is REQUIRED by Inet in order to properly identify the email address of the message sender. There are exceptions to this rule, please see the Frequently Asked Questions at the end of this documentation. You may get desirable results if you do not use REPLYCHK. Use INETUTIL to set the REPLYCHK options (defaults are almost always preferable). Instructions on installing the program are in the REPLYCHK.DOC file. When the user reads a message, they will most likely want to respond to it. They would usually press R for Reply, and the BBS will load 12 the editor and the user will type their reply and save it. Since your most BBS systems do not know the difference between a regular message and an Internet message, the reply the user has just written will most likely end up going nowhere, just written to the BBS message base. This is where Inet becomes uniquely useful! Remember, not all BBS systems support using an external message editor, or the MSGINF/MSGTMP files. For now, we will assume you are using one that is compatible. The following command line will enable the reply handling feature of Inet: C:\INET\INET.EXE Place the above command line in your External Message Editor field of your BBS software's setup. Inet will look at the temporary message files created by the BBS (MSGINF/MSGTMP) during the reply process, and attempt to determine if the message is a normal message needing no processing by Inet, or an Internet message, requiring necessary reformatting. This is done transparent to the user. If the message is not an Internet message, Inet simply loads the message editor and returns to the BBS when the message is saved. If you are not using BBS software which supports these features, you can use Inet in standalone mode, and it will take care of display the messages to the user, handling replies, and posting new messages as well. However, using Inet in /READ mode does not necessarily remove the requirement to use Replychk. 10. Configuring The Internet Connection Inet comes with a configuration program to make life a easier for you! The configuration program, INETUTIL.EXE, is the proper method for configuration the Internet Connection. You will find detailed online help for each of the configuration options. Therefore, the configuration information has been removed from this document. Please refer to the online help system for information on specific configuration items. 11. Using REPLYCHK to Reply to Internet Messages REPLYCHK is designed to scan incoming netmail messages before they are imported into your message base by your echomail tosser. The program looks for strings of text in the message body which indicate the originator's Internet address. To keep messages in a common format, readable by anyone or any computer on the Internet, standards exist which dictate the format of each and every Internet message. When these Internet messages are transferred into a Fidonet system, the control and routing information is usually left intact. REPLYCHK takes advantage of this information to automatically determine the 13 address of the person sending the message. When you reply to a message that has been processed by REPLYCHK, Inet will automatically know the reply address and fill in the To: line for you. The REPLYCHK.CFG file contains rules which determine what to look for when determining the reply address. We will examine a couple of actual Internet messages below: Pvt From : f.greatorex To : Mark.williamson Subj : got your messages. @MSGID: relay2.geis.com 5cbd3690 @REPLY: f.greatorex @REPLYADDR f.greatorex@genie.geis.com Originally_From: f.greatorex@genie.geis.com There are two important lines to note in the message above. The first is the @REPLYADDR line. This is called a kludge line, and is usually hidden from the caller. Kludge lines begin with a Control-A (ASCII 01) character (this gets translated to the >@= you see above upon export). When the BBS exports the message to the MSGTMP file, it may or may not write the kludge line information. If it were a given that ALL BBS systems quoted the kludge lines, then finding the reply address would be simple. However, this is not the case. The second line is important because it serves the same purpose as the @REPLYADDR line, but is not a kludge line, so it will always be quoted, because it is part of the message text. Here is another common message format: From: ur-valhalla!lawrence.edu!Dennis.Ribbens Subject: eco-propaganda Message-ID: <01HNUO27116U0009NI@LUCIA.LIB.LAWRENCE.EDU> Date: Tue, 07 Mar 1995 09:54:57 -0600 (CST) This one is particularly interesting, because at first glance, the From: line seems a bit odd. Do not be alarmed, this is a perfectly legal address. This is called a >bang= path. It is an older style of addressing Internet messages and its use is discouraged. Using REPLYCHK, Inet would easily be able to reply to this message. From: "Paul De Groot, Edmonton" <ur-valhalla!freenet.edmonton.ab.ca!pdegroot> Subject: eco-propaganda! Message-ID: <Pine.A32.3.91.950307135332.40184A-100000@freenet.edmonton.ab.ca> Date: Tue, 7 Mar 1995 14:00:24 -0700 (MST) 14 On Mon, 6 Mar 1995 DHEGEMAN@gateway.wbc.edu wrote: The message above is more challenging, but still easily handled by REPLYCHK. Using the From: line, REPLYCHK would see the brackets <> as the beginning and end of the address text, and retrieve the information between them. (The From: line above is word-wrapped to fit the width of the screen and printed page, but would normally be on one line, ending with the > character.) So, there you have it! Numerous samples of Internet messages that REPLYCHK will automatically detect the reply address, and give Inet a field it can read directly, and insert into the To: line of your replies! The format of the REPLYCHK.CFG file is simple, and is detailed within the file itself. Please print out the file and examine its contents. You should not normally need to change the settings, as they have been optimized to work with the most common message formats. All that is required to use REPLYCHK is to place the following line in the batch file that processes your netmail: C:\INET\REPLYCHK.EXE Of course the path may be different on your system. The ideal place to insert this line is just before your tosser imports the netmail into the message base. This will ensure any inbound internet mail is reformatted for use by Inet before going to the message base. After Inet reads the MSGTMP as it was written by the BBS, or the reformatted .MSG file (in /READ mode), it will attempt to determine if the message is an Internet message using the @INETADDR line. If it cannot find an @INETADDR line, Inet will proceed as if it were a regular message. 12. Using the Internet Connection Using Inet is very easy. When the program loads in /POST mode, the user will be prompted to enter a destination address. They can enter up to 70 characters for this address. They may also type ? to receive help, or / to load the Address Book Menu. These must be the first character on the input line. If you have enabled the address book, a menu will appear with several options. After the user has typed in a To: line and a Subj: line for their message, Inet will load your editor. The user will then type their message as usual, and Inet will take control again when they save the message. Inet will write the message as a netmail message to your UUCP host and then prompt the user if they wish to store the address in their address book (if enabled). 15 This is the simplest way to use Inet. Now, we will describe the address book features. 12.1. Address Book Menu In addition to storing the user's favorite addresses, Inet will also allow your users to store a comment attached to each address. From the Address Book Menu, the following options are available: Help with Address Book Displays the ADDRHELP.A?? screen, pausing at each end of page. Locate an Address Performs either a partial or exact match with the user specified search text. If the user selects Partial match, Inet will also check the comment field for a matching string. This is handy in bringing up a list of coworkers, or members of a club, etc. Select an Address Displays a list of the user's addresses, prompting for a selection at the end of each page. Edit an Address Prompts the user to select an address to edit, then brings up input fields to allow editing of the address and comment. New! Since Internet e-mail can be used for more than just sending a message to an individual, some times you will need to place certain words or commands in the subject of your Internet message. Now you can have Inet do this for you automatically! When you save an address in the address book, you will be asked for a comment. If you begin the comment with the word >SUBJECT:= (include the colon >:=, Inet will retrieve the text that follows and insert it into the Subj: field of the message. Now, whenever you retrieve an address from the address book, the subject line for that address will be filled in as well. Delete an Address Prompts a user to select an address to delete. Upon confirmation, the address record is deleted from the database. No retrieval is possible after the record is deleted. Add a new address 16 The user is prompted to enter an address and comment to add. Quit to BBS Immediately exits Inet, and returns to the BBS. Hangup (Logoff) Immediately disconnects the caller, and returns to the BBS. Redraw screen Performs a screen redraw. Very useful in the event line noise garbles the user's screen. Public/Private Address Book This option toggles between using the Public Address Book, and the user's own Private Address Book. Unlike the Private book, addresses in the Public book are visible to all users. Public Address Book entries may only be Added, Edited or Deleted by a user with Sysop Security Level. Inet will create the public address book file in the same directory as INET.EXE. The file is not actually created until the first public address is stored. Exit Address Book Returns to the To: input line. Note: In ANSI (graphics) mode, Inet uses a scrolling lightbar menu to select addresses. In this menu, the address is on the left of the menu, and the comment is on the right, surrounded by (). In non-graphics mode, the selection is made from a hot-keyed list. The user presses a single key to make a selection. The menus are also hot-keyed. Pressing the highlighted letter will perform a selection as if the ENTER key had been pressed on the highlighted item. 13. Location of Files With the exception of the log files, Inet expects to find all help screens, address books, and configuration files in the same directory as INET.EXE. This cannot be changed. When loading, if Inet finds a configuration file with a file extension matching the current node number, that configuration file will be loaded. For example, assuming you have three nodes, and in the INET.EXE directory, you have INET.CFG and INETCFG.2. Inet on nodes 1 and 3 will use INET.CFG while Inet on node 2 will use INETCFG.2 as the configuration file. When using INETUTIL.EXE, you will be prompted to 17 enter the filename of the configuration file to edit or save. 14. Frequently Asked Questions Q: I am using a BBS which is not listed in this documentation. Can I use Inet? A: Most likely the answer is yes. You have to study how your BBS interacts with external programs to determine if Inet can be used. Here's a table to help with this analysis: Question Answer Use Inet Are you a member of Fidonet Yes Yes or a Fidonet style network? No No Does your BBS create one of the Yes Yes following door information files: No No DOOR.SYS, DORINFO1.DEF, EXITINFO.BBS, CHAIN.TXT, SFDOORS.DAT, or CALLINFO.BBS Does your BBS create MSGINF/MSGTMP? Yes Yes No Standalone Does your BBS support Hudson, Jam, Yes Yes Squish, *.MSG, or Goldbase message No Standalone base? Q: I am a bit confused with the reply process. How do I setup REPLYCHK for my BBS? A: Normally, you do not need to configure any additional settings for REPLYCHK than those already provided. All that is required is to have REPLYCHK run *PRIOR* to your echomail tosser. The reason for this is that REPLYCHK must scan the inbound netmail directory before the tosser imports the messages into the message base. When a user replies to a message, the two temporary files MSGINF/MSGTMP are written to disk. Inet reads the MSGTMP file (which contains the message body) and looks for the special keyword @INETADDR. Immediately following this line is the actual internet address of the originator. Inet uses this information to send the new message to the correct address. Without this special line, Inet treats the message as a normal local message and simply allows you to edit the message text and save it back to the MSGTMP file which is in turn read back in by the BBS. Q: I have 15 addresses on file, but INET and INETUTIL both tell me I have only four. Why? 18 A: With the previous version of Inet, a program error (BUG) resulted in improper tracking of addresses. Run INETUTIL and select PACK USER FILE from the User File Manager menu to correct this. Q: I don't want my users subscribing to internet lists, how can I control this? A: Use the BADADDR.CTL file which contains addresses which are not allowed. Q: How can I quote the original message in the ASCII editor? A: The quote feature is not available in the ASCII editor. Q: This is by far the most fantastic program I have for my BBS! How can I register this work of art? A: Use the INETUTIL program and fill out the registration form, use your credit card, and send it directly to my Fidonet address (DO NOT ROUTE THE MESSAGE). Or, use the Online Registration door on my BBS, or, lastly, use good `ole snail mail and send a check or money order. Q: I am not using a BBS that is directly supported by Inet, but I think I can use Inet in standalone mode. If I used Inet to read messages from my inbound netmail directory, do I need REPLYCHK? A: The short answer is no. The long answer is maybe not. Replychk provides a great ability to move internet messages to a special directory, which you can keep separate from your netmail directory. If you do not have much volume, or you do not wish to utilize this feature, then no, you do not need to run REPLYCHK. Inet will determine the internet address from the messages according to the same settings you have for REPLYCHK. As Inet's feature list grows, the dependency on REPLYCHK may increase, but we will attempt to keep it as simple as possible. Q: Why would I want to set a security level on the post mode? A: Perhaps to attract donations to your BBS. A user can browse around Inet, but when they attempt to post a message, a warning can be displayed telling them they have insufficient security level, blah blah, please donate. Q: I can't seem to locate a gateway for my outbound email. What do I do? A: There are numerous gateways in Fidonet. Look in your nodelist for GUUCP or UUCP. If your gateway is long distance, you can route your mail through your hub. 19 Q: Ok, How do I route my mail? A: If you are using Frontdoor, then you need to edit the file ROUTE.FD and place an entry such as this near the top: Route-to 1:202/707 1:202/707 The first address is your hub's address. The second address is the gateway address. Additionally, you mail want to change the flags in INETUTIL to reflect HLD (hold), LOC (local), and PVT (private). This will make sure that the outbound internet mail gets sent during an event instead of everytime a user sends a message (it's your call). Q: What about support for: listserv, gigo, direct mail transfers, newsgroups, netmail, nodelist lookup, autorouting of personal email, file attachments, etc.? A: Stay tuned :) 15. Where to go if you need help The author frequents many Fidonet Sysop conferences, such as RemoteAccess Utilities, QuickBBS Support, Proboard Support, PCBoard Sysops, Spitfire, and others that deal with BBS systems. Additionally, you can send Fidonet netmail to one of the addresses listed at the end of this documentation. The best place of all to reach me is in my Fidonet conference, OMEGA_SOFT. There you will find topics of discussion on all of my software. There are many possibilities for Inet's future expansion. Several users have expressed ideas that would expand Inet's current capabilities. The author gladly accepts all your comments. Although it is impossible to reply to all of the messages about Inet, I sure try! Your messages are always read by the individual who does the actual programming, so ideas are always welcomed. 16. Contacting the Author You may contact the author at the support BBS listed below: Support/Registrations: Alternate Support: Mark Williamson James Goldbloom Internet: omega@connectnet.com AD Message System BBS: (619) 575-4245 Fidonet 1:109/611 PO Box 131 Internet: denied1@blkcat.com Imperial Beach, CA 91932 BBS: (703)241-1826 (BBS Guest Account: (BBS Guest account: 20 login as GUEST to download Login as INET TESTER or try out our software! Password: INET) 21