Almathera Ten Pack 1: Comms & Networking/Almathera Ten on Ten - Disc 1: Comms & Networking.iso/jackingin/amitcp_faq

Internet Message Format | 1995-05-11 | 41KB

Path: bloom-beacon.mit.edu!hookup!news.mathworks.com!uunet!cygnus.com!news.zeitgeist.net!usenet
From: [e-mail] (Mike Meyer)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.networking,comp.sys.amiga.datacomm,comp.sys.amiga.applications,comp.answers,news.answers
Subject: AmiTCP/IP Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)
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Date: Sun, 26 Mar 95 01:10:03 PST
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Summary: This post contains a list of Frequently Asked Questions
        (and their answers) about AmiTCP/IP. It should be read by anyone
        who wishes to post about or use AmiTCP/IP.
Xref: bloom-beacon.mit.edu comp.sys.amiga.networking:5680 comp.sys.amiga.datacomm:25115 comp.sys.amiga.applications:27080 comp.answers:10840 news.answers:37787

Version:  3.3
Posting-Frequency:  semimonthly
Last-modified:  1995/3/8
Archive-name:  amiga/AmiTCP-faq
URL:  http://www.phone.net/ATCPFAQ/amitcp.html

            AmiTCP/IP Frequently Asked Questions and their Answers

Table of Contents

  1: Introduction

  2: Legal mumbo jumbo

  3: Disclaimer

  4: Acknowledgments

  5: Questions about using AmiTCP

    5.1: What is AmiTCP?

    5.2: Where can I get AmiTCP?

    5.3: Where is the AmiTCP documentation?

    5.4: What is the latest version of AmiTCP?

    5.5: What do I need in order to use AmiTCP?

    5.6: What is/are "Domain names to search"?

    5.7: Are there any alternatives to AmiTCP?

    5.8: How do I contact the AmiTCP authors?

    5.9: I only log on for a few seconds to see if I've got mail waiting. Would
    AmiTCP be overkill for this situation?

    5.10: If I'm using AmiTCP, are my downloaded files and my mail being stored
    on my local hard drive?

    5.11: Am I correct in stating that I can be connected to several different
    computers and using several different applications? (thanks Markus :-)

  6: Internet Standards

    6.1: What is TCP/IP?

    6.2: What is the Internet?

    6.3: What is C/SLIP?

    6.4: What is PPP?

    6.5: What is Ethernet?

    6.6: What is an RFC?

    6.7: What is NFS?

    6.8: What is a domain name server, and how do I get one?

  7: Applications to use with AmiTCP

    7.1: Where is the list of AmiTCP applications?

    7.2: What mail and news clients can I use with AmiTCP?

    7.3: Is there an IRC client for AmiTCP?

    7.4: What is NapsaTerm used for?

    7.5: Is there a telnet daemon?

    7.6: Do I need MultiUser?

    7.7: I thought Emacs was just a text editor. I've seen it mentioned in a
    few posts. What is it used for?

    7.8: Where can I find more programs for use with AmiTCP?

  8: Common bugs, problems and howtos

    8.1: I think I found a bug in AmiTCP. What should I do?

    8.2: What does "resource allocation failure" mean?

    8.3: What is the problem with SLIP and the A2232 board?

    8.4: I get a message "could not open serial device unit 0" when I run
    AmiTCP after I connect to my SLIP server. I tried quitting Term but my
    connection to my server is terminated. a) Why is this?, b) How can I fix
    it? and c) How do I stay online?

    8.5: Can I use AmiTCP with a dynamic IP address?

    8.6: I have connected to my host fine but I cannot connect to any hosts
    outside my University or Network. How can I fix this?

    8.7: How can I see what's happening with my network connection?

    8.8: AmigaELM uses the HOSTNAME but AmiTCP seems to want the fully
    qualified domain name. How can I resolve this problem? (Thanks to Jarno and
    Michael)

    8.9: What is the WaitForPort command in bin/startnet doing?

    8.10: How do I set up other hosts to reach the internet via my SLIP line?

  9: Miscellanious other questions

    9.1: What is SANA-II?

    9.2: My internet provider offers SLIP accounts for a small extra charge. If
    I change my account to a SLIP account, can I still access it the "old" way,
    in case I just want to quickly check my mail or something?

  10: Other sources of information

    10.1: Is there an AmiTCP mailing list?

    10.2: Where are the archives of the AmiTCP Mailing List?

    10.3: What should I do if I have a question that is not answered here?

    10.4: What other references might be useful?

1: Introduction

This Document is the AmiTCP/IP Frequently Asked Questions and their answers (I
hope ;-). I decided to create this after I got my Amiga connected through
AmiTCP/IP, and I found the same questions being asked again and again, I also
found myself to be answering some of them :-)

This FAQ will be posted semimonthly to: news.answers <news:news.answers>,
comp.answers <news:comp.answers>, comp.sys.amiga.datacomm
<news:comp.sys.amiga.datacomm>, comp.sys.amiga.applications
<news:comp.sys.amiga.applications> and comp.sys.amiga.networking
<news:comp.sys.amiga.networking>.

The current version of this FAQ is available via the World Wide Web, in either
ascii text <http://www.phone.net/ATCPFAQ/amitcp.txt> or HTML
<http://www.phone.net/ATCPFAQ/amitcp.html> formats.

If you obtain this FAQ from any source other than those listed, there is a
chance that it is out of date, and you should try the listed sources for a
current version.

I have prepared a brief description of how the FAQ is prepared,
<http://www.phone.net/ATCPFAQ/FAQ.html> and a searchable version is in the
works.

If you have any suggestions, queries or corrections please send email to me
<mailto:[e-mail]> and I will do my best to answer it. I hope
this document is helpful to new people and experienced people alike and answers
some queries that they may have.

This FAQ is not a guide to TCP/IP. If you want that look for TCP/IP books in
your bookstore or search the Internet for Information, which is where most of
the information in this document came from. Also, this FAQ is also not a guide
to the Internet.

I have explained briefly some of the Internet protocols but they are very basic
explanations and I have only included them because they bear some relevance to
AmiTCP/IP.

Throughout this FAQ, AmiTCP/IP is refered to as AmiTCP, and "SLIP/PPP or other
dialup protocol" will commonly be referred to as "dialup".
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2: Legal mumbo jumbo

This document is copyright Mike W. Meyer. Permission is granted for this
document to be freely distributed complete and unaltered. In addition, any
portion of this document may be distributed on USENET, so long as the credits
are included in any portion that includes more than two answers. For the
purposes of this license, USENET is any data stream or file collection which
uses all documents posted to any newsgroup I post this article to

The document is derived from a work that was copyright Neil J. McRae.
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3: Disclaimer

If you screw up, it's your fault and not mine. This information is provided "as
is" and any damage occuring to you or your equipment is your own fault. Neil J.
McRae and Mike W. Meyer disclaim any liability of any kind for damages that may
occur from use of the information within this FAQ.

Mike W. Meyer also disclaims any liability as to the informations accuracy.
While much effort has gone into providing accurate data, there is no guarantee.

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4: Acknowledgments

Neil J. MCrae deserves much credit for creating and maintaining version 1 of
this document.

Just a few thanks to a few people who helped me in some way while creating this
document.

I'd like to thank the the AmiTCP group <[e-mail]> who are:

Pekka Pessi <mailto:[e-mail]>
Jarno Rajahalme <mailto:[e-mail]>
Markus Peuhkuri <mailto:[e-mail]>
Tomi Ollila <mailto:[e-mail]>

Thanks for doing this, guys! Keep up the good work on AmiTCP.

And thanks also to:

Oliver Smith <mailto:[e-mail]>
Michael B. Smith <mailto:[e-mail]>
Jake Dias <mailto:[e-mail]>
James R Grinter <mailto:[e-mail]>
Graham Walter <mailto:[e-mail]>
Wyrd Synapse <mailto:[e-mail]>
Leslie Orchard <mailto:[e-mail]>
Dan Murrell Jnr. <mailto:[e-mail]>
Matthew Zeier <mailto:[e-mail]>
Douglas Scott <mailto:[e-mail]>
Demon Internet <mailto:[e-mail]>
Holger Kruse <mailto:[e-mail]>
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5: Questions about using AmiTCP

5.1: What is AmiTCP?

AmiTCP is a set of programs that enables an Amiga to connect to a TCP/IP
network. AmiTCP lets the user use commands such as ftp and telnet from an
Amiga. AmiTCP also lets remote users connect to your machine from other TCP/IP
hosts. AmiTCP is a TCP/IP protocol stack for implementing basic Internet
protocols on top of any SANA-II network device driver, such as one for SLIP or
ethernet. AmiTCP can be configured to let other users connect and login or
transfer files from your computer.

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5.2: Where can I get AmiTCP?

AmiTCP is available from several places: Any Aminet mirror: ftp.wustl.edu,
ftp.doc.ic.ac.uk and ftp.luth.se. And from ftp.demon.co.uk and ftp.funet.fi via
Anonymous FTP.

ftp://remarque.berkeley.edu/pub/mwm/

The home site for AmiTCP is kampi.hut.fi:AmiTCP/ and this is where the current
version is available from.

AmiTCP is also available on Fred Fish Disks.

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5.3: Where is the AmiTCP documentation?

The documentation is available in several formats from kampi.hut.fi via
anonymous FTP. <ftp://kampi.hut.fi/AmiTCP>

AmiTCP-dvA-20.lha DVI A4 page size
AmiTCP-dvL-20.lha DVI US Letter page size
AmiTCP-psA-20.lha Postscript A4 Page Size (recommended =>300 DPI printers)
AmiTCP-psL-20.lha Postscript US Letter Page Size (again =>300 DPI printers)
AmiTCP-txt-20.lha Docs in ASCII text format

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5.4: What is the latest version of AmiTCP?

Things are a bit confusing at the moment:

The latest release of AmiTCP is the AmiTCP 4.0 demo version.
The latest release of AmiTCP with source is AmiTCP 3.0b2.
The latest production release of AmiTCP with source is AmiTCP 2.3

AmiTCP 2.3 is distributed as a binary patch package to version 2.2 of AmiTCP.

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5.5: What do I need in order to use AmiTCP?

You need the following hardware:

An Amiga running AmigaDOS 2 or greater and some form of connection to a
network, such as a modem for a serial connection or an ethernet card for an
ethernet connection. See the FAQ "What is ethernet?" for information about
ethernet cards. At least 2MB of ram and a hard disk are recommended.

In addition to a version of AmiTCP, you need a SANA-II network driver. AmiTCP
includes a driver for SLIP and CSLIP. See the FAQ "What is SANA-II for more
information on SANA-II.

You need the following information:

NOTE: This information should be sought from your network provider or your
System/Network Administrator.

  An IP address allocated for your Amiga. For example my IP address is
  140.174.197.1.

  A destination IP address (this only applies if you are using a "point to
  point" protocol such as most dialup protocols). Usually the destination IP
  address is the address of the equipment you connect to.

  A netmask for you network (usually this only applies for a network such as an
  ethernet or if you are connected to several networks). If you are connected
  via a single dialup connection, such as SLIP or PPP, use a netmask of
  255.255.255.254. Note: If you only have the one connection, like most of us,
  the netmask is purely irrelevant.

  A name for your Amiga (also know a nodename or hostname). My hostname is
  contessa.

  A domain name. The domain name is usually your providers network name, but
  isn't always. For example, mine is "phone.net".

  The numeric address of a domain name server. My nameserver is
  140.174.153.100. This is used to convert text addresses (contessa.phone.net)
  into numeric addresses (140.174.197.1). If you don't have access to a name
  server, you will have to use numeric (or dotted-decimal) IP addresses to
  connect to other hosts, or add regularly used addresses to your
  AmiTCP:db/hosts file. If you have access to a Unix machine, you can copy
  their "/etc/hosts" file. You are strongly advised to use a nameserver if you
  have access to one, as this saves disk space, and will save you many bundles
  of hair when your favourite host changes it's numeric IP address. (thanks
  Oliver)

  The default gateway address. If you use ethernet, this is normally the
  address of your router (the machine with connections to the outside world).
  If you use a dialup protocol, this is normally the same as your destination
  address. If TCP/IP doesn't have specific information on where to send data,
  it will send it to the default gateway. For example, if your sending mail to
  your Auntie in New Zealand, mail will pass trough this address :-)

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5.6: What is/are "Domain names to search"?

(thanks Jarno :)

The "Domain names to search" are the domain names which are appended to a given
host name on the search. If you have a name "foo" and the domain names to
search are "bar.edu" and "zip.zop" then "foo.bar.edu" is tried first, and if
that fails, "foo.zip.zop" is tried next. If the name to search includes the
domain part, it is searched as it is.

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5.7: Are there any alternatives to AmiTCP?

The only other freely available TCP/IP stack is AmigaNOS.

Commercial versions of AS225R2 are avaliable through a number of vendors. Two
are:

Interworks, Inc.
43191 Camino Casillas
Temecula, CA 92592
USA
909-699-8120

Canadian Prototype Replicas
P.O. Box 8
Breslau, Ontario Canada N0B 1M0
[phone]
Contact: Allan M. Purtle

[Contact information for others greatly appreciated!]

There is also AS225r1, which was sold together with the Commodore Arnet and
ethernet board, but it requires a Commodore Arcnet/Ethernet board. This is not
SANA-II compatible, does not drive SLIP or PPP, and does not use DNS. It may
not be possible to find as a new item.

Other networking like programs include DNET and AmigaUnixWindows. These and
AmigaNOS are available on Aminet.

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5.8: How do I contact the AmiTCP authors?

The AmiTCP authors can be contacted by email. <[e-mail]> Please only
contact the group on AmiTCP matters. If you have a problem with a client or a
server with AmiTCP, contact the author of that program.

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5.9: I only log on for a few seconds to see if I've got mail waiting. Would
AmiTCP be overkill for this situation?

In this case, yes. Connecting via AmiTCP would be a bit of an overkill.

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5.10: If I'm using AmiTCP, are my downloaded files and my mail being stored on
my local hard drive?

Yes, if you use FTP from your Amiga, the files are transferred DIRECTLY to your
Amiga's hard disk drive. No more ZMODEM!!! The same goes for mail, news, and so
on.

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5.11: Am I correct in stating that I can be connected to several different
computers and using several different applications? (thanks Markus :-)

Yes, this is correct. However, the more connections you have, the more
bandwidth is required/used on your link. For example, you could be using FTP
while on IRC, or you could be viewing Mosaic pages while reading news.

However, if there is no traffic on some connections (they are idle), they do
not use bandwidth at all. No matter how many terminal sessions you have open,
you only generate traffic from the one(s) you are using.

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6: Internet Standards

6.1: What is TCP/IP?

TCP/IP stands for Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol. TCP/IP is a
protocol that allows any system on a network to talk "directly" to any other
system, by passing packets of information back and forth. TCP/IP (and its later
relative OSI) is usually used over networks built on top of Ethernet,
Token-Ring, Starlan and other LANS. The Internet uses TCP/IP.

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6.2: What is the Internet?

An "internet" is a network comprised of computers that talk to each other using
TCP/IP.

The "Internet" is a vast network of hundreds of thousands of machines using
TCP/IP to communicate.

The Internet grew out of a US government funded project in inter-computer
communications that grew into an enormous network of systems. One of the
principle characteristics of this network is that machines are addressed by
domain names which identify the destination, rather than addresses that are
constructed out of the route from machine to machine to machine.

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6.3: What is C/SLIP?

SLIP is Serial Line Internet Protocol. SLIP is used, most commonly, for
connecting a computer to a TCP/IP network using a modem. SLIP lets IP packets
be sent up and down a serial line.

CSLIP is an extension of the SLIP protocol, which reduces the typical TCP/IP
packet-overhead of 40 bytes per packet to 3 or 5 bytes by "remembering" a
number of active connections, not resending unused fields, and only sending
changes to the headers. Since a compression algorithm is not used, it does not
impair any compression added by your modem, and thus presents a significant
improvement in packet throughput! CSLIP gives much better response in
interactive applications such as Telnet. (Thanks Oliver and Markus)

If your providers don't have SLIP, or if you are your provider, and you don't
have SLIP, it is publically available. Ask you System Administrator for more
information.

Existing AmiTCP CSLIP drivers will only use CSLIP if it is available on the
remote end. Otherwise they will gracefully degrade to using ordinary SLIP.

For a detailed description of SLIP and CSLIP consult a book on TCP/IP
protocols. There is a SLIP faq available in comp.protocols.tcp-ip newsgroup.

SLIP is described in RFC 1055. CSLIP is described in RFCs 1055 & 1144

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6.4: What is PPP?

PPP is Point to Point Protocol, another way of connecting to your network. It
is a more robust protocol than SLIP, and addresses many of SLIP's weaknesses.
However it is much more difficult than SLIP to implement, but the advantage
over SLIP make it the serial protocol of the future. (this is my opinion ;-)

For a detailed description of PPP consult a book on TCP/IP or get the PPP faq
available via anonymous FTP. <RTFM.MIT.EDU:/usenet/comp.protocols.ppp>

PPP is described in RFCs 1332, 1333, 1334, 1376, 1377, 1552, 1570, 1598,
1619,1638 and 1663 phew!

A SANA-II PPP driver is available from Aminet. <Aminet:comm/net/PPP1_3.lha>
This is a non registered version. A shareware version with many more features
is also on Aminet but requires a key file, which you must pay the author $15.
Consult the documentation for more details on this.

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6.5: What is Ethernet?

(thanks to wombat.doc.ic.ac.uk <http://wombat.doc.ic.ac.uk/> :)

A coaxial cable local area network first described by Metcalfe & Boggs of Xerox
PARC in 1976. Specified by DEC, INTEL & XEROX (DIX), it's now recognised as the
industry standard. Data is broken into packets, and packets are transmitted
using the CSMA/CD algorithm until they arrive at the destination without
colliding with any other. The first contention slot after a transmission is
reserved for an acknowledge packet. A node is either transmitting or receiving
at any instant. The bandwidth is ~10Mbit/s. Disk-Ethernet-Disk transfer rate
with TCP/IP is typically 30 kbyte/s. The cable is a 50 ohm coaxial cable with
multiple shielding.

EtherNet is described in lots of RFCs. Read the index if you're that keen to
find out.

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6.6: What is an RFC?

RFCs are documents that are used to define the Internet standards. RFC stands
for Request For Comments.

De facto: Requirement For Conformance. (thanks Michael)

RFC are available from many FTP sites including ftp.wustl.edu,
<ftp:ftp.wustl.edu> ftp.doc.ic.ac.uk <ftp:ftp.doc.ic.ac.uk> and
ftp.demon.co.uk. <ftp:ftp.demon.co.uk> NIC <ftp:rs.internic.net> is the
official place in the United States. UUNet <ftp:ftp.uu.net> is the best
connected place to get them in the USA.

The file "rfc-index.txt" (which should be available on every RFC repository)
contains an index of all published RFC's

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6.7: What is NFS?

(From the Sun NFS documentation:) NFS is a network file system developed by Sun
Microsystems, Inc. The Sun Network Filesystem (NFS) protocol provides
transparent remote access to shared filesystems over local area networks. The
NFS protocol is designed to be machine, operating system, network architecture,
and transport protocol independent.

For a detailed description of NFS, consult a TCP/IP book.

The NFS Client by Carsten Heyl is included info the AmiTCP distribution. See
the ch_nfs documentation in AmiTCP:help.

There is also an Amiga to Amiga NetFS implemetation that is included with
AmiTCP. This is NOT NFS but lets the Amiga share other Amiga's Disk Drives.

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6.8: What is a domain name server, and how do I get one?

A domain name server (DNS), put simply, is a massive address book of the
Internet, It enables the user to use hostnames while not having the hostname
listed in their Amitcp:db/hosts file.

A partial named implementation is on ftp.demon.co.uk. However, as someone who
has set up his own name server, I would recommend that you use someone else's.
:-) DNS is quite a complex system, and unless you are running a massive
network, you don't really need your own.

For more information on DNS, consult a TCP/IP book.

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7: Applications to use with AmiTCP

7.1: Where is the list of AmiTCP applications?

These are available from gopher
<gopher://gopher.tky.hut.fi/00/.publish/puhuri/AmiTCP/NetAppList.txt> and the
World Wide Web <http://www.hut.fi/~puhuri/Amiga/NetAppList.html>

Updates to this list should be mailed to Markus. <[e-mail]>

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7.2: What mail and news clients can I use with AmiTCP?

There is only one complete Mail and News package called INetUtils by Michael B.
Smith. I use these and I recommend them to all. These utilities work as drop in
commands for AUUCP and let you use UUCP compatible newsreaders such as TIN and
UUCP compatible mail readers such as AmigaELM. The faq was posted to USENET
using InetUtils.

GRn is also available for AMITCP, which allows direct connection with your news
server.

AmiPOP by Scott Ellis is also included with InetUtils for users who can connect
to POP mail servers.

All the above mentioned programs are available on Aminet in one of the news,
<Aminet:comm/news> mail <Aminet:comm/mail> or net <Aminet:comm/net>
directories.

Also Gnus can be used with GNU Emacs (albeit a tad slow) for reading news. Mail
with emacs still requires an external transport unit such as InetUtils. Gnus
was one of the first applications used to test AmiTCP.

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7.3: Is there an IRC client for AmiTCP?

There is one written Emacs LISP, which requires Emacs. This is available from
kampi.hut.fi. However, there are some functions that cause normal irc clients
to display error messages (so if people moan at you you know why :-) :-) Emacs
is available on Aminet.

The Grapevine Amiga IRC works with AmiTCP. It has a nice graphic interface and
DCC su. The latest version is available on the support site, ftp.cryogenic.com.
on AmiNet, but the support site is always current.

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7.4: What is NapsaTerm used for?

Napsaterm is an rlogin program which can emulate a VT terminal. It lets you
login to a host that uses the rlogin protocol, Napsaterm 38.b now also is now a
telnet client. Consult the NapsaTerm documentation for more information.

NB: If you wish to specify a port number for telnet, use the -s command; e.g.

1.> telnet auntie.bbcnc.org.uk 9999

is replaced with

1.> napsaterm -d TELNET -s 9999 auntie.bbcnc.org.uk

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7.5: Is there a telnet daemon?

Yes, tnserv on Aminet. However it is an active daemon and also does not use the
AmiTCP passwd file for password information.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

7.6: Do I need MultiUser?

No. However, MultiUser is very handy if you plan to have your machine on the
net all the time. Unfortunately, MultiUser and AmiTCP don't use the same format
for the password file.

MultiUser is on Aminet.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

7.7: I thought Emacs was just a text editor. I've seen it mentioned in a few
posts. What is it used for?

Emacs is the GOD of all editors :-). It has its own programming language that
lets the user run programs on it. Emacs has gopher, IRC and WWW programs that
can be used with AmiTCP. Emacs includes Gnus for news reading.

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7.8: Where can I find more programs for use with AmiTCP?

Aminet is always the place to look, usually in the comm directory, Also look in
amitcp directory on demon <ftp://ftp.demon.co.uk/pub/amiga/amitcp> this site
dedicated to the Internet.

Also look in the applications list available via gopher
<gopher://gopher.tky.hut.fi/00/.publish/puhuri/AmiTCP/NetAppList.txt> and on
the World Wide Web. <http://www.tky.hut.fi/~puhuri/Amiga/NetAppList.html>

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8: Common bugs, problems and howtos

8.1: I think I found a bug in AmiTCP. What should I do?

Check it in the c.s.a.networking newsgroup <news:comp.sys.amiga.networking>
before taking it to the authors; make sure they spend their time working on our
beloved AmiTCP, rather than repeatedly answering the same questions by mail.

Then once you are SURE that it is a bug and you can reproduce it several times
mail the AmiTCP bugs list <mailto:[e-mail]> giving as much
information regarding your hardware and software setup as possible, with an
accurate description of the bug and the steps needed to take show the bug's
performance ;-)

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8.2: What does "resource allocation failure" mean?

(Thanks Oliver)

This means your particular SANA-II Driver (RHCSlip, GWCSlip, Slip, PPP) cannot
fire itself up; this can often be due to an error in your configuration file
(usually in (env|envarc):sana2 ... slip0.config or ppp0.config or similar) or
may be that some resource on which the driver relies (e.g. serial.device) is
missing, wrongly configured or not working. With GWCSlip this is usually
because you've omitted something like the "DialScript=AmiTCP:DB/DialScript"
parameter.

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8.3: What is the problem with SLIP and the A2232 board?

The problem is with EOFMODE. The A2232 does not handle this feature properly.
The rhcslip.device V38.8 or 38.9 works also with A2232. Availible from Aminet.

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8.4: I get a message "could not open serial device unit 0" when I run AmiTCP
after I connect to my SLIP server. I tried quitting Term but my connection to
my server is terminated. a) Why is this?, b) How can I fix it? and c) How do I
stay online?

a) There are many reasons for this problem. The most common is that the serial
device in use by another program, for example your comms package. (Term,
Terminus etc). If you are using a terminal package to dial into your TCP/IP
server this will give this error. And your modem is not set to ignore DTR, so
when you quit term the modem hangs up the phone, thus ending your Connection.

b) There are many solutions to avoid this problem. I am going to suggest 2. The
first is to use the Dial in arexx script that in on Aminet, this automates the
entire connection process, Arexx is used to dial up your Server enter your
account details and startup AmiTCP when it has connected and logged in. The
script is very flexible and also handles Dynamic IP assign, you may need to
modify the script depending on your setup, however this is a very
straightforward process.

The script is available from  Aminet. <Aminet:comm/net/amitcp_dial10.lha>

Also there is another dialer program caller dialer. This program acts as a go
between serial.device and your PPP/SLIP driver. This program dials up your
hosts and logs the user in and then puts the SANA-II driver online. This is
available from Demon. <ftp.demon.co.uk:pub/amiga/amitcp/dialer_1.lha>

I'm currently using this and I find it excellent.

A similar type program is gwcslip, by Graham Walter. This is a CSLIP SANA-II
driver which dials into your host. It works very much like to the above
program. This program is available from Demon
<ftp.demon.co.uk:/pub/amiga/amitcp> in gwslip#?.lha. Look for the revision
number which is part of the filename.

c) The other is to set you modem to ignore DTR. For most modems, "AT&D0" will
work; if it doesn't, consult your modem manual. After doing that, start your
terminal program, dial into your server, login in as normal and issue what
commands you need to start up your TCP/IP connection (e.g. sliplogin). When you
have started up your serving program QUIT your terminal program leaving the
call running and THEN start AmiTCP by executing AmiTCP:bin/startnet

NOTE: You must ensure that the baud rate your terminal program is using is the
same as the baud rate you have configured your SLIP/CSLIP/PPP driver to use.
Please, remember to set your baud rate to the configuration file of the SANA-II
device driver you are using. See the documentation inluded with your SANA-II
driver for more information on this file.

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8.5: Can I use AmiTCP with a dynamic IP address?

Yes. You can use the Arexx script on Aminet or follow the above steps, but
before you start AmiTCP you must change your startnet script to your assigned
IP number. This goes for any other dynamic addresses (such as your hostname).

Also, the PPP driver on Aminet has special options for connecting to dialup
hosts. Consult the excellent documentation within the archive.

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8.6: I have connected to my host fine but I cannot connect to any hosts outside
my University or Network. How can I fix this?

This is a routing problem. Add a route to your default gateway using the
command:

AmiTCP:bin/route add default your.default.gateways.number

140.174.153.10 is my default gateway. Ask your system administrator for this
number. This command should be already in your startnet script if you have
followed the Install procedure correctly.

This could also be because of a firewall (the IP traffic from your hosts is not
passed to the Internet). Your Network provider will be able to give you more
information on this.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

8.7: How can I see what's happening with my network connection?

The command AmiTCP:bin/netstat will show you all the active connections to your
machine, where they are from, and which port they are connected to. For
example, if you have a connection to port 25, your Amiga is getting new mail.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

8.8: AmigaELM uses the HOSTNAME but AmiTCP seems to want the fully qualified
domain name. How can I resolve this problem? (Thanks to Jarno and Michael)

You could probably set the variable to "name only", since AmiTCP/IP itself does
not use the variable at all. Some application programs (such as e-mail) might
have problems, though. The current standard on the various Unix versions is
that the HOSTNAME is the fully qualified host name (with the domain).

AmiTCP 3.0 and 4.0 fix this by implementing the gethostname() function
differently (the name is taken from the name server/host database instead of
the HOSTNAME variable if possible).

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8.9: What is the WaitForPort command in bin/startnet doing?

The purpose of the WaitForPort command in bin/startnet is to prevent execution
of the forthcoming commands before AmiTCP has fully initialized itself.
WaitForPort is part of the Rexx package that was bundled with AmigaDOS 2.0 and
later, and can be found in sys:rexxc.

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8.10: How do I set up other hosts to reach the internet via my SLIP line?

Before you do anything else, get IP address(es) for the other hosts from your
service provider. Your service provider has to arrange to send packets for
those IP addresses to your Amiga, so that it can forward them to the
appropriate hosts. Unless your provider is forwarding those packets to your
Amiga, nothing else will work, so don't even try. Note that your provider is
not obligated to provide this service to you, unless you have a contract that
says they are. Some providers will refuse to do so.

Next, install TCP/IP on your other hosts. The default gateway address should be
the IP address of the gateway Amiga (the one that is connected to the external
SLIP line). For a SLIP connection, the destination IP address should also be
the gateway Amiga.

Finally, configure the gateway Amiga. For SLIP interfaces, you can use the same
IP address for each line, with the destination address being the address of the
host on the other end of the line. Presumably, you're going to use the same
SLIP driver, so configure the second interface similar to the first, changing
only the device name and unit number. You may want to turn off carrier detect.
Copy the ifconfig line in amitcp:bin/startnet, changing the destination IP
address and SLIP device and unit to the values for the SLIP connection you are
adding. Last - but not least - edit amitcp:db/amitcp.config to set gateway=YES
instead of NO.

Assuming that everything was done properly - by both you and your network
provider - you should be able to reboot the gateway and internal machines, and
have everything work. Testing should proceed along the same lines as setting up
an initial SLIP line: make sure your machines can talk to each other, then try
talking to the first external destination, then try reaching the internet at
large.

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9: Miscellanious other questions

9.1: What is SANA-II?

SANA-II is the software interface between AmiTCP and your network interface.
There are freely available SANA-II drivers for SLIP. CSLIP, the A2060 card and
the A2065 card and PPP. If you are purchasing a card to connect your Amiga to a
network such as Ethernet, make sure that the card has a SANA-II driver if you
want to use AmiTCP with the card.

The SANA-II is the standard Amiga network device driver specification released
by Commodore-Amiga. The SANA-II specification is available on the Aminet, fish
disks and other forums. (Thanks Jarno)

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

9.2: My internet provider offers SLIP accounts for a small extra charge. If I
change my account to a SLIP account, can I still access it the "old" way, in
case I just want to quickly check my mail or something?

The only people who can answer that are your Network providers.

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10: Other sources of information

10.1: Is there an AmiTCP mailing list?

Yes, it is meant for developers of software for AmiTCP. Please consult the file
AmiTCP:README.FIRST. ;-)

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

10.2: Where are the archives of the AmiTCP Mailing List?

(thanks Markus :)

These are available in from gopher
<gopher://gopher.tky.hut.fi/11/.publish/puhuri/AmiTCP/list> and also via
Anonymous FTP <kampi.hut.fi:AmiTCP> in amitcp-listYYYY-MM.gz where YYYY-MM is
the year and month.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

10.3: What should I do if I have a question that is not answered here?

Your best option is to post to USENET in the comp.sys.amiga.networking
newsgroup. Include as much information as possible, what system your running,
what version of AmiTCP your running, and what the problem is. The more info you
give the better the chance you have of your question being answered.
Alternatively mail me <mailto:[e-mail]> or the amitcp group
<mailto:[e-mail]> and we will try to answer your questions.

This is of course after you have read all the AmiTCP documentation and any
additional documentation that comes with the software that you use :-)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

10.4: What other references might be useful?

[Authors note: I'm including both commercial and non-commercial references,
along with how to find either them or more information. This is not an
endorsement, merely a pointer to more information.]

For information on Mosaic and World Wide Web software on the Amiga, see the
Amiga Mosaic & WWW FAQ. <http://www.phone.net/ATCPFAQ/amosaic.html>

If you're interested in using The Internet Adapter (tm) (normally just TIA),
you might want to get a copy of the TIA FAQ.
<http://marketplace.com/tia/tia.user.faqs/tia.user.faq.pointers.html> For using
TIA with amitcp, there is an  archive of things that might be useful
<ftp://marketplace.com/tia/docs/TIA2AmiTCP.lha> to you.

"Connect Your Amiga! A Guide to the Internet, LANs, BBSs and Online Services,"
by Dale L. Larson. ISBN 1-885876-02-5, US$24.95. For more info:

Intangible Assets Manufacturing
828 Ormond Avenue
Drexel Hill, PA 19026-2604
USA
VOICE: [phone]
FAX: [phone]
EMAIL: [e-mail]
WWW: http://www.iam.com/iam <http://www.iam.com/iam>
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