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╔══════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════╗
║ LORABBS PROFESSIONAL EDITION - VERSION 2.99.41 ║
╚══════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════╝
Preliminary Documentation
Version 2.99.41
Coyright (c) 1996-97 by Marco Maccaferri. All rights reserved.
╔══════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════╗
║ INSTALLATION ║
╚══════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════╝
Lora will ship with a ready-to-run configuration that allows you
to plug in your modem and start you BBS system in a matter of
minutes, with minimal configuration changes (someone may call
this Plug-and-Play).
To install Lora, simply unpack the original distribution package
on an empty directory and type install. You must use an empty
directory, even if you are upgrading from Lora 2.4x, since the
data files are all changed but someone may have the same name,
if you install the new program over a previous installation you
may overwrite some files and you will not be able to import your
existing configuration to the new version.
The following files and directories will be created by the
installation program:
inbound\ Mail inbound directory
outbound\ Mail outbound directory
msg\ Message base files
file\ File areas root directory
temp\ Temporary files directory
home\ User's home directories (private
directories)
misc\*.* Text files that should be displayed during
the BBS operations
menu\*.mnu Menu files
nodes\nodelist.dat FidoNet nodelist data files
nodes\nodes.dat FidoNet nodes data
config.dat Configuration file
channel.dat Channel configuration overrides
events.dat Event scheduler data
file.dat File areas data file
file.idx File areas index file
msg.dat Message areas data file
msg.idx Message areas index file
limits.dat Users limits definitions
packer.dat Compressor definitions
protocol.dat External file transfer protocols
definitions
default.lng Default (english) language file
italian.lng Italian language file
lora.doc Documentation (this file)
lora.exe Main program
lmsg.exe Message areas maintenance utility
lfile.exe File areas maintenance utility
luser.exe Users maintenance utility
snoop.exe Utility to see the user's output on the
local
comm.dll Communication dynamic link (shared) library
lora_api.dll Lora Application Programming Interface
dynamic link (shared) library
msgbase.dll Message base dynamic link (shared) library
bbs.dll BBS dynamic link (shared) library
afxhelp.txt Help text file for the Areafix processor.
raidhelp.txt Help text file for the Raid processor.
so32dll.dll 32 bit socket library. You should delete
this file if you have the TCP/IP stack
already running on your OS/2 system.
tcp32dll.dll 32 bit TCP/IP library. You should delete
this file if you have the TCP/IP stack
already running on your OS/2 system.
If this is a new installation, you need to change some default
values to your needs, before starting your BBS. You should
change the 'Global / Site informations' dialog and, if
necessary, the 'Modem / Hardware' and 'Modem / Command Strings'
dialogs. The default configuration is designed to run on the
COM2 serial port at a speed of 19200 bps and with the simple ATZ
initialisation command. Change this values to reflect your
hardware requirements.
If you are upgrading from a previous beta release, you must run
the update.exe program before starting Lora. If you don't find
this program in the distribution file, then it is not required
(it isn't a bug, just no data files upgrade are required).
You can start exploring your new BBS by issuing the 'System /
Local login' command. As a new user you are assigned the levels
defined with the 'BBS / New users' dialog. If these levels are
too low for you (as a sysop you may want to have an higher
access level), just log off and go to the 'Manager / User
editor' dialog. Your name should be the first displayed on
screen. Change the 'Security' dialog and the 'Limits' field to
reflect your needs.
┌──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│ Notes for Linux users │
└──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘
The installation program will be extracted with not execution
permission. You should manually change that with the following
command:
chmod a+x INSTALL
After the installation program unpacks all the required files,
you should manually change the execution permissions for the
executable files, in order to run the program.
The following commands should be issued from the command line:
chmod a+x lora
chmod a+x lfile
chmod a+x lmsg
chmod a+x luser
Starting from Lora version 2.99.41 there are no more shared
libraries. I had server reports from people trying to use the
Linux version with a lot of problems, may of them can't even
start Lora. From this version on there will be only executable
files with all needed libraries already linked in, this should
solve most of the installation problems.
Lora for Linux can run both as a standalone program (taking full
control of the active console) or as a login daemon. By default
Lora will start as a standalone program an display the mailer
front-end screen with the log, modem output, outbound and status
windows. Using the -daemon command line switch it will start as
a daemon process with no input/output to the standard I/O
streams. Using this parameter you can add Lora to your
/etc/inittab file to be automatically started after each boot.
For example:
lora - Start Lora as a standalone program.
lora -daemon - Start Lora as a daemon process.
Example of /etc/inittab entry:
# BBS lines
s2:12345:respawn:/sbin/lora /home/bbs/config.dat \
/home/bbs/channel.dat \
-n1 -b38400 -p/dev/ttyS1 -daemon
It is possible that Lora can't open the comunication device. On
some Linux systems Lora must be run as root in order to
successfully open the comunication device. If you are not logged
as root and you have problems running Lora, try to logout and
reenter as root.
┌──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│ Upgrading from Lora 2.4x │
└──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘
If you have installed Lora 2.99.41 in a directory separated from
your existing Lora 2.4x installation, then you can upgrade
almost all your existing files. Otherwise, sorry...
For this task the programs 'lcvt240.exe' and 'lcvt241.exe' area
provided. This is a very simple program, with very little error
checking, so be careful and read these notes entirely. The
program is a 16 bit DOS executable.
'lcvt240.exe' will convert all Lora 2.40 files except the menu
files. 'lcvt241.exe' will convert all Lora 2.41 (pl59) files
except the menu files. Since this section is not yet complete in
Lora 2.99.41, the menu files can't be converted right now. A
complete conversion program will be provided with the final
release.
'lcvt240.exe' and 'lcvt241.exe' can be started with the
following parameters:
lcvt* <operation> <frompath> <topath>
<operation> Is the file conversion operation that should be
performed. You can convert one of the following
files:
msg Message areas configuration
file File areas configuration
sched Event scheduler
users Users database
limits User limits definitions
nodes FidoNet nodes definitions
echolink Links for the echomail areas
packers Compressor definitions
filelink Links for the echofile (TIC) areas
<frompath> Is the path complete with the trailing backslash
of your existing Lora 2.4x files. For example:
c:\lora\
<topath> Is the path complete with the trailing backslash
where you have installed Lora 2.99.41. For
example: .\ for the current directory.
Following is a batch file that can be used to completely convert
a Lora 2.4x configuration to Lora 2.99.41:
lcvt240 msg c:\lora\ .\
lcvt240 file c:\lora\ .\
lcvt240 sched c:\lora\ .\
lcvt240 users c:\lora\ .\
lcvt240 limits c:\lora\ .\
lcvt240 nodes c:\lora\ .\nodes\
lcvt240 echolink c:\lora\ .\
lcvt240 packers c:\lora\ .\
lcvt240 filelink c:\lora\ .\
After converting the configuration files, you can create the
filebase with the 'lfile.exe' program. Simply run the following
command:
lfile -i
This command will read the old files.bbs from the file areas
directories and create the filebase.dat and filebase.idx files
that can be read by Lora 2.99.41.