Telegard Bulletin Board Software, v3.02
RELEASE Documentation
Copyright (C) 1996 by Tim Strike
All Rights Reserved.
These are just notes that I have compiled over time with regards to
the many questions I get asked daily. This is not a F.A.Q., but
is a way of explaining how and why certain things work the way they
do with Telegard. It will be continually updated. New topics (from
release to release) will be marked with a "|" pipe character along
the left margin.
REFERENCE FILES AND DOCUMENTATION
* Telegard includes some small reference files in /notes/, all
with the extension of *.REF. These files cover various aspects
of the system, included ACS commands, COLOUR commands, MCI
codes, MENU commands, SCRIPT commands, SYSOP FUNCTION keys, TEXT
files and the command line options for Telegard.
* Telegard documentation has not been completed at the time of
the release of gamma-3. Our goal is to complete the
documentation for the final 3.0 release. In the mean time,
Kevin Watkins has done a fine job on the pre-release
documentation, which is distributed in it's current form as
TELEGARD.DOC.
UTILITIES
* INDEX.EXE was not designed to be run while a user is online;
this is for several reasons, but main reason is it modifies
files which the online user will access at some point. Indexing
should *ONLY* be run when a user is *NOT* online. This goes for
single or multinode setups.
* USERS.EXE allows you to pack away deleted users (unlike 2.7,
Telegard 3.0 does not automatically reuse deleted accounts).
USERS.EXE also allows sorting of the userbase -- first it sorts
by security level, and then it sorts by user name within each
security level echelon.
MAINTENANCE
* Telegard is, for the most part, self-maintaining. The index
files are designed to work without interruption and most of the
data files automatically handle packing and removal of unused
records.
That said, the Telegard index files do require some maintenance
to maintain top performance. It is recommended that you:
(i) Run INDEX SORT ALL on a nightly schedule
(ii) Run INDEX BUILD ALL on a weekly schedule, if not
every couple of days
LANGUAGES
* Telegard 3.0 no longer has an internal strings list. All
strings are stored in an external language file (the default of
which is ENGLISH.TXT in /language/). To change this file, use
a text editor which does *not* strip spaces from the end of a
line (Qedit with said option disabled works well). After
changing any language file, you must recompile it. From your
/language/ directory, run "C:\BBS\LANGUAGE\MAKELANG <language>"
and this will compile your new language strings.
* The language system is fairly extensive, and just about every
user-viewable string can be configured in any manner you like.
For more information, see the header in ENGLISH.TXT, and don't
forget about the *.REF files in /notes/.
MESSAGES
* Telegard uses JAM and Squish message bases because they are
standardized. Standardized formats allow external utilities to
easily work with Telegard, without the need of a conversion
program (/a la TELEMAIL). For these reasons as well, I have not
taken the time to develop a message base packer for Telegard --
it's development time that I just don't have.
There are several external packers available -- some with
freeware/evaluation packages, others with shareware packages:
Gecho 1.10+ Registered Only MBUTIL JAM
FastEcho 1.45a Shareware FEUTILS JAM
Fmail 1.02g Shareware FTOOLS JAM
Squish 1.11 Shareware SQPACK Squish
* File attaches are enabled in Telegard, but the popular JAM
tossers do not support or do not correctly support incoming
and outgoing messages. I suggest limiting attaches to local
bases *ONLY* for now.
* Editing of messages will *not* be added to Telegard. I have my
personal reasons, and while I realize that it is an often
requested feature, I refuse to submerge my values for others on
everything -- I will implement some features I don't agree with,
this won't be one of them!
Setup an external SysOp editor (TimEd, GoldEd, etc) to the
editing of messages if you so desire. Or export/capture the
message, delete the post, and resend it.
| * Message bases only update the lastread pointer if using the
| NEWSCAN option. This is done *on purpose*. Reading forwards
| through a base, or for that matter, reverse, would cause the
| highread to be set when it wasn't meant to be set. This is not
| a bug, and infact, is a rather useful and powerful feature
| (which I won't change now or in the future -- sorry).
* Internal full screen editing will *not* be added to Telegard in
the near future. My development time is limited to new features
-- since many FSE programs already exist, some with extended TG3
support, I refuse to re-invent the wheel while I have other
areas of concern.
* However, Telegard works quite well with external FSE programs!
Telegard 3.0 has been tested with IceEdit (v1.50, Ice
Technologies, 1:259/912), Gedit (v2.10, The Developers Network,
1:170/303) and QuickEd (v1.nn, Dror Tirosh). Other FSE programs
have not been tested, and may not work that well with Telegard
(i.e. TopEd and it's awkward multinode configuration/expectations)
PROTOCOLS AND ARCHIVERS (and for that matter, MODEMS)
* Telegard uses an advanced setup mechanism for protocols,
archivers and modems. We provide working setups which have been
tested for the most popular products, and allow you to quickly
import these setups and us as-is. Most of these setups do not
require any form of modification.
To import the release setups for protocols, archivers and
modems, goto the respective area, select the item to define,
select option (!)Definition Files, select (I)mport and select
the correct item to import. Telegard gamma-3 also prompts when
adding/deleting these items if you wish to import a pre-define
definition.
If at all possible, DO THIS. It will save you many headaches
when trying to setup these external programs on your system.
* LHA troubleshooting -- If you are using LHA/LZH on your system,
make sure you run a version which is compatible with extracting
to a specific path. I personally use LHA 2.05. If you have
problems unpacking mail/files from an LHA archive -- then try
changing ~AP to ~AP\ in the definition, and if it *still*
doesn't work, try removing ~AP entirely from the definition.
* RAR troubleshooting -- RAR encrypted archive handling (archives
w/ file passwords) is _very_ poor. To ensure that RAR does not
mess up files on your system, use the RAR definition included
with Telegard -- it has been tested with version 1.54/1.55.
* DSZ/GSZ configuration -- If you are using non-standard port
setups for your communications, then you will need to update
your DSZ/GSZ protocol definitions. Change "PORT ~CP" to "PORTX
~CJ,~CI" and that should alleviate the problems. Make sure that
within Telegard you have your modem BASE I/O ADDRESS and IRQ set
properly as well (single nodes -> Config.Modem, multiple nodes
-> Manager.Nodes.Modem).
* BIMODEM troubleshooting -- don't bother. BiModem is *not* worth
the effort because it has poor error handling and is prone to
problems. If you really must use BiModem, then set it up from
the docs as if you were using DSZ compatibility, and then use
the DSZ definition as a base definition, updating only the
protocol command lines and description.
* Protocol troubleshooting, in general -- There are several things
to check when troubleshooting protocol problems:
(i) Are you using non-standard ports? If YES, you will
likely need to modify your protocols so they know
this.
(ii) Have you set the log options correctly? Check by
looking at a imported definition for examples -- or
better yet, *use* an imported definition. If you have
a SET DSZLOG= statement *outside* of Telegard, remove
it so as not to interfere with protocol SET statement.
(iii) Is your environment size big enough for the SET=
statement used by the protocol? DOS defaults the
environment to 256 bytes. If you have increased your
environment or are getting close to the 256 byte mark
outside of Telegard, then you need to increase the
environment *inside* Telegard -- setup environment
size under SystemConfig.e(X)ternal.
MULTINODE CONSIDERATIONS
| * When loading Telegard in a multinode environment from a batch
| file, I suggest including the -O command line parameter. This
| assumes that the node specified on the command line *is* the
| correct node number, and will override any previous node status
| left from a system crash or whatnot.
| The main reason that -O was *not* made the default, was that it
| was assumed that the batch files could easily pass -O to
| override, while a local user typing 'TELEGARD -Nnn' to boot the
| system would not neccessarily type the correct node number, thus
| overriding an active node, and killing the process. Thus,
| automated processes like .BAT files loading Telegard on a known,
| specific node, should use -O to override the settings.
| * Door drop files are stored in /TEMPnnn/ under multinode systems.
| When running doors under a multinode system, it is suggested
| that you look at several things:
| (a) Can the door handle more than one node at once? If
| not, you will need to use the script SINGLE.SCR -- read
| it for implementation instructions.
| (b) If the door can handle more than one node, it *should*
| have the ability to point to the directory containing
| the door drop files -- use /TEMP%1/ with the ~CN
| command in your batch file to pass the node directory.
OPERATING SYSTEM LIMITATIONS
* DOS directory limits - DOS and most operating systems can't
handle a large number of files in any given directory. Remember
this and try and keep your directories limited to a smaller
number of files; each JAM/Squish area requires 5 data files, and
thus storing 100 areas in one directory results in 500 files.
Separating the files into categories (most notably, Networks)
can cut down on access time for those files. It's more
significant on multinode systems, but I suggest keeping the
number of files to somewhere between 100 and 150, meaning keep
the number of areas per directory to around 30.
| * Telegard has very much been designed for DOS 8+3 filename type
| systems. To change this would require some of the guts of the
| system to be removed and reworked, and in all honesty, I'm not
| going to make the effort. File systems which use longer
| filenames can also use 8+3 format -- so use that format for BBS
| related files. Windows '95 users can use the SHORTFILE name for
| backwards compatibility.
| OTHER ISSUES
|
| * There is no shuttle logon menu, nor will I ever add one to the
| Telegard code. It's a personal issue, and I just don't agree
| with shuttle logon processes. If you wish to add a shuttle
| logon, use a script file (top of LOGON.SCR, or a seperate
| shuttle logon), or use a logon menu. Please do not ask me to
| code one into Telegard; your message will be deleted and I will
| not respond. Sorry.
INTERESTING TID-BITS
* So you want to display certain files on certain dates (01/01,
12/25, etc.) -- well, this is very easy with Telegard and the
scripting file. For instance, adding the following line to
your LOGON.SCR will allow you to display these timely files
automatically:
| FILEDISPLAY ~EP/-~EL5~SJ
Will then display any file in the form of mm-dd.* on that
particular date. So 01-01.* is display on 01/01, 12-25.* is
displayed on 12/25, etc.
| * To parse IF/IFNOT statements for empty strings (""), try
| putting a dummy character on either side of the test: i.e.
| IF "!~&1" "!" will parse only if ~&1 == NULL, and replaces
| the logical statement of IF "~&1" "" which most of us would try.
| This is similar to the logical problems in .BAT files and the
| token based parsing of the current script language.
* To reset your time logging graphs, delete the file TIMELOG.DAT
when no user is online and all nodes are sitting in DOS. This
will start new graphs the next time a user logs on.
Regards, Tim Strike
Fidonet 1:259/423
Internet ts@gryn.org *or* 4ts2@qlink.queensu.ca
WWW http://qlink.queensu.ca/~4ts2
FTP ftp://filebank.com/telegard
BBS (905)820-7273
2400-16,800 Dual Standard (HST/V32bis)
24 hours, except ZMH (4:00-5:00pm)