
        ͻ
                LORABBS PROFESSIONAL EDITION - VERSION 2.99.34        
        ͼ

        Preliminary Documentation
        Version 2.99.34

        Coyright (c) 1996-97 by Marco Maccaferri. All rights reserved.


        ͻ
         INSTALLATION                                                 
        ͼ

        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. 


        Ŀ
         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 lc
        chmod a+x lora
        chmod a+x lfile
        chmod a+x lmsg
        chmod a+x luser
        chmod a+x comm.dll
        chmod a+x bbs.dll
        chmod a+x lora_api.dll
        chmod a+x msgbase.dll

        As you have noticed there are some .dll files. These files are
        shared libraries (other systems calls these files Dynamic Link
        Libraries, so the extension of .dll). In order for Lora to find
        these libraries you should add the directory that contains these
        files to the LD_LIBRARY_PATH environment variabile.

        My suggestion is to create a symbolic link in the /sbin (or
        /usr/bin) directory for the executable files (lora, lc, lmsg,
        luser and lfile) and a symbolic link in the /lib (or /usr/lib)
        directory for the .dll files (comm.dll, lora_api.dll,
        msgbase.dll and bbs.dll). For example:

        ln -s lc /usr/bin/lc
        ln -s lora /usr/bin/lora
        ln -s lfile /usr/bin/lfile
        ln -s lmsg /usr/bin/lmsg
        ln -s luser /usr/bin/luser
        ln -s comm.dll /usr/lib/comm.dll
        ln -s bbs.dll /usr/lib/bbs.dll
        ln -s lora_api.dll /usr/lib/lora_api.dll
        ln -s msgbase.dll /usr/lib/msgbase.dll

        Of course you must be logged as root or have enough privileges
        to do this kind of operations.

        If Lora can't start because it can't find the library
        libncurses.so.3.0 (or any other version) you can use the one
        that is included in the package. Simply rename the file ncur199e
        to the name requested by Lora. For example:

        mv ncur199e libncurses.so.3.0

        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.


        Ŀ
         Upgrading from Lora 2.4x                                     
        

        If you have installed Lora 2.99.29 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 2.99.29, 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 2.99.29. 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 2.99.29:

        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 2.99.29.

