VUUAccess A VUUCP Replacement Tool Developed by Mitchel F. Ludwig Version 1.01 New Features in v1.01 : - Added support for "" in Waffle static file. - Fixed bug in static file parsing which ignored last line of static file. - Added better handling of RMAIL/RNEWS with bad header info. Bad header info is now logged to the .log file, but the processing of information will continue. - Added better handling of messages which exceed the limit VBBS imposes. Now, messages of > 32K are logged as such and skipped. Processing continues. - Tracking of mail. Mail messages are logged, in their entirity, to the .log file. Remember to clean it up, on an active system, it will get big quick. Registration : As of the 1.01 release of the VUUAccess code, I am now taking registration info for the software. Registration is $25.00 US, and for that you get, basically, nothing. Except for the work I've done, the easy documentation, the quick and helpful support, and the nasty looks from my wife, you get nothing. Honestly though, I'm all for shareware, and I think VUUAccess is a very useful package. Just like I feel anyone using Waffle to transport UUCP should be using a registered copy of their software, you should register this. Once registered, sysops will receive notification, by mail, of any updates to the VUUAccess code. Additionally, I will accept any reasonable requests for enhancements, bug fixes, documentation work, whatever, from registered users. Also, the nifty part, registered users will get access to an anonymous login to my system, from which they will be able to download the latest and greatest VUUAccess code. Please send the following information, along with your check to my address (at the bottom of this document). Full Name : Street Address : City, St, Zip : UUCP System Name : Your account on : VBBS Node # : VBBS Handle : The System : First off, let me state my kudos to Roland for an excellent package in VBBS. I've never met the man, but his determination and drive have been of benefit to us all. Kissing up finished, let me state that, while the VUUCP package provided for VBBS is usable, it's no picnic. To that end, begins my story... About two years ago, I started using VBBS. Up to then, I had run both a Waffle BBS, as well as a public access UNIX system. When I moved to VBBS, I looked at the original VUUCP. Although it worked, it was anything but useful. It was difficult to manage, and frequently didn't work at all. At that point, I started using Waffle as a door from my VBBS system, and began to look for alternatives. It took me about two months to decided that, if I wanted my USENET news/mail directed into VBBS, I was going to have to do it myself. Took me two years to get around to it. Thus was born VUUAccess. Please note. This software is currently in BETA test. I don't guarentee anything. It's clean, as far as I can tell, but you never know. Those who take the software are encouraged to let me know what the deal is. I'd appreciate any comments you might have on how to improve it. Also, if you find it useful, and you are going to use it, a $25.00 donation is requested. Not required, mind you, but requested. You can send it to me at the address below. Installation : Installation of VUUAccess is about as easy as it gets. Merely place the VUUCP.EXE program in your root VBBS directory, and your installed. It is assumed that you are already running Waffle, using the 1.64 release or better. There are no configuration programs, no install scripts, nothing. All you need to do is define a few environment variables, and you are off. They are : WAFFLE : This is the default Waffle environment variable. It should point to the static file for your Waffle system. TEMP : This should point to a directory where temporary files can be worked on. VBBS : This points to the VBBS home directory. It should be an explicit drive and path. VBBSID : This is your VBBS node number. If you have a registered number, place it here. If not, use whatever is in your network configuration for VBBS (usually 0). SIG : This points to the file that you want appended to the end of all outgoing mail and news. Much like the VBBS taglines, it should be something that describes your system. If you don't want one, you can leave this environment variable unassigned. That's all there is to it. VUUAccess is now set up. All you need to do on the VBBS end to make it active is set up Network type 9 in the VCONFIG package. Enter your network node name, and you are ready to fly. To test the system, and see if it is working, try mailing from VBBS to an existing account on your Waffle system. From VBBS, send mail, using the correct network, to the account on the Waffle system. For example, if you have an account named root on your Waffle system, mail to root@youraddress, where youraddress is the USENET address of your machine. After leaving the VBBS session, VUUAccess should send the mail to your Waffle system. Log into the Waffle system, and check to make sure that it is there. You should have received mail from username.usernum@youraddress, where username the name entered in the last name field on your VBBS system, usernum is the account number you have on VBBS, and youraddress is your network address. Once this is working, you can move on. If any problems occur, check the Waffle error logs for the type of problem encountered. Common problems include : Incorrectly setting up environment variables. No path to Waffle bin directory. Bad Waffle static file setup. Configuring Mail : To set up the ability to receive mail, run the VUUCP package using the /P option. This will generate user aliases for your system. When it is done running, check the alias file for your Waffle system. For each user on your system, you should see a line similar to: username.usernum | vuucp /E NETWORKID=9 username.usernum This information tells Waffle that when mail comes in for username.usernum, to pass it to the VUUCP program. Based on the Network type and destination address, VUUCP will mail the incoming mail to the correct VBBS address. Once this had been completed, try mailing from Waffle to VBBS. From waffle, send mail to your VBBS address as it is displayed in the aliases file. You should see the VUUCP banner as the program routes the mail to VBBS. Now log into VBBS. The mail tosser should mail a number of messages to various users. These include both your test message, as well as welcome messages from VUUCP to the new USENET users on your system. Once this is completed, log in and read mail. You should have two messages from the USENET. One should be a welcome message, the other your mail from Waffle. If this is not occurring, check the Waffle error files. Configuring News : Assuming the correct installation of VUUAccess for mail, installation for news support is infinitely easy. The administrator need only add the newsgroups to Vconfig that he/she wished to make available to users into a sub area, and off he/she goes. In order to pass news to VBBS, it is necessary that a line be added to whatever batch file will be used to poll a host machine on the USENET network. For example, using a batch file named poll.bat, the file could look like : UUXQT BATCH UUCICO -s all UUXQT c:\vbbs\VUUCP /n NETWORKID=9 expire In short, this does the following : UUXQT : Runs the Waffle UUXQT program to process any incoming mail/news that may still be there. BATCH : Will create batches of news for outgoing processing. UUCICO : Will poll any system in your L.sys file. UUXQT : Process any news/mail that came in during the uucico session. VUUCP : Execute VUUCP, and read into VBBS any new incoming news. EXPIRE : Run a third party (also available for download) expire program to clean up old news. Any incoming news which also has an entry in the network subs list for your VBBS system will be read in and passed to VBBS as a new post. ALIASES.SYS File : If there exist on your system any aliases you wish to keep at all times, you may place a file in the system directory of your Waffle system called aliases.sys. This file will be appended to the aliases file each time VUUCP is executed with the /P option. Use this file for aliasing accounts like root into your VBBS system. External Events : To correctly process information in VUUCP, a number of external events need to be set up. At a minimum, the following events should be placed in your external events list in Vconfig. c:\vbbs\VUUCP /P NETWORKID=network_number This tells VUUCP to create the alias file for Waffle at a specified time of each day. This should run once per day, usually in the evening or early morning. c:\waffle\bin\POLL.bat This tells VBBS to call Waffle to poll out to a host system. This can occur any number of times during a day, but should occur at least once per day. Logging of Information : The VUUCP log is located in the VBBS data directory. Any pertinent information is logged here. This includes, but is not limited to, mail and news traffic to and from the VBBS system. VUUCP Execution parameters : The VUUCP package is called using the following conventions : VUUCP /option NETWORKID=network_number [user]. When executing VUUCP, a number of calling parameters may be passed. They are : /U : Any outgoing news/mail will be passed from the VBBS system to rnews or rmail. /P : Build alias file. This will build an alias file by combining any VBBS accounts into USENET accounts, as well as including any aliases in your aliases.sys file. Additionally, new USENET users will have mailed to them a welcome message explaining a little bit about the USENET. /E : Pass incoming mail from USENET to a VBBS account. /N : Process incoming news from USENET into VBBS. For more information, or to download VUUAccess, call : The Starship Bistromath 908-940-1012 24hrs v.32bis or mail me at 1@9083 (VNet) root@wefunk.rent.com (USENET) ludwig.1@wefunk.rent.com (USENET) Snail Mail : Mitchel F. Ludwig 105 Lindsey Court Franklin Park, NJ 08823