ÉÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍ» º ÚÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ¿ º ÛÛÛÛÛº ³ The News At 10 ³ º±ÛÛÛ º ÀÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÙ º ÛÛÛÛÛº þ RELEASE 2.0 þ º±ÛÛÛ º 03 April 1990 º ÛÛÛÛÛº Public Release - Distribute Freely º±ÛÛÛ º (c)1990, Tim Kilgore, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED º ÈÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍͼ ÚÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ¿ ÛÛÛÛ³ What is The News At Ten? ³±ÛÛÛ ÀÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÙ The News At Ten is a program designed to help System Operators (SysOps) produce a system newsletter. TNAT produces both ANSI and ASCII output in three primary formats and in three secondary formats. The output that TNAT produces is attractive and should enhance the overall appearance of your BBS. TNAT should help to make the reading of the news more pleasurable to the caller. ÚÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ¿ ÛÛÛÛ³ Why TNAT? ³±ÛÛÛ ÀÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÙ The News At Ten was written as a response to the high price of a similar product. SysOp's are constantly gouged for money and sometimes the price doesn't match the utility that the product affords. While TNAT isn't freeware, at $10 per site it certainly doesn't carry an oppressive price tag. The News At Ten also has some advantages over existing products. The best of these is that TNAT doesn't rely upon a built-in word processor. TNAT reads document files and creates the newsletter from them. This means that you can use your favorite word processor, spelling checker, and all the other bells and buzzers that come with it and STILL produce a newsletter. Because TNAT reads individual files, you can also quickly delete a news file and recompile the newsletter. It is also self-policing, deleting files beyond a user defined range. You won't need to waste time with PURGE commands and other nonsense with TNAT! TNAT also meets the needs of your BBS software. Pause codes, message breaks, and screen clearing commands are all supported so that you can configure TNAT to work exactly as your BBS software needs it too. TNAT has been designed to be as generic as possible and has been tested under many different types of BBS software. TNAT also supports randomly determined formats. This means that all of the different formats can be mixed into a single display. We'll discuss this at length in the section entitled 'Configuration.' Finally, TNAT offers all the goodies that you'd expect to find in a newsletter generator. User definable colors, many output formats, and quality programming. Plus, TNAT makes extensive use of professional level machine language routines which means that it is FAST. We hope that you like TNAT! ÚÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ¿ ÛÛÛ³ Requirements ³±ÛÛ ÀÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÙ TNAT is designed to operate on an IBM or compatible. TNAT requires DOS 3.x and at least 128k of RAM. Memory requirements will fluctuate with the size of the document processed. ÚÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ¿ ÛÛÛÛ³ How TNAT Works ³±ÛÛÛ ÀÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÙ TNAT is invoked as follows: TNAT20 filename.ext The 'filename.ext' is the name of the configuration file that TNAT will use. Because the configuration file contains all of the information for the operation of TNAT, it makes TNAT very flexible. You could create several configuration files which would process different messages. This allows you to easily produce such things as conference newsletters as well as the system newsletter. TNAT is also batch capable. If you have a weekly or monthly event (such as resetting doors) that you want people to know about, TNAT is the perfect batch driven choice. Once TNAT has loaded the configuration file it now begins to create your newsletter. First, it looks for a 'header' file if you have specified one. If you haven't, TNAT will proceed to the next step. The header is a file which proceeds the newsletter. This allows you to further personalize your system newsletter without worrying about cumbersome batch files. (See EXAMPLE1.CLR or EXAMPLE1.BBS for an example of a newsletter with a header file attached.) Now TNAT begins to go to work. Using the colors and format that you have specified, TNAT begins processing your text files. The text files are first sorted by date, with the newest file being processed first. If TNAT encounters files beyond a specified range, it deletes them. TNAT then begins processing your text files. These text files must fall within certain format limitations. These limitations are described in the 'Input Files' section of this document. If all goes well, TNAT creates your newsletter. The operation of TNAT is drab and boring, but the output isn't! ÚÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ¿ ÛÛÛ³ Input Files ³±ÛÛ ÀÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÙ TNAT uses standard ASCII text files for input. These text files MUST meet the following specifications: LINE 1 (HEADER) 30 Characters Max ALL OTHER LINES 63 Characters Max (each line must terminate in a CR-LF tandom) (spaces DO count as characters) If you haven't already done so, examine EXAMPLE1.CLR or EXAMPLE1.BBS. Then examine the files EX1.DOC, EX2.DOC, and EX3.DOC to see how these simple rules are used. TNAT processes all files with a specified extension in a specified subdirectory. Thus, if TNAT is told process files with an extension of DOC in a given subdirectory, it will ignore any file with a different extension. The advantage to this is that you can keep all of your TNAT data files together. If you have conferences, you could give the files an extension which identified it (such as C1, C2,_C33, C34, etc). This would allow you to create newsletters for each conference fairly easily. ÚÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ¿ ÛÛÛ³ Configuration ³±ÛÛ ÀÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÙ TNAT is distributed with a program called TNATCFG.EXE which will make the configuration of TNAT a snap. It is a WYSIWYG configuration program and is easy to use. None the less, there are a few steps of the configuration process which warrant discussion. To create a new configuration file, just type TNATCFG at the DOS prompt. To edit an old configuration file, type: TNATCFG TNATCFG will appear and, depending if you are using a CGA system or not, you will be asked about snow checking. After the razzle-dazzle opening, TNATCFG is ready to go to work. TNATCFG uses a form of pull-down menus as it's interface with you. You should start at the left and work your way right. TNATCFG will NOT let you save a configuration file that isn't validated, so all information needs to be entered, validated, and then saved. FORMAT The first selection on TNATCFG is the FORMAT box. When you pull it down, you'll be given the following options: STANDARD CHECKERS TELETYPE ALTERNATING RANDOM CONTROLLED The first three choices allow you to produce single format output of your choice. STANDARD is the older TNAT format, with a simple graceful box as the output format. CHECKERS creates a box with a checkered border. TELETYPE produces alternating text colors and attempts to appear like a sheet of green-bar computer paper. The second group of three choices utilize all of the first three output formats. Here is how each works: ALTERNATING - Alternating randomly determines a starting format and then produces alternates between each of the first three formats. If you had 4 documents that you processed into TNAT, here is how they might look: DOC1 DOC2 DOC3 DOC4 CHECKERS TELETYPE STANDARD CHECKERS (and so on) RANDOM - The random format option randomly determines the format used for each document processed. Because it is random, the same primary format can and will appear back to back. Here is how your output might appear: DOC1 DOC2 DOC3 DOC4 DOC5 STANDARD STANDARD CHECKERS STANDARD TELETYPE CONTROLLED - Controlled is a variant of the RANDOM option. The controlled format insures that the same two primary formats do NOT appear back to back. Using the arrow keys, move the cursor down to the option you prefer and press enter. A small box will appear next to the option, indicating that it has been selected. If, when you save the file, you have not selected a FORMAT, then ALTERNATING will be used as the default. COLORS This is a simple option to use. Select it, and then you will be presented with a menu with a number of choices. Select one of them. Now use all 4 of the arrow keys to increment the color values for the area you selected. To exit this option, hit ESC or press enter. PATHS This area allows you to specify the directories that output will be written to, input will be read from, and where your MASTHEAD files are located. The input boxes for each use WordStar keystrokes or, at you option, DOS keystrokes for editing. Insert is off when you start, with the mini-editor being in overstrike mode. When you select this option, you will be presented with the following choices: Output Drive & Path Input Drive & Path Masthead Drv & Path INPUT DRIVE & PATH - This is where TNAT goes to get the files that it will process. TNAT looks for files with a certain extension, such as DOC or TXT, in the directory that you specify. (How to tell TNAT the extension to be used is discussed under CONFIGURATION: File Names.) An example would be: C:\DOCS OUTPUT DRIVE & PATH - This is where TNAT will write the output that it produces. It should point to a directory that your BBS software utilizes and can find. I use Phoenix so I write my output file directly to the Phoenix directory as shown here: C:\PHOENIX MASTHEAD DRV & PATH TNAT will allow you to specify a MASTHEAD file that will appear before all other output. This MASTHEAD allows you to personalize TNAT to match the flavor of your BBS. I keep my MASTHEAD files in the same directory as my INPUT files. This keeps things simpler for me. So, an example of this would be: C:\DOCS The paths that you provide should NOT have a backslash (\) appended to them. These paths must be verified before TNAT will allow you to save the configuration file, so enter them correctly. FILE NAMES This option allows you to specify the file names that will be used or created by TNAT. Again, full featured editing is effect. ANSI & ASCII OUTPUT FILE - This is where you specify the name of the ANSI output file. Simply enter a file name of your liking, and TNAT will create it once it executes. NOTE: If you specify the name of an existing file, you will not be warned. TNAT will overwrite the file and you will lose it. Be sure that the file name is unique. EXTENSION USED - When TNAT goes to the directory that you specified for input, it will look for files bearing the extension entered here. When it finds them, it will sort them by date and then create the bulletin. Commonly used extensions are DOC and TXT. ANSI & ASCII HEADER - These are the Masthead file names that TNAT will use. They should reside in the directory specified in PATHS: MastHead Drv & Path, above. PAGE STOP Some extremely versatile BBS' allow the SysOp to specify when a display is to come to a stop or delay. TNAT fully supports this capability by allowing you enter a code that will appear after EACH document processed. There has been some confusion about using this capability. If your BBS can STOP a text file with a control sequence, then this option could further enhance the display of TNAT. To tell TNAT that you are using PAGE STOP codes, highlight the PAGE STOP on/OFF and press enter. You will note that the on/OFF has become ON/off, denoting that the feature is activated. You must now decide if you want screen clearing codes to be sent between each message. This allows you show your file, stop, clear the screen, show the next file, etc. If you want to activate screen clearing codes, highlight the option and press enter. You will note that the toggle has (on/OFF) has changed. Finally, you must enter the PAGE STOP code. TNAT's mini- editor is incapable of direct entry of ASCII codes below 32. To defeat this limitation, the ^ symbol lets TNAT know that an ASCII character number is about to follow. If you want to use ASCII characters above 32, simply press and hold the ALT key and then enter the ASCII value (32 to 255 in this case) from the KEYPAD. The desired ASCII character will then appear. Commonly used BBS escape codes are CONTROL-A through CONTROL-D. Here is a chart for entering those codes: CTRL-A = ^1 CTRL-B = ^2 CTRL-C = ^3 CTRL-D = ^4 (and so on) If your BBS supports it, this a powerful feature which will help to enhance the appearance of the display of your newsletter. PAGE BREAK CODES Some BBS' must be told when to present a PRESS ENTER TO CONTINUE prompt. If they don't receive this code, the BBS system dumps the file until comes to an end. Your 2400 baud+ callers will be hard pressed to keep up with the display, so TNAT affords you the opportunity to automatically insert your code which will stop the display. Like PAGE STOP (above), you must first tell TNAT that you are using the PAGE BREAK option. Highlight the PAGE BREAK on/OFF and press enter. Note the 'on' is now capitalized. Now you have the option of telling TNAT how many lines it will count before it will insert the PAGE BREAK code. The default is 23. You may enter a value from 1 to 99 here. 23 to 25 is common. (Note that TNAT begins it's count from the first document processed. It does NOT count the number of lines in your MASTHEAD file, so you may wish to append a stopping sequence at the end of your MASTHEAD file.) Now you must enter your PAGE BREAK code. The same rules for entering PAGE STOP codes apply. There has been some confusion between what the PAGE STOP and the PAGE BREAK options allow you to do. PAGE STOP appends an escape sequence after each message. PAGE BREAK inserts an escape sequence after a certain number of lines. Both PAGE STOP and PAGE BREAK should not be activated. The two do not work together well. MISC This input box deals with a number of options. We'll discuss each one. YOUR NAME - Enter anything that you like. If you have registered TNAT, then please enter your name exactly as it appears in your registration info. Again, full featured editing is in effect. YOUR BBS' NAME - Follow the guideline listed above under YOUR NAME. REGISTRATION NUMBER - If you select this option, you will notice that the entry field is prepopulated with "1111111111" (10 1's). TNAT will fail to function if anything but a valid registration number is entered here. The ten 1's will allow TNAT to function as an unregistered user. NUMBER OF BULLETINS - You may enter a number ranging from 1 to 30,000 in this field. TNAT will look at this number and compare it to the number of files with matching extension. If you have specified, say, 10 bulletins and TNAT finds 11 files meeting your specifications, the oldest of them will be deleted. TNAT is self policing, deleting old news files automatically. CONFIG FILE NAME - This is the name of the file that all your configuration information will be written to. An example is provided when you select this option. Note that if you do not specify a drive and path, the file will be written to the current directory. You still must specify a file name. TEST PATHS GIVEN - TNAT relies upon TNATCFG to verify paths. Therefore, TNATCFG will not allow you save a configuration file without first verifying all the paths. While this error checking could be done much fast, TNATCFG slows itself down, allowing you to see each path being checked. SAVE & CONTINUE - Once you have selected the TEST PATHS GIVEN and have been given a clean bill of health, this option becomes available to you. Your settings will be saved and you will be able to continue editing you configuration. EXIT CONFIGURATION - Watch yourself! There is no 'safety-net' here. If you select this option, TNATCFG will immediately return you to the DOS prompt. EDITING A CONFIGURATION FILE BY HAND Because TNATCFG currently doesn't allow the editing of existing configuration files and some page break/stop codes may be too long, you can edit the configuration file by hand. This is, at best, a difficult process. If you find that you need to edit a configuration file by hand, examine DESCRIBED.CFG for details on what each line in the configuration file means. An advantage to editing your config file by hand is that you can quickly make a minor adjustment, or change a color easily. QEdit is an excellent choice for this sort of editing. ÚÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ¿ ÛÛÛ³ REGISTERING ³±ÛÛ ÀÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÙ TNAT is a high visibility program that your callers will see every time that they log on. The success of shareware depends largely upon the individual SysOp. If you register the products that you use, you set an example for others to follow. Do not under-estimate your importance as a role model in the shareware community. TNAT will cost you all of $10 to register. The registration information will work with future releases at no additional cost. TNAT represents many hours of labor and a sizable investment of funds. If you compare TNAT10 to TNAT20, I think that you'll understand the amount of work that went into release 2.0. If you like what TNAT does for you, then please register. TNAT20 may be utilized for 30 days. After that time period, you are expected to discontinue the use of TNAT20, register it, or take advantage Planet ><'s pledge system. To register, simply print the file REGISTER.TXT, fill in the blanks, get a money order, and mail it in. I'll either mail the registration info or deliver it to your BBS, your option. The pledge system is fairly simple. You send in a registration form and check the PLEDGE box. No money is sent. You will receive your registration information just as a paying registrant would. You will then be expected to pay the $10 within 60 days. While the pledge system sounds like a fairly simple way to rip a shareware author off, it is being offered for a number of reasons. First, I run a BBS myself and I KNOW how much it costs to operate one. Second, I tend to trust people until they show that they can't be trusted. SysOp's tend to be people that you can count on. Those that abuse this trust will get what is coming to them. Future releases of TNAT and all Planet >< productions will be distributed with a listing of those that taken advantage of the pledge system and then failed to pay. So if you are considering using the pledge system, think it over. You'll look pretty cheap otherwise. ÚÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ¿ ÛÛÛÛ³ Liability ³±ÛÛÛ ÀÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÙ By using any programs enclosed in this archive you are agreeing to release Tim Kilgore and Planet >< Programming from all liability for consequential damages. In no event shall the author or Plant >< Programming be liable for any damages whatsoever resulting from the use or inability to use this product, even if the author had been advised of the possibilities of such damages. ÚÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ¿ ÛÛÛ³ Release History ³±ÛÛ ÀÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÙ Feb 1990 Released TNAT v1.0 This release was my first shareware release. It was poorly written, used DOS commands, and wasn't that fast. But, gosh, it worked great and I'm still mighty proud of it. Mar 1990 Release TNAT v2.0b This was a beta release. No major errors were reported, and only two minor errors surfaced. This release didn't include TNATCFG. Apr 1990 Released TNAT v2.0 TNAT has been greatly improved. No DOS calls, rapid sorting, and extensive use of machine language routines has increased both the power and flexibility of TNAT. Color is now user definable. Three primary output formats are offered with three secondary formats added. TNATCFG was added to the TNAT system. Features WYSIWYG configuration and error checking. ÚÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ¿ ÛÛÛ³ Support Sites ³±ÛÛ ÀÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÙ If you are really having problems getting TNAT to function smoothly with your software, the SysOp's of the following BBS' may be able to help you. Primary Support Sites - Planet >< RCS Software: PHOENIX RCS SysOp: Tim Kilgore FIDO 1:289/5 þ Phoenix 9:899/2 816-263-7623 9600 Hayes V32 The Disk Fix Software: WildCat! SysOp: Tom Wallace FIDO 1:3615/5 1-615-983-8232 9600 Hayes V42 Secondary Support Sites - The Anonymous BBS Software: RyBBS SysOp: Bob R. 1-414-251-2580 9600 Hayes V42 Oregon Trails CrossRoads Software: Opus SysOp: Thomas Lange FIDO 1:303/5 1-307-472-3615 9600 Hayes V42 The Loris BBS Software: SpitFire SysOp: Rick Veazey 1-803-756-3025 2400 baud The Universe of Karsheda Software: Phoenix SysOp: Kevin Wozniak Phoenix Net 9:840/2 1-414-764-3244 9600 HST (A number of fine BBS products originate here) If you don't see your BBS software listed here and are interested in becoming a secondary support site, please E- mail Tim Kilgore at Planet ><. ÚÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ¿ ÛÛÛ³ Other Planet >< Titles ³±ÛÛ ÀÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÙ Planet >< Programming specializes in Hi-Vis programs with the Sysop in mind. All programs make use of machine language routines to increase speed and to provide heightened error-trapping. For PHOENIX RCS - The Phoenix Composite Callers Compiler distributed as PCCC10.ZIP If you have less than 500 users, then PCCC is just the tool that you've been looking for. PCCC produces 2 displays in both ANSI and ASCII flavors. The first display is called THE CALLERS REGISTER and it will show the last 1 to 30 callers in the order that they called in. Designed to be executed as an errorlevel drop, THE CALLERS REGISTER lets you callers know who has been on recently. The second display is called THE HALL OF USERS. It is a listing of all callers and the last time they called. The listing is also sorted alphabetically! PCCC is so fast that this file can also be created as part of your errorlevel drop! PCCC is available at Phoenix Net 9:899/2 and is FREQ'able. Expect upgrades every 3 to 6 months.