Ham Radio 2000 #2

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Text File | 1997-10-02 | 78KB | 1,853 lines

WINPACK Windows Packet Program by Roger Barker (G4IDE) ====================================================== This document has been written by Mike Marriott (G0OPC) on behalf of Roger Barker (G4IDE) the author and owner of WINPACK. Any errors in this document are mine (Mike Marriott) not Roger's. If you find any errors or have any idea's for update please send them to me. You will find packet and Email addresses at the end of this document. This document is NOT a replacement for the ONLINE help that is available within WINPACK. It is simply an overview to allow you the quick reference flexibility of a hard copy printout if you are not used to the windows help system. WINPACK has CONTEXT SENSITIVE HELP. This means that, at any time, you may press F1 to see a help file on the area of WINPACK that you are using. You will be able to select the particular help you require from the help screen once you have pressed F1 by pointing and clicking the mouse pointer on the part of the program you wish to know about. A larger help file may also be accessed by using the PULL DOWN HELP from the menu bar and clicking on HELP CONTENTS. You may then click on any of the help subjects available or search for a help subject using the search button. I recommend that you read the README.TXT that can be accessed under the HELP pull down menu. WINPACK requires Microsoft Windows V3.1 or later and will run in Windows 95. Winpack is a Windows based packet PMS program to allow you to get the best possible use from your Packet TNC or network switch. It contains many features that are found in no other packet software in the world. WINPACK fully supports G8BPQ's network switch or TF2.7b Host Mode software. WINPACK is also able to use a BAYCOM modem. This can be achieved by running the G8BPQ network switch along with BAYDRV.VXD (C) Jon Welch G7JJF and NODE2BAY.EXE. NODE2BAY.EXE acts as an interface between G7JJF's BAYDRV Baycom driver for Windows and G8BPQ's BPQCODE node software. It allows Windows packet applications which support BPQ (such as WinPack) to be used with BAYDRV and therefore with a Baycom modem. NODE2BAY.EXE is not in itself a Baycom driver, BAYDRV.VXD is the driver. If you have any problems using BAYDRV in conjunction with NODE2BAY.EXE please contact Roger Barker G4IDE, DO NOT contact G7JJF. BAYDRV is a very clever piece of software and we would like to thank G7JJF for giving his permission for it to be used in this application. WINPACK can be set up to automatically download message listings from your local BBS, collect bulletins that you select or that are selected automatically according to your choice, down or upload your personal mail or mail you have written. WINPACK can automatically decode 7+ files once all the parts have been received and can encode a file into 7+ for you to send. WINPACK can send or receive YAPP protocol files, and uses automatic YAPP restart protocols as supported in FBB BBS software. WINPACK has FULL online help facilities in the normal Windows convention. The F1 key can be pressed AT ANY time to enter the help files. Should you be willing to leave your computer and packet station switched on at all times, WINPACK will operate automatically at times decided by you, (this could be at times of least traffic) and will achieve the above results and much more. If your local BBS transmits the FBB UNPROTO list beacons then WINPACK can be set to collect a bulletin list from these beacons. Should you not want to leave your computer running then a single click of the mouse button can achieve the same result at any time you choose. WINPACK has DX cluster support and reconnection facilities. WINPACK has script file control that allows YOU to decide what you want to happen. WINPACK will automatically deal with password BBS access with either NNA or FBB type passwords, and other password types can be delt with via external add-on programs. WINPACK will run in MODEM mode to allow you to use a telephone modem to access the landline port of an FBB BBS if one is available. WINPACK is able to run and use both internal and external programs and servers. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- GETTING STARTED =============== After installing WINPACK on your computer there are a few things you must do to set up the program. Firstly, point and click the mouse pointer on OPTIONS in the MENU row at the top of the screen. You may also hold down the ALT key and press the letter O. The OPTIONS pull down menu will appear. Point and Click COMMS SETUP or use ALT O again. COMMS SETUP ----------- This will produce the WINPACK COMMS SETUP box. You will see setup Options for Baud Rate, Data Bits, Stop Bits, Parity and Com Port on the left hand side of the box. When you point and Click on one of the small white spots a black dot will appear in it. This means that you have selected that option. You must now select these options so that they correspond with the settings of your TNC. If they do not correspond then you will get either gobbledegook on screen or nothing at all. On the right hand side of the box you will see Connect String, Disconnect String, Editor Line Length, Handshaking, DCD Shows Con and Host Mode. For the moment it is best to leave these settings as per default until you have the program working. One exception to this might be the COM PORT setting. If you are aware of which Com Port you have your TNC connected to then set the appropriate port. The Connect and Disconnect strings are usually quite standard and should cause you no problems as they are. However, if you find that your TNC sends out a different Connect or Disconnect text from the ones shown you may edit them at any time. Point and Click the OK button to save your new selections and close this box. You should now be able to communicate with your TNC. If you cannot then firstly re-check the COM PORT selected. If you are getting gobbledegook on the screen then you have the COM PORT set correctly but you have other parameters incorrectly set. You must try various selections until you find the correct one. The following is a good place to start:- 9600 Baud 8 Data Bits 1 Stop Bit No Parity It is recommended that you use 8 Data Bits as this will allow the use of the 7+ auto decoding. If you are using TF2.7b Host software, or the G8BPQ switch then you will need to re-set the Host Mode setting accordingly. PERSONAL/BBS INFO ----------------- Your Next move is to set up your personal details in PERSONAL/BBS INFO. This can be found in the OPTIONS pull down menu. Pull Down OPTIONS, or use ALT O and point and click Personal/BBS Info or use ALT E. The Personal/BBS Info Box will appear. The edit cursor will be in the FIRST NAME box ready. Simply type in your first name and use the TAB key to move to the next box. Continue on like this until you have put all the information you can in these boxes. The BBS Information is dependent on the BBS you use. The Default entries are for FBB BBS software, however, some other BBS software can vary. The Message End Identifier for NNA BBS software is "<End of message" and the PROMPT will vary considerably. The "Date/time" label should be left blank if your local BBS is running NNA BBS software. The best way to set up the "Date/time", "Message #" and "Title" fields is to do a Verbose (V instead of R) read of a bulletin from your BBS. Look at the top few lines of the message for the information. What ever you put in these boxes it must be constant. So don't include date or time information that may appear in the BBS prompt, this could change each time you log onto your BBS. The LIST entries (Bulletin and Personal) can also vary. WINPACK has an internal bulletin counter that can be used to List bulletins from the last number listed by you. Details of this can be found in the online help. However, at this stage it would be better simply to put L in the Bulletins box if your BBS is NNA or LR if your BBS is FBB and LM in the personal box. (The L, LR and LM above may vary in some software. You will need to check). Point and Click OK to close this box and save your selections. IMPORTANT. ========= Click on VIEW README.TXT under the HELP pull down menu. This file contains information that will be of help to you. ------------------------------------------------------------------- OK, the above should be enough to get you started. Now lets run through the MENU Options in the pull down menu. The MENU BAR contains the following: File Edit Mail Action Options Scripts Yapp Help On the program screen you will see that one of the letters of each of the above is underlined. You can use the ALT key and the underlined letter to bring down the pull down menu. This Underlined Letter/ALT Key link holds true at any time within WINPACK. --------------------------------------------------------------------- FILE ==== In the FILE pull down menu you will see:- EDIT WINDOW CAPTURE SEND DELETE PRINT START ALARMS SELECTION LIST EDITOR VIEWERS EDITOR WINPSCAPE THEMES EDITOR EXIT If you do not see any of the above do not worry. WINPACK is infinitely variable and external programs that are added later will appear in this list. EDIT WINDOW ----------- Selecting EDIT WINDOW opens an edit window in the bottom half of the screen. You can cut copy and paste using CTRL_C, CTRL_V and CTRL_X as in notepad. So if you're writing a reply to a message you can mark a section in the main screen, copy it to the clipboard with CTRL_C, paste it into the edit window with CTRL_V. If you use CTRL_Q the text will be quoted (i.e ">" put at the start of each line). Sections of messages you receive or read can also be highlighted and quoted automatically from other parts of the program but we will come back to that later. CTRL_Z can also be used to ZOOM the edit window so that it fills the whole screen. There is an edit sub menu which can be accessed from the edit window by pressing F10 or pointing the mouse cursor in the edit window and clicking the RIGHT mouse button TWICE. Selecting EDIT again from the pull down menu when the edit window is open hides the edit window. (See EDIT SUB MENU at the end of this section) CAPTURE ------- Selecting CAPTURE allows you to open a capture file. All received text will be stored in the file until you close it by selecting the option again. Capture files will normally be kept in the CAPTURE subdirectory. SEND ---- This option allows you to select a file which will be sent to the TNC. Please note that this option MUST only be used for text files. DELETE ------ This option allows you to delete files. When you have selected a file to delete, you will be prompted for the confirmation before it is deleted. You can delete multiple files by clicking one file name and then holding the shift key down and clicking the other file names. PRINT ----- This option will allow you to print highlighted text to your default printer. If you only wish to print certain text then you must highlight that text by holding down the left mouse button whilst dragging the mouse cursor over the text. You must do this before you click on the print option. If no text is highlighted then all text in the window will be printed. You can also PRINT TO FILE by clicking the print to file button at the bottom left of the Print dialog box. There are also other options available in the print dialog box. START ALARMS ------------ This option is to switch on and switch off the alarm system. The alarm system is a small program that monitors the text on the WINPACK screen and watches for certain strings that you have included in it's setup. When it see's this text it will make the sound that you have set. To setup the alarms start them from the pull down menu and then double click the minimized alarm icon. This will then maximize to reveal a small screen with OPTIONS and QUITE in a pull down menu. Clicking on OPTIONS or using ALT O will bring up the following list: TEXT EXCLUDE LOG ALARMS SOUND If you where to enter G0OPC in the TEXT then every time G0OPC was seen on screen the alarm would sound. There are a selection of sounds available under the SOUND pull down menu. Try it and see, it can be quite helpful especially if you run WINPACK minimized whilst you use another application. Clicking the QUIT will turn the alarms off. SELECTION LIST EDITOR --------------------- The SELECTION LIST is the method by which you may automatically download certain bulletins from the BBS that are of interest to you, or set the times that you want an AUTOBBS session to be triggered. The information for these lists are kept in SELECT.TXT and AUTOTIME.TXT. The editor makes this selection very easy indeed. Clicking on SELECTION LIST EDITOR will open a window that contains a number of boxes. The heading on these boxes are [TO] [FROM] [AT] [TITLE TEXT] [NOT TO] [NOT FROM] [NOT AT] [NOT TITLE TEXT]. There is also a box on the right hand side called AUTO TIMES. Below each box you will see a smaller box. Place the cursor in this smaller box and type in what you require and press the enter key. The text you just typed in will appear in the upper box. E.G If you click the cursor in the smaller box under [TO] and type DEBATE followed by pressing ENTER then DEBATE will appear in the upper box. If you now click OK the SELECTION screen will vanish. When you next log into your local BBS with the AUTOBBS session and download a bulletin list then ALL bulletins that are listed to DEBATE will be downloaded automatically. By using a combination of the various boxes you can select bulletins to meet your own particular interest groups. The AUTO TIMES set the times that the AUTOBBS will run. When you first install WINPACK a sample list of times will be included in this box. These times can be changed but the basic format should be observed. You can also include the word "MAIL" which will instruct WINPACK to only pick up personal mail for you at those particular times. From V6.3 onward you can also use the AUTO TIMES list to tell WinPack times at which you would like it to automatically prune the bulletin list. If you put "PRUNE" after a time, e.g. "12:30 PRUNE" then at that time the list will be pruned. It will be reduced to approximately the number of messages set by the menu option "Bulletin List Prune Size", the pruning action will depend on your setting of "Block Delete Bulletins" - see BULLETIN DELETING below. ********************************** People who DO NOT use FBB unproto beacons PLEASE NOTE: ====== You MUST work through the BULLETINS COLUMN SETUP under the OPTIONS pull down menu to set up the bulletin column location or the selection list will not work. This is the most common problem report received, and dealt with, by Roger Barker. ********************************** VIEWERS EDITOR -------------- WINPACK has the ability to view files using external viewers. This can be done automatically when a file is read. An example would be: BMP C:\WINDOWS\PBRUSH.EXE This would cause all BMP files received to be automatically offered for view in Paint Brush. If you have a viewer for any particular type of file they should be entered here. WINPSCAPE --------- The use of WINPSCAPE really is beyond the scope of this document as it is a rather advanced feature. Basically it monitors all text received looking for HTML (WEB) documents. I would suggest that you use the online help by opening WINPSCAPE and then pressing F1 to learn more about this feature. THEMES EDITOR ------------- The THEMES editor is similar to the SELECTION LIST EDITOR but has a different kind of use. When you are reading bulletins in WINPACK, you have filter buttons available which allow you to select all the bulletins to a certain topic, all the bulletins from a certain sender, etc. Because of the way that people address messages, you often find that two or more different topic addresses will be used for the same subject and people send bulletins to ALL, or HELP about pretty much anything. By creating a theme you can link several selection criteria together, so, when you select that THEME when reading bulletins in WINPACK, all messages meeting the selection criteria for the theme are displayed. For example, you might create a theme called "WINPACK" which contains the following selections: [TO] WINPAC WINPAK WINP7 [TITLE TEXT] WINPACK [FROM] G4IDE If you look at the THEME EDITOR you will notice that the entry boxes are similar to the ones used in the SELECTION LIST EDITOR. The same rules of entry apply. The lower half of the editor shows you what is available from the selection list editor. Double clicking any of these entries will move them to the THEME EDITOR. The THEME TITLE will also need to be entered in the box at the top of the screen. When you read the bulletin list in WINPACK you will find a THEME button in the row of buttons at the bottom of the list screen. Clicking this button will bring up a list of theme's that you have created. Select one by highliting it and click the SELECT button or use ALT S. The list of bulletins will then be narrowed down to the ones that meet the theme criteria. From this point you may select the bulletins you want to download by double clicking them. They will be tagged with an asterisk at the left hand side and will be downloaded next time you log into your BBS. EXIT ---- This option allows you to EXIT the program. Holding down the ALT key and pressing X achieves the same result. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- EDIT WINDOW SUB MENU ==================== The EDIT WINDOW will need to be open in the lower half of the screen to find this sub menu. In the edit window there is an edit sub menu that can be pulled down by pressing F10 or pointing the mouse pointer at the edit screen and clicking the RIGHT mouse button TWICE. The edit sub menu is as follows: SEND SIGNATURE QUOTE UNQUOTE SAVE LOAD PASTE FROM CLEAR HIDE ZOOM SEND ---- The function of the SEND option depends on how you are using the edit window. If you are simply editing a file, then selecting this option causes the text currently in the window to be sent to the TNC. The idea is that you can easily compose messages in an editor, rather than sending them a line at at a time straight to your local BBS. When the text is sent the window is cleared. However, the text is also copied to the windows clipboard, so, if you want to get it back, press CONTROL_V. If you are composing a message as a result of selecting "WRITE A MESSAGE" on the MAIL menu, then the message is put in the queue ready to be sent to the BBS on your next Auto BBS Session. Pressing Alt END has the same effect as selecting this option. SIGNATURE --------- Selecting this option will show a list of your pre-defined signatures. Pre-defined signature files can be created in any plain ASCII text editor (I would recommend DOS EDIT) and must be named with .SIG on the end of the file name. They MUST be in the WINPACK directory. You can have as many as you wish and they can contain "TOKENS" to allow variable entry such as current date and time. They can also contain certain graphic characters which can be produced by holding down the ALT key and entering a number on the NUMERIC key pad. Try ALT 186 (on the numeric key pad). Here is an example: 73 De Mike G0OPC @ GB7WNM.#35.GBR.EU Message Written At $HH:$NN Local Time. $DD $MMM $YYY If this where saved as MIKE.SIG in the WINPACK directory it would show under the SIGNATURE part of the edit window pull down menu as MIKE. If you then clicked on MIKE the above file would be put into the edit window at the current cursor position and the tokens would be replaced with the following: $HH:$NN Current system time $DD $MMM $YYY Current system date. There are a number of possibilities for use of "Tokens". A list of the tokens available can be found in the online help. QUOTE ----- If you mark a section of text in the edit window by dragging the mouse over it and then select this option, the text will be 'QUOTED'. That means ">" will be put at the beginning of each line. The idea is that you can load a message from someone else into the edit buffer and quote sections of it in your reply. How successful the quoting is depends on the line length used by the sender. However, the program attempts to do some intelligent reformatting on the text if the lines are too long. UNQUOTE ------- This option is only available if if you have quoted a section of text. If it looks a mess you can select UNQUOTE to put it back as it was, so long as the quoted text is still selected. SAVE ---- This option allows you to save the contents of the window to a file. LOAD ---- This option allows you to load an existing file into the window. PASTE FROM ---------- This option allows you to paste from an existing file into the window. The file will be inserted at the cursor position. CLEAR ----- If you select this option the window is cleared. HIDE ---- Selecting this option will hide the window, however, it's contents will be preserved. ZOOM ---- Clicking ZOOM enlarges the edit window to full size. Clicking ZOOM again returns the window to it's original size. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- EDIT ==== Under this pull down menu you have: CUT COPY PASTE PASTE & QUOTE CUT --- If you highlite text by dragging the mouse over it with the left mouse button pressed you can "CUT" it from the other text with this option. The text will be moved to the Windows Clip Board. COPY ---- Using the same highliting method as above you can "COPY" the text to the clip board with this method. PASTE ----- This option is only available if the EDIT WINDOW has the focus (This means that it is visible and in use) and the clip board has text in it that you have previously CUT or COPIED from elsewhere. Using PASTE will PASTE the text from the clip board to the edit window at the cursor position. PLEASE NOTE: The clip board will operate in the background and will be invisible to you in all these operations. You need not run the clipboard or open a clip board window. PASTE & QUOTE ------------- This option works the same as PASTE but a QUOTE ">" is put at the beginning of each line. The idea of the option is to make it easy to quote text from a message to which you are replying. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- MAIL ==== Under this pull down menu you have: READ MAIL WRITE A MESSAGE EDIT A MESSAGE DELETE A MESSAGE READ BULLETINS AUTO BBS SESSION MAIL OPTIONS REPAIR BULL LIST CHANGE LASTNUM READ MAIL --------- This option is to allow you to read personal mail. WRITE A MESSAGE --------------- This option allows you to write a personal message or a bulletin. It also allows you to send 7+ messages and files. A box will appear that asks you to input TYPE, TO, NAME, AT and TITLE. You must use the TAB key to move from box to box. TYPE = P for Personal mail B for a Bulletin. You will also see the ADDRESS BOOK. This feature allows you to keep addresses of people you normally write to on file. After having written the details into the boxes simply click on the ADD button and the details will be put in the address book. If, in the future, you wish to write to that person again you simply click on the name to highlight it and click the TO button, or double click the name, and the details will be entered for you. You may delete an address from the list by highlighting it and clicking DELETE. WinPack supports mailing lists, which allow you to send the same message to several recipients. For more information, see the "Writing Messages" section of the online help. You will also see the 7PLUS button. Clicking this button will bring up a box that allows you to SELECT A FILE to be encoded into 7+. Using the various point and click windows to browse, select a file and DOUBLE CLICK on the file you wish to send. A box will appear that will ask if you wish the file to be ZIPPED (Compressed). If you click on NO then WINPACK will start to encode the file into 7+. You will be told how many parts the file will be and asked if you wish to proceed. If there are a number of parts you will be asked if you want to release all parts immediately or at a controlled rate. UK Stations PLEASE read the DCC guidelines on 7+ which have been included with WINPACK. They are current at the time of release. If you have trouble ZIPping (Compressing) files it could be that your copy of PKZIP.EXE is not being found. PKZIP.PIF (In the C:\WINPACK directory) assumes that the directory where you have PKZIP.EXE is on your DOS path. If it isn't then you need to put in a full path for the file, e.g C:\WINPACK\PKZIP.EXE. EDIT A MESSAGE -------------- This option allows you to edit a message that you have written before you send it to the local BBS. WINPACK also supports Brian Quinion's SPELL CHECK. This is NOT supplied with WINPACK as it is too large. It has to be obtained as a separate item. If you have Brian's spell checker then you must install it as described in the Winpack README.TXT "Spell Checker Support" section. You can then use ALT F9 to cause the spell check to scan the text in the editor. DELETE A MESSAGE ---------------- This option allows you to delete a message that you have written. READ BULLETINS -------------- When you select this option the 'message list' will be displayed. It will be positioned at the start of any new messages that have been added since you last used this option. You can move around the list by using the scroll bars, PAGE UP/PAGE DOWN or using the bar graph at the top of the screen. To mark a message for downloading, double click anywhere on the line and an asterisk (*) will be placed at the beginning of the line. Or you can move the text cursor to anywhere on the required line and press <return>. A second double click or <return> will clear the asterisk. A message that has been downloaded but not read will be marked with an 'N' one that has been read will be marked 'Y'. A message that has been read and deleted will be marked 'K'. If you want to clear the 'K' so you can mark the message for download again simply hold down the CONTROL key and double click that line. To read a message that has been marked 'N' or 'Y' simply double click that line. The buttons at the bottom of the screen have the following functions:- UNREAD - Display the next unread message. FROM - filter the displayed message list by sender. When you are prompted to input the required "FROM" you can use "*" as a wildcard. E.G if you input "G4*" then all messages from callsigns starting with G4 will be listed. TO - filter the message list by TOPIC. When you are prompted to input the required "TO" you can use "*" as a wildcard as above. AT - filter the message list using the "AT" address. When you are prompted enter the @ address e.g GB7WNM. TITLE - filter the message list by TITLE. Input text that you want to occur somewhere in the title. THEMES - This option allows you to activate SELECTION THEMES that have previously been constructed. You will be shown an option box that contains all the names of your themes. Highlite one and click SELECT. For more information read the THEMES section of this manual or look under "WHAT ARE THEMES" in the online help. ALL BULLS - list all the messages for which text is available. ALL LIST - clear any filters and display the list. NEW - positions the list so that the top line on the screen is one message before the first new message since you last looked at the message listing. DELETE - drag the mouse to mark a block, then press DELETE to delete that block. PRUNE - same as DELETE, but the list will be deleted from the top down to and including the marked block. If you don't mark a block before selecting PRUNE, then it will prune the list down to the last 'N' lines, where 'N' is the number set in "Options", "Bulletin Deleting", "Bulletins List Prune Size" - default 5,000. If you want Delete and Prune to automatically delete any bulletins that are marked 'Y' in the pruned part of the list, check "Options", "Deleting Bulletins", "Block Delete Bulletins". DONE - Finished reading bulletins. AUTO BBS SESSION ---------------- Selecting this option causes WINPACK to start an automatic BBS session. WINPACK will connect to your local BBS and then carry out the following actions:- 1. Download any waiting personal mail then kill it. 2. List all messages. 3. Download any messages that you have marked for collection on previously downloaded lists, including those that are automatically marked according to your requirements. 4. Upload any messages that you have written. For technical reasons, the action may vary according to what options are being used. For example, the message list may not always be updated on every connect. (This happens if the BBS is FBB, compressed forwarding is in use and the message list command is something other than "LR $NUM-" - which is probably a bit complicated to include in detail!) Also, if people are using an FBB V7 BBS with compressed download and compressed forward, then they really need to set "SPLIT_SESSIONS=TRUE" in the [FBB] section of PACKET.INI because FBB V7 won't allow compressed download and compressed forward in the same session. MAIL OPTIONS ------------ Clicking on this option will bring up the MAIL OPTIONS box. This box allows you to set up the FBB or TPK compatability, mail compression and a couple of other items I will explain below. Before setting WINPACK to make use of the FBB unproto mail beacons from your local BBS you must contact your sysop and make sure your call is correctly configured in his software. You must also set the UNPROTO parameter in your TNC to your local BBS call sign. If you do not do this then WINPACK will not be able to send out the SYNCH requests needed to request synchonisation of the bulletin list collection. If you simply want to emulate TPK then point and click the TPK compatability mode box and all will be set up for you. WINPACK supports both FBB and NNA type compressed forwarding and downloading. If your local BBS is FBB or NNA then you can select the compression boxes. This will speed up your mail and data transfer rates. If your local BBS is neither of the above packages then you will need to check with your sysop to see if his software is compatible. If it is then it may well work. PLEASE READ THE HELP FILES BEFORE MAKING CHANGES HERE. ----------------------------------------------------- HUMAN MODE ---------- "Human Mode" is a special case. Some BBS's are configured so that they wont allow a user to do anything that looks like BBS forwarding. This is most likely to occur with some USA types of BBS software, and with WINFBB, if the sysop has configured it in a particular way. If you check the "Human Mode" box WINPACK will not send it's SID banner (Something like [WinPack-6.0-$]) to the BBS, and it will not attempt to add it's own BID to the messages when they are being forwarded. It will behave just as if you were running a manual connection. This should allow WINPACK to be used with even the fussiest of BBS software and sysop. ASK MAIL ONLY THIS SESSION -------------------------- In some situations WINPACK will prompt you "Mail Only This Session?" when you manually start an AUTOBBS session. If you say "YES" bulletins and bulletin lists will not be downloaded on that session. If you check this box then WINPACK will assume that you are always answering "NO" to this prompt and will not show it. WINPACK will need to restart after any changes to this section. REPAIR BULLS LIST ----------------- Clicking this option will scan and repair certain problems that could appear in the Bulletin list. If you have any corruption or problems with the list try this option. CHANGE LASTNUM -------------- This is an advanced option! It is unlikely that most people will ever need to use it. It is only in WinPack to compensate for a problem which occurs very occasionally with FBB. WinPack has an internal variable called LASTNUM. If you use the FBB unproto headers, LASTNUM is used in deciding the sync request number. If you don't use the unproto headers, but your "List Bulletins" command in "Personal/BBS Info" is set to something like "LR $NUM-", then the value of LASTNUM is substituted for $NUM when the command is sent to the BBS. On very rare occasions FBB BBSs seem to misbehave and will refuse to send the beacon corresponding to a particular message number, so WinPack repeatedly syncs on a number and the BBS insists on sending the headers starting from the next number. Or FBB will not respond correctly to an "LR nnnnn-" command. E.g. WinPack sends "LR 12345-" which means "list all bulletins from 12345 onwards", and the BBS will respond "There are no messages", even though there are lots of bulletins with numbers higher than 12345 . This menu option allows you to adjust LASTNUM and so work round these problems. The most you should ever need to adjust it is upwards by one. DON'T USE THIS OPTION UNLESS YOU ARE ABSOLUTELY SURE ABOUT WHAT YOU ARE DOING! --------------------------------------------------------------------- ACTION ====== Under this pull down menu you have: SIGNATURE PAUSE DISCONNECT AUTO BBS DISABLE UNPROTO BUFFER STAY CONNECTED TERMINAL HOST INITIALISE HOST RESET SIGNATURE --------- Selecting this option will allow you to add a signature to a message you are writing. You will be presented with a list of available signature files and you can pick which one you want to use. These signatures can be constructed in a plain ASCII text editor like DOS EDIT and must have .SIG as a file name follower. They must be in the WINPACK directory. There is further information on constructing signature files under the EDIT WINDOW section of this manual and in the online help files. Note that if you use the signature button rather than this menu option, then the default signature is used - you won't be able to select your signature. (However, right clicking on the signature button gives a short cut to this menu option). Pause ----- Normally the receive windows will automatically scroll as new data is received so that the latest data is always visible. This can be a nuisance if you are trying to scroll back to view something that has gone off the screen because as soon as some new data arrives the screen scrolls down again! If you select this option then the automatic scrolling is disabled and so you are able to scroll back and view previous data. Don't leave pause on for too long, because while it is enabled all new data that is received is put into a buffer, which can only hold about 30,000 characters. Selecting the option whilst pause is on turns it off. Disconnect ---------- Pressing this button should cause a disconnect (assuming you are connected to somebody!) It sends a Control_C and then 'd' to the TNC. It has the same effect as pressing the disconnect button. Unproto Buffer -------------- This option displays a form which shows any FBB unproto beacons that are currently being held in memory waiting for gaps in the list of received beacons to be filled. It gives an idea of how well, or how badly, you are receiving the beacons from your local BBS. Gaps occur when your system fails to hear beacons. With perfect reception of the beacons the list will always be empty. The option is only available if you are using the FBB beacons. Stay Connected -------------- If you select this option *during an Auto BBS session*, when the session ends WinPack won't disconnect you from the BBS. However, please note that if the session uses compressed forwarding, this option will not be available. Terminal -------- If you are using BPQ, this option starts the BPQ Terminal. If you are running another host mode then it will start a special terminal for that host mode. Otherwise this option is not available. Host Initialise --------------- This option is only available if you are using a special host mode. If host mode communications with the TNC is lost for any reason, this option allows you to try to reinitialise it. Host Reset ---------- This option is only available with some special host modes. It carries out a complete reset of the host mode firmware, and then reinitialises it. --------------------------------------------------------------------- OPTIONS ======= Under this pull down menu you have: PERSONAL/BBS INFO COMMS SETUP SIGNATURE SETUP 7PLUS SETUP USE SPEECH PASSWORD FONTS BULLETIN COLUMNS BULLETIN DELETING LOGGING COLOURS SPLIT WINDOW WORD WRAP USE VIEWERS CHARACTER MODE ENABLE BEEP RESTORE ON BEEP ICON ON TOP ENABLE REMOTE SHOW BUTTON HINTS PERSONAL/BBS INFO ----------------- This is where you enter all your personal information and also the information about your local BBS. It is important that this information is filled in before you use WINPACK for the first time. The personal information box is self explanatory as is the log information box. The BBS information depends on the type of BBS software your local BBS uses. The default information that is present when you first install WINPACK is good for a start if your local BBS runs FBB software. All you will need to do is change the BBS CALLSIGN and the BBS PROMPT. Be careful not to put any variable information (Like Time or Date) in the BBS PROMPT box. If you do it will not be recognised by WINPACK because it will change every time you log on. If you have problems with the AUTOBBS sessions then this is the first place to check. Log onto your BBS by hand and take a note of the format of all the various text's needed. COMMS SETUP ----------- This is the first part of WINPACK that needs to be correctly setup. See the COMMS SETUP section at the beginning of this manual. SIGNATURE SETUP --------------- This pull down menu has two sub menu's: Auto Signature If Auto Signature is enabled, every mail message you write will have the default signature file appended to it. This means you don't have to press the signature button, or use the Signature menu option to sign it. BUT it also means that, if you have this option enabled and you also add a signature manually, you will sign the message twice! In other words, if you have Auto Sig enabled, don't use the signature button or the Signature menu option when you are writing messages. Default Signature This option allows you to choose which signature file you want to use as your default signature. This signature is used by the Auto Sig option, and also when you press the signature button. You will be given a list of available signatures, with the current default signature checked. 7PLUS SETUP ----------- This pull down menu has 5 sub menu's: Auto 7plus Decode If this option is checked then all personal mail and bulletins are scanned as they are received to see if they contain 7+ data. If they do then the data is extracted and put in the WINPACK\7DECODE directory. When all the parts of a 7+ set have been received, the program will decode the file and send you a personal message as to whether the decode was successful or not. If it is successful then the parts are deleted. If it is unsuccessful then a .ERR file will be produced. If an .ERR file is produced then to send it to the sender of the 7+ data do as follows:- 1. Select "Mail", "Write a Message" and start a message to the sender. 2. From the edit window menu select "Load" and load in the .ERR file form the 7EXTRACT directory. 3. Send the message. When the .COR files are received back from the 7Plus sender these will be automatically processed and the corrected data produced from the 7Plus parts and .COR file. Scan Capture Files If this option is checked WinPack will scan Capture files for 7plus parts. The scanning is done immediately after Capture is turned off. Any 7plus found will be identified in the log as coming from a capture file, apart from that the processing is exactly the same as for mail. Keep 7plus Parts If this option is checked, then, when a set of 7+ parts have been successfully decoded, the parts of the file are moved into the WINPACK\7PLUSOLD directory. If the option is not checked then the parts are simply deleted. This option is only available if either "Auto 7plus Decode" or Scan Capture Files is checked. Log 7plus Decode If this option is checked, then, every time that WinPack attempts to decode a 7plus file, an entry will be made in the log file 7PLUSLOG.TXT. By looking at the log you can see when a file was decoded, if the decode was successful, whether it was received as a bulletin or as personal mail, and who sent it. This option is only available if "Auto 7plus Decode" or Scan Capture Files is checked. 7plus Part Size This option allows you to set the maximum part size used for 7plus messages sent by WinPack. The default is 4000 bytes. Don't forget that many BBSs in the UK quite correctly forward "smallest first", so if you use a very large part size, you will probably delay your own mail! USE SPEECH ---------- If this option is checked then WinPack will use your sound card to announce some events. It will tell you the callsign of the remote station every time a connect occurs, and will also tell you when a disconnect occurs. When new messages arrive it will announce "New mail". The call sign and frequency of 'Spots' will be announced when you are connected to a DX cluster, and it will tell you when somebody is calling you with the /TALK remote command. For this option to work you must have an MCI Sound driver installed. If you have problems then check in Control Panel, Drivers and see if it lists "[MCI] Sound". If it doesn't then select "Add..." and see if an MCI Sound driver is available on your system . If you try to enable this option and get lots of messages about MCI.VBX not being loaded and MMSYSTEM.DLL not being found, then your PC does not have multimedia extensions - probably because you are running Windows 3.0. When you connect to a station, the announcement is made up from the file CONN.WAV (which says "connected to") and the WAV files for the individual characters in the callsign. You can, if you wish, create your own WAV files for particular stations. For instance, if you create GB7WNM.WAV and put it in the WINPACK\WAV directory, then every time you connect to GB7WNM this file will be used. This allows you to get a more natural announcement for stations to which you frequently connect. If you record your own WAV files then make sure you record them as MONO files sampled at 11Khz. If you do not the files will be played individually which will make the speech slow and disjointed. Files that are correctly recorded are joined together in a temporary file to produce a more natural flowing sound to the announcement. You can decide what you want to announce by clicking on the entries on the "USE SPEECH" sub menus. You may also set the use of WAV files in your SCRIPT files by using PLAYWAV. See instructions on how to do this under HOW SCRIPTS WORK. PASSWORD -------- The password option allows you to decide which, if any, type of password access you need to use for your BBS access. Clicking on this option opens another pull down menu that has three entries: NONE F6FBB G1NNA Clicking on NONE will disable this feature. To use the automatic password access option you must first get a password matrix from your BBS sysop. Contact your BBS sysop for advise on how to do this. The password matrix must then be put in the WINPACK directory and either called PASS_FBB.TXT or PASS_NNA.TXT depending on which type of BBS it is that you have a password for. If your BBS is an NNA BBS then you must call your password matrix PASS_NNA.TXT and put it in the WINPACK directory, then click on G1NNA under the PASSWORD option. You must now modify the corresponding NNAPASS.TXT or FBBPASS.TXT in the WINPACK\SCRIPTS directory. There are two demonstration files in WINPACK\SCRIPTS to help you. Simply modify the corresponding file to suit your BBS connection requirements. There are some instructions in the demonstration files to help you. When the above has been done you will be able to log into the BBS and exchange passwords automatically. Other types of passwords are supported by external add-on programs that have been written for this purpose. FONTS ----- This option allows you to set up the font for each window. The default is WINPACK 11point. It is recommended that you leave the font as default as changing fonts can create problems in some circumstances. If, however, you decide to change the font then please read the WINPACK online help. BULLETIN COLUMNS ---------------- Any program like WINPACK that uses message list processing has to know where the various columns are in the listing. If it doesn't then it will not be able to mark messages. This message option allows you to do that. The status line will prompt you as to what you have to do. Simply highlite this option and a sub menu will be shown. Click on each of the sub menu's in turn and then DOUBLE CLICK the appropriate column in the bulletin list. You must log into your local BBS and download a bulletins list before you can set this option up as the option requires a bulletin list on which to recognise the column locations. You should also note that if the bulletin list on an FBBBBS goes above 99,999 then the bulletin columns will move one space sideways. You will need to go through this proceedure again to re-set up. BE CAREFUL...If a sysop has let his bulletin count get this high then it is highly likely that he is about to re-number which will mean that you will have to re-set again. Also note that the bulletin columns option will not be available if you are using the FBB unproto beacons. BULLETIN DELETING ----------------- This menu has two sub menu options: Block Delete Bulletins If you PRUNE the bulletins list, or delete a block of lines from it, then normally any lines within the deleted section for which a bulletin has been downloaded and which have a status of "Y" will not be deleted. To get rid of those lines you must first kill the bulletin. If you enable "BLOCK DELETE BULLETINS" these lines will be deleted and the associated bulletins will automatically be killed. You cannot delete bulletins with the status "N" in this way. WINPACK will assume that, if you download them, you wanted to read them. Bulletin List Prune Size If you click Prune in "Read Bulletins" without first marking a block of lines in the message list, the list will be pruned down to the number of lines set in this option. The default is 5,000. LOGGING ------- This menu has three sub menu options: Auto Log If this option is checked then WINPACK will log all connections and disconnections in the file called TEXT\AUTOLOG.TXT. The following is logged: Date Time Call sign connected to Frequency Power Mode. Some of this information is acquired from the Personal/BBS Info, so please make sure that the information is entered correctly. Be aware that the above may not be sufficient to meet the local requirements in some parts of the world, but should be sufficient for the UK. Auto Dump This option allows you to enable or disable the 'AUTO DUMP' facility. When auto dump is enabled, then, whilst you are connected to another station, all transmitted and received text is saved in the file TEXT\AUTODUMP.TXT. If you have auto-dump enabled, then be warned that, if you are very active on packet AUTODUMP.TXT can get very large very quickly! Every time you enable this option WINPACK checks to see if AUTODUMP.TXT already exists. If it does then you are given the option of overwriting the existing file or appending to it. So if you want to clear the file and start again, simply disable and then re-enable the option. Log Frequency/Power This option allows you to select a different frequency and power to be used in the auto-log. When WINPACK starts up the default is always to use the frequency and power as specified in your PERSONAL INFORMATION and those values are automatically added as the first item on the "LOG FREQUENCY/POWER" sub menu. If you want other FREQUENCY/POWER options to be available, you must create a file in the WINPACK directory called LOGFREQ.TXT and put some settings in it. Here is an example of the required format for the data in this file:- 144.650MHz/10dBW 144.675MHz/10dBW 432.675MHz/13dBW When you select an option on the menu that frequency and power will be used in the log entries but WINPACK will always return to the default values when the program is re-started. COLOURS ------- This option allows you to change the colours of some things in WINPACK. You can also change the background colours of the text windows and the colours of the LED's if you wish. A sub menu will be shown that is self explanatory. Note: The TEXT colour for the text in the various windows is set in the FONTS menu option. SPLIT WINDOW ------------ This option allows you to split the receive screen into two windows. If you select it while the screen is already split then the window will return to a single window. You do not need to use the split receive window, it is an advanced option. If you are happy with a single window then simply ignore it. All received text will go to the window you select. To select a window simply point and click the mouse pointer in that window. The idea is that you can feed text to a selected window then keep that text whilst feeding further text to the other window. This could be helpful if you wish to compare text or read a section of text before it passes by. Also, if you are listing messages from your local BBS manually then you can send the list to one window but send a message to the other window. Messages can be read in this manner by double clicking on the *MESSAGE NUMBER* whilst still connected to the local BBS. A Read command for that message will automatically be sent to the BBS and the returning message will appear in the other window. WORD WRAP --------- The receive windows can either have horizontal scroll bars - which allow you to bring into view any text that is off the screen - or they can have 'word wrap' enabled. This means that when text reaches the right hand edge of the window it wraps onto the next line, rather than disappearing off the screen. USE VIEWERS ----------- What are Viewers? Viewers allow you to "view" the contents of messages that contain other than plain text. They allow you to do it automatically without having to manually start another application. "Viewing" means to look at the contents of a file. Normally, if you receive a 7plus file which contains, say, a zipped JPG image, to look at the image you must first unzip the file, then you must run another program to actually look at the image. If you have configured a viewer for JPG files in Winpack, then, when you read the SYSTEM message telling you that the file has been received, you will be offered the opportunity of viewing it - you won't need to unzip it and the viewer application will be started by WinPack. Viewers can be configured for any file type for which you have a suitable program available, not just for image files. For example, you can set up viewers for WAV files, MIDI files or HTML files. Viewers work in two ways:- 1. They allow an incoming non-7plus SB or SP to be viewed by an external application. 2. They allow the contents of decoded 7plus files to be viewed by an external application. Viewing decoded 7plus files When WinPack successfully decodes a 7plus file, it sends you a SYSTEM message. When you read that message, WinPack will check to see if you have a viewer configured for the file type, if you have, then it will ask you if you want to view the decoded file. A lot of 7plus is, of course, zipped up. If WinPack finds a zip it will look in it and see if there is a viewable file. One restriction is that you can only view one file in each zip - otherwise it would become unmanageable. However, the vast majority of 7plus zips only contain one file. The file offered for viewing is the first one in the zip for which a viewer is configured. This has implications for viewing HTML - see "A Few Comments" below. Configuring viewers: To be able to view files, you need to tell WinPack what viewers to use for each file type. This is done by using the VIEWERS EDITOR under the FILE pull down menu. If a WWW browser is used as a viewer, it can take an awful long time to load. Netscape allows you to pass files to the program whilst it is running by using a DDE link, so avoiding having to keep reloading it. Internet Explorer *V3* is compatible with this feature of Netscape. If you use a browser that is compatible, you can put "NDDE" at the end of its line, to tell WinPack to use Netscape style DDE. Please note - my own tests suggest that Internet Explorer V2 is not compatible. If you want to take advantage of DDE, *don't* close your browser after you have viewed a file, minimise it instead. Some viewers under Windows 3.11:- [VIEWERS] htm=c:\netscape\netscape.exe wav=c:\windows\recorder.exe mid=c:\windows\mplayer.exe bmp=c:\windows\pbrush.exe pcx=c:\windows\pbrush.exe jpg=c:\netscape\netscape.exe gif=c:\netscape\netscape.exe txt=c:\windows\notepad.exe doc=c:\winword\winword.exe Some viewers under Windows 95:- [VIEWERS] htm=c:\progra~1\micros~2\iexplore.exe ndde wav=c:\windows\sndrec32.exe mid=c:\windows\mplayer.exe bmp=c:\progra~1\access~1\mspaint.exe pcx=c:\progra~1\access~1\mspaint.exe jpg=c:\progra~1\micros~2\iexplore.exe ndde gif=c:\progra~1\micros~2\iexplore.exe ndde txt=c:\progra~1\access~1\wordpad.exe doc=c:\progra~1\access~1\wordpad.exe Note - the directory names have to be the short, DOS compatible names. CHARACTER MODE -------------- Normally, text keyed into the transmit window isn't sent to the TNC until <return> is pressed at the end of the line. This is usually the best way to operate. However, there are some circumstances when it is necessary to send the characters to the TNC immediately a key is pressed. For example, if you run the 'CAL' command on the Tiny-2 you need to be able to send the single letters 'K','D' etc. On such occasions it is best to switch the program into character mode. In Character mode the transmit window is not used , so you loose the split screen operation and the 8 transmit scroll back buffers. The program normally operates with ECHO OFF and does it's own local echo of the characters. This does not work very well in character mode and so, when you switch to character mode , it sends ECHO ON to the TNC. If the program is already in character mode, selecting this option will switch it back to normal mode. ECHO OFF will be sent to the TNC. ENABLE BEEP ----------- Selecting this option alternately enables and disables the program bell. The bell can be useful if you are connected to the DX cluster, since the default is that the cluster will send a 'bell' with every 'spot'. When the bell is disabled the option does not have a tick against it. RESTORE ON BEEP --------------- Enabling this option means that if the program is minimised (running as an icon) and you have the bell enabled, then the program will be restored to normal size every time a beep occurs, The option was put in with the idea that you could leave the program running as an icon whilst connected to the DX cluster and it would 'pop up' whenever a spot occurred. ICON ON TOP ----------- If this option is selected and WINPACK is minimised (run as an icon) the icon will always stay on top of other programs and remain visible. This is useful since the following information is displayed on the icon label:- 1. If you are connected to the DX cluster, the call sign and frequency from any incoming 'spots' is shown. 2. If you are carrying out a YAPP file transfer, the file name and the number of bytes that have been sent/received is shown. This option will not be of any use if you are running WINDOWS95. ENABLE REMOTE ------------- This option allows you to enable or disable the WINPACK remote commands. These are commands prefixed with / that are available to users of your system. Look under the online help files (Remote Access Commands) for more detailed information. SHOW BUTTON HINTS ----------------- Enabling this option allows a small yellow hint flag to be shown if you point at a button and pause for a second. This is helpful if you cannot recall which button you need to click to do something. ----------------------------------------------------------------------- SCRIPTS ======= Under this pull down menu you have: PLAY A SCRIPT EDIT A SCRIPT PLAY A SCRIPT ------------- This option allows you to play a script. See HOW SCRIPTS WORK below. EDIT A SCRIPT ------------- This option allows you to edit a script file. HOW SCRIPTS WORK ---------------- WINPACK supports it's own form of SCRIPT language. A SCRIPT is a series of commands that the Program recognises as telling it to do something specific. So, if the program recognises WAITFOR XXX as meaning that it must scan all incoming text until it finds XXX then that is what it will do, and it will go no further until a match is found or until a predefined time has passed, depending on how the programmer has written the program. When it finds a match for XXX it will then move onto the next instruction. This allows you, the user, to write your own little programs to achieve specific tasks. You create scripts by using a text editor. You can create them in the EDIT WINDOW and then save them in the SCRIPTS sub directory. There are several example scripts included with WINPACK. DXCLUST, BBS and SETTIME are just three. If you want to try using scripts please read the comments in these examples. There are also three special scripts:- STARTUP, EXIT and BBSBYE. If these script files exists in your SCRIPTS sub directory then STARTUP will be executed whenever you start the program and EXIT will be executed whenever you quit the program. BBSBYE will be executed, if it exists, at the end of an AUTOBBS session on disconnection. This can be used if you need to send a command to disconnect from a remote node AFTER disconnecting from the BBS. Most people will not require this. If there is no STARTUP,EXIT or BBSBYE script then WINPACK will simply carry on as normal. (The SETTIME script could be used as the STARTUP script if you wish, this would then set the TNC to the same time and date as your computer). The words that the program understands are called KEYWORDS. Often a keyword is followed by text associated to it, sometimes the text is optional. Here is a list of some of the KEYWORDS used in WINPACK. Take a look at the online help for a complete up to date list:- WAITCON - wait for a connection to be established. WAITDIS - wait for disconnection. WAITFOR <text> - wait for ,text. to be received. WAITLINE <text> - wait for a line of text with <text> anywhere in it. SEND <text> - send <text> to the TNC. SENDPASSWORD - sends a password, normally based on the previous line of text. OPENCAPTURE <filename> - open a capture file called <filename>. CLOSECAPTURE - close the capture file. RECONNECT - If a script contains this keyword then, when it has successfully completed the following will happen:- 1. A button with the caption R will appear on the status bar. 2. If a disconnection occurs the script will be re-run. This will carry on happening until you click the button - which makes it disappear. 3. After the first reconnection the caption will change to '1' the next time it will go to '2'. When it reaches '9' it will go to 'A' then so on through the alphabet. The idea is to let you know how many times you have disconnected. The sole purpose of the reconnection facility is to enable you to automatically reconnect to a DX cluster if the link drops out. How successful it is depends on what causes the disconnect - if it is caused by a DX cluster crash then this instant reconnect will naturally fail. The default delay before attempting a reconnect is 10 seconds. You may find it better to increase this. Do this as follows:- (a) Make sure WINPACK is NOT running. (b) Edit PACKET.INI in the WINPACK directory using a text editor such as windows notepad. (c) Look for a section entitled [TERMINAL]. In that section there is an entry which says 'RECONNECT_DELAY=10'. Change the 10(seconds) to a number of your choice. (d) Save the file. PLAYWAV <wav_name> - the WAV file <wav_name> is played. The file must be in the WINPACK\WAV subdirectory. HOTKEY <key> - this assigns a hot key to a script. Valid values for <key> are F2 to F9. The script can then be played by simply pressing this key. TITLE <text> - if you put a TITLE line in a script then, when you use the "Play A Script" menu option, the list displayed will contain the description rather than just the file name. FBBSYNCH sends a synch request to the local BBS if you are using the unproto list. See FBB ENHANCED MAIL FACILITIES in the help files. The SEND keyword will normally put a carriage return on the end of <text>. I don't think there is a situation where you would not want to do this, in fact, most TNC's will not send the text until they get a carriage return. If you don't want a <return> sent then put a '~' (Tilde) character (shift_# on a UK keyboard) on the end of the line of text. E.G: SEND *~ will send an asterisk without a <return> after it, which is very handy for auto_bauding AEA TNC's. Usually any WAITFOR text will also end with a <return> because you will normally be waiting for a prompt of some sort from the other end. However, there may be times when the text you are waiting for doesn't end with a <return>. Therefore you have to put in the <return> if it part of the WAITFOR text. You do this by putting in '^M'. The '^' is a shifted 6 an a UK keyboard. Have a look at the sample scripts and it should be obvious what to do. Lines starting with ";" are ignored. Lines that cannot be understood are also ignored. The script interpreter understands a limited number of tokens. The purpose of tokens is to enable commonly used information to be put into script files or into the signature file by the program. All the tokens start with the '$' (Dollar) character. If the program finds any of these tokens in a script or in the signature file it substitutes them with some other text. Some tokens are used for personal information which is read from the PERSONAL.TXT. The tokens are:- $MYCALL $1STNAME $2NDNAME $QTH $QRA $WAB $BBS $BBS_PROMPT To change them simply edit PERSONAL.TXT by using the "PERSONAL/BBS Info" on the OPTIONS menu. $VERSION makes the program version available, it can be used in the .SIG files. $WINP_PATH makes the WINPACK path available, it can be used in SELEDIT.XTR and ALARM.XTR. All other tokens are associated with Date and Time which are taken from your computer clock. These tokens are:- TOKEN SUBSTITUTE EXAMPLE ===== ========== ======= $YYYY The Year 1995 $YY The Year 95 $MMM The Month Dec $MM The Month 12 $DD The Date 31 $HH The Hour 17 $NN The Minute 52 $SS The Second 45 $TZ The Time Zone UTC The main purpose of the DATE/TIME tokens is for setting the TNC's date and time from a script file such as can be seen in SETTIME.TXT. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- YAPP ==== Under this pull down menu you have: SEND A FILE RECEIVE A FILE RECEIVE RESUME AUTO RECEIVE YAPP is the most popular protocol for transferring BINARY files via AX25 packet radio at this time. It was originally devised by WA7MBL. There have been a few extensions made to the original system. WINPACK supports the most popular of these which is FBB style 'Crash Resume'. This allows you to resume transferring a file after the previous attempt failed part way through. SEND A FILE ----------- This option allows you to send a file using YAPP protocol. RECEIVE A FILE -------------- This option allows you to receive a file using YAPP protocol. RECEIVE RESUME -------------- This option allows you to resume receiving a file using YAPP protocol when the link has failed part way through a previous attempt. AUTO RECEIVE ------------ This option allows you to automate reception of files using YAPP protocol. --------------------------------------------------------------------- HELP ==== Help Contents ------------- Will open the help files at the contents page. View README.TXT --------------- This option allows you to view the README.TXT. It is recommended that you do this before you do anything else with WINPACK as it contains useful information about the program. View CHANGES.TXT ---------------- This option allows you to read the list of changes in the different versions of WINPACK. REGISTRATION DETAILS -------------------- Shows the details of the registered user of the package you are using. REGISTER WINPACK ---------------- This option allows you to input your registration details. You can obtain information on how to register WINPACK from the online help. *************************************** Please remember, WINPACK IS NOT FREEWARE is is REGISTRATION-WARE. If you use the software you should seriously consider paying the registration fee. Considering the amount of work put into the software by Roger Barker it is quite reasonable to pay the small fee asked. WINPACK is probably the most widely used packet driver program in the world, and is, without doubt, one of the best written. The software is not disabled in any way. You will simply get a small 'Nag' screen every now and then to remind you that you have not registered. It's up to you and your conscience. *************************************** About ----- Gives some details about WINPACK. --------------------------------------------------------------------- BUTTONS ======= Along the top of the screen just below the menu bar are a row of buttons. Each of these buttons is a short cut way of achieving a task that is under one of the pull down menu's. If you have SHOW BUTTON HINTS checked in the OPTIONS menu and you place the mouse pointer on one of the buttons, after a short delay a small yellow hint will appear to remind you of the buttons function. The first button will open the edit window in the lower half of the screen. The second button will open or close the capture file. The third button is for sending a text file to the TNC. The fourth button is the printer button. Clicking this button will bring up a box for you to specify your printer requirements. The printer will print all the text in the window that has the cursor in it. If you wish to print just selected text then highlighted that text by dragging the mouse cursor over it whilst holding down the left mouse button. The printer will then print the highlighted text. There is also an option to allow you to print to a file on either your hard disc or a floppy disc if you wish. The fifth button Manually starts the auto BBS function. The sixth button allows you to read personal mail that has been received. The seventh button allows you to write mail. The eighth button takes you to the bulletin list and read screen. The ninth button add's your selected signature file to the end of the message you are writing. RIGHT clicking this button gives you a short cut to the signature file selection. The tenth button enable's or disable's the screen word wrap. The eleventh button is the Pause (PAWS !!!) button. This pauses the incoming text to the screen so you may read something. Don't forget that the screen buffers can only hold a finite amount. After that it is lost, so it's not a good idea to leave the pause on for long periods. The twelfth button (With the little hatchet) is the instant disconnect. This button will instantly disconnect you from any station you are connected too. The thirteenth button. If you are running BPQ or any other host mode a Thirteenth button will appear. This is the TERMINAL button and has the same action as the TERMINAL option under the ACTION menu. When you have the split screen function enabled there will be a thirteenth button that has a number on it. This button allows you to switch the incoming text to either the upper (1) or lower (2) screens. When using the RECONNECT feature a button will appear on the lower bar of the screen that will indicate the number of reconnections. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- IMPORTANT ========= Once you have downloaded your first message listing from your local BBS it is important that you set up the BULLETIN COLUMNS. This will allow WINPACK to know where to look for information required to allow many of the features to work. Firstly click on Mail and then click on READ BULLETINS in that pull down menu. Secondly click on OPTIONS and click on BULLETIN COLUMNS.. You will be shown a second submenu that has:- FROM COLUMN TO COLUMN AT COLUMN TITLE COLUMN Firstly click on FROM COLUMN. The box will clear and you will be left with your listing again. Now you must point the mouse cursor at the FROM column in the list that indicates where the message came from and DOUBLE CLICK. The cursor will move to the front of that column and the bell will sound, "Thank You" will appear in the lower task bar. This will indicate to the program where the FROM column is in the list. Continue in the same manner with the TO,AT and TITLE column's. Now click on the DONE button at the bottom of the screen. Once this has been done there should be no reason to do it again unless you start using another local BBS that has a different column setup. These options are not available if you use the FBB unproto beacons to collect your bulletin list. You should also note that if the bulletin list on an FBBBBS goes above 99,999 the columns will move one position sideways. This means that you will have to set the columns up again. BE CAREFUL. If a sysop has let his bulletin count get this high then it is highly likely that he is about to renumber, so keep your eyes open for a change back to a number below 99,999. PLEASE BE WARNED: The columns in the message listing that is downloaded from your BBS can be disturbed and look ragged and untidy if you change the FONT to a non mono spaced font. The default font is WINPACK11 point. WINPACK also supports the DRAG DROP of files from the files manager. First of all, please note that there are some restrictions on when you can drag and drop. The rough rule is that if anything else is going on, e.g reading mail, running a script, reading bulletins, then the drag drop is ignored. If you drop a file onto Winpack it normally assumes that you want to send it to the TNC (the exception to this is the EDIT window). If the file extension is "TXT" or "BAT" then it sends it as an ASCII file. If the extension obviously means it is a binary file ("EXE", "COM", "ZIP") then it will send it using YAPP protocol. If the file type cannot be determined then you will be prompted as to whether it is a binary or ASCII file. You will always be prompted about "DOC" files, since that extension is often used for text files in DOS, but is also used for Microsoft Word files. Be careful using DRAG and DROP. If the file is an ASCII file then it is sent to the TNC even if it is not connected - because it could be a setup file. You wont be allowed to start a YAPP send if you aren't connected to another station. However, remember that, unless the other station is running software that supports auto-detect of YAPP transfer (such as WINPACK) you must make sure it is ready to receive the file before you "drop" it. If the EDIT window is open then DRAG and DROP works differently. If the file is dropped in the EDIT window then it replaces the text currently in the window. If it is dropped anywhere else then it is ignored. WINPACK has a number of server built in. These are REQCFG, REQFIL, REQDIR, BACKUP and ACK. Please refer to the HELP files to understand the use of these servers. Have fun with WINPACK written By Roger Barker (G4IDE) Distributed by Mike Marriott G0OPC @ GB7WNM.#35.GBR.EU Email mike@g0opc.demon.co.uk