FreeXP Installation Guide

by Martin Foster
<martin@freexp.co.uk>
v2.0, October 2004

Copyright © Martin Foster 2004

This guide has been written as an aid to getting started with FreeXP. The intentions are to get you as far as making your first poll to your Boss, sending an AreaFix request and then processing the resultant list. In no way is it intended as a tutorial in the use of FreeXP. The FreeXP maintainer has the author's written permission to include this document in any and/or all of his FreeXP distribution archives. Alterations and/or amendments to this guide by anyone other than the copyright holder are expressely forbidden. Any alterations or amendments which are felt to be necessary should be submitted to the copyright holder at either of the following addresses:

Fido Netmail: 2:250/501.2

martin@freexp.co.uk

Before commencing the installation, you MUST obtain the following information from your Boss:

IMPORTANT NOTE: In the unlikely event that your Boss's mailer neither supports EMSI nor FTS-0006, you will NOT be able to poll him with FreeXP! Needless to say, there's no point in going any further than here :-((

BASIC FidoNet Point Installation(4D)

Preliminary work

  1. Extract the contents of FXP???.ZIP into a directory of your choice (suggest \XP). Please note: the archive contains three directories; DOC, SAMPLES and BEISPIEL, so the -d switch must be used when extracting the archive to preserve the directory structure.

  2. Move the contents of the SAMPLES directory into your FreeXP HOME directory and then delete the empty SAMPLES directory. The BEISPIEL directory and its contents can be either ignored or deleted, as it contains German templates and scripts.

  3. Now start FreeXP by typing XP.EXE.

READ CAREFULLY!

Look very closely at your screen and then type "e". Do NOT press <Enter> at any stage unless you want the German interface.

Basic Configuration

ONLINE HELP IS AVAILABLE AT ANY TIME BY PRESSING <F1>

N.B. To move between fields either press <Tab>, <Up-arrow> or <Down-arrow>. To "check" a box, press the <Spacebar>. 

Now press <Enter> to save your settings

Now press <Enter> to save your settings and return to the main screen

Now press <Enter> to save your settings and return to the previous screen

Now press <Enter> to save your settings and return to the previous screen

Now press <Enter> to save your settings and return to the previous screen

If your Boss IS online 24 hours, you need do nothing with the above option. 

"Misc (/Netcall/All)" ---> This box needs to be checked.

Now press <Enter> to save your settings and return to the previous
screen. Select "OK" and press <Enter> to take you back to the main
screen.

The BASIC installation is now complete.

Notes

http://www.freexp.co.uk/ (England)

http://www.freexp.de/ (Germany)

Requesting and processing an areas list

  1. From FreeXP's main screen, select "Message". From the menu that has now appeared, select "Area Manager". From the sub-menu select "Get list" and press <Enter>. FreeXP will now generate an areafix request. If you wish to view the areafix request prior to sending it to your Boss, select "Message/Unsent/show" and press <Enter>. The message header information should now be displayed. To view the message itself, press <Enter>. When you have looked at the areafix message, press <ESC>, <ESC>, to bring you back to the main screen.

  2. And now for the big moment - sending the areafix request to your Boss. First make sure your modem is switched on and then from the main screen, press "N", then press "S" - it's as simple as that! Now sit back and watch it all happen :-)

  3. Assuming all went well with the poll, you must now poll your Boss again to pickup the areas list. Depending on how your Boss has his system set up will determine how long to wait before calling back. Most Bosses process areafix requests on the spot. It's entirely a matter for you to decide how long to wait before attempting to pickup the areas list but I would suggest waiting at least five minutes. To pickup the list, press "N" followed by "S" from the main screen and FreeXP will call your Boss to pickup the waiting areas list.

  4. You should now have two folders displayed on your main screen. One of the folders should be named "/¯Netcall", which contains extracts from the logfile and the other should be marked "/<yourname>", which is your incoming netmail folder. To process the areas list, cursor over the folder named "/<yourname>" and press <Enter>. Assuming that the only item in this folder is the areas list, now select "Message/Area Manager/Import list" and press <Enter>. If there is more than the areas list in this folder, you need to cursor over the areas list prior to selecting "Message/Area Manager/Import list". FreeXP will now read the areas list and import it into its database. To view the areas list, cursor over the areas list and press <Enter>.

  5. To fix-in(subscribe) to an area(s), select "Message/Area Manager/ Subscribe" and press <Enter>. The areas list will now be displayed. To fix into areas it's a simple matter of cursoring over the area(s) and pressing the <Spacebar>. When you have finished, press <Enter> and you will be asked to confirm your choice(s). It's a simple "Yes/No" reply. Assuming that you answered yes, FreeXP will generate the areafix request. To send the request, get back to the main screen and press "N" followed by "S".

Basic/Desirable tweaks 'n twiddles

Once the first three polls have been successfully made, a few tweaks need to be done before polling your Boss again. Although not mandatory, they could be considered desirable:

  1. From the menu bar across the top of FreeXP's main screen, select "Config". From the drop down menu, select "Options" and from that drop down menu, select "Messages". Cursor down to "Use Re^n", un-check the box and press <Enter>, <Enter>, <Enter>. The cursor should now be in the "## XP ##" box. Press <F2>, cursor down to "never" and press <Enter>. Check the next box and press <Enter> and then press <Enter> on the remaining options.

  2. From the menu bar across the top of FreeXP's main screen, select "Edit". From the drop down menu, select "Groups". Cursor down to "Netz" and press "E". Now cursor down to "Replies" and press F2. Cursor down to "none" and press <Enter>, <Enter>. Press "O" to save the new setting.

  3. From the menu bar across the top of FreeXP's main screen, select "Config". From the drop down menu, select "Options" and from that drop down menu, select "Netcall". Cursor down to "Complete netcall logfile (NETCALL.LOG)" and check the box. Now press <Enter>, <Enter> to save the new setting.

  4. From the menu bar across the top of FreeXP's main screen, select "Config". From the drop down menu, select "Options" and from that drop down menu, select "Addresses". In the "Organization" field, enter your system name e.g. "My Point" - without the quotes. Now press <Enter> and in the "Postal address" field, write your City/Town. Leave all other fields blank.

  5. Before writing any messages, it would be advisable to configure your "signature" and "greetings" templates. By doing this, you will be saving yourself a lot of unnecessary typing. To configure these templates, select "Edit" from the menu bar across the top of FreeXP's main screen and from the drop down menu, select "Templates". For your netmail signature, cursor down to "Signature (Priv)" and press <Enter>. This will place you in the FreeXP editor where you may define your netmail signature. Once you are happy with your signature, press <ESC> and answer "Yes" to the question. Now cursor up to "Signature (Pub)" and press <Enter> to get back into the editor, where you may now define your echomail signature. Repeat the "<ESC>, "Yes" process to save your echomail signature. Now cursor up to "Header (Priv)" and press <Enter> to get back into the editor where you may now define your netmail "greeting". This could be something like "Hi $VORNAME" or "Hello $VORNAME" - without the quotes. $VORNAME will translate to the first name of the person you are writing to but only for new netmail messages. For netmail replies, see "Quote (Priv)". Now repeat the "<ESC>", "Yes" process to save your netmail greeting. Now cursor up to "Header (Pub)" and press <Enter> to get back into the editor where you may now define your echomail "greeting". This could be something like "Hello All" or "Hi" - without the quotes. Now repeat the "<ESC>", "Yes" process to save your echomail greeting. A full explanation on the use and configuration of templates can be found in "TEMPLATE.HTO" which is available for download on the internet at http://www.bitzbox.plus.com For further help with FreeXP, link into the FidoNet echo XPOINT.

Have Fun! :-)

Command line switches for starting FreeXP

FreeXP is started with: 

XP [/Option1 /Option2 ...]

Options are: 

/?         Help

/av:       Runs the integrated archive viewer.
           eg. XP /av:file.zip. Wildcards allowed.

/f:<File>  loads a EGA/VGA-Font File (Screen Font)
           in the usual formats (8x8, 8x16 Pixels)
           If no extension is given, .FNT assumed.

/gd:       selects another phone charge file (Default:
           GEBUEHR.DAT).

/j         no dumb remark when exiting FreeXP....

/k:X       passes the (single) keystroke X to the
           programme, where X is any character.
           (Can start a key macro on start-up)

/l:X       selects the language, eg. /l:E for English.
           Of course, the language module must be installed.

/LCD       changes colours to improve screen visibility
           on laptops etc.
           see also /m below.

/m         forces a black & white display.

/maus      activates a Cursor-Mouse emulation.

/pw:xxx    passes the start-up password direct.

/q         deactivates all sounds, so as not to
           wake you at night..

/rp        Do not check TSRs
           FreeXP normally checks after a
           DOS-Shell whether TSRs were loaded and
           exits if yes. (It is rarely advisable to
           load TSRs in a shell). However, if you must,
           this switch stops the check.

/sd        Do not flush Smartdrive;
           Normally XP flushes the smartdrive write
           cache (if active) at regular intervals to
           minimise data loss possibilities. This
           deactivates this flushing if you don't like
           it.

/trace     activates netcall script logging.

/w         Give up CPU time under Windows. To lower the
           load on the CPU when XP is idle, the screen
           saver, clock and mouse emulation is
           switched off.

/z:x       Set x screen lines. x must be one of the
           values shown under /Config/Display/Lines.

For the following options, if you set more than one, they are carried out in the order shown here. /ip & /ips may not be specified simultaneously. In this case the LAST given is run. 

/autostart:hhmm-hhmm  Starts FreeXP if the
           current time is in the given time period.
           This entry is designed for the autoexec.bat
           file and starting the PC with a time switch.
           If the time at start is in the given period,
           XP starts up.

/user:BOX:NAME  sets the User name for the given
           Box. For multi-user points.
           For Fido use "_" instead of ":" in
           the Box name.

/ip:FILE   Imports the specified file name as
           puffer, as under (/XPoint/Import
           /Puffer). The filename may be a full
           path; the file must have a PUFFER
           format.

/ipe:FILE  as /ip, but sets the receive date for
           messages to the date they were
           written.

/ips:BOX:FILE  reads in the puffer FILE, and also
           lays it up ready to send to BOX.
           For Fido use "_" instead of ":" in
           the box name.

/g         is an extra switch for /ip and /ipe, which
           sets the imported messages direct to "already
           read". Not necessary for /ips

/n:BOX[:hh:mm]  starts FreeXP making a call to
           the given box. If the time is
           specified, it waits to make a
           netcall at the given time.
           For Fido use "_" instead of ":" in
           the box name.

/n:*       starts FreeXP to make a  /Netcall/All.

/nr:BOX    makes a relogin netcall at the given box.
           The connect must already exist, and the
           box be waiting for "Username".
           (Z-Netz only)

/t:n       starts FreeXP running Timing List
           no. "n"

/r         does a Re-Org/Messages

/pack      does a Re-Org/Pack

/xpack     only pack files whose use lies under 100%
           A file name may be specified,
           eg. /xpack:USER packs only the User File.

/ss        start screensaver

/x         End Program. Since it is carried out last, it
           is used to end the program after other tasks
           have been carried out by other parameters,

Diagnostics Options: 

/d         debug mode; displays more information during
           the progress of a netcall.

/df:1      shows the command call when an external
           program is called (icl. parameters).

/df:2      waits for a key to be pressed after an
           external program call.

Instead of specifying long command lines when calling FreeXP, you can list your favourite parameters in a text file and place it in the AUTOEXEC directory.