hi there! this is Forums v2.1.0, a simple bbs for linux, written in perl.

to install:
	1) edit Forums and look for the line that says '$HOME = "/foo/bar/baz";'
		at the beginning.  change "/foo/bar/baz" to be the directory 
		where the forums directories will reside.  the actual program 
		doesn't have to live here, it can go in /usr/local/bin or 
		wherever you like, but Forums needs a directory for each forum 
		it will maintain, and these need to go together in some 
		directory like /usr/local/lib/forums or /usr/local/bin/forums 
		or somewhere you like, even /home/you/forums.  $HOME is this 
		directory.

	2) put the Forums program in /usr/local/bin.(or wherever you like, as
		long as its somewhere people can run it from)
	
	3) create the $HOME directory you decided on in step 1. put the
		list of forums (forums.list), the user priviledges file
		(userpriv.dat), and a directory named "forum_name" for each
		forum named in forums.list.  If there are no forums in 
		forums.list don't worry, there will be. You're going to put 
		them there. ONE WORD FORUM NAMES ONLY.  

	4) set up the user priviledge file and the forums.list file, according
		to the directions in those files.

	5) if you didn't make directories for the forums in forums.list at step
		3, make them now. make sure they are world writeable, or group
		writeable to a group of forum users.  Forums assumes that all
		users are of one group, like "users," and that the group can 
		write all the necessary files.  if this is a problem, one 
		solution is to make Forums a sgid program to a group that can
	 	write the forums. this is not really recommended. another is to
		go to the configuration section of the program and change the
		$CHMOD from 0664 to 0666 for world writeable files, and make the
		forums directories world-writeable too.  at any rate, all the 
		users of Forums have to be able to write these directories.  
		there are 2 settings $SETGROUP and $GROUP which will force all 
		important files to have the proper group ownership.  this is 
		really so that the occasional user (especially root) who does 
		not have proper group membership can do stuff without screwing 
		everything up.  unfortunately, forums really needs posters to 
		have proper group membership...people who don't won't be able 
		to post properly -- they won't be able to change the file 
		that records the number of posts, so their post won't be 
		remembered.  these variables are so that if wrong-group users
		write new threads, other people will still be able to post to 
		them, which they wouldn't be able to do otherwise.  using 
		world-writeable files fixes all this, at the cost of a minor 
		security risk. (the risk is that unauthorized people will be 
		more able to change posts and threads and their data...no one 
		will be able to hack root or anything like that.) if you use 
		world writeable files, set $SETGROUP to 0. you can then leave 
		$GROUP blank.  it is handy on linux to set the sticky bits on on 
		these dirs, although on freebsd this doesn't work.  the important
		thing is that there are files people need to all be able to write.

	6) make a directory called "who" in $HOME for the who-is-online files
		Forums maintains, and the message files.  this means, of course,
		that nameing a forum "who" is not good, although it is possible.
		do NOT set the sticky bit here.  people need to be able to delete
		other peoples files.

	7) make a directory called "moderated" for moderated posts.
		do NOT name a regular forum "moderated" as this will cause 
		big problems. also set $MODFILE to point to a file, used to 
		replace moderated posts.  if you will have no moderators, this
		is irrelevant.  if you want people NOT to be able to read
		moderated posts, set up forums.list and userpriv.dat to
		make moderated an unreadeable forum.
	
	8) make files called $HOME/welcome and $HOME/goodbye and set WELCOMEPAGE
		and GOODBYEPAGE to point to these files, as files to show upon 
		first entering and leaving the forums.  setting these to "" or 
		to any file that doesn't exist or has 0 length will result in 
		no welcome/goodbye page display.

	9) set up $PAGER and $EDITOR to point to your favorite pager and editor.

	10) set $MAXAGE to the age in days you want a thread to live, without
		anyone writing to it.  if a thread passes $MAXAGE days without
		new posts, it will die, and become unreadable. i recommend a 
		reasonable age, because if threads never die, your users' join
		files will get large and unwieldy. default is 2 weeks (14 days).

	11) set $SYSADMIN to your email address.  forums uses mail(1) to mail
		$SYSADMIN so people can report bugs or problems, make 
		suggestions, etc.  no one else can be mailed.

	12) decide if you want threading, and set $THREADED.  threading means
		that messages can be grouped together logically (threaded) or
		just be all one big group (unthreaded). WARNING!!!! once you
		select one or the other LEAVE IT THAT WAY.  you may cause 
		problems if you change it.  actually, it should be able to
		go from unthreaded to threaded fairly easily, but not the
		other way.  going the other way is an undefined behavior, and
		is virtually guaranteed to cause you grief.  if you MUST go from
		threaded to unthreaded, i recommend deleting all the users 
		.jfiles (a file called ".jfile" in their home directories), 
		which should ease the transition, although it resets the records
		of what they have and have not read. it -will- prevent the 
		problems though.


	13) all done! run forums and enjoy.

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	Forums will make a file in each users home directory called ~/.jfile
	i hope this is no problem.
		
	Forums will age threads. after MAXAGE of inactivity (you can define
		MAXAGE at the beginning of the Forums file), a thread will
		disappear permanently from readability.  this is to keep
		.jfile from getting too big, and to preserve readability of 
		the forums. the actual posts will not be deleted though. if
		you do not select threading, ageing will not occur.
	
	Forums needs access to the "clear" command, so if you don't have one
		available make one by makeing a shell script called "clear" like
		this:
			#!/usr/bin/sh
			tput clear

		and putting it somewhere in the users paths, so Forums can 
		find it. Don't forget to make the script executable.

	Forums also needs access to touch, rm, cp, and cat, mail, plus whatever 
		editor you decide upon, defined in EDITOR and/or the environmental
		variable BBS_EDIT, at the start of the Forums file, and the PAGER 
		(less(1) or more(1), usually).	

	Forums comes with safe-pico, a pico editor that cannot read-in new 
		files, or write out the file to any name but the one supplied,
		and a copy of the source to less, a pager that can be compiled
		"safe", (See the less README).  i recommend you use them if 
		you want any security at all. be aware that more has a shell-out
		command.  these things can be changed with $EDITOR and $PAGER.
		these are the only 2 security risks i know of associated with
		using Forums...otherwise, you should be able to make it a login
		shell and use it with users getting no access to the Unix 
		underneath. This is as far as i know, but i'm no expert.  let 
		the user beware.  I deny all responsibility for trouble you get 
		into trusting that Forums is a secure environment.  Sorry.
		alternately, you can let them run forums from their account,
		as any other program. 

	Forums should be very easy to use. there is online help available.
		just press '?' or 'h' for a help screen.
		
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forums is easy to edit if you know even a little perl.  the program is fairly
simple, and all you have to do is look for "print" statements, or write your 
own, and you have a fully customized look, with the Forums feel.  I feel that
Forums has a good, easy, attractive feel to it, its based loosely on the mindvox
bbs of which i was a member for several years, and which i really liked.

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Forums is shareware. if you use it, please register. my addres is
	Colin Maroney
	124 Rome Ave.
	Rockford, Il.
			61107
registration is $25.

you are free to use forums and modify it as you see fit. if you fix a bug,
or offer a good improvement, you get free registration and my sincere thanx.

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i take absolutely no legal responsibility for forums' behavior whatsoever, so 
if it crashes your system and kills yer dog, or otherwise malfunctions in any 
way, that's just your bad luck, not mine.  this release seems pretty stable
to me, and has been tested as well as i can test it, but it may not be 
correctly functional in the real world. let the user beware.

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i am cjm1@execpc.com if you have bug reports or comments.

