-website.
+installation guide that comes with the Spider distribution.
I am assuming a general knowledge of Linux and its commands. You should
@@ -34,26 +35,20 @@ know how to use tar and how to edit files using your favourite editor.
The crucial ingredient for all of this is
-. Now I know Perl 5.005
-is out and this will almost certainly work with it, but
- comes with 5.004.
-Be Warned, earlier versions of
- do not come
-with 5.004 as standard, you need to
-
+. Earlier versions of
+Spider required perl 5.004, however it is now STRONGLY recommended
+that you use at least version 5.005_03 as this is the version being used
+in the development of Spider.
In addition to the standard Red Hat distribution you will require the
-following modules: -
+following modules from ...
-- MD5-1.7.tar.gz
-
- Data-Dumper-2.10.tar.gz
-
- FreezeThaw-0.3.tar.gz
-
- MLDBM-2.00.tar.gz
-
- TimeDate-1.08.tar.gz
-
- IO-1.20.tar.gz
+
- Data-Dumper-2.101.tar.gz
+
- TimeDate-1.10.tar.gz
+
- IO-1.20.tar.gz (for perl 5.00403 and lower)
- Net-Telnet-3.02.tar.gz
- Curses-1.05.tar.gz
- Time-HiRes-01.20.tar.gz
@@ -70,7 +65,7 @@ but use the above list as the earliest versions usable.
I will assume that you have already downloaded the latest tarball of
the DXSpider software and are ready to install it. I am assuming version
-1.35 for this section but of course you would use the latest version.
+1.46 for this section but of course you would use the latest version.
Login as root and create a user to run the cluster under. UNDER
@@ -102,7 +97,7 @@ permissions. Copy the tarball to /home/sysop and do the following.
# cd ~sysop
-# tar xvfz spider-1.35.tar.gz
+# tar xvfz spider-1.46.tar.gz
# ln -s ~sysop/spider /spider
# groupadd -g 251 spider (or another number)
@@ -180,10 +175,10 @@ for the file to work so leave it in.
PLEASE USE CAPITAL LETTERS FOR CALLSIGNS
-DON'T alter the DXVars.pm (or any other file) in /spider/perl, they are
-overwritten with every release. Any files or commands you place in /spider/local
-or /spider/local_cmd will automagically be used in preference to the ones in
-/spider/perl EVEN while the cluster is running!
+DON'T alter any file in /spider/perl, they are overwritten with every
+release. Any files or commands you place in /spider/local or /spider/local_cmd
+will automagically be used in preference to the ones in /spider/perl EVEN
+while the cluster is running!
Save the new file and change directory to ../perl ....
@@ -197,7 +192,7 @@ Now type the following command which creates the basic user file with you as
the sysop.
-$ create_sysop.pl
+$ ./create_sysop.pl
Starting up for the first time
@@ -207,8 +202,8 @@ We can now bring spider up for the first time and see if all is well or not!
It should look something like this ...
-$ cluster.pl
-DXSpider DX Cluster Version 1.35
+$ ./cluster.pl
+DXSpider DX Cluster Version 1.46
Copyright (c) 1998 Dirk Koopman G1TLH
loading prefixes ...
loading band data ...
@@ -221,10 +216,10 @@ orft we jolly well go ...
If all is well then login on another term or console as sysop and
-cd to /spider/perl. Now issue the following command ...
+cd to /spider/src. Now issue the following command ...
-$ client.pl
+$ ./client
@@ -248,7 +243,7 @@ shutdown
and both the cluster and the client should return to Linux prompts.
-The Client program
+The Client program
In earlier versions of Spider, all the processes were Perl scripts. This
@@ -259,6 +254,61 @@ has to be "made". CD to /spider/src and type make. You
should see the output on your screen and hopefully now have a small C program
called client. Leave it in this directory.
+
+Quick installation guide (Linux version)
+
+
+This section is designed for experienced Spider sysops who want to install
+Spider from scratch. It is simply a check list of things that need to be
+done without any explanations. The name in brackets at the end of each line
+is the user that should be doing that process.
+
+
+- Login as root
+
- Get the additional CPAN modules and install them (root)
+
- Create the "sysop" user and set a password (root)
+
- Put the Spider tarball in ~sysop and untar it (root)
+
- ln -s ~sysop/spider /spider (root)
+
- groupadd -g 251 spider (root)
+
- Add any more users you need to the group entry in /etc/group (root)
+
- Set the permissions on the spider tree (root)
+
- Fix permissions on ax25_call and netrom_call (root)
+
- Login as the sysop user
+
- cd to /spider (sysop)
+
- mkdir local (sysop)
+
- mkdir local_cmd (sysop)
+
- cp perl/DXVars.pm.issue local/DXVars.pm (sysop)
+
- cd to /spider/local and edit DXVars to set your details (sysop)
+
- cd ../perl (sysop)
+
- ./create_sysop.pl (sysop)
+
- ./cluster.pl (sysop)
+
+
+Spider should now be running and you should be able to login using the
+client program.
+
+
+- Login as root
+
- Enter the correct line in ax25d.conf (root)
+
- Enter the correct line in /etc/services (root)
+
- Enter the correct line in /etc/inetd.conf (root)
+
- killall -HUP inetd (root)
+
+
+Spider should now be able to accept logins via telnet, netrom and ax25.
+
+
+- Login as sysop
+
- Start the cluster (sysop)
+
- set/node and type for links (sysop)
+
- Write any connect scripts (sysop)
+
- Edit /spider/crontab as required (sysop)
+
- Edit any other files as necessary (sysop)
+
- Set filters, hops and forwarding files (sysop)
+
- Login as root
+
- Enter the correct line in /etc/inittab (root)
+
+
Configuration
Allowing ax25 connects from users
@@ -273,8 +323,29 @@ each interface that you wish to allow connections on, use the following format .
default * * * * * * - sysop /spider/src/client client %u ax25
-Allowing telnet connects from users
+or, if you wish your users to be able to use SSID's on their callsigns ..
+
+
+default * * * * * * - sysop /spider/src/client client %s ax25
+
+
+For most purposes this is not desirable. The only time you probably will
+need this is when you need to allow other cluster nodes that are using SSID's
+in. In this case it would probably be better to use the first example and
+then add a specific line for that node like this:
+
+
+GB7DJK-2 * * * * * * - sysop /spider/src/client client gb7djk-2 ax25
+default * * * * * * - sysop /spider/src/client client %u ax25
+
+
+Allowing telnet connects from users
+
+From version 1.47 there is a new (more efficient) way of doing this
+(see next section) but, if you prefer, the method of doing it described
+here will continue to work just fine.
+
Allowing telnet connections is quite simple. Firstly you need to add a line
in /etc/services to allow connections to a port number, like this ....
@@ -290,7 +361,6 @@ spdlogin stream tcp nowait root /usr/sbin/tcpd /spider/src/client login telnet
-This needs to be added above the standard services such as ftp, telnet etc.
Once this is done, you need to restart inetd like this ....
@@ -298,11 +368,11 @@ killall -HUP inetd
-
Now login as sysop and cd spider/perl. You can test that spider
+
Now login as sysop and cd spider/src. You can test that spider
is accepting telnet logins by issuing the following command ....
-client.pl login telnet
+./client login telnet
You should get a login prompt and on issuing a callsign, you will be given
@@ -319,6 +389,84 @@ telnet localhost 8000
You should now get the login prompt and be able to login as before.
+Setting up telnet connects (from 1.47 onwards)
+
+
+From version 1.47 you can choose to allow the perl cluster.pl program to
+allow connections directly (i.e. not via the /spider/src/client
+interface program). If you are using Windows then this is the only method
+available of allowing incoming telnet connections.
+
+
+To do this you need first to remove any line that you may previously have set
+up in /etc/inetd.conf. Remember to:-
+
+
+killall -HUP inetd
+
+
+
+to make the change happen...
+
+
+Having done that, you need to copy the file
+/spider/perl/Listeners.pm to /spider/local and
+then edit it. You will need to uncomment the line containing &dquot;0.0.0.0&dquot;
+and select the correct port to listen on. So that it looks like this:-
+
+
+@listen = (
+ ["0.0.0.0", 8000],
+);
+
+
+
+As standard, the listener will listen on all interfaces simultaneously.
+If you require more control than this, you can specify each interface
+individually:-
+
+
+@listen = (
+ ["gb7baa.dxcluster.net", 8000],
+ ["44.131.16.2", 6300],
+);
+
+
+
+This will only be successful if the IP addresses on each interface are static.
+If you are using some kind of dynamic IP addressing then the 'default' method
+is the only one that will work.
+
+
+Restart the cluster.pl program to enable the listener.
+
+
+One important difference with the internal listener is that no echoing
+is done by the cluster program. Users will need to set 'local-echo' on in
+their telnet clients if it isn't set automatically (as per the standards).
+Needless to say this will probably only apply to Windows users.
+
+Setting up for AGW Engine (1.47 onwards)
+
+
+AGW Engine is a Windows based ax25 stack. You can connect to an AGW engine
+from Linux as well as Windows based machines.
+
+
+In order to enable access to an AGW Engine you need to copy
+/spider/perl/AGWConnect.pm to /spider/local and edit it.
+Specifically you must:-
+
+
+- set $enable to 1.
+
- set $login and $passwd to the values set up in your AGW installation.
+If you haven't set any there, then you should not touch these values.
+
- You can connect to a remote AGW engine (ie on some other machine) by changing $addr
+and $port appropriately.
+
- Restart the cluster.pl program
+
+
+
Setting up node connects
@@ -346,7 +494,7 @@ For now, we will assume that the cluster we are going to connect to is an
AK1A type node.
-Start up the cluster as you did before and login as the sysop with client.pl.
+Start up the cluster as you did before and login as the sysop with client.
The cluster node I am wanting to make a connection to is GB7BAA but you would
obviously use whatever callsign you required. At the prompt type ...
@@ -360,17 +508,17 @@ The case does not matter as long as you have a version of DXSpider later than
That is now set, it is as simple as that. To prove it, login on yet another
-console as sysop and issue the command ...
+console as sysop, cd to spider/src and issue the command ...
-client.pl gb7baa (using the callsign you set as a node)
+./client gb7baa (using the callsign you set as a node)
You should get an initialisation string from DXSpider like this ...
-client.pl gb7baa
+./client gb7baa
PC38^GB7MBC^~
@@ -378,6 +526,15 @@ If the callsign you just set up as a cluster node is for an incoming connect,
this is all that needs to be done. If the connection is to be outgoing then
a connection script needs to be written.
+
+Sometimes you make a mistake... Honest, it does happen. If you want to make a node
+back to being a normal user, regardless
+of what type it is, do:
+
+
+unset/node gb7baa
+
+
Connection scripts
@@ -390,20 +547,20 @@ Writing a script for connections is therefore relatively simple.
The connect scripts consist of lines which start with the following keywords
or symbols:-
-
+
-# All lines starting with a # are ignored, as are completely
+# are ignored, as are completely
blank lines.
-timeout timeout followed by a number is the number of seconds to wait for a
+timeout followed by a number is the number of seconds to wait for a
command to complete. If there is no timeout specified in the script
then the default is 60 seconds.
-abort abort is a regular expression containing one or more strings to look
+abort is a regular expression containing one or more strings to look
for to abort a connection. This is a perl regular expression and is
executed ignoring case.
-connect connect followed by ax25 or telnet and some type dependent
+connect followed by ax25, agw (for Windows users) or telnet and some type dependent
information. In the case of a telnet connection, there can be up to
two parameters.
The first is the ip address or hostname of the computer you wish to
@@ -414,7 +571,7 @@ connect connect followed by ax25 or telnet and some type dependent
responsibility to get your node and other ax25 parameters to work
before going down this route!
-' ' is the delimiting character for a word or phrase of an expect/send
+' is the delimiting character for a word or phrase of an expect/send
line in a chat type script. The words/phrases normally come in pairs,
either can be empty. Each line reads input from the connection until
it sees the string (or perl regular expression) contained in the
@@ -424,16 +581,16 @@ connect connect followed by ax25 or telnet and some type dependent
then the right hand string is sent to the connection.
This process is repeated for every line of chat script.
-client client starts the connection, put the arguments you would want here
+client starts the connection, put the arguments you would want here
if you were starting the client program manually. You only need this
if the script has a different name to the callsign you are trying to
connect to (i.e. you have a script called other which actually
connects to GB7DJK-1 [instead of a script called gb7djk-1]).
-
+
-There are many possible ways to configure the script but here are two examples,
-one for a NETRom/AX25 connect and one for tcp/ip.
+There are many possible ways to configure the script but here are three examples,
+one for a NETRom/AX25 connect, one for AGW engines and one for tcp/ip.
timeout 60
@@ -449,6 +606,21 @@ client gb7dxm ax25
+
+timeout 60
+abort (Busy|Sorry|Fail)
+# this does exactly the same as the previous example
+# the '1' is the AGW port number to connect thru for g1tlh
+connect agw 1 g1tlh
+'Connect' ''
+'Connect' 'c np7'
+'Connect' 'c gb7dxm'
+# you can leave this out if you call the script 'gb7dxm'
+client gb7dxm ax25
+
+
+
+
timeout 15
connect telnet dirkl.tobit.co.uk
@@ -477,7 +649,8 @@ G0VGS de GB7MBC 13-Dec-1998 2043Z >
This will start a connection using the script called gb7djk-1. You can
follow the connection by watching the term or console from where you started
-cluster.pl. You should see something like this ...
+cluster.pl. From version 1.47 onwards, you will need to set/debug connect first.
+You should see something like this ...
<- D G1TLH connect gb7djk-1
@@ -546,7 +719,7 @@ on the route taken to connect.
Telnet echo itself should only be a problem if the connection is being made to
the telnet port (23). This port uses special rules that include echo negotiation.
-If the connection is to a different port, such as 8000, this negotiation does
+If the connection is to a different port, such as 7300, this negotiation does
not happen and therefore no echo should be present.
@@ -602,9 +775,16 @@ DX:3:respawn:/bin/su -c "/usr/bin/perl -w /spider/perl/cluster.pl" sysop >/dev/t
-This line works fine for RedHat and SuSE distributions. The line required for
-Slackware distributions is slightly different. My thanks to Aurelio, PA3EZL for
-this information.
+This line works fine for RedHat distributions. It is also fine for SuSE up to
+7.0. From Suse 7.1 you need to add runlevels 2 and 5 like this ...
+
+
+DX:235:respawn:/bin/su -c "/usr/bin/perl -w /spider/perl/cluster.pl" sysop >/dev/tty7
+
+
+
+The line required for Slackware distributions is slightly different. My thanks to
+Aurelio, PA3EZL for this information.
DX:23:respawn:/bin/su - sysop -c "/usr/bin/perl -w /spider/perl/cluster.pl" >/dev/tty7
@@ -633,7 +813,7 @@ a comment)
# check every 10 minutes to see if gb7xxx is connected and if not
# start a connect job going
-0,10,20,30,40,50 * * * * start_connect('gb7xxx') if !connected('gb7xxx')
+0,10,20,30,40,50 * * * * start_connect('gb7xxx') if unless connected('gb7xxx')
@@ -1678,13 +1858,13 @@ You can also store other information in this directory, either directly or
nested under directories. One use for this would be to store DX bulletins
such as the OPDX bulletins. These can be listed and read by the user.
To keep things tidy, make a directory under /spider/packclus called
-bulletins. Now copy any OPDX or similar bulletins into it. These
+bulletin. Now copy any OPDX or similar bulletins into it. These
can be listed by the user in the same way as above using the show/files
-command with an extension for the bulletins directory you have just created,
+command with an extension for the bulletin directory you have just created,
like this ....
-show/files bulletins
+show/files bulletin
@@ -1692,11 +1872,11 @@ An example would look like this ....
sh/files
-bulletins DIR 20-Dec-1999 1715Z news 1602 14-Dec-1999 1330Z
+bulletin DIR 20-Dec-1999 1715Z news 1602 14-Dec-1999 1330Z
You can see that in the files area (basically the packclus directory) there is a
-file called news and a directory called bulletins. You can
+file called news and a directory called bulletin. You can
also see that dates they were created. In the case of the file news,
you can also see the time it was last modified, a good clue as to whether the
file has been updated since you last read it. To read the file called
@@ -1706,10 +1886,10 @@ file has been updated since you last read it. To read the file called
type news
-To look what is in the bulletins directory you issue the command ....
+To look what is in the bulletin directory you issue the command ....
-show/files bulletins
+show/files bulletin
opdx390 21381 29-Nov-1999 1621Z opdx390.1 1670 29-Nov-1999 1621Z
opdx390.2 2193 29-Nov-1999 1621Z opdx391 25045 29-Nov-1999 1621Z
opdx392 35969 29-Nov-1999 1621Z opdx393 15023 29-Nov-1999 1621Z
@@ -1729,7 +1909,7 @@ Press Enter to continue, A to abort (16 lines) >
You can now read any file in this directory using the type command, like this ....
-type bulletins/opdx391
+type bulletin/opdx391
Ohio/Penn DX Bulletin No. 391
The Ohio/Penn Dx PacketCluster
DX Bulletin No. 391
@@ -1898,7 +2078,7 @@ results once you have set an alias.
In later versions of Spider a simple console program is provided for the sysop.
This has a type ahead buffer with line editing facilities and colour for spots,
-announces etc. To use this program, simply use console.pl instead of client.pl.
+announces etc. To use this program, simply use console.pl instead of client.
To edit the colours, copy /spider/perl/Console.pl to /spider/local and edit the
@@ -3993,13 +4173,50 @@ for more information.
-show/badspotterShow all the bad spotters in the system
+show/badspotter Show all the bad spotters in the system
Display all the bad spotter's callsigns in the system, see SET/BADSPOTTER
for more information.
+show/configuration (0)
+
+
+
+show/configuration [<node>] Show all visible nodes and their users
+
+
+
+This command allows you to see all the users that can be seen
+and the nodes to which they are connected. With the optional node,
+you can specify a particular node to look at.
+
+This command is normally abbreviated to: sh/c
+
+BE WARNED: the list that is returned can be VERY long
+
+show/configuration/node (0)
+
+
+
+show/configuration/node Show all the nodes connected
+
+
+
+Show all the nodes connected locally and the nodes they have connected.
+
+show/connect (1)
+
+
+
+show/connect Show all the active connections
+
+
+
+This command shows information on all the active connections known to
+the node. This command gives slightly more information than WHO.
+
show/date (0)