Installing Yapp

To get started running Yapp, you need to have the following:

• Yapp binary distribution for your platform
• Yapp script/template distribution (generic for all platforms)
• license provided by Armidale Software

Generic distributions and binaries for several operating systems are available at:

ftp://ftp.armidalesoftware.com/pub/armidale/yapp/

To obtain a Yapp license, send email to:

yapp@armidalesoftware.com

Once you have acquired the above items, you may proceed as follows:

1. Decide on what login to use to own Yapp files. A separate user account (typically "yapp", but can be anything), should be created to own the bbs files. We will refer to this account as cfadm. Access to this account is needed for a Yapp administrator to create and delete new conferences. We will refer to anyone with access to the cfadm account as the "Yapp administrator''.
2. Log in as cfadm, and uncompress and untar the generic distribution and the binary distribution in the destination directory (e.g. /usr/bbs). We will herafter refer to this directory as bbsdir. For example:

cd /usr/bbs

gunzip yapp.3.0.11-generic-dist.tar.gz

tar -xvf yapp.3.0.11-generic-dist.tar

gunzip yapp3.0.11-solaris-bin.tar.gz

tar -xvf yapp3.0.11-solaris-bin.tar

3. While still logged in as cfadm, run the Install script from the bbsdir directory.

   ./Install

   This will prompt you for the remaining items and may give you additional information about what needs to be done. The default value will be shown in square brackets. If you wish to use the defaults shown, you may simply hit enter at the prompts.

Login to be used as bbs owner [cfadm]:
This should be the cfadm login (see Step 1), and must be the same as the login you are running the Install script as.

WWW login to be used as sysop [sysop]:
This is the web-side login which will be able to access Yapp administrative functions from the web. (We will refer hereafter to this login as sysop.) It may be the same as cfadm but is usually "sysop".

Unix login used by httpd to invoke programs as [nobody]:
This is the login (typically "nobody") which httpd uses to execute CGI scripts. (We will refer hereafter to this login as nobody.) Its value can be found for the NCSA and Apache web servers by looking up the value of User in the web server's httpd.conf file.

Enter bbsdir [/usr/bbs]:
This is the main Yapp subdirectory, and should be the same as the current directory when invoking the Install script.

Enter wwwdir [/usr/bbs/www]:
This is the subdirectory under which Yapp will put all web-related file and CGI script directories.

Enter licensedir [/usr/bbs/license]:
This is the subdirectory which Yapp will use for your license information.

Enter confdir [/usr/bbs/confs]:
This is the subdirectory under which Yapp will look for individual conference directories.

Enter userhome [/usr/bbs/www/home]:
This is the subdirectory under which Yapp will keep home directories for web-only users.

Enter userfile [~/passwd]:
This is where Yapp will keep miscellaneous user information for web-only users. If the filename begins with a '~', Yapp will use a separate file for each web user, stored in their home directory. Otherwise, Yapp will keep a single shared file in the indicated location, with one line per web user.

Enter passfile [/usr/bbs/etc/.htpasswd]:
This is the password file used for web logins, where encrypted passwords are stored.

Enter sendmail [/usr/lib/sendmail]:
This is the location of the sendmail program on your system. Yapp attempts to find the correct location itself and displays it as the default.

Enter maildir [/var/mail]:
This should be set to the system mail directory. Yapp will look for the user's mailbox there and inform the user when new mail arrives.

Allow hosts to freeze items linked to other conferences? [true]:
Yapp allows an item to simultaneously exist in multiple conferences, each controlled by their own fairwitnesses (hosts). By default, a host in any of those conferences will be able to do administrative functions on the item. You can disable this feature by answering false.

Allow users to censor/scribble responses in frozen items? [true]:
When this feature is enabled, users can censor, scribble, and edit their own responses in frozen items. You can disable this feature by answering false.

Use compressed DBM file for user information?[false]:
This refers to the "userfile" mentioned above, and is only valid when separate user files are kept per user. Answering false means that information is kept as plain text. Answering true tells Yapp to keep information in DBM format. Note that webuser does not currently support DBM format files.

Participation file directory? [/usr/bbs/part]:
Yapp can allow a user to log in in via either Unix or the WWW and maintain a single set of data on what the user has previously read. However, if such combining is used, compatibility with PicoSpan is lost. If you don't run PicoSpan, just hit return. If you do run PicoSpan, you should enter the word "work".

Padding size? [78]:
Yapp allows authors to edit their item subjects and response text as long as the new text fits into the old space. The padding option tells Yapp to leave extra space when entering subjects and responses so that there is extra leeway when editing. Be aware that this will cause older Yapp binaries to display ",E'' at the end of responses, so you should currently use a padding size of 0 if you require backward compatability.

Changing to cfadm-owned participation files
If you are changing from using user-owned participation files to using cfadm-owned participation files, and you wish to retain existing information about what users have already seen, then participation files under users' home directories must be placed under the new directory subtree. If you want the Install script to automatically do this for you, hit return at the prompt. Otherwise, answer no.

Once you have answered the above questions, the Install script will attempt to install the options you have requested. Afterwards, it will report any outstanding installation steps which must be performed by root. Those items are described below.

If directed to do so by the Install script, copy or link the file ./yapp.conf into one of the following places:

/etc/yapp.conf

/usr/local/etc/yapp.conf

bbsdir/yapp.conf

~cfadm/yapp.conf

For more information on the yapp.conf file, see Yapp Technical Info.