MBSE BBS Setup: FTN node setup

Last update 29 September 2024

MBSE BBS Setup: FTN node setup

Introduction

Unlike many other BBS packages, you need only one record for each node. If you have a relation with a node for one network with cost sharing and other networks without cost sharing, you need two records for that node. For each node you can setup the AKAs, mail, files and session handshake. There are ten screens for each node.

1. Edit general setup

This screen has the general information for the node. The contact info fields are just for private use and these fields are only used in this screen.

Sysop name The name of the system operator. The name entered here is used in areamgr and filemgr messages as well as other messages to that sysop.

Outbox dir A private outbound directory for this node. Any file dropped into this directory will be sent to the node and removed after it is sent. The outbox directory is for files to be sent to the node. All files you put in there will be sent to the remote if user mbse has read/write access to the file. Only real files are allowed, no symlinks. This is useful when running IBBS doors.

Pvt. phone Node's private phone.

Pvt. fax Node's private FAX number.

Pvt. cellphone Node's private cell phone number.

Pvt. email Node's email address.

Pvt. remark Private remark about this node.

Route via Route via a set FTN address. All mail for this node will be send via this AKA, even mail and files for other networks. This can be useful if this node has internet access so you can send everything to this node over the Internet. To force calling this node via Internet, ISDN, or POTS, this can be done by using nodelist flags override. See section 3 of this page for more info. This setting is more useful to force routing via another node or AKA.

Netmail direct Set "direct" flag for mail to this node.

Netmail crash Set "direct" flag for mail to this node.

Netmail hold Set "direct" flag for mail to this node.

Pack mail If "yes", netmail and echomail will be packed in compressed ARCmail archives.

Send notify Send automatic generated notify messages to this node.

Language The language to use for areamgr msgs.

Deleted If this node must be deleted.

2. Edit node's AKAs

In this screen, you can setup 20 AKAs for the node.

3. Edit node session

In this screen you can setup the node's mail session defaults.

Session passwd This is the mailer session password.

Dial command You can put an override here for the normal dial command. If you leave this empty, the command from the modem setup is used.

Phone number 1 An alternative phone number to dial.

Phone number 2 An alternative phone number to dial. Use these above commands if the node has another phone number as mentioned in the nodelist.

Nodelist flags Override for the nodelist flags. The actual nodelist flags are completly ignored if you enter something here so make sure all flags you need are here. All AKAs of this node will use the same flags. This can be useful to force calling this node via the Internet and to force a certain protocol.

Inet hostname The FQDN hostname or IP address of this node. This replaces the original system name from the nodelist and this is then used to make the Internet TCP/IP connection. This can be useful if the FQDN is not present in the nodelist (though these days you would not normally need to use this field as nearly all modern FTN networks use the INA flag for the node's FQDN).

Outbound sess. Outbound session method. Choices are Direct and Directory. Direct means all mailer connections except FTP. Directory means that everything is put in a directory from which the other node can fetch the mail and files using FTP.

Inbound sess. Inbound session method. Choices are Direct and Directory. Direct means all mailer connections except FTP. Directory means that inbound mail and files are expected in a directory where it is stored by the node using FTP.

No EMSI Disable EMSI handshake used with "mailer over telnet" sessions.

No YooHoo/2U2 Disable FTSC-0006 handshake.

No Filerequest Disable file requests from this node.

Don't call Do not call this node.

8.3 names Set this if the node only accepts 8.3 filenames.

No PLZ Disable PLZ compression on outgoing calls with the BinkP protocol.

No GZ/BZ2 Disable GZ and BZ2 compression on outgoing calls with the BinkP protocol.

No Zmodem Disable Zmodem protocol.

No Zedzap Disable Zedzap protocol.

No Hydra Disable Hydra protocol.

BinkP CRC32 Enable CRC32 file transfer checks.

BinkP old esc Some older software used the wrong character escape method as published in FSP-1011 revision 3. For these systems, turn this flag on or you won't be able to send long filenames with spaces in the name or other special characters. Known affected software are Argus and Internet Rex up to 2.31. Others may exist.
No BinkP/1.1 Internet Rex, from version 2.24 up to 2.31 have a buggy BinkP/1.1 implementation. Set this to "yes" for nodes that use one of these versions of Internet Rex and the BinkP session will fall back to the BinkP/1.0 protocol.

Ign. Hold Ignore the nodelist flags "hold" or "down". Set this only if you want to call a node that is set to "hold" or "down" and you know that you can connect it.

4. Edit node - mail processing

PKT password The password to insert in .PKT files. With some mailers, such as D'Bridge, you must set a packet password but the password does not have to be enforced (see below).

Check PKT pwd Check password in received .PKT files. If not, errors or missing passwords are only logged. If set, errors or missing password are refused and the .PKT files are renamed to .BAD. This should normally be off unless you are actually using a packet password.

Mail forward Not in use yet (someday).

ARCmail comp. Use ARCmail 0.60 file naming convention for out of zone mail (normally set to "yes").

ARCmail a..z Allow a..z last character for ARCmail filenames (normally set to "yes").

5. Edit mail groups

Here you can tag which mail groups are available for this node. Note that all groups are visible here, even for networks this node has no aka's in. Be carefull not to allow a node to connect areas from networks he has no aka in.

6. File setup

Files password The password for .tic files.

Incl. message Send a netmail message for each file to send.

Send TIC file Send .tic file to this node.

Advanced TIC Send advanced or standard .tic files.

Advanced SB Send advanced Seen-By lines, some systems can't handle this!

To line in TIC Send the To line in the ticfile. Some braindead systems will forward this line instead of processing it and then the next system in the line will fail.

File forward Forward TIC files for this node (not yet).

7. File groups

The same story as for mail groups is true for the file groups.

8. Directory session

Setup in this screen is needed if you selected Inbound and or Outbound session as Directory session. The node is then getting and bringing mail using the ftp protocol and no normal mailer connects are being used anymore. This may be a good solution for points, they only need a simple mailreader and a tosser. The mail is transferred by the mbfido program, during the toss or tic command after the normal inbound is processed mbfido will look for nodes inbound directories to process. When mail is added to the outbound, mail for nodes with directory sessions is not stored in the normal Binley Style Outbound but in the session outbound directory.
You need to setup a ftp account for this node and the best thing is to set this up so that the other node is forced in a chroot environment, ie. make it so that the node only sees his own directories and cannot leave that. The ftp account needs to be a member of group bbs because mbfido needs access to the files as well as the node. The nodes account needs also to be a member of group bbsftp for the chroot environment. The node needs umask 002 so that files that he puts there will have group read/write access. During toss mbfido also stores the files with group read/write access so that the node can remove the files when he has fetched all files. Directory locking is supported and is compatible with other mailers that support ftp. Here is a small sample of protftp.conf for use with directory sessions:
# This is /etc/proftpd.conf for use with mbsebbs ftp mail
# sessions and anonymous ftp access.
# It assumes that you have a user/group "nobody" and "ftp" 
# for normal/anonymous operation.
# It also assumes you have a group bbsftp were ftp mail users
# must be a member of.
#
ServerName			"Seaport ProFTPD server"
ServerType			inetd
DefaultServer			on
#
# Port 21 is the standard FTP port.
Port				21
# Umask 002 is to force new dirs and files to be group writable.
Umask				002
#
# To prevent DoS attacks, set the maximum number of child processes
# to 30.
MaxInstances			30
#
# Set the user and group that the server normally runs at.
User				nobody
Group				nogroup
#
SystemLog			/var/log/proftpd
TransferLog			/var/log/xferlog
#
# Anonymous ftp and members of group bbsftp have a chroot environment.
DefaultRoot	~ bbsftp
#
# Normally, we want files to be overwriteable.
<Directory /*>
  AllowOverwrite		on
</Directory>
#
# A basic anonymous FTP server configuration.
# To enable this, remove the user ftp from /etc/ftpusers.
<Anonymous ~ftp>
  RequireValidShell		off
  User				ftp
  Group				ftp
  # We want clients to be able to login with "anonymous" as well as "ftp"
  UserAlias			anonymous ftp
  #
  # Limit the maximum number of anonymous logins
  MaxClients			50
  #
  # We want 'welcome.msg' displayed at login, and '.message' displayed
  # in each newly chdired directory.
  DisplayLogin			welcome.msg
  DisplayFirstChDir		.welcome
  DisplayReadme			README
  #
  # Display .dotfiles and .dirs
  LsDefaultOptions		"-a"
  #
  # Limit WRITE everywhere in the anonymous chroot
  <Limit WRITE>
    DenyAll
  </Limit>
  #
  # An upload directory that allows storing files but not retrieving
  # or creating directories.
  <Directory incoming/*>
     <Limit READ>
       DenyAll
     </Limit>

     <Limit STOR>
       AllowAll
     </Limit>
  </Directory>
  #
</Anonymous>
Here are some examples to create an account, first create the extra group bbsftp:
groupadd bbsftp
Then create accounts like this:
useradd -g bbs -G bbsftp -d /opt/mbse/var/bbsftp/irex -s /bin/bash -c "FTP Mail account" irex
Then give the node a password for the ftp login. Note that this account has a shell, proftpd needs a valid shell to allow access. If the node tries to telnet to your bbs he can't login with this account if you use mblogin, this is because the node is not in the bbs userfile. If you system allows it, the node can access the shell using rlogin or ssh.
Now the items to setup for the directory sessions:

Outbound settings

Files path The path were to store the outbound mail and files.

Check for lock If we need to check for a lockfile before adding files.

Wait clear lock Wait for the lock to clear if present or not. If set to yes and there is a lock created by the node then mbfido will wait for maximum 10 minutes for the lock to disappear. If set to no, mbfido skips this node and will add mail and files at a later time.
Check lockfile The full filename and path of the lockfile to check for.

Create lock If mbfido should create a lock during the time it will add mail and files.

Create lockfile The full filename and path of the lockfile to create.

Inbound settings

Files path The path from were to get the inbound mail and files.

Check for lock If we need to check for a lockfile before getting files.

Wait clear lock Wait for the lock to clear if present or not. If set to yes and there is a lock created by the node then mbfido will wait for maximum 10 minutes for the lock to disappear. If set to no, mbfido skips this node and will scan this directory at a later time.
Check lockfile The full filename and path of the lockfile to check for.

Create lock If mbfido should create a lock during the time it will get mail and files.

Create lockfile The full filename and path of the lockfile to create.

9. Security

This will set the security bits for the node. These bits can be used to give access or deny access to certain echomail areas or tic file areas. Default bit 1 is set for each node.

10. Area and File managers

This screen sets names and passwords of the uplink managers, also our own password is set here.

Uplink AreaMgr program The name of the Areamgr program of this node. This could be AreaFix, AreaMgr etc.

Uplink AreaMgr passowrd The password for the Areamgr of this node.

Uplink AreaMgr is BBBS If the uplink uses BBBS software set this to Yes.

Uplink FilMgr program The name of the Filemgr progrom of this node. This could be FileMgr, Allfix, Raid etc.

Uplink FileMgr password The password of the Filemgr if this node.

Uplink FileMgr is BBBS If the plink uses BBBS set this to Yes.

Our Area/Filemgr passwd Our own Area/Filemgr password for this node to send to our node.

11. Statistics

In this statistics screen you can see the mail and files flow with this node. Values are stored for the current week, the previous week, the current month and previous month and the overall total since you defined this node. There are actual 12 months of statistics stored in the nodes record, only 2 are visible.

Back to index Back to main index

Sysop name	The name of the system operator. The name entered here is used in areamgr and filemgr messages as well as other messages to that sysop.
Outbox dir	A private outbound directory for this node. Any file dropped into this directory will be sent to the node and removed after it is sent. The outbox directory is for files to be sent to the node. All files you put in there will be sent to the remote if user mbse has read/write access to the file. Only real files are allowed, no symlinks. This is useful when running IBBS doors.
Pvt. phone	Node's private phone.
Pvt. fax	Node's private FAX number.
Pvt. cellphone	Node's private cell phone number.
Pvt. email	Node's email address.
Pvt. remark	Private remark about this node.
Route via	Route via a set FTN address. All mail for this node will be send via this AKA, even mail and files for other networks. This can be useful if this node has internet access so you can send everything to this node over the Internet. To force calling this node via Internet, ISDN, or POTS, this can be done by using nodelist flags override. See section 3 of this page for more info. This setting is more useful to force routing via another node or AKA.
Netmail direct	Set "direct" flag for mail to this node.
Netmail crash	Set "direct" flag for mail to this node.
Netmail hold	Set "direct" flag for mail to this node.
Pack mail	If "yes", netmail and echomail will be packed in compressed ARCmail archives.
Send notify	Send automatic generated notify messages to this node.
Language	The language to use for areamgr msgs.
Deleted	If this node must be deleted.

Session passwd	This is the mailer session password.
Dial command	You can put an override here for the normal dial command. If you leave this empty, the command from the modem setup is used.
Phone number 1	An alternative phone number to dial.
Phone number 2	An alternative phone number to dial. Use these above commands if the node has another phone number as mentioned in the nodelist.
Nodelist flags	Override for the nodelist flags. The actual nodelist flags are completly ignored if you enter something here so make sure all flags you need are here. All AKAs of this node will use the same flags. This can be useful to force calling this node via the Internet and to force a certain protocol.
Inet hostname	The FQDN hostname or IP address of this node. This replaces the original system name from the nodelist and this is then used to make the Internet TCP/IP connection. This can be useful if the FQDN is not present in the nodelist (though these days you would not normally need to use this field as nearly all modern FTN networks use the INA flag for the node's FQDN).
Outbound sess.	Outbound session method. Choices are Direct and Directory. Direct means all mailer connections except FTP. Directory means that everything is put in a directory from which the other node can fetch the mail and files using FTP.
Inbound sess.	Inbound session method. Choices are Direct and Directory. Direct means all mailer connections except FTP. Directory means that inbound mail and files are expected in a directory where it is stored by the node using FTP.
No EMSI	Disable EMSI handshake used with "mailer over telnet" sessions.
No YooHoo/2U2	Disable FTSC-0006 handshake.
No Filerequest	Disable file requests from this node.
Don't call	Do not call this node.
8.3 names	Set this if the node only accepts 8.3 filenames.
No PLZ	Disable PLZ compression on outgoing calls with the BinkP protocol.
No GZ/BZ2	Disable GZ and BZ2 compression on outgoing calls with the BinkP protocol.
No Zmodem	Disable Zmodem protocol.
No Zedzap	Disable Zedzap protocol.
No Hydra	Disable Hydra protocol.
BinkP CRC32	Enable CRC32 file transfer checks.
BinkP old esc	Some older software used the wrong character escape method as published in FSP-1011 revision 3. For these systems, turn this flag on or you won't be able to send long filenames with spaces in the name or other special characters. Known affected software are Argus and Internet Rex up to 2.31. Others may exist.
No BinkP/1.1	Internet Rex, from version 2.24 up to 2.31 have a buggy BinkP/1.1 implementation. Set this to "yes" for nodes that use one of these versions of Internet Rex and the BinkP session will fall back to the BinkP/1.0 protocol.
Ign. Hold	Ignore the nodelist flags "hold" or "down". Set this only if you want to call a node that is set to "hold" or "down" and you know that you can connect it.

PKT password	The password to insert in .PKT files. With some mailers, such as D'Bridge, you must set a packet password but the password does not have to be enforced (see below).
Check PKT pwd	Check password in received .PKT files. If not, errors or missing passwords are only logged. If set, errors or missing password are refused and the .PKT files are renamed to .BAD. This should normally be off unless you are actually using a packet password.
Mail forward	Not in use yet (someday).
ARCmail comp.	Use ARCmail 0.60 file naming convention for out of zone mail (normally set to "yes").
ARCmail a..z	Allow a..z last character for ARCmail filenames (normally set to "yes").

Files password	The password for .tic files.
Incl. message	Send a netmail message for each file to send.
Send TIC file	Send .tic file to this node.
Advanced TIC	Send advanced or standard .tic files.
Advanced SB	Send advanced Seen-By lines, some systems can't handle this!
To line in TIC	Send the To line in the ticfile. Some braindead systems will forward this line instead of processing it and then the next system in the line will fail.
File forward	Forward TIC files for this node (not yet).

Outbound settings
Files path	The path were to store the outbound mail and files.
Check for lock	If we need to check for a lockfile before adding files.
Wait clear lock	Wait for the lock to clear if present or not. If set to yes and there is a lock created by the node then mbfido will wait for maximum 10 minutes for the lock to disappear. If set to no, mbfido skips this node and will add mail and files at a later time.
Check lockfile	The full filename and path of the lockfile to check for.
Create lock	If mbfido should create a lock during the time it will add mail and files.
Create lockfile	The full filename and path of the lockfile to create.
Inbound settings
Files path	The path from were to get the inbound mail and files.
Check for lock	If we need to check for a lockfile before getting files.
Wait clear lock	Wait for the lock to clear if present or not. If set to yes and there is a lock created by the node then mbfido will wait for maximum 10 minutes for the lock to disappear. If set to no, mbfido skips this node and will scan this directory at a later time.
Check lockfile	The full filename and path of the lockfile to check for.
Create lock	If mbfido should create a lock during the time it will get mail and files.
Create lockfile	The full filename and path of the lockfile to create.

Uplink AreaMgr program	The name of the Areamgr program of this node. This could be AreaFix, AreaMgr etc.
Uplink AreaMgr passowrd	The password for the Areamgr of this node.
Uplink AreaMgr is BBBS	If the uplink uses BBBS software set this to Yes.
Uplink FilMgr program	The name of the Filemgr progrom of this node. This could be FileMgr, Allfix, Raid etc.
Uplink FileMgr password	The password of the Filemgr if this node.
Uplink FileMgr is BBBS	If the plink uses BBBS set this to Yes.
Our Area/Filemgr passwd	Our own Area/Filemgr password for this node to send to our node.