VBBS 6.14a

At a glance

Package

VBBS 6.14a, Virtual Advanced Communications; the shareware build, unregistered

Lines

Two: the unregistered build turns a third caller away on its own screen ("Limit 2 Channels"). Each line is a channel with its own control record and temporary directory. Proven: two.

Starting account

Operator

Callers page you with

L at the main menu

Console keys

Answer, Break in and Leave: F1 (the package's one chat key)

The board

What ATA set up. The package's own installer, run on ATA's machine; its database group index rebuilt by VCONFIG (the installed file pointed at a database that does not exist, and the board died at the main menu); the ninth path of its path table pointed at a real folder; the operator made through the board's own interview and raised to level 255 with a full day of minutes; the name index built from it; and the board's own wrapper, BBS.EXE, as the front end, so the menu items that shrink the board out of memory to run a program work.

The DOS page. "VBBS local logon" is channel 0, the console session, straight to the login prompt. "VCONFIG" is the configuration editor; Esc leaves and writes its files on the way out.

Making it your own. Your board lives in D:\VBBS. VCONFIG's Main Configuration holds the board name, the SysOp name and the System Password. The menus are the .PDM files in TXT and the function blocks in V. TXT\DEFAULT.STR is every string a caller reads.

The System Password. VBBS asks it ("System Password:") at the logon of every caller at level 255, which is what the operator account is, after the birth date if the account has none. The bundled board has none, so that prompt takes a plain Enter. Set one in VCONFIG (Main Configuration, item C): ATA keeps it out of every caller's machine and checks what you type on the host, as it does for the operator's own password. The same goes for the New User Password (item 6): when it is set, an applicant must type it before applying ("Please enter the new user password:"). Only the host compares it, and ATA lets an application land only from a caller whose typed answer the host matched, so the masked copy a caller's machine holds is no way in.

Callers. Handle, then password. A caller with no birth date on record is asked for it at logon. The interview's zip and phone fields print their own punctuation and wait for Enter. Log in by handle or by user number (the board tells a new caller their number). New members start at level 1.

Files. VBBS's own driver, VXY, moves the files, paced a little slower than other boards (it loses bytes at full speed). Uploads land in the file area (MISC).

Things to know. VBBS runs its own daily maintenance at the first call of a new day.

Legend of the Red Dragon on VBBS 6.14a

The steps every board shares (getting LORD, LORDCFG, the wrapper batch) are in the door guide. This is what is particular to this board.

Drop file: DOOR.SYS, in each channel's own folder: D:\VBBS\TEMP\N1\ for line 1, D:\VBBS\TEMP\N2\ for line 2. LORDCFG: (9) DOORSYS, path d:\vbbs\temp\n1\ for node 1 and d:\vbbs\temp\n2\ for node 2.

Batch: D:\VBBS\DOORS\LORD.BAT:

@ECHO OFF
D:
CD \DOORS\LORD
CALL START.BAT %NODE%
CD \VBBS

The door list. VBBS's doors are VCONFIG's "A. Doors Configuration" (kept in DOORS.CFG). On the DOS page press VCONFIG:

1. Press A for Doors Configuration. F1 adds an entry called "New Game"; Enter opens it.
2. In the entry, a field's number opens that field, and what you type replaces its contents. Set:
   • Program Name: Legend of the Red Dragon
   • Command Line: DOORS\LORD.BAT %1 (%1 is the channel)
   • Security Level: 1 (VBBS's new-member level)
   • Single User: No (LORD keeps one node file per line)
3. Esc saves and leaves the entry, and Esc again leaves VCONFIG, which writes its files on the way out.

Careful in that form: a letter typed while no field is open is a command (a stray D deletes the entry). Open a field by its number before typing.

How callers get there. O at the main menu (On-Line Programs) lists the doors; 1 starts LORD.