FIDONET, THE INTERNET, AND WEBUTIL

If you run a BBS system, then you know all about long distance phone charges. Sending or picking up files from a system on the other side of the country, let alone IN another country, can be very expensive. The Internet offers a wonderful opportunity to transfer files to anywhere in the world with a local call.

WEBUTIL, being an FTP robot, can automatically upload or download files to an FTP site. You can use this technology to upload FIDONET files to an FTP site. Your downlinks can then download those files from that FTP site, to their local system. And, in return, your downlinks can also upload files that you can pick up. Below is a step by step explanation of how you can use WEBUTIL to exchange FIDONET mail and files via the INTERNET.

Note: Please note that in order to use WEBUTIL to exchange FIDONET mail and files via the INTERNET, you will have to make use of a feature in ALLFIX. This is explained below.

For each system that you exchange files with, you will need to make a directory on an FTP site, and in that directory, you need to create two sub-directories, one for transferring files TO that system, and one for transferring files FROM that system. Example:

\fidonet\harald
\fidonet\harald\in
\fidonet\harald\out

In the above example, we have created the "in" and "out" directories for transferring files with a person named "Harald". The "in" directory is where your downlink uploads files, and the "out" directory is where you upload files. It is important that both you and your downlinks know which directories should be used!

Next, you set up WEBUTIL so that it will upload files FROM a particular local directory TO the "out" directory and download files from the "in" directory to the inbound directory for your FIDONET mailer, such as FrontDoor. Below is a selection from a sample WEBUTIL.INI file.

[FTP]
NAME=FIDONET files for John Doe
URI=ftp.mysite.com
USER=myuser
PASSWORD=mypassword
TRANSFER=\holding\doe\*.*,/files/doe/out/,UP,DELETE
TRANSFER=/files/doe/in/*.*,\fd\inbound,DOWN,DELETE
[END]

As you can see in the above example, we use the DELETE flag to delete all of the files after they have been transferred. This is necessary so that you do not continously upload and download the same files, day after day.

In this explanation, we have assumed that all of the files for a particular system are located in one directory. In the previous example, we assumed that all of the files for John Doe were located in the directory \holding\doe. If you use ALLFIX, then all you need to do is to define a "holding directory" for John Doe in the Node manager, and to toggle the "Copy other files" option to Yes, in the "Advanced options" sub-menu. What this does is tell ALLFIX to MOVE all of the mail and files on hold for this system to the holding directory. WEBUTIL, in turn, will see those files and upload them to the FTP site.

We hope that this explanation has helped you get a better idea of how to use WEBUTIL to save long distance phone charges, by transferring FIDONET mail and files via the INTERNET. If you have any questions or problems getting WEBUTIL or this explanation, please feel fee to contact us at [email protected].