Last update 07-Aug-2001

 

MBSE BBS Basic Installation

Introduction.

Before you compile and install MBSE BBS you must first setup the basic environment. If you don't do this, things will fail.

 

Step 1: planning the filesystems.

MBSE BBS is default installed in /opt/mbse. The spoolfiles (in and outbound, message bases) go into /var/spool/mbse. In the /opt/mbse path are several subdirectories, bin for the binaries, etc for the configuration and some scripts, english, spanish, italian and dutch for the language files and menus, home for the users homedirectories, log for the logfiles, magic for the filerequest magicnames, fdb for the files database, var for some statistic files and tmp as temp directory.

Don't use UMSDOS or SAMBA filesystems for the bbs, stick by the standard Linux filesystems (ext2 or reiserfs). If you intent to make your bbs also accessible by FTP and WWW you must create the directory structure under the ftp user behind the pub directory. Read the ftp server doc for details. If you don't follow these guidlines, you will run into trouble later and have to spend a lot of time in correcting this error.

The default setup will be as follows:

/opt/mbse		binaries, config and user home directories.
/var/spool/mbse		In/outbound, queues, download directories.

 

Step 2: Running the installation script.

The installation script must be run by root. It checks if there is a previous or failed installation on your system. If that's so the script will not run. In other words, you can only run this script once. The script makes backup copies of the system files it changes, these files will get the extension .mbse To run the installation script you need the archive mbbsebbs-0.33.nn.tar.gz. Unpack this archive on your system, in /tmp will do fine: 

cd /tmp
tar xfvz /path/to/the/mbsebbs-0.33.nn.tar.gz
To start the script type: 
cd mbsebbs-0.33.nn
bash ./SETUP.sh
Yes, use bash as shell here. On some systems root doesn't use bash as login shell, calling the script with bash forces the use of bash. The script does the following:
  1. Create the group bbs
  2. Create the user mbse
  3. Create a .profile for user mbse
  4. Create and set owner of directory tree under /opt/mbse
Then the script will ask you to give a password for user mbse This password is for system maintenance and for you to make changes to the bbs. You will need that frequently but you should not make that password easy to guess of course. The script will then continue again:
  1. The user bbs is added.
  2. The password will be removed from user bbs This action will make changes in /etc/shadow (if you have that) otherwise in /etc/passwd. On FreeBSD it uses other tools to modify the master database.
  3. If they don't exist in the file /etc/services the services fido, tfido and binkp will be added.
  4. If they don't exist in the file /etc/inetd.conf the internet protocols for the mailer will be added. The inetd is restarted to activate the changes.

 

Step 3: Check the basic installation

The last screen of the script is about sanity checks. Perform those checks! If something is wrong, now is the time to fix it. Don't panic and remember the backups of the system files that are changed are in /etc with the extension .mbse i.e: those were the original files. If everythings is allright, then remove the directory /tmp/mbsebbs-0.33.nn: 

cd /tmp
rm -Rf mbsebbs-0.33.nn

 

Step 4: Install the basic packages.

Login as user mbse. While in the home directory unpack the distribution archives: 

tar xfvz /path/to/mbsebbs-0.33.nn.tar.gz
You now have the subdirectory with sources in the right place. Next build the binaries and install them using the folowing commands: 
cd ~/mbsebbs-0.33.nn
./configure
make
su
password: enter root password here
make install
exit
The last part of the installation procedure shows you the location of the bbs startup script that is added to your system. Because this is your first time installation, example menus, textfiles and some databases are installed. If they already exist on your systems (when you do an upgrade) they will not be installed again.

Now you must start the mbtask daemon by hand by typing /opt/mbse/bin/mbtask. Check the file /opt/mbse/log/mbtask.log for startup problems. You may notice that the program mbcico is started everytime, this is not a problem, it simply doesn't work right now because you haven't configured anything yet.

 

Step 5: (RedHat) startup problems.

From RedHat 6.1 (not the older versions) the behaviour of the su is changed. This may be true for other distributions since the end of 1999 and for Mandrake as well. The file /etc/rc.d/init.d/mbsed that is created by the setup script is different then before. The new command is su - instead of simply su. It might be that other new distributions also need the extra minus sign. If that's the case, please let me know and tell me how I can test what version it is.

 

Step 6: ready.

Now the basic environment is finished, the next thing is to install the scripts, examples and configuration.

 

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