TIPS AND TRICKS FROM T&J SOFTWARE Revised: 08/07/1994 WILDCAT! 4.x ============ * Problems may develop using the DOOR.SYS drop file if you have a LARGE number of conferences. I would suggest picking up a copy of a file called FDOORSYS.ZIP written by Tim Rider (Tim can be reached on The Source BBS at 310-371-3737). Here is what Tim's documentation states: "WildCat! v4.0 allows up to 32,000 conference areas. Due to the specifications of DOOR.SYS, all the conferences that a user is joined to are written to line #23 of DOOR.SYS. 32,000 conferences takes up a lot of room, and some SysOps have a DOOR.SYS file that may end up to be over 100k. Some doors have been choking on the large DOOR.SYS, so I wrote this small utility to remove that line." from FDOORSYS.DOC by Tim Rider RENEGADE BBS ============ * If you are using BNU fossil driver and having problems with the doors, try using X00 v1.50+. Several Renegade systems have reported problems using BNU with the doors. * If you are getting out of memory errors. Go into the System Config section, [E] System Toggles, then [U] to turn the SWAP FILE 'ON'. TRIBBS v5.02+ ============= * Color ANSI checking will not work if you use TRIBBS.SYS drop file. Set the doors up using the PCBOARD.SYS drop file. * If you use DOOR.SYS, TriBBS reloads this file and will deduct twice the amount of time that was actually used. Try using another drop file, or copying the DOOR.SYS to a seperate directory and then telling the door to look there for it. * NOTE: This only applies to doors that you adjust the users time in the door such as Bordello, Studs, and Studette. T&J Raffle ========== * An ILLEGAL FUNCTION CALL will result if you enter a "closing date" that is not valid. If you want the door to lock at the end of the month, then put in the first of the month. Remote Access v2.0 ================== * Using DOOR.SYS may result in an OVERFLOW error -- try using a different caller drop file such as DORINFO1.DEF. This is currently being examined! Keyboard Timeouts ================= * If you are operating on a 486 computer and getting a "keyboard timeout", you will need to set the following environmental variable in your AUTOEXEC.BAT. SET NO87=ON This will turn off your co-processor and allow the door to function properly Overflow Errors =============== * Overflows can occur if you are running under DESQview and your tick counts are set too low -- try raising the tick counts. * If you're running Wildcat! v3.9+ and are getting OVERFLOW errors, make sure NONE of your security level definitions have the MAXIMUM DAILY DOWNLOADS set to more than 32,000 -- anything over that will cause an OVERFLOW ERROR in ANY door using DOORFRAME. Garbled Information on Remote ============================= * If the door seems to operate fine on the BBS end but the remote cannot receive or receives garbled information, check and make sure you are passing the correct IRQ to the door (if you are running a non standard IRQ). Graphic Cards (general) ======================= * ATI Graphics Ultra Pro card - do not use the ANSI.SYS driver that came with the card. Use the normal DOS ANSI.SYS for the screens to show correctly. * Trident SVGA Cards - You should have a utility disk with a file called TANSI.SYS, use this ansi driver instead of the standard ANSI.SYS. DESQview/X ========== * Make sure you have the MATH COPROCESSOR flagged ON even if you don't have a math coprocessor. Lockups on certain COM PORTS ============================ * If you're running on a non-standard IRQ, be sure you are passing the IRQ on the command line!! Example: STUDS! STUDS!.CFG /5 Studs! will now run on IRQ 5. Upgrading to New Versions ========================= * When you purchase a KEY from T&J Software, that KEY is valid for all upgrades also! Wildcat! 3.x ============ * If you are running Studs!, Studette!, or Bordello!, you must use the caller drop file DOOR.SYS to make sure the callers remaining time is passed back to Wildcat! * Wildcat! IM Version Setup using DigiFossil v1.3: All of our doors will run on the Wildcat! IM version using DigiFos v1.3. I have received TWO different setup routines concerning the IM version, here's an example: DF LOCK%WCNODEID% -OR- DF ON CD\WC30\DOOR\STUDS CD\WC30\DOOR\STUDS STUDS! STUDS!.CFG /FD STUDS! STUDS!.CFG CD\WC30 CD\WC30 DF OFF DF OFF Comments on either setup would be greatly appreciated! Spitfire BBS's ============== * If you're having trouble with the doors dropping carrier on exiting back to the BBS, switch to using DOOR.SYS instead of SFDOORS.DAT. On some Spitfire configurations this will happen when using SFDOORS.DAT. Using DESQview ============== * If you're running the doors under DV and you're getting ANSI character codes on the local monitor, be sure to load the file DVANSI.COM in the main batch file that starts your BBS! Bulletin PATHS and FILENAMES ============================ * When specifying the bulletin path, be sure to also select a name for the bulletin! This could cause lockups when using Bordello, Strip Poker, and Video Poker. If you don't want bulletins created, simply enter the word NONE for the path and filename. REGISTERED KEYS =============== * Distribution of a registered key is against copyright laws, which carries significant penalties. If a registered key is found being distributed, all keys purchased from us (by the person distributing the keys) will be invalidated and the matter will be turned over to our attorney's. We do share this information with other shareware authors. ERROR Codes (general) ===================== * ERROR #53 - This error means a file was not found. If this occurs right when the door is opened, please check the PATH to the caller drop file (i.e. DOOR.SYS), or make sure the caller drop file is being created properly! QuickBasic Error codes DoorFrame uses the QB error codes. --------------------------------------------------------------------------- 2 Syntax Error 61 Disk full 5 Ilegal Function Call 62 Input past end of File 6 Overflow 63 Bad record number 7 Out of memory 64 Bad filename 11 Division by Zero 67 Too many files 13 type mismatch 68 Device unavailable 24 Device Timeout 69 Comm-buffer overflow 25 Device fault 70 Permission denied 52 Bad filename or number 71 Disk not ready 53 File Not Found 72 Disk media error 55 File Already open 74 Rename across disk 57 Device I/O error 75 Path/File access error 58 File already exists 76 Path not found 59 Bad Record length The most common error that you will see is #62. This is usually caused by the CFG file not having enough lines. I have included this list so that you may be able to fix a problem that occurs with a T&J Software door. Error #75 is usually an incorrect path and/or filename in the CFG file.