RdL> Thanks, I'm not a C programmer and all I could help 
 RdL> with is reporting bugs and making suggestions. I'll 
 RdL> help test but not just yet.  

Ok....

 RdL> - On my windows computer each node runs in a seperate 
 RdL> window. I can easily see who's doing what. If someone 
 RdL> pages me, I can answer the page and chat with a user.. 
 RdL> I can take over the keyboard and control the bbs etc.. 
 RdL> On linux, it seems that maximus runs as as a hidden 
 RdL> process. Is there a way I can see what people are 
 RdL> doing on the BBS, answer pages, etc...? "Snoop mode"  
 RdL> I'll be honest, I didn't spend much time playing with 
 RdL> Maximus for linux and nor am I a linux expert. 
 ...
 RdL> BTW do you (or anyone reading) have an answer for my 
 RdL> question shown above? That's really important for me 
 RdL> and if I can't do that I'd rather stick with the Windows version.


I'm not sure how you are running Max under Linux.  The way I've been
running, I see the normal setup for the way I run it.  If you are running
with the -k option, then there is only one (local) window.  The telnet port
was partially working (using the -p switch).  Wes was still working on the
serial port support the last time he made a change....

 BJ> WARNING:  I do not use the Win32 version of Maximus.  I 
 BJ> runn Maximus/2 under OS/2, and am helping get Maximus 
 BJ> running under Linux when time permits.

 RdL> Really? Which version of OS/2 are you using and how 
 RdL> did you get it on a TCP/IP LAN? I used to run my board 
 RdL> on OS/2 Warp 3 way back when, single node using a 
 RdL> modem. I still have my boxed copy here, I installed it 
 RdL> on a computer and couldn't find anything to use a 
 RdL> TCP/IP LAN. IBM Internet Connection or whatever it 
 RdL> waws called works for dialup PPP Internet access only. 

I'm using OS/2 version 4, which comes native with TCP/IP support over
ethernet cards.  OS/2 version 3 needs an add on package for TCP/IP support
over ethernet cards, and would be cheaper to get Warp 4 or now eCS or
OS/2's support package (which includes later updates).  To get the BBS to
anser telnet ports, I use VMODEM, which is part of the SIO package. 
Outside of the operating system, this is the only software I have purchased
specifically to run my BBS.  [I have had the local net buy one other
software package for my use when they wanted me to run as a hub, and get
running very quickly....]

 RdL> Then a friend lended me an OS/2 Warp 4 cd. He says it worked on his 486 
 RdL> just fine. I tried installing it on a p166 with a 2 GB 
 RdL> hard drive and every time I load the setup program it 
 RdL> totally corrupts the partition table. Even if there 
 RdL> are no partitions on it. win98 fdisk, partition magic 
 RdL> 5 and 7, and a couple other utils I tried couldn't 
 RdL> touch the drive after OS/2 Warp 4 messed it up. I had 
 RdL> to use linux fdisk to rebuild a new partition table. 


There are a number of limits on installing OS/2 version 4 (WARP 4).  I
deliberately bought both a 256Mb and a 64Mb memory card (?) so that I could
limit my system to 64Mb memory for the initial install of Warp 4.  [Once
installed and updated with fixes I added the 256Mb card (?) in.  To install
on greater than 512 Mb drives, there are a number of items you need to be
concerned with.  The fact that the drive was corrupted tells me that the
computer bios for the hard disk settings was probably not in sync with how
the hard disk was partitioned.  OS/2 bypasses the BIOS settings at a
certian point, and usually reads the information off the hard disks.  If
the disk had been setup on another system, or with some wierd or invalid
paritional table stuff, this could cause problems.  And you may have needed
updated IDE drivers to handle it.  [I happen to use Dani's IDE driver due
to some of the HD's I've worked with.....

 RdL> I tried this on 3 different computers and it wrecked 
 RdL> every one of them! That's why I'm not using OS/2 right 
 RdL> now. I remember it was excellent at multitasking DOS 
 RdL> doors and SIO/VMODEM was free I think? 

SIO is not free.  A four port shareware version is available to try, but it
is shareware, not free software.

Take care......

Bob Jones, 1:343/41

--- Maximus/2 3.01