<title>The DXSpider Installation and Administration Manual
<author>Ian Maude, G0VGS, (ianmaude@btinternet.com)
-<date>Version 1.33 (Revision 1.20) February 2001
+<date>Version 1.33 (Revision 1.22) March 2001
<abstract>
A reference for SysOps of the DXSpider DXCluster program.
</abstract>
<sect1>Introduction
<P>
-This section describes the installation of DX Spider v1.35 on a
-<htmlurl url="http://www.redhat.com" name="RedHat"> Linux Distribution.
+This section describes the installation of DX Spider v1.46 on a
+<htmlurl url="http://www.redhat.com" name="RedHat"> Linux Distribution.
+Wherever possible I will try to include differences for other distributions.
I do not intend to try and cover the installation of Linux or the setup
of the AX25 utilities. If you need help on this then read Iains original
-HOWTO on the <htmlurl url="http://www.dxcluster.org" name="DXSpider">
-website.
+installation guide that comes with the Spider distribution.
<P>
I am assuming a general knowledge of Linux and its commands. You should
<P>
The crucial ingredient for all of this is
-<htmlurl url="http://www.perl.org" name="Perl 5.004">. Now I know Perl 5.005
-is out and this will almost certainly work with it, but
-<htmlurl url="http://www.redhat.com" name="RedHat 5.1"> comes with 5.004.
-<em>Be Warned</em>, earlier versions of
-<htmlurl url="http://www.redhat.com" name="RedHat"> <bf>do not</bf> come
-with 5.004 as standard, you need to
-<htmlurl url="ftp://upgrade.redhat.com" name="upgrade">
+<htmlurl url="http://www.perl.org" name="Perl">. Earlier versions of
+Spider required perl 5.004, however it is now <it>STRONGLY</it> recommended
+that you use at least version 5.005_03 as this is the version being used
+in the development of Spider.
<P>In addition to the standard Red Hat distribution you will require the
-following <htmlurl url="http://www.cpan.org/CPAN.html" name="CPAN"> modules: -
+following modules from <htmlurl url="http://www.cpan.org/CPAN.html" name="http://www.cpan.org/CPAN.html"> ...
<P>
<itemize>
<item> MD5-1.7.tar.gz
<item> Data-Dumper-2.10.tar.gz
-<item> FreezeThaw-0.3.tar.gz
-<item> MLDBM-2.00.tar.gz
<item> TimeDate-1.08.tar.gz
<item> IO-1.20.tar.gz
<item> Net-Telnet-3.02.tar.gz
<P>
I will assume that you have already downloaded the latest tarball of
the DXSpider software and are ready to install it. I am assuming version
-1.35 for this section but of course you would use the latest version.
+1.46 for this section but of course you would use the latest version.
<P>
Login as root and create a user to run the cluster under. <bf><it>UNDER
<tscreen><verb>
# cd ~sysop
-# tar xvfz spider-1.35.tar.gz
+# tar xvfz spider-1.46.tar.gz
# ln -s ~sysop/spider /spider
# groupadd -g 251 spider (or another number)
</verb></tscreen>
<P><bf>PLEASE USE CAPITAL LETTERS FOR CALLSIGNS</bf>
<P>
-DON'T alter the DXVars.pm (or any other file) in /spider/perl, they are
-overwritten with every release. Any files or commands you place in /spider/local
-or /spider/local_cmd will automagically be used in preference to the ones in
-/spider/perl EVEN while the cluster is running!
+DON'T alter any file in /spider/perl, they are overwritten with every
+release. Any files or commands you place in /spider/local or /spider/local_cmd
+will automagically be used in preference to the ones in /spider/perl EVEN
+while the cluster is running!
<P>
Save the new file and change directory to ../perl ....
the sysop.
<tscreen><verb>
-$ create_sysop.pl
+$ ./create_sysop.pl
</verb></tscreen>
<sect1>Starting up for the first time
It should look something like this ...
<tscreen><verb>
-$ cluster.pl
-DXSpider DX Cluster Version 1.35
+$ ./cluster.pl
+DXSpider DX Cluster Version 1.46
Copyright (c) 1998 Dirk Koopman G1TLH
loading prefixes ...
loading band data ...
cd to /spider/perl. Now issue the following command ...
<tscreen><verb>
-$ client.pl
+$ ./client.pl
</verb></tscreen>
<P>
default * * * * * * - sysop /spider/src/client client %u ax25
</verb></tscreen>
+or, if you wish your users to be able to use SSID's on their callsigns ..
+
+<tscreen><verb>
+default * * * * * * - sysop /spider/src/client client %s ax25
+</verb></tscreen>
+
<sect1>Allowing telnet connects from users
<P>
is accepting telnet logins by issuing the following command ....
<tscreen><verb>
-client.pl login telnet
+./client.pl login telnet
</verb></tscreen>
You should get a login prompt and on issuing a callsign, you will be given
<P>
That is now set, it is as simple as that. To prove it, login on yet another
-console as sysop and issue the command ...
+console as sysop, cd to spider/perl and issue the command ...
<tscreen><verb>
-client.pl gb7baa (using the callsign you set as a node)
+./client.pl gb7baa (using the callsign you set as a node)
</verb></tscreen>
<P>
You should get an initialisation string from DXSpider like this ...
<tscreen><verb>
-client.pl gb7baa
+./client.pl gb7baa
PC38^GB7MBC^~
</verb></tscreen>
</verb></tscreen>
<P>
-This line works fine for RedHat and SuSE distributions. The line required for
-Slackware distributions is slightly different. My thanks to Aurelio, PA3EZL for
-this information.
+This line works fine for RedHat distributions. It is also fine for SuSE up to
+7.0. From Suse 7.1 you need to add runlevels 2 and 5 like this ...
+
+<tscreen><verb>
+DX:235:respawn:/bin/su -c "/usr/bin/perl -w /spider/perl/cluster.pl" sysop >/dev/tty7
+</verb></tscreen>
+
+
+The line required for Slackware distributions is slightly different. My thanks to
+Aurelio, PA3EZL for this information.
<tscreen><verb>
DX:23:respawn:/bin/su - sysop -c "/usr/bin/perl -w /spider/perl/cluster.pl" >/dev/tty7