COPYRIGHT

Free For All Links Version 1.00
Copyright 2001 London Perl Mongers, All rights reserved

LICENSE

This script is free software; you are free to redistibute it
and/or modify it under the same terms as Perl itself.

URL

The most up to date version of this script is available from the nms
script archive at  <http://nms-cgi.sourceforge.net/>.

SUMMARY

Free For All Links is a program to maintain a simple database of web links.
Any visitor to the web page can add links to the database.

FILES

In this distribution, you will find five files:

ffa.pl        - The main perl script.
README        - This file. Instructions on how to install and use ffa.
database.txt  - A sample database file.
links.html    - A sample HTML file.
MANIFEST      - List of files.

CONFIGURATION

In order for this program to work properly on your webserver it will require
a small amount of configuration before you upload it.

All of the configuration is done by editing the program file directly, you
can do this in your favourite text editor or notepad if you are on Windows.
You probably don't want to use a wordprocessor to do this unless you are
certain you can save the file as plain text.

Firstly you will need to change the first line of the program:

   #!/usr/bin/perl -wT

so that it points at the proper location of perl on your webserver - your
system administrator or webhosting provider should be able to tell you this.
You only need to change the '/usr/bin/perl' part - all of the rest of the
line must be left exactly as it is.

There are a number of variables that you can change in ffa.pl which
alter the way that the program works.

$DEBUGGING    - This should be set to 1 whilst you are installing
                and testing the script. Once the script is live you
                should change it to 0. When set to 1, errors will
                be output to the browser. This is a security risk and
                should not be used when the script is live.

$directory    - The directory path where all of the ffa files are stored.

$linkstitle   - A title. This will be used on some of the generated pages.

$filename     - The filename of the HTML file that will display the links.

$linksurl     - The public URL to the HTML page that will display the links.

$usedatabase  - If this is true (i.e. set to 1) we store the links in a 
                database text file as well as in the HTML page. If this is
                false (i.e. set to 0) we store the links only in the HTML
                page.

$database     - The filename of the database where the links are stored.

$sendmail     - Set to true (i.e. 1) if you want to be notified of new 
                additions to the list of links.

$mailer       - The path to the mailer (probably sendmail) on your system.

$mail_address - The address to which notifications of new links are sent.

$style        - The URL of a stylesheet to use on generated HTML pages.

$default_section - The default category that new links will be added to.

%sections     - A hash defining the set of sections (or 'categories'). The
                keys are the section identifiers (as found in the comments
                in the HTML file) and the values are the descriptive titles
                of the sections.

INSTALLATION

ffa is installed simply by copying the file ffa.pl into your cgi-bin 
directory. If you don't know where your cgi-bin directory is, then
please ask your system administrator

You may need to rename ffa.pl to ffa.cgi. Again, your system
administrator will know if this is the case.

You will probably need to turn on execute permissions to the file. You can
do this by running the command "chmod +x ffa.pl" from your command
line. If you don't have command line access to your web server then there
will probably be an equivalent function in your file transfer program.

The webserver needs write permission for the path you set up in $directory
and also for the $database file. Again, ask your system administrator if
you don't know how to do this.

Then, edit the links.html page and put in on your website. You'll need to
edit the link in the <form> tag so that it points to your copy of ffa.pl.

SUPPORT

For support of this script please email:

  <nms-cgi-support@lists.sourceforge.net>

This mailling list is read by the NMS developers and other helpful people
who will try to help you solve your problem.
