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 Ameol FAQs Setup |
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Q) What changes do I need to make to Ameol once I migrate to
a CIXdesktop account? Once you migrate you will no longer be able to send or receive email via the Pipex mail server mail.cix.co.uk, all mail server settings should now be changed to mail.cixonline.com unless you are forwarding your email off-site. Passwords
Mail servers: POP3 SMTP SMTP Authentication Conferencing mail To switch, simply select "Use CIX Online mailbox" when migrating your account. You can change this after migration or check your current setting from the Webmail preferences menu in CIX Online. In Ameol we recommend you switch Settings | Mail | Delivery to "Always send using CIX Internet". IMAP
Connection: If you still require a dial-up Internet connection, you can choose one of the free ISPs that offer local rate 0845 dial-up connectivity. You may find this useful as a backup for your broadband connection or while travelling. Other settings in Ameol blink properties, (these should not have changed during migration). Click on the Conferencing tab and ensure that "Connect With:" is set to either "Internet Conferencing" or "Net access", it should not be set to "Dial-Up Conferencing". Click on the little button to the right of the "Connect With:" drop down list. The "Address:" value should be "cix.conferencing.co.uk"; the "Timeout:" should be at least 90 seconds; the "Port or Service:" set to "Telnet"; and the "Script to run:" set to "connect.scr". The last entry may require a full pathname to the script file -- e.g., C:\Program Files\Ameol2\Script. Troubleshooting: If you find you only have 2 tabs instead of 4 tabs when you choose Settings | Mail, you will need to rerun your Ameol setup routine to install the Internet components of Ameol. See When do I need to run Ameol Setup?
Q) Can I use anti-virus software with Ameol.? Anti-Virus software may also quarantine incoming messages and stop the flow of normal incoming mail. You may need to read the information supplied with your anti-virus package or talk to the vendor to resolve these issues. Outgoing email can also be affected, especially if you are scanning outgoing messages that contain attachments as this can cause the mail server to timeout before it has finished sending your message. If your Anti-Virus software scans the Ameol Data, Archive or Scratch directory while Ameol is trying to import your messages after a blink, it can corrupt your entire messagebase, sometimes beyond repair. We strongly recommend that you exclude these directories from scanning. If firewall software blocks the mail ports on 25 or 110 you will find that you can no longer send or receive email. Firewall software may even detect if you upgrade your email package and not allow access until you authorise it. Obviously firewall and anti-virus software are very important and
people are often quite rightly concerned about disabling it, especially for
email. Email is plain text, files sent as attachments are converted to
plain text in order to send them via email. Generally speaking an email
received by you in Ameol is quite safe even if it has an attachment, however
the act of decoding the attachment may create a file that contains a
virus. Running that file may then infect your computer. Some email
programs such as Outlook can automatically decode and run the attachment, which
can then infect your computer. It can also be vulnerable to web links,
which download a program onto your machine. Viruses are often written to attack
Outlook, as it is a very common package. Ameol does not tend to suffer
from these exploits so providing you use caution when opening and running
attachments you should be OK. You should avoid unencoding attachments
from an unknown source or that you are not expecting. Setting your
anti-virus package to scan the attachment directory in Ameol, typically
More useful information can be found in the cix:virus conference.
Q) How do I set up Ameol to connect to cix conferencing from
another ISP? POP3 (Post Office Protocol version 3) is used to receive email; Pipex customers should leave it set as mail.cix.co.uk, assuming you want to read CIX email rather than email to your other ISP. CIXdesktop customers should set this to mail.cixonline.com unless you are forwarding your email off to a different mailbox.
SMTP (Simple Mail Transfer Protocol) is used to send email; it must be set to
the name of the server provided by your other ISP. Now let's go through the settings. Right-click on the button you use to initiate a full blink and choose Properties. Click on the "DUN" tab; if you are using a dial-up connection then ensure that the "Use Dial-up Networking" option is ticked, that the correct DUN entry for your other ISP is chosen from the "Entry:" drop down list and that the "User Name:" and "Password:" are entered correctly for that ISP. (Sometimes your username can be long, and include the .co.uk etc. e.g., someone.freeserve.co.uk.) If you are using an always on broadband or LAN connection then "Use Dial-Up Networking" should be unticked. You can also untick DUN if you have DUN set to dial on demand. If there is a connection it will be used; if not it will be dialled if the connection settings are to connect on demand. Now click on the Internet tab; check that the "SMTP server" is set to the correct one for that ISP -- e.g., mail.freeserve.co.uk. (An alternative approach is described in Why does my e-mail stick in the outbasket with a red exclamation mark?, Why do I see the "Relaying denied" message in my logs?)
Now click on the Conferencing tab; ensure that "Connect With:" is either
"Internet Conferencing" or "Net access"; it should not be set
to "Dial-Up Conferencing". Click on the little button to the right of the
"Connect With:" drop down list. The "Address:" value should be cix.conferencing.co.uk; the "Timeout:" should be at least
90 seconds; the "Port or Service:" set to "Telnet"; and the "Script to run:"
set to "connect.scr". The last may require a full pathname to the script file
-- e.g., C:\Program Files\Ameol2\Script.
Q) How do I set up a second Ameol user on my machine? To set up a new user and to ensure that the message base for the new user is kept separate from the main user (Administrator), do the following:
1. When logged on as the Administrator:
2. Create the following subdirectory under the \<Ameol2 installed
directory>\Users\<newuser>
3. Before continuing, you might wish to print out this message. When logged on
as the new user the very first time, you will have to
go through the set up. Now: When you click OK on this dialog, Ameol warns you that it needs to close Ameol. Confirm that this is OK. Now start Ameol again for this new user. It now tells you "Ameol2 cannot find your messagebase database index file ..." Click New at this point.
Q) When do I need to run Ameol Setup? And how?
1. Wrong details entered for e-mail, etc.
2. Wrong type of account set up. To run setup, you should simply be able to double-click on the Ameol setup icon in the CIX Software folder on your desktop (or use Start> Programs> CIX Software if you do not have that folder on your desktop). However if you do not have such an icon (because you chose not to install icons, you deleted the icon or you installed a version of Ameol which didn't install icons even when asked to) then simply run Ameol232 with the /setup command line parameter. You can do this by duplicating the Ameol icon on your desktop: i) Right-click on the icon and select Copy. ii) Right-click on the desktop and select Paste. You will now have another icon for Ameol with "Copy of" preceding whatever title the original icon has. iii) Right-click on this new icon and select Properties.
iv) Select the Shortcut tab and add " /setup" (without the quotes but
with the leading space) to the end of whatever is in the "Target:"
box v) Now double-click the new and changed icon.
Q) I made a mess of entering my user name or password details
when I installed Ameol2. How do I go back and correct then?
Q) How do I setup the CIX Spam and Virus Filter? Your CIX SVF is fully configurable. Login to CIX Online and go into My Account | Mail Settings or from the Webmail button on the top menu bar, from here you will find CIX SVF settings. All incoming email receives a score from the SpamAssassin engine, the higher the score the more likely that the message is junk. The default trigger level setting in SVF is 8 however we now find that this is a bit on the high side and most users find that a setting between 2 and 4 is a good starting point. The lower the number, the more aggressive the filtering. You can set your SVF trigger level as low as 1. You can also setup your own black and white lists. To ensure that genuine email does not get trapped by your spam filter you can add and email address or domain to your white list. You can add problem addresses to your black list to always filter out messages from those addresses. To ensure you always receive messages from other CIX users it is a good idea to add the following addresses to your white list. cixonline.com Emails containing viruses or that have a higher spam score than your trigger level will be moved into your quarantine folder and can be accessed from CIX Online. You should keep an eye on your quarantine folder after making any changes to ensure that no genuine email is being trapped. Notes: *The black and white list acts upon the SMTP envelope address, this can sometimes be different to the From address shown in the email header. *Determined spammers are always adapting the techniques they use to send spam in an attempt to thwart spam filtering, while we make every effort to keep our spam filtering effective, no spam filters can be 100% effective. Periodically spam levels may increase for short periods of time while effective filtering can be introduced to block them. *SpamAssassin does not filter spam based on keywords.
Q) How do I set up Ameol to connect via the CIX Homeworker
ADSL service? POP3 (Post Office Protocol version 3) is used to receive email. Under Settings | Mail | Internet, set your POP3 server to mail.cixonline.com unless you are forwarding your email off to a different mailbox, in which case you can use the settings for that mailbox. SMTP (Simple Mail Transfer Protocol) is used to send email. Also under Settings | Mail | Internet, set your SMTP server to mail.cixonline.com. Right-click on the button that you use to initiate a full blink and choose Properties. Click on the Internet tab and check that the "SMTP server" is also set to mail.cixonline.com, tick the box "This server requires authentication" and enter you normal CIX Online username and password in the boxes provided. On the DUN tab you can untick "Use Dial Up Networking". Now click on the Conferencing tab and ensure that "Connect With:" is set to either "Internet Conferencing" or "Net access", it should no longer be set to "Dial-Up Conferencing". Click on the little button to the right of the "Connect With:" drop down list.
The "Address:" value should be "cix.conferencing.co.uk"; the "Timeout:" should
be at least 90 seconds; the "Port or Service:" set to "Telnet"; and the "Script
to run:" set to "connect.scr". The last entry may require a full pathname to
the script file -- e.g., C:\Program Files\Ameol2\Script.
Q) Can I change the number of logs archived by Ameol? HKEY_CURRENT_USER (If doing this for a user different than 'admin', substitute the username for ADMIN in the key tree.) Now in the in the right hand pane, use Edit|New> and select 'DWORD Value'. Call it MaxToArchive. Now use Edit|Modify and set it to the required value. (Be sure to select the Decimal option unless you wish to work in Hexadecimal.)
Q) Can I change the port numbers used by Ameol to connect to
NNTP, POP3 and/or SMTP? For NNTP servers just change the port number shown when editing the server information via Settings|Usenet, Servers tab, select the affected server and click Edit. The POP3 and SMTP port numbers can not be changed through the User Interface. However there is an undocumented way to do it anyway. For POP3 servers, use regedit to create a DWORD key called POP3Port under HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\CIX\Ameol2\ADMIN\Settings and set it to whatever port you want to use. If the key does not exist the default of 110 is used. (N.B., If the user for whom you are changing the port is not ADMIN, simply change that part of the registry key accordingly.) For SMTP servers, use regedit to create a DWORD key called SMTPPort under HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\CIX\Ameol2\ADMIN\Settings and set it to whatever port you want to use. If the key does not exist the default of 25 is used. (N.B., If the user for whom you are changing the port is not ADMIN, simply change that part of the registry key accordingly.) Please note that while changing the POP3 and SMTP port numbers has been tested and works, it is not supported.
Q) How do I increase the number of archives kept? For Windows HKEY_CURRENT_USER
Q) Why do I get shorter lines in
the messages I post than the value I've set i-n 'Wrap Column' on the Editor tab
of Settings|Preferences...?
Q) Why can't I see message styles - bold, italics etc? Once you have done that you should see each of the words below with styles applied to them. This is in *bold* This is in /italics/ This is underlined Also you need to understand the way you must use the style characters in order to obtain the results you desire. Style processing used to require that *each* _word_ be surrounded by /one/ of the three style characters preceded or followed by a space (as appropriate for opening or closing the style). Later Ameol was amended to allow several words to be subject to a style. The only restriction is that the beginning and ending style character must be on the same line; i.e., it will not /wrap/ a style across lines. E.G., /This whole line is italicised with one set of style characters/ but *the following rather long and wordy explanation clause is not in bold due to the fact that it wraps across a line.* The exception to the requirement that the ending style character must be followed by a space is that certain punctuation marks may follow instead of a space. These are: comma, full-stop, question mark, exclamation mark and closing parenthesis. It doesn't, however, recognise any other punctuation marks such as a colon or semi-colon, single or double quotes, opening or closing brackets (except the closing parenthesis mentioned earlier) nor hyphens. So anything after the closing style character other than a space, comma, full-stop, exclamation mark or closing parenthesis disables the style. E.G., *comma*, /space/ _question mark_? *exclamation mark* /closing/ With punctuation not-recognised: _colon_: But without: _colon_
Q) Why does my word-wrapping sometimes not work? It is not a good idea to use a proportional font when composing messages in Ameol2. A proportional font is one such as MS Sans Serif, Times New Roman or Arial where the widths of the individual letters vary. Using these fonts will create lines far longer than the Wrap Column set in Settings|Preferences, Editor tab because Ameol2 is unable to calculate properly the actual position of the wrap column. In most cases, composing messages using a proportional font does not cause a problem because Ameol2 will wrap the text before posting to CIX. However it can cause things such as tables or bulleted items to fail to format properly because the text wrapping incorrectly determines the end of a paragraph.
Q) Can I stay online at the end of a blink? If you mean being able to stay online to the CIX conferencing system, then there
is an option to do this. Use Settings|Communications..., Blinks tab. Select the
blink type you wish to modify and click the Edit... button. At the bottom you
will see a "Stay online at end" option which can be checked. This is also an
available option if you do a custom connect (File|Connect>Custom...). If you
mean being able to perform other internet activity, then simply start a DUN
connection external to Ameol before blinking. Once the blink completes you will
be disconnected from CIX Conferencing, but will remain on line for other
internet actions.
Q) Why does Ameol use the American style date display (i.e.,
mm/dd/yy)? For some people, this does not always correct the problem. If this is true for you, then: 1. Change your settings in control panel to the 'wrong' format.
Q) What is the difference between a "full" connection and a
"conferencing via - dial up" connection?
Q) How do you increase the maximum allowed scratchpad size
on CIX Conferencing? opt scratchpad nnnnnnnn quit where "nnnnnnnn" must be a numeric value up to the maximum allowed of 20000000 (20MB). In Ameol, perform the following steps to effect this: 1. Use File|Scripts... 2. Select "Get profile.txt" and click Add. 3. Click OK and blink. This downloads your current profile and stores it as a file named profile.txt in your ~\Ameol2\Users directory. 4. Edit that profile.txt file in a normal text editor, add (or modify) the line mentioned above and save it. 5. Use File|Scripts... 6. Select "Put profile.txt" and click Add. 7. Click OK and blink. This uploads the modified profile. The next blink will allow you to download a scratchpad of the size you chose for "nnnnnnnn".
Q) All the threads to all messages
in one topic are now showing in an unusual way. The other topics and
conferences are fine. Why?
Q) How do I resize the columns in the message window,
globally?
Q) The mail/news threading in Ameol2 is sometimes a little
odd. What's up? For CIX or local topics, it uses the message number. Therefore misthreadings are almost impossible unless the original poster commented to the wrong message. **************************************************************************
**************************************************************
***************************************** For newsgroups, Ameol2 uses the References line to locate the original message. This line appears in the header (which can be viewed with View|Mail/Usenet Headers) and looks as follows: References: <512egs$3hi@news2.Belgium.EU.net> The portion between the < and > is the Message ID for the original message. Every usenet article has a unique message ID unless it is crossposted in which case there could well be the same message in multiple newsgroups with the same message ID. However in this case it will be the same, identical message. It is important to remember that message IDs are not guaranteed to be unique for different messages. There's a slim chance that two newsreaders anywhere in the world can generate the same message ID. The message ID for a message also appears in the header and looks like this: Message-ID: <01bb9eea$1ea227e0$1197c5c2@pcserge> The portion between the < and > is the message ID. When Ameol2 tries to thread a follow-up (as comments are known in the Usenet community), it scans from the end of the topic looking in the Message-ID field for a message whose ID matches that in the References field. If no References field is given, it attempts to thread by subject. In which case a message with the subject: Subject: Re: make$$$$ will be threaded to one whose subject is any of the following: Subject: make$$$$ If a Reference field is given but the original Message-ID is NOT found, Ameol2 will NOT attempt to thread by subject. For mail, the principle is the same except that it uses the In-Reply-To field instead of the References field. When a message is copied to another folder, Ameol2 attempts to rethread that message again using the procedure shown above. To speed things up when importing messages, it does NOT attempt to rethread until it has determined the destination folder for that message. Note that the Folder|Rethread Messages command uses these rules when attempting to rethread messages however it can't cope if the article to which an article is supposed to be rethreaded appears later in the database. This is because the database engine is forward threading only, so while rethread can tie a later message to a previous one, it can't tie a previous message to a later one. Also note that if you rethread the messages in the topic you are currently viewing, the display doesn't refresh to show the new threading. You have to go to another topic then back to the original one. |
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