A locally customized version of the
WWWBoard
message board system is available and can be used in conjunction
with the CS CGI server. In order to use this system, you must first
set up your account for CGI script usage.
Note that you may want to do this under a class account if this is
for a particular CS class you are teaching.
Once you have this set up, you can create your WWWBoard system by
simply running "makewwwboard". This is a frontend script
that will ask you several questions and set things up based on
your responses.
Once the board is created, you will accesss it using a URL of
the form:
http://www.cs.indiana.edu/cgi-pub/USER/NAME/wwwboard/index.cgi
where USER is the username of the account under which the board
was created and NAME was the directory name you entered when running
makewwwboard. There is also a corresponding administrator url
of the form:
https://www.cs.indiana.edu/cgi-pub/USER/NAME/wwwadmin/wwwadmin.cgi
You can use this url to remove messages from the message board.
The exact URLs particular to your message board are displayed when you run makewwwboard.
If you selected the secure https access method during the setup
of the message board, the above message board URL will use https instead
of http. The administration URL will always use https since it
relies on authentication to restrict access to the administrative functions.
This system consists of the following components in the
selected directory:
- wwwboard - Contains the cgi scripts and html files used
to display and post messages.
- wwwadmin - Contains the cgi scripts and html files used
for list administration.
- messages - Contains the posted messages and associated data files.
- base.css - A stylesheet that controls the appearance of web pages.
- home - Contains the files associated with the optional homepage
feature. This feature lets you include the message board as part of
a larger cgi-based homepage setup. You have the option to include this
feature when you run makewwwboard.
Once you have things set up, there is additional customization you
can do:
- If you selected 'https' secure list access, you can edit the
.htaccess file in the top level message board directory. Initially,
this file is either configured to allow access to any IU user or to
only allow access to the creator of the list, depending on the
options you chose when running makewwwboard. If you chose not
to give access to all IU users, you will need to add users to the
"require user" line. Please see the
corresponding FAQ entry
for more information.
- Initially, only the creator of the message board will have administrator
access. You can add additional administrators by modifying wwwadmin/.htaccess.
- There is a stylesheet that can be customized to alter the
appearance of the web pages. This file is named base.css.
- There are various configuration options in wwwboard/wwwboard.cgi that you
can change. Search for "Configure Options" in this script for more
information.
- If you elected to use the homepage feature when you created the
message board, the correspoding homepage will need to be customized by
editing home/index.html.
When you run makewwwboard, you have the option of using http
or https. If you choose http and do not set up any type of
authentication,
the message board will be wide open and can be read
or posted to by anyone in the world. To restrict access to the
message board, you can select the secure https method of access
which will result in the creation of .htaccess files that
restrict access via network ID
by default.
However, you can use the message board
in conjunction with
any of the standard web-based access
control mechanisms
(by hostname/domain,
with a password, and
via network ID). Simply create
the appropriate
.htaccess files in the top-level message board directory.
Finally, you may want to check out the FAQ entry explaining
how to set up an RSS feed for your
message board.
We wish to thank Kent Dybvig and Oscar Waddell for their
invaluable help in improving and customizing the original
WWWBoard system.
