Installing News2U

Follow these steps to install and configure News2U:
  1. copy the "news2u" directory in the desired HTML path on your server. 
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  2. copy "news" directory with scripts into your cgi directory. 
  3. Set these variables in news_prefs.pm: 

  4.  
    • $password - Select a password for the administrator (case-sensitive).
    • $mailer - Select the mailer program you want to use. Valid options include sendmail (Unix), Mail (Unix), Blat (NT), or Gbmail (NT). After selecting the mailer, define mailer-specific variables.

    • $archives - Specify minimum number of  days until a story is archived.

    • $expires - Specify minimum nunber of days until a story is deleted.

    • $home - Specify the web address to the news2u directory.

    •  
    • $homedir - Specify the file path to the news2u directory. For NT, use double slashes within the file path.For Unix, use a single forward slash(/) within the filepath.

    • $datafields - indicate the number of active datafields and give them labels using numbered $fieldname variable.

  5. In the other scripts, ensure that the location to PERL specified in the first line of each script is correct.

  6. Modify links in the index.html, search.html, and _admin.html files to reflect the location of the scripts on your system. 

Customizing HTML templates

Any HTML file located in the templates directory can be used. Templates are HTML files that are inserted into the results screen for each matching entry. To insert information from your template file, use the following tags:
     
  • !FIELD1! - Prints to contents of data column 1.
  • !FIELD2! - Prints to contents of data column 2.
  • !FIELD3! - Prints to contents of data column 3.
  • !FIELD4! - Prints to contents of data column 4.
  • !FIELD5! - Prints to contents of data column 5.
  • etc.

Sending e-mail for new submissions

News2U will automatically notify individuals by email when a new story is submitted. However, it requires that you have a supported mail program:

  • For NT, you must have BLAT.EXE installed.
  • For Unix, you must have the 'Mail' command active.

To have news2u automatically notify an editor or site administrator when a new article is submitted, you must configure the following:

In news_prefs.pl:

  • Define $mailer as either "BLAT" (for NT) or "MAIL" (for Unix).

  • Specify the location of your mailer. Define $blat (for NT) or $mail (for Unix).

  • Define $administrator. Specify the email address(s) to receive a message when articles are submitted. You must include a forward slash(\) before the "@" sign.

In submitter.html:

  • Remove the hidden variable names "notify" or set its value to "yes".