What is NetForum?

NetForum is a program that adds a message forum to your web site. Unlike some other solutions out there, you don’t need CGI programming or run special server software. That’s cool, since few of us have our own web server. All we have is some web space provided by our Internet service providers, and they usually don’t let you run your own CGI stuffs.

NetForum relies on an Internet mailbox, a common commodity, for its operation. What happens is messages get sent to the mailbox first, then NetForum retrieves it later on and uploads it to your web site. It means the messages won’t appear as soon as they’re posted – a definite downside. On the other hand, it means your computer need to connect to the Internet only when NetForum is retrieving message and uploading files, instead of all the time – a definite upside.

Also, since your visitor will be composing the message with his or her E-mail program, rather than some crummy HTML form, it will look much better. Thanks to support of HTML by many E-mail programs, such as Netscape Communicator and Outlook Express, messages can include such niceties as embedded graphics, sound, and hyperlinks.

Employment of the Internet mailbox means messages can be sent from a mailing list. Funneling messages coming from an existing source goes a long way in terms of ensuring the success of your message forum. It also gives people a chance to preview the list.

NetForum does other nice things too, like letting other people add links to your list of sites to visit, and countering the votes for your online survey. All these, and not CGI!

Program Requirement

• PC running Windows 95 or NT 4.0 - NetForum is a Win95 program.
• Internet Access - This can be a LAN connection or dial-up networking connection. For the later, you can let NetForum dial up to the Internet as necessary or have it wait patiently for access to become available (when you dial up to engage in other businesses, like surfing the web).
• Internet E-mail account - The major advantage of NetForum over other message forum solution is the use of the E-mail for posting message, as oppose to HTML form. What it means is you don’t have to do any CGI programming. You do, obviously, need a place for people to send E-mail to.
  
  If you a spare E-mail account for NetForum’s exclusive use, that’s great. Do not fret though, if all you have is the one you use for your personal E-mail. NetForum is designed to work with personal E-mail account. It will intelligently pick out messages sent to the forum and leave your personal mail alone.
• Web Space Accessible Through FTP - Presumably you already have a web site, so this should be no problem. Remote sites (those hosted on the Internet service provider’s computer) are almost universally updated by uploading file to an FTP server, although the major online services may be using some different scheme.

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