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InfoTrac CPS Client
Application Instructions for System Administrators Unix Client Download and Installation Instructions This page is under construction; please write james.knight@galegroup.com if you have questions about Unix client installations. |
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| Overview | The InfoTrac EF client for Unix
is an application suite that runs on a library's Unix host and allows users access to the
InfoTrac databases using character-mode terminal devices (e.g., OPAC terminals or PCs
connected to the library's WAN via non-TCP/IP dialup connections). The programs represent
the client-side component of the application's client-server architecture; the EF client
communicates with The Gale Group (TGG) servers over the internet. Thus, the client's host
must be a node on the internet and able to communicate with TGG servers directly. If the
host resides behind a firewall, care must be taken that ports above 5000 be open for the
client to communicate with the servers. The program works with a variety of terminal types and emulators (see note 1 below). Most common OPAC terminal types are supported, including Wyse native and AddsVP emulation, and DEC VT. The InfoTrac EF client for Unix is available for Solaris, DEC/Unix, HP/UX, AIX, Unixware and Linux (RH5.2) platforms. The program sets are available as Unix compressed tape archives from our FTP server at The current builds for each platform are listed below. Detailed instructions for download, installation and configuration are also included. Support for the Unix implementation of the EF client is available at
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| Location code(s) | Before starting, it is useful to
identify the site's location code(s). This code is used to launch the application from the
user's shell or startup script. If more than one site is using the InfoTrac EF client, it
is likely more than one profile, and thus, location code will be used by as many separate
user accounts. To obtain the location code(s) needed to run the InfoTrac EF client, contact the installation support group, at 800 877 4253, or the technical support desk at 800 227 8431. If you are upgrading an earlier installation of the client, you may be able to identify these location codes by reading the startup scripts for accounts currently using the client. For example, in a startup script for user account 'itefuser' (e.g., .profile), look for the line similar to
where <locationID> is the location ID. |
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| The administrator shell account | The InfoTrac EF client programs
should be installed in their own directory. A separate shell access account for client
administration should be created, and the client installed in that account's home
directory. A typical Solaris installation is shown here:
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| Download and install the tape archive | The installation requires
approximately 8MB of disk storage. After logging onto the site's host using the TGG administration account, connect to TGG's FTP server and download the tape archive:
Step (e) above downloads and renames the file itef260b.tar.Z, using the common Unix tar.Z nomenclature, to the tggadmin home directory. Next, exit the ftp application, then uncompress and unreel the archive:
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| Install the client programs | Complete the installation by
running the ITinstall script. If you are upgrading an olderversion of the client software,
use the -o option.
Toward the end of the installation, the script will prompt for an installation ID and location ID. The installation ID can be any character string, but should uniquely identify the library or institution where the client program is running; e.g., 'libname'. If you are upgrading an earlier version of the client, use the default provided. Otherwise, enter a new ID. When prompted for a location ID, use the location ID recommended by the installation staff (see above). If you are upgrading an earlier version of the client, use the default provided. |
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| Using the InfoTrac EF program | The InfoTrac EF program
executable is 'itef', and is located in the .../release2 subdirectory of the TGG
administrator account used to install the client. If desired, a symbolic link to itef may be placed in a system directory to allow execution of the program by shell account users. However, normally it will be desirable to call itef from a shell script which passes the proper parameters. Right now the login files for the iac account are set up to allow the execution of InfoTrac client software using the iacenter alias. The quickest way to test the software is to login using the TGG administrator account and enter
at the shell prompt. The TGG administrator login is intended as a maintenance account, and should not be distributed to general users. Any user who executes InfoTrac needs the following variables set in their startup script(s):
One way of executing this program is from the .profile of a login created for the purpose. Sample .profile files are located in the .../samples/ subdirectory of .../release2. The file .../samples/dot.profile can easily be modified into a login shell for an InfoTrac user. Care should be taken that all environment variables, such as TERMINFO, are defined. The itef executable expects three parameters: userclass, keymap, and location. The command line looks like this: itef -u<userclass> -k<keymap> -e<location> <userclass> should be set to 'a'. Other values are supported (i.e., [a-f]), but are no longer used to distinguish class privileges. The keymap specifies the mapping between keyboard keys and InfoTrac functions. The iac account is set to use the 'genericu' keymap. The genericu keymap maps nearly all functions to printable characters, including "[" for page-up and "]" for page-down. By modifying the alias for 'iacenter' or manually entering the 'itef' command you can select other keymaps, such as 'wy60vt'. The 'wy60vt' keymap is designed for Wyse60 terminals that are emulating vt100s. The 'iucute' keymap is designed for DOS PCs using the Clarkson Telnet emulation software. Let us know if you need info on other keymap options. We can design a custom keymap for you as well. The location ID indicates to InfoTrac servers the location and library affiliation of the patron (see above). The acceptable location identifiers for your library will be provided by TGG installation staff. Printing support is implemented via TERMPRN values. The TERMPRN options are listed below. In the Unix versions of InfoTrac they are implemented as environment variables and should be included in a user's login shell.
The PRNDELAY and PRNLINES variables control the pacing of printed output. The client pauses every PRNLINES lines for PRNDELAY seconds. It also checks for printout cancellation at each pause point. By default, PRNDELAY is 0, resulting in no output pacing. PRNLINES defaults to 5, which causes a check for printout cancellation to occur after every five lines. However, due to the amount of buffering present in the typical Telnet connection, a significant number of lines will be printed after the cancellation is recognized. PRNLINES can have values between 1 and 10. PRNDELAY can have values between 0 and 5. If there is a problem with flow-control for a terminal, or if users are having difficulty canceling a print job, setting PRNDELAY to a non-zero integer will cause the output to be paced. Higher values of PRNDELAY will result in slower output. Also, lower values of PRNLINES will result in slower output. Both of these parameters may be varied to obtain the best performance. If PRNLINES is specified without specifying PRNDELAY, PRNDELAY defaults to 2. |
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| Holdings | Previous versions of the InfoTrac
EF client (i.e., before v2.5x) required that the library's holdings file be uploaded to
the .../release2/holdings subdirectory on the client's host (for more on creation and
maintenance of holdings see InfoTrac EF
Journal Holdings). Current versions of the EF client do not support locally hosted
holdings files. Instead, holdings files should be uploaded, using a web browser, to the
InfoTrac servers:
A password is required and can be obtained by contacting the support desk at 800 227 8431. |
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| Questions about the information in this document should be directed to james.knight@galegroup.com. | ||||||||||||||||