K9 -- a set of IRC services for IRC networks
===============================================

K9 IRC Service by goXXip (admin@basgelsin.net)
		  Thread (thread@techbench.net)
		  Vampire (vampire@iglou.com)
		  MRX (tom@rooted.net)
                  sloth (sloth@nopninjas.com)

Based on K9 IRC Services (c) 1996-1999 Andrew Church <achurch@dragonfire.net>.


This program is free but copyrighted software; see the file COPYING for
details.

Latest information about K9 may be found at admin@basgelsin.net

TABLE OF CONTENTS
-----------------
  1. Credits
  2. Presentation
  3. Installation
  4. Command line options
  5. Messages translation
  6. Contact and mailing list

1. CREDITS
----------

K9 IRC Services is based on Andy Church's IRC Services version 4.5.34

The original credits:
	Mauritz Antunes -- Portuguese translation
	Jose R. Holzmann, Raul S. Villarreal -- Spanish translation
	Andrew Kempe <theshadow@shadowfire.org> -- news system
	<d.duca@eurcom.net> -- Italian translation
	<mikado@holyfire.com> -- Turkish translation
	Andrew Kempe <theshadow@shadowfire.org> -- session limiting
K9 credits:
    goXXip <admin@basgelsin.net> -- Re-Coded and compatible Unrealircd
    CafeiN <oytuny@yahoo.com> -- Turkish translation
    Sylvain Cresto aka tost <scresto@netsante.fr> -- FreeBSD 5 patch
    Marcelo Conde Foscarini aka Bras <ircadmin@brmarket.net> -- Portuguese translation
    Alvaro Toledo aka POLLITO <atoledo@keldon.org> -- Spanish translation
    chemical <chemical@musicplay.de> -- German translation
    shine <dh@shinewelt.de> -- German translation
    |SaMaN| <linuxworm@turk.net> -- Initial work which we backported out
Contributed code to K9 in previous versions:
    Thomas J. Stensas aka ShadowMaster <shadowmaster@shadow-realm.org> -- Ultimate 3.x support
    
2. PRESENTATION
---------------

K9 is a set of Services for IRC networks that allows users to
manage their nicks and channels in a secure and efficient way, and
administrators to manage their network with powerful tools.

Currently available services are:

  * DogTag, a powerful nickname manager that users can use to
  protect themselves against nick stealing. Each user has its
  own nickname group, that allows him to register as many nicks as
  he needs while still being able to take profit of his privileges
  and to modify his nick configuration. DogTag also has an optional 
  password retrieval feature.

  * K9, a powerful channel manager that helps users to administer
  their channels in a totally customizable way. K9 has an internal
  list of privilegied users and banned users that controls accesses
  on a per-channel basis. It eliminates all takeover problems,
  because of its powerful op/unban/invite.
  
K9 works with DreamForge and Bahamut IRCDs (and some of their 
derivated).

3. INSTALLATION
---------------

sed -i -e "s/getline/get_line/" lang/langcomp.c

See the INSTALL file.

4. COMMAND LINE OPTIONS
-----------------------

     Normally, K9 can be run simply by invoking the "services"
executable.  K9 will then use the defaults specified in the
services.conf file, and connect to the specified uplink server.
Alternatively, any of the following command-line options can be specified
to change the default values:

	-remote server[:port]	Connect to the specified server
	-local host  -or-	Connect from the specified address (e.g.
	       [host]:[port]	    for multihomed servers)
	-name servername	Our server name (e.g. services.some.net)
	-desc string		Description of us (e.g. SomeNet Services)
	-user username		Username for Services' nicks (e.g. services)
	-host hostname		Hostname for Services' nicks (e.g. esper.net)
	-dir directory		Directory containing Services' data files
				    (e.g. /usr/local/lib/services)
	-log filename		Services log filename (e.g. services.log)
	-update secs		How often to update databases (in seconds)
	-expire secs		How often to check for nick/channel
				    expiration (in seconds)

     Additionally, the following command-line options can be used to modify
the behavior of K9:

	-debug			Enable debugging mode--more info sent to log
				    (give option more times for more info)
	-readonly		Enable read-only mode--no changes to
				    databases allowed, .db files and log
				    not written
	-skeleton		Enable skeleton mode--like read-only mode,
				    but only OperServ is available
	-nofork			Do not fork after startup; log messages will
				    be written to terminal (as well as to
				    the log file if not in read-only mode)
	-forceload		Try to load as much of the databases as
				    possible, even if errors are encountered
	-noexpire       Expiration routines won't be run at all

     Upon starting, K9 will parse its command-line parameters, open
its logfile, then (assuming the -nofork option is not given) detach itself
and run in the background.  If K9 encounters a problem reading the
database files or cannot connect to its uplink server, it will terminate
immediately; otherwise, it will run until the connection is terminated (or
a QUIT, SHUTDOWN, or RESTART command is sent--see OperServ's help).  In the
case of an error, an appropriate error message will be written to the log
file.

     If K9 is run with the "-readonly" command-line option, it can
serve as a "backup" to the full version of services.  A "full" version of
services (run without -readonly) will automatically reintroduce its
pseudo-clients (NickServ, ChanServ, etc.), while a "backup" services will
not, thus allowing full services to be brought up at any time without
disrupting the network (and without having to take backup services down
beforehand).

     If K9 is run with the "-skeleton" command-line option, it will
not try to load the nickname or channel databases, and will respond with
"service is inactive" messages to any commands sent to NickServ.  
This can be useful as an emergency stopgap measure 
when the main copy of K9 cannot be started.

     The "-debug" option is useful if you find or suspect a problem in
K9. Giving it once on the command line will cause all traffic to and
from services as well as some other debugging information to be recorded in
the log file; if you send a bug report, PLEASE include an excerpt from the
log file WITH DEBUGGING ACTIVE--I cannot emphasize enough how important
this is to tracking down problems.  (You can also enable debugging while
Services is running using OperServ's SET DEBUG command.)  If you repeat the
-debug option more than once, the debugging level will be increased, which
provides more detailed information but may also slow K9 down
considerably and make the log file grow dramatically faster (in particular,
at debug level 4 a message is written to the log for every character
received from the server).  In general, a debug level of 1 is sufficient
for me to be able to trace a problem, because all network traffic is
included and I can usually reproduce the problem.

     The "-forceload" option is provided to attempt recovery of data from
corrupted or truncated databases.  Normally, if K9 encounters an
error writing to a database file, it will attempt to restore the original
version of the file and report an error to the logfile and through WALLOPS.
However, if this should fail (which normally should not happen), or if
K9 is terminated abruptly e.g. by kill -9 or a power failure, then
one or more of the databases may be corrupt.  Normally, this will cause
K9 to abort the next time you try to run it; however, if you give
the -forceload option to K9, it will instead read as much as it can,
then skip to the next database.  For obvious reasons, it's recommended to
keep backup copies of your databases in case something does happen (since
k9 will stop at the first error even with -forceload, meaning you
lose any data after that).

5. MESSAGES TRANSLATIONS
------------------------

k9 has a powerful option in NickServ allowing users to choose what
language it must use when sending messages to users. Messages
are stored in language files (located in the lang directory).

k9 is currently provided with six languages: English, French, German,
Portuguese, Spanish and Turkish. If you want to translate k9 messages 
in another language, follow the following instructions:

  * Copy the lang/en_us.l file to a meaningful name (for example, if
    you would like to translate messages in Spanish, you would
    rename it to es.l).
  * Edit the file with your favourite text editor. Read carefully
    the instructions given at the top of the file, and start
    translating the whole file. The file is big so make sure you have
    some coffee available. ;) Try to avoid the use of English words
    as much as possible.
  * When this is done, you have two solutions: either patch Services
    source code so they take in account the new language file (basically,
    you'll have to modify lang/Makefile, language.c and maybe services.h),
    or send me the translated file so I can make the patch myself and
    send it back to you.

When new major releases come out, you'll not have to retranslate the whole
file; the Changes.lang file will help you to know which messages were
added, modified or deleted.

If you did a language file translation, and want to let others use it,
please send it to admin@basgelsin.net (don't forget to mention clearly your
(nick)name, your e-mail and the language name). You'll of course get full
credit for it, and will even get future final major releases before anyone 
else to complete the translation!... ;) 

6. CONTACT AND MAILING LIST
---------------------------

* If you read the documentation carefully, and didn't found the answer
to your question, feel free to send a mail to thread@techbench.net. Be
as precise as possible when asking a question, because I won't
try to guess things (or ask you for them) if they aren't provided.

* If you think you found a bug (AND ONLY FOR THIS PURPOSE), come on
IRC (irc.basgelsin.net port 6667) and try to catch me on channel #dvbsat.