PMDF System Manager's Guide


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38.6.4 Informing Lotus Notes about PMDF

You must perform the following configuration tasks on the Lotus Notes side.

  1. On the Lotus Notes server system you must create a directory or two for the PMDF Notes Gateway Server Add-ins' use; see Section 38.6.4.1.
  2. Copy the appropriate PMDF Notes Gateway Server Add-in executable images from the PMDF distribution to the Lotus Notes program directory on the PC server system; see Section 38.6.4.2.
  3. Configure the options for the PMDF Notes Gateway Server Add-ins in the Lotus Notes server initialization file; see Section 38.6.4.3.
  4. Start the PMDF Notes Gateway service; see Section 38.6.4.4.
  5. Add a foreign domain record for PMDF to the Lotus Note's server's Public Name & Address Book; see Section 38.6.4.5.

The sub-sections below provide step-by-step instructions on performing these tasks to inform Lotus Notes about PMDF.

38.6.4.1 Create a Directory on the Lotus Notes Server System

On the Lotus Notes server system you must create a scratch directory for the PMDF Notes Gateway Server Add-ins' use. Although the Add-ins use a TCP/IP protocol to communicate with PMDF, the Notes API expects to pass messages, and especially attachments, to Server Add-in programs as files. Thus the PMDF Notes Gateway Server Add-ins need a scratch area for these temporary files. The PMDF Notes Gateway Server Add-ins have to be given a directory name through which messages and attachments will be staged as they are imported into Notes, and which will be used to stage messages and attachments as they are exported from Notes.

The directory for temporary files needs to be created. A typical name would be


c:\pngate\intemp\
as the scratch directory for messages and attachments being imported into Notes, and for messages and attachments being exported from Notes. In such an example, the site must create the directory c:\pngate\intemp.

The PMDF Notes Gateway Server Add-ins must be told of the name chosen; see Section 38.6.4.3 for how to configure the PMDF Notes Gateway Server Add-ins.

38.6.4.2 Copy the Add-in Iimage to the Lotus Notes Server System

Copy the appropriate version of the PMDF Notes Gateway Server Add-in images, pngatecin.exe and pngatecout.exe, to the Lotus Notes program directory on the PC server system.

For an NT (Intel hardware) based Lotus Notes server, copy the pngatecin.exe and pngatecout.exe images from either the pmdf_root:[other.nt-intel.notes] (OpenVMS), /pmdf/other/nt-intel/notes/ (UNIX), or the C:\pmdf\other\nt-intel\notes\ (NT) directory on the PMDF system, or directly from the [other.nt-intel.notes] (OpenVMS), the /other/nt-intel/notes (UNIX), or the \other\nt-intel\notes (NT) directory on the PMDF distribution CD-ROM (an ISO 9660 with Rockridge extensions CD-ROM directly readable from many platforms including most PC operating systems) to the Lotus Notes program directory on the PC server system.

For an OS/2 based Lotus Notes server, copy the pngatecin.exe and pngatecout.exe images from either the pmdf_root:[other.os2.notes] (OpenVMS), the /pmdf/other/os2/notes (UNIX), or the C:\pmdf\other\os2\notes\ (NT) directory on the PMDF system, or directly from the [other.os2.notes] (OpenVMS), the /other/os2/notes (UNIX), or the \other\os2\notes (OS/2) directory on the PMDF distribution CD-ROM (an ISO 9660 with Rockridge extensions CD-ROM directly readable from many platforms including most PC operating systems) to the Lotus Notes program directory on the PC server system.

38.6.4.3 Configure Server Add-in Options in the Lotus Notes Server Initialization File

Now configure the options for the PMDF Notes Gateway Server Add-in. Edit the Lotus Notes server initialization file, notes.ini, setting options for the PNGATECIN and PNGATECOUT tasks. On an OS/2 based Lotus Notes server, this initialization file is normally located in the Lotus Notes data directory; on an NT based Lotus Notes server, this file can be located in the Lotus Notes data directory but normally is instead located in the Windows NT installation directory, generally \winnt. To the notes.ini, file, add the lines:


PNGateDomain=PMDF-domain
PNGateInTemp=intempdir
PNGateHost=PMDF-host-name
PNGateInPort=master-port
PNGateOutPort=slave-port
PNGateInterval=polling-delay
MailTimeout=export-time-limit
PNGateCharSet=l_cp850.cls 
where PMDF-domain is the name used from the Lotus Notes side to address messages to PMDF, typically just PMDF, where intempdir is the name of the scratch directory used for temporary message and attachment files being imported into and out of Notes, as described in Section 38.6.4.1 above, where PMDF-host-name is the TCP/IP name of the PMDF system, where master-port is the port on which the Dispatcher listens to run the master direction of the channel (the PMDF to Notes direction), where slave-port is the port on which the Dispatcher listens to run the slave direction of the channel (the Notes to PMDF direction), where polling-delay is the frequency in minutes with which the Lotus Notes server should run the Add-ins, and where export-time-limit is the time limit in hours after which to bounce messages that could not be exported from Lotus Notes during that time. The PNGateCharSet option specifies the name of a Lotus Notes server .cls file, which controls what character set the Lotus Notes server will accept from the Lotus Notes Server Add-in. The usual recommended value is


PNGateCharSet=l_cp850.cls 
as shown, as this causes the Lotus Notes server to accept messages using IBM code page 850 (the IBM850 character set), which matches the character set it normally emits. More generally, you should set this option to match the character set your Lotus Notes server actually emits on the messages it sends. Note that it is particularly important to set this option on NT based Lotus Notes servers, which by default can use different character sets for incoming and outgoing messages.

For instance, a site where PMDF is running on a machine with the TCP/IP name of mailhub.example.com, and that created a \pngate directory on the C: drive might use:


PNGateDomain=PMDF 
PNGateInTemp=c:\pngate\tmp\
PNGateHost=mailhub.example.com 
PNGateInPort=9972 
PNGateOutPort=9971 
PNGateInterval=2 
MailTimeout=72 
PNGateCharSet=l_cp850.cls 

When selecting an appropriate MailTimeout value, consider how long it would be reasonable to expect that the PMDF system might be unavailable for TCP/IP connections. The sample value shown, 72, would cover the case of a network outage extending for a three day weekend.

In addition to the above mandatory options, you can also want to set additional options; Section 38.6.4.3.1, Section 38.6.4.3.2, and Section 38.6.4.3.3 discuss additional options.

38.6.4.3.1 "Tunnelling" Complete Notes Documents

Lotus Notes documents can contain formatting information, graphics, etc., usable only by another Lotus Notes user. The PMDF Notes Gateway Add-in always extracts a plain text version of a Notes document from Lotus Notes. Optionally, the PMDF Notes Gateway Add-in can also extract the complete Lotus Notes document, in case the message recipient will be another Lotus Notes user. In the latter case, the Lotus Notes channel will generate a MIME multipart/alternative part containing both a text version of the Notes document and the complete Notes document. If the recipient of the message receives it through another PMDF Notes Gateway, then the full Notes document version will be used. Other recipients can instead read the text/plain version. To enable this feature, to the notes.ini file add the line


PNGateAlternate=1 
To extract just a text/plain version of Notes documents, either remove this line or change it to read


PNGateAlternate=0 

Note that if desired, the PMDF conversion channel can be used to remove the "tunnelled" complete version of the Notes document from messages destined for recipients known not to use Lotus Notes. (Note that mail user agents that support the MIME multipart/alternative format should not insist on displaying the Notes part to non-Notes recipients in any case, but removing the "tunnelled" Notes parts can still be useful to cut down on message bandwidth.) A DELETE=1 conversion file entry can be used to delete the tunnelled parts themselves, and in addition, the Level CHARSET-CONVERSION keyword tells PMDF to remove the (redundant, once the "tunnelled" original Notes part has been deleted) multipart/alternative structure from around the remaining text part.

For instance, a site that already has a conversion channel set up and that wants to remove the "tunnelled" complete Notes documents from messages going to their L (local) channel, might use CHARSET-CONVERSION and CONVERSIONS mapping table such as


CONVERSIONS 
 
  IN-CHAN=ln_*;OUT-CHAN=l;CONVERT          Yes 
 
CHARSET-CONVERSION 
 
  IN-CHAN=conversion;OUT-CHAN=l;CONVERT    Level 
 
with a conversion file entry of


in-chan=ln_*; out-chan=l; 
  in-type=application; in-subtype=x-pmdf-notes-doc; 
  delete=1 
See Chapter 28 and Chapter 5 for details about the conversion channel and the CONVERSIONS mapping table.

38.6.4.3.2 Debug Output

You can need from time to time to ask the PMDF Notes Server Add-in to produce debugging information. To turn on such debugging, add to the notes.ini file the line


PNGateDebug=level
where level is an integer between 0 and 9. 0 means no debugging; 1 through 9 stand for increasing levels of verbosity. Messages are written to the Lotus Notes log and console.

Note that the line


PNGateDebug 
with no level specified defaults to moderate debugging; to turn off debugging completely, remove the line from the file or set the debugging level to 0.

38.6.4.3.3 Additional Server Add-in Options

Specifying


PNGateFixedFont=1 
in the Notes server initialization file causes mail arriving from PMDF to be formatted using a fixed pitch font instead of the normal font.

By default, if PNGateStrictTimer=0 is set in the Notes server initialization file or if the option is not set at all, Lotus Notes will immediately send each outbound message to PMDF. Specifying


PNGateStrictTimer=1 
instead causes the PNGateInterval to be used to control the sending of messages from Lotus Notes to PMDF.

Specifying


PNGateLineLen=x
in the Notes server initialization file causes lines in text parts coming from Lotus Notes to be wrapped at x columns. By default, if this option is not specified, such lines will be wrapped at 80 columns.

38.6.4.4 Starting the PMDF Notes Gateway Service

If you want the PMDF Notes Gateway service to start automatically when the Lotus Notes server is started, then add PNGATECIN and PNGATECOUT to the list of server tasks. That is, edit the notes.ini file further and add ,PNGATECIN,PNGATECOUT to the ServerTasks line, i.e.,


ServerTasks=...,PNGATECIN,PNGATECOUT 
Then PNGATECIN and PNGATECOUT will be started up the next time Lotus Notes server software is restarted. (You can want to restart the Lotus Notes server software now.)

For testing, or if you cannot restart the Lotus Notes server now, you can manually start the PMDF Notes Gateway service using the LOAD PNGATECIN and LOAD PNGATECOUT commands from the Lotus Notes server console. (This will start PNGATECIN and PNGATECOUT even if they haven't been added to the ServerTasks line.)

If you want to halt just the PNGATECIN task, you can use the TELL PNGATECIN QUIT command; similarly, TELL PNGATECOUT QUIT halts the PNGATECOUT task. If Lotus Notes does not respond to such a command, repeat it several times. An Add-in can only respond to such a command when it is idle. You can find the you have to prefix the image name with the dollar character on OS/2 or N character on NT Intel, e.g., TELL $PNGATECIN QUIT on OS/2, or TELL NPNGATECIN QUIT on NT Intel.

To check if the PNGATECIN and PNGATECOUT tasks are running, issue the command SHOW TASKS from the Lotus Notes server console.

For an overview of installing and managing server add-in tasks, see Chapter 4 and Chapter 5 of the Lotus Notes API 3.4 User Guide.

38.6.4.5 Add a Foreign Domain Record to the Lotus Notes Address Book

With a Lotus Notes client, use the Create/Server/Domain form (Lotus Notes V4.x) to add a foreign domain record to the Lotus Notes server's Public Name & Address Book. Set the fields as follows. With Lotus Notes V4.x:


Domain type: Foreign Domain 
Foreign domain name: PMDF-domain
Gateway server name: Notes-server-name
Gateway mail file name: pngate.nsf 
where PMDF-domain is the Lotus Notes side's name for PMDF, as specified by the PNGateDomain Notes initialization file option described in Section 38.6.4.3, and where Notes-server-name is the Lotus Notes server's name for itself.

Normally this is done by the Server Administrator, (or by anyone else who has appropriate access to be able to modify the server's Public Name & Address Book). To check if the new domain has been successfully entered, while still in the public name and address book, go to the navigation pane and expand "Folders and Views", then expand "Server", and then expand "Domain". PMDF-domain should show up as one of the entries in the view pane.


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