Flamez IRC Services -- a system of IRC services for IRC networks
---------------------------------------------------------

There is absolutely NO WARRANTY provided with this program; 
if it blows up in your face, you get to clean up the mess.  
Services may be freely redistributed; see the GNU 
General Public License (in the file "COPYING") for details.


TABLE OF CONTENTS
      1. Credits
      2. Introduction
      3. Configuration, Compilation and Installation
      4. Operation
      5. Overview of Services Clients
      6. IRC Protocol Additions
      7. Importing Databases From Other Programs
      8. Reaching The Maintainer
      9. Internal Security

The latest version of Services can be obtained from the places below.
The Services web site at:
        http://www.flamez.net/

1. CREDITS

     Flamez-IRCServices developed by and copyright (c) 2001-2002

     We would like to thank all the users who have stuck
by us and continue to help us with improving these
services. Many thanks to all who have helped make
another services release a possibility. Please visit
us on http://www.flamez.net and report any bugs or new
ideas to support@flamez.net
	
     Author: jabea - jabea@insiderz.net

     Project Leader: gcc - gcc@insiderz.net

     NOTE: These services are a modification of ircservices
by A. Church. Special thanks go to him for his inspiration
to open source his services. (http://www.ircservices.za.net/)


2. INTRODUCTION

     IRC Services is a system of services (as the name implies) to be used
with Internet Relay Chat networks.  Services provides for definitive
nickname and channel ownership, as well as the ability to send messages
("memos") to offline users, and gives IRC operators considerably more
control over the network, enabling them to change modes in any channel and
place network-wide bans, among other things.

     Services runs as a server on an IRC network, and is designed to use
the RFC 1459 IRC protocol, with some optional additions discussed at the
end of this document.

     Services was originally designed for use with versions of the DALnet
IRC server implementation (ircd.dal) through 4.4.13.  Currently, Services
interoperates with the following IRC servers:
          ircd-2.8.x (or any RFC1459-compliant server)
          ircd-2.8.x+TS8
          ircu 2.9.x
          ircd.dal 4.4.x
          ircd.dal 4.6.x (Dreamforge)
          Bahamut 1.4.23 and later
          Unreal 3.1.1 (DEVELOPMENT, UNSTABLE)

Services has also been reported to work with UltimateIRCD 2.8.1, using IRC
server type 22 (Dreamforge) in the configure script, and with Chunky Monkey
IRCD 0.9 or later, using IRC server type 23 (Bahamut).

The following servers have been reported NOT to work with Services:
          NewNet
          ircd-hybrid
          ircd 2.x with "+CS" extension
          TS4
          ircd 2.9.x
          ircd 2.10.x

Services also does not support the IRC protocol extensions defined in RFCs
2811-2813.

     If you have one of these servers or you cannot get Services to work
with your server, please switch to one of the supported servers listed
above.


3. CONFIGURATION, COMPILATION AND INSTALLATION

     In order to compile Services, you'll need the Bourne shell or a
compatible shell (such as GNU bash), GNU make or a compatible make (which
needs to support the "include" and "ifdef" directives), and an ANSI C
compiler (gcc 2.x recommended; also see (*) below).  If you want to modify
the language files, you will also need the Perl interpreter in your path.
All GNU utilities can be found at ftp://prep.ai.mit.edu/pub/gnu/.
NOTE: The "make" distributed with FreeBSD is known not to work with
Services; use GNU make instead, usually installed as "gmake".

(*) Services is coded (loosely) around the ANSI standard, and will not
    compile under K&R compilers.  However, Services does not attempt
    complete ANSI conformance, and may fail to compile or run correctly
    using some compilers that claim to be ANSI-compatible.  In particular,
    gcc 3.0 reportedly plays games with structure member ordering (this
    actually appears to violate ANSI) and should be avoided for the time
    being.

     Before trying to compile Services, there are some manual configuration
tasks that need to be done: run the "configure" script, (optionally) edit
config.h, and (optionally) edit the top section of the Makefile.

     The "configure" script will try to learn how things work on your
system, and set up appropriate Makefile and C source definitions.  It will
also ask you a few questions about how you want Services set up.  (It will
ask all of the questions before doing any of the automated tests.)  If you
get an error while running the script, get bash (if you don't already have
it) and run "bash configure".  IMPORTANT NOTE:  Make sure you select the
correct IRC server style!  If Services compiles correctly but you only get
messages like "Internal error - unable to process request" or "ERROR Wrong
protocol", the most likely cause is that you chose the wrong IRC server
style.

     Note that when asked for the binary and data file installation
directories, you need to choose directories other than the Services source
directory (if you try to install to the Services source directory, the
configure script will display an error message).  If you are installing
Services as a normal user (as opposed to root) and do not have write access
to the default /usr/local/sbin and /usr/local/lib directories, I would
suggest using "bin" and "lib" directories under your home directory, or
creating a separate Services directory and installing the files there.
You may choose the same directory for both settings if you so desire.

     If you are compiling Services for use on a different system, or in
another situation where you cannot or do not want to create the directories
given for the install script, run the configure script with the
"-no-dir-check" option.  This will omit the check for existence of the
specified directories.

     config.h contains a few basic Services settings; in most cases you
should not need to change these.  Most settings will be configured via the
"services.conf" file (discussed below).

     The Makefile has a section at the top allowing you to configure
certain compile-time options.  You can also add additional C compiler flags
here, such as warning or optimization flags (this can also be done in the
configure script using the -cflags command-line option).

     Once these steps are done, you should be able to compile Services with
little trouble.  If Services fails to compile on your system, or if you
have to tweak configure's output to get it to work, please send a bug
report so that the problem can be fixed for future releases.

     Once Services is compiled, type "make install" to copy the program and
data files to their destinations.  Care should be taken that only
authorized people have access to the data files; by default (changeable
via the configure script), passwords are NOT encrypted, so unauthorized
access to the files would be a big problem!

     Finally, if you are using Services for the first time or upgrading
from a version prior to 4.1.0, you will need to create the Services
configuration file.  An example configuration file is provided in the file
"example.conf", which will be installed in the Services data directory.
Edit this file to your liking (note that you will need to fill in values
for at least some directives--pay particular attention to ServicesRoot),
then rename the file to "services.conf".

     If you are upgrading from an earlier version of Services, check the
WhatsNew file for a list of options which have been added.  Descriptions of
the options can be found in the example.conf file.


4. OPERATION

     This section does not detail the operation of the individual pieces of
Services; that information can be found in the online help files
("/msg *Serv help").  It only describes how to start Services itself.

     Normally, Services can be run simply by invoking the "services"
executable.  Services 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 override 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)
        -numeric numeric        (Unreal) Server numeric, 1-254 or 0 for none
        -user username          Username for Services' nicks (e.g. services)
        -host hostname          Hostname for Services' nicks (e.g. some.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 Services:

        -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               Prevents all expirations (nicknames, channels,
                                    akills, session limit exceptions, etc.)
        -noakill                Disables autokill checking

     The above list of options can be obtained using the "-help" option
(which may be abbreviated to "-h").

     Upon starting, Services 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 Services 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.  Services may also be restarted from outside IRC by sending it the
SIGHUP signal.

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

     The "-debug" option is useful if you find or suspect a problem in
Services. 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 Services 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
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 Services 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
Services 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
Services to abort the next time you try to run it; however, if you give
the -forceload option to Services, 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
Services will stop at the first error even with -forceload, meaning you
lose any data after that).

     Two additional programs are available in addition to the main
executable: "listnicks" and "listchans", both installed as hard links to
the main executable.  The programs will list all registered nicknames and
channels, respectively; or, if given the -c option, will display the
number of registered nicknames or channels.


5. OVERVIEW OF SERVICES CLIENTS

     This is a brief introduction to the various clients available from
Services.  All *Serv clients can be /msg'd with "help" for a general
introduction or "help <command>" for more detailed command descriptions.

     NickServ is the nickname server; it allows users to register and
control nicknames, and will (at the user's choice) /kill any unauthorized
user who tries to use that nick after a warning.  NickServ also allows
users to select a language which Services will then use for all
communication with the user (command responses as well as automatic
notices).

     ChanServ is the channel server; as NickServ does with nicknames, it
allows users to register and control channels.  There is a much wider array
of controls available via ChanServ than NickServ, since there are
considerably more features available for channels than for nicknames.
These include automatic mode setting, topic retention (active by default,
this will cause the channel's topic to be saved while the channel is empty
and restored when a user joins it again), and automatic opping, voicing, or
kicking of selected users, among others.

     MemoServ allows users to send short messages to other users, which can
be stored and retrieved at the recipient's convenience.  Memos can also be
sent to channels; any user with the proper access to a channel can read
such memos.

     HelpServ allows users to request information about Services and/or the
network on which it is being used.  HelpServ will, on request, send a help
text to a user.  The actual help texts used by HelpServ are stored in the
"helpfiles" subdirectory of the Services data directory; HelpServ
lowercases its arguments, joins them with slashes, and attempts to read the
filename given by the resulting string.  For example, the command
"/msg HelpServ server Dragonfire" causes HelpServ to look for the file
helpfiles/server/dragonfire in the data directory.  If a given help file is
a directory (for example, "/msg HelpServ server" where helpfiles/server is
a directory), HelpServ will look for a file named "index" in that directory
and send it in response to the help request if it exists.  (Note that the
other pseudo-clients have their own help systems independent of HelpServ,
and the help texts for those clients are stored in the "lang" subdirectory
of the Services distribution.)

     IrcIIHelp is HelpServ under another name, and allows ircII users to
simply type "/help <topic>" to get help on the ircII client.  The files can
also be accessed with "/msg HelpServ ircii <topic>".

     OperServ provides services to IRC operators, including the ability to
send a network-wide message from a Services pseudo-client and obtain
statistics on Services and the network.  A set of IRC operators can be
defined as "Services operators" using the OPER command; these users will
have access to more functions, including the ability to change the mode of
any channel, kick any user from a channel, and add and remove network-wide
bans ("autokills" or AKILLs, similar to classic K:lines but applying to all
servers on the network).  A more privileged group of operators can be
defined as "Services administrators" via the ADMIN command, and can perform
additional functions, such as manually updating Services' databases or
shutting Services down, as well as set options for any nickname and channel
without needing to identify for that nick or channel.  The only person who
can use the ADMIN ADD and ADMIN DEL commands is the Services super-user
(Services root), whose nick should be inserted in the ServicesRoot
directive in services.conf, although any Services admin can obtain Services
super-user privileges with the SU command.  (Note that Services will not
recognize a user as a Services operator or admin unless that user has
identified with NickServ, and users will not be permitted to use any
OperServ functions unless they are IRC operators.)  Obviously, all these
functions should be used with care.

     StatServ (available only if selected in the configure script) keeps
detailed statistics on the network.  At present, StatServ tracks the time
of last connection, last SQUIT message, and number of users and operators
on each server; more features are planned for the future.

     DevNull is just like its Unix equivalent /dev/null: it ignores
anything sent to it.  It can be removed, by commenting out DevNullName in
services.conf, without affecting the rest of Services in any way.

     Global is the global noticer: when Services is instructed to send a
notice to all clients on the network, this nickname sends the message.
This nick is also used when sending "news" messages (see the OperServ NEWS
command help for more information).  You may want to change this to a more
meaningful name for your network; for example, on the EsperNet network, the
nick "EsperNet" is used for this pseudoclient.


6. IRC PROTOCOL ADDITIONS

     [ This section is heavily out of date.  --AC 2001/01/25 ]

     The following commands, not defined in RFC 1459, are used by Services
if available on the selected server type:

AKILL

    Syntax: AKILL <hostmask> <usermask> :<reason>

    This syntax is used by version 4.x.x of DALnet's ircd. See below for
    the syntax used by Bahamut.

    Adds an AutoKill to the network; this is like a K:line, but is
    propogated to all servers.  Any user matching the usermask and
    hostmask will not be allowed to connect.

    Example:  :services.esper.net AKILL *.lame.com lamer :Flooding
        Disallows any client matching "lamer@*.lame.com" from connecting
        to the network.


    Bahamut Syntax: AKILL <hostmask> <usermask> <expiry> <who> <time> :<reason>

    This AutoKill works in the same way as the original one except that it
    has a few more parameters. They are, in the above order: hostmask,
    usermask, seconds until expiry, nick of person who added the akill,
    time of addition and finally the reason for the AutoKill.

    Example:  :services.esper.net AKILL *.lame.com lamer 3600 IRCop 945085429
                        :Flooding
        Works in the same way as the first example, but has the following:
                - will expire in 1 hour
                - was added by IRCop
                - was added on Mon Dec 13 11:43:49 1999 UTC

RAKILL

    Syntax: RAKILL <hostmask> <usermask>

    Removes an AutoKill line from all servers.

    Example:  :services.esper.net RAKILL *.lame.com lamer
        Removes the AutoKill described in the previous example.

GLINE

    Syntax: GLINE * +<expire> <mask>

    Similar to AKILL, defines a network-wide ban.  <expire> is given in
    seconds from the current time, so, for example, 3600 means "1 hour
    from now".

    Example:  :services.esper.net GLINE * +604800 lamer@*.lame.com
        Disallows any client matching "lamer@*.lame.com" from connecting
        to the network for the next 604800 seconds (1 week).


GLOBOPS

    Syntax: GLOBOPS <message>

    Sends a message to all users with user mode +og.

    Example:  :Alcan GLOBOPS :Watch out for flooders from *.lame.com.

GOPER

    Syntax: GOPER <message>

    Sends a message to all IRC operators, regardless of other user modes.

    Example:  :services.esper.net GOPER :WARNING -- clones detected from
                      ppp1-9.lame.com


7. IMPORTING DATABASES FROM OTHER PROGRAMS

     As of Services 4.1.0, a program (import-db) has been added to convert
databases used by other Services-like programs to the format used by
Services, allowing easy transition to Services.  If you would like to use
Services with databases created by unsupported software, please E-mail me
(see below) with a location where the software's source code may be
downloaded and I will look into adding conversion support for the software.
Currently, the following programs' data files are understood:
        - Auspice 2.5.x
        - Daylight
        - Epona (version 1.3.0 or later)
        - IRCS 1.2
        - Magick 1.4b2
        - PTlink 2.18.x
        - SirvNET (all versions)
        - Wrecked 1.2.0

     The import-db program may be compiled with the command:

        make import-db

(or "gmake import-db" if GNU make is installed on your system as "gmake").
This will create an executable called "import-db" in the Services
distribution directory, and you should run the program from that directory.
For example, if you have unpacked the Services distribution into
/usr/local/src/services, run this program as
"/usr/local/src/services/import-db".

     import-db may be given any of the following options, in any order:

        <dir>       Specify directory where data files are located.
                        (This argument is required.)
        -v          Be verbose; print progress reports.
        -h          Print command line help message and exit.
        +<program>  Specify which program created the data files:
            +auspice-2.5    Auspice 2.5.x
            +daylight       Daylight
            +epona          Epona (any version)
            +ircs-1.2       IRCS 1.2
            +magick-1.4b2   Magick 1.4b2
            +ptlink-2.18    PTlink 2.18.x
            +sirv           SirvNET (any version)
            +wrecked-1.2    Wrecked 1.2.0

If you do not specify the program which created the databases, import-db
will attempt to determine the database type by looking at the files in the
given directory.  If it cannot determine the database type, import-db will
print an error message and exit.

     As an example, you can use the following command to convert databases
from the IRCS program, version 1.2, assuming your database files are saved
in "/usr/local/lib/ircs":

        import-db +ircs-1.2 /usr/local/lib/ircs

     If all files are successfully read in, then they will be written in a
format readable by Services in the data directory you specified in the
"configure" script (by default /usr/local/lib/services).  Any existing
databases in that directory will be backed up to files with a tilde ("~")
appended to each filename; however, any existing files with the same names
will not be overwritten by the backups (backups will not be made in that
case).

     Note that not all features of other programs are supported by
Services, so nickname and channel settings may operate slightly different
than they did in the original program.  In particular, the following
incompatibilities/differences are known:

   * Auspice
        - The "NOOP" and "NEVEROP" nick flags are not supported.  Any nicks
             with these flags set will still be opped by Services if they
             have the appropriate access level in a channel.
        - E-mailing of memos and log files is not supported.
        - The AUTH feature is not supported.
        - ChanServ FREEZE is not supported.
        - Services does not support "root" and "master" privilege levels as
             in Auspice.  There can only be one root nick, which is set in
             services.conf; all root/master settings in the data files will
             be discarded.  (Admin/oper settings will be retained.)  Note
             that Services admins can perform any function (except
             modifying the admin list), including modifying Services
             settings and shutting down Services.

   * Daylight
        - Services does not support the XMANAGEMENT channel setting.

   * Epona
        - Epona's nick linking system is different from that of Services.
             All nick links will be preserved when importing databases;
             however, be aware that some features operate differently on
             linked nicks (for example, each linked nick has its own
             password).
        - Services does not store the following information; it will be
             lost when the databases are converted:
                + ICQ number for nicks
                + setter and reason given for a channel FORBID
                + last used time for a channel access entry
                + creator and creation time for a channel autokick
        - Services does not distinguish between using the ChanServ OP,
             VOICE and related commands on oneself or other users.  When
             converting databases, the "OPME" ("VOICEME", etc.) level will
             be used for the "OP" ("VOICE") level in Services.  This may
             allow some users to use these commands when they previously
             could not do so.
        - Services does not currently support SG/Q/ZLINE functions.

   * IRCS 1.2
        - Channels with names longer than 63 characters (including the
             leading "#") are not supported; any such channels will be
             removed from the database before it is saved.  (Note that it
             is possible to modify the CHANMAX constant in config.h to
             allow longer channel names, but as this can cause problems
             when upgrading Services, it is not recommended.)
        - Channel autoop/autovoice cannot be set for individual nicks.
             All nicks with appropriate access will be opped even if the
             NickServ NOOP setting was set or ChanServ SET AUTOOP OFF was
             used for the nick.
        - The numeric access level for SOP is different, so some access
             levels will be altered to match the default SOP level in
             Services.  (Channel privileges will remain unchanged.)
        - The "senior", "junior", and "helper" OperServ access levels do
             not exist in Services.  Users on the "senior" list will be
             moved to the Services admin list; users on other lists will be
             moved to the Services operator list.
             WARNING: As a result of the above, users on the "senior" list
             will be given access to the JUPE and LISTIGNORE commands.

   * Magick 1.4b2
        - Services does not send replies using PRIVMSG; the NI_PRIVMSG nick
             setting will be ignored.
        - Services does not have a "channel news" system like Magick, and
             all channel news items will be discarded.

   * PTlink 2.18
        - PTlink supports several encryption methods; passwords encrypted
             with a method other than MD5 cannot be used with Services, and
             import-db will refuse to convert such databases.
        - Services does not support an autojoin function for nicks.
        - Services does not store the following information; it will be
             lost when the databases are converted:
                + ICQ number, location, birthdate, and time of last
                     identify for nicks
                + maximum number of users and time of maximum for channels
                + creator for a channel access entry
                + creator and last used time for a channel autokick

   * SirvNET
        - The "NOOP" and "NEVEROP" nick flags are not supported.  Any nicks
             with these flags set will still be opped by Services if they
             have the appropriate access level in a channel.
        - E-mailing of memos and log files is not supported.
        - The AUTH feature is not supported.
        - ChanServ FREEZE is not supported.
        - Channel memos are implemented differently (they are stored
             separately from nick memos), and any user may send a memo to a
             channel.
        - Limiting channels to priviliged users (the LEVEL command) is not
             supported, and such restrictions will be discarded when
             importing the databases.  However, some IRC servers (such as
             Unreal) have channel modes allowing channels to be limited to
             IRC operators or administrators only, and Services allows
             those modes to be locked on with the SET MLOCK command.

   * Wrecked 1.2.0
        - Services does not send replies using PRIVMSG; the NI_PRIVMSG
             nick setting will be ignored.
        - The "NOOP" and "NEVEROP" nick flags are not supported.  Any nicks
             with these flags set will still be opped by Services if they
             have the appropriate access level in a channel.


8. REACHING THE MAINTAINER

     The maintainer can be reached via E-mail at support@flamez.net.  Please
feel free to send comments, suggestions, problem reports, context diffs, or
whatever, though I cannot guarantee a reply.


9. INTERNAL SECURITY

    In an effort to prevent highly privileged accounts being compromised by
the use of commands available to other highly privileged accounts, Services
limits the use of certain commands reserved for Services admins. Services
admins can not use the commands GETPASS, SET PASSWORD, FORBID or DROP on
another Services admin. Only the Services root has these abilities.

    The SUSPEND command, however, can be used on anyone, including the Services
root, thus allowing a compromised account to be disabled.