Notes on Minuet
---------------

Minuet is a suite of Internet applications for the IBM PC.  It requires a
packet driver, either class 1 or class 6.  You need to have the packet
driver set up and the connection established before you set up Minuet.

Minuet doesn't work with Klos PPP on my 1000TL with a 14.4k modem and a
16450 UART.  It did with a 2400-baud modem, and it does with Etherppp or
Dospppd with the 14.4k.

Minuet is mouseable and has both online documentation and context-sensitive
online help.  If you are in doubt while setting it up, hit F1 for some
help on that option.

To set up Minuet, go to the directory where you have it installed and type
MINUET at the DOS prompt.  Setup is done via the "Setup" menu, pulled down
by pressing <alt>-S.  The first three options, "User...", "Servers...", and
"Network...", bring up dialog boxes with stuff that needs to be set up
before you can use Minuet.

"User..." brings up the "Setup Personal Information" dialog box.  Here you
need to enter your E-Mail Address and Password.  The Password is the
password for your POP account.  The rest of the stuff is all optional; set
it later if you want.

"Servers..." brings up the "Setup Servers" dialog box.	Here you set your
mail and news servers and the ports used to access them.  Set Mail to your
POP server's name.  110 is the standard port for POP3 and you shouldn't need
to change it (set it to 109 if your ISP is using POP2, which is very
unlikely).  Set News to your NNTP server name.  The port number (119) should
not be changed.  The Gopher server should be set to gopher.micro.umn.edu. 
The Finger server does not need to be changed (i.e., change it to your local
server if you want to use finger).

"Network..." brings up the "Setup Network" dialog box.	This stuff is
important.  If you have static IP, proceed as follows.  Set PCs IP address
to the IP address you were assigned.  Set Net mask to your provider's
netmask; usually it is 255.255.255.0, but ask.  Net mask 0.0.0.0 might work
also.  For Name server timeout, Connect timeout, I/O timeout, and Retransmit
timeout you can just use the defaults.  Set MTU, MAXSEG, and Window to 512.

The gateway is the system that you're connecting to; ask your provider if
you don't know its IP address. The provider should tell you the IP address
of the name server.  Usually you will have only one of each, so type them on
the first line and leave the rest blank.

If you have dynamic IP, leave PCs IP address, Net mask, and Gateway blank. 
Fill in Name Server for the 1st IP address.  Minuet will get your machine's
IP address from the MYIP environment variable and assume a dialup
connection so that Gateway and Net mask will not be used.  As with static
IP, you can leave Name server timeout, Connect timeout, I/O timeout,
and Retransmit timeout at the default.  Set MTU, MAXSEG, and Window to 512.

If you have dynamic IP and use PHONE.EXE in the Umslip package as your
dialer program, Marc Williams reports that:

    When using phone.exe, there's a line in the phone.cmd script "Grab
    MYIP".  When the IP address shows up on the screen a batch file is
    created called PHONEENV.BAT that sets the MYIP variable. Normally you
    have to run it manually after phone finishes logging on.  I just put it
    in cslip.bat (cwruslip.bat) so it's called automatically.

You can of course use any other method of setting MYIP, for example Ipread
(q.v.).

BOOTP does not generally work as advertised with University of Minnesota
applications, though Dospppd v0.6 includes a workaround (BOOTP will also
work with Slipper or Cslipper).  To use BOOTP with Minuet and Dospppd v0.6,
leave PCs IP address, Net mask, Gateway and Name Server all blank.  BOOTP
does not work with Minuet and Dospppd v0.5 or other PPP or SLIP packet
drivers.

At this point, you should be able to run Internet apps by hitting the
function keys listed on the bottom of the screen.  Minuet has lots of
features; hit F1 if you don't know what to do.

The news reader in Minuet won't work if your provider carries a lot of
newsgroups (it tries to download the complete list of newsgroups into a
small conventional RAM buffer).  You can trick it into working by manually
creating the files it wants, if you figure out the format, which is not
documented.  If your site has a lot of groups, you might want to use Trumpet
for news instead.  Minuet's news also does not work with compressed drives
(Stacker, DoubleSpace, etc.).  The system will lock up as it seems to know
how much space is really on a drive and assumes there's not enough. 
Minuet's news will download all new articles in subscribed groups, so it's
not a good choice if you're interested in alt.binaries.*.

If you have EGA or VGA, Minuet can display images on Web pages (it doesn't
show fonts or other page layout, though).  Note, however, that Minuet
requires a 386 to display a .jpg.  If graphics are enabled, Minuet is also
prone to crashes on an XT.

If you use Minuet for WWW browsing, then from time to time, you should
probably clear out its cache by deleting the files in the MINCACHE
directory.  Minuet does not have a reload feature for Web pages.