Overview

Does your web server have a user list? Do you find it time consuming to keep the page current, adding new users, modifying existing entries and deleting old entries? If so, display users may be of interest as it can reduce your maintenance overhead by allowing users to add, modify and even delete their entries. The program will also automatically delete entries when an account is closed.

How Does It Work?

The program looks in the home directory of each user for a data file (nominally called the .user file). If this file is present (and readable), that user will be added to the directory listing. Although the data allows the user to set a number of options, an empty file will produce a default listing.

The program also optionally uses a second file to display biographical information about the user. For compatibility purposes, the nominal file used in the .plan file used by finger. This file is inserted into the directory listing to provide information about the user.

Optional Password File Entries

The Linux password file which is used by this program allows the inclusion of the additional data in the user’s entry. This program assumes that this extra data will take the form of the user’s home phone number, work phone number and address. If this option data is stored in the password file, it may lead to the publishing of unintended information.

Program Options

The webmaster has a number of  that must be configured to allow the program to work correctly on the host.

$allow_html_tags

Set this to 'true' if users are allowed to use HTML tags in their description files (plan file). If this is not set to ‘true’, the program will remove lines that contain angle brackets (<>), prevent HTML tags from functioning.

Example: $allow_html_tags = 'false';

$mail_address

Normally, the email address of the users and the webmaster is derived from the web server’s domain name. The program assumes that names bwginning with ‘www’ will have an email address which has the ‘www.’ Removed. For example, if the web server is www.thisplace.org.au, then the email address will be thisplace.org.au. If this is not correct, this parameter can be used to specify and alternate email server. Only set this to the address of the email server if it can't be derived from the web server's address.

Example: $mail_address = 'thisplace.org.au';

$mail_image

This image will be displayed as the icon to be used for mailing the webmaster.

Example: $mail_image = '/graphics/labels/letter.gif';

$toppage_image

This image will be displayed as the icon to be used to allow the user to got to the site's top page.

Example: $toppage_image = '/graphics/labels/ml_label.gif';

$top_page

The will be appended to the domain name as a hyperlink to the top page of the site. This can be blank since it is appended to the site's address. Although this says toppage, it can point to anywhere in the user’s web tree. Include the leading '/' if a pathname is included.

Example: $top_page = '/junk/index.html';

$background_image

This is the image that will be displayed as the user list's background.

Example: $background_image    = '/graphics/backgrounds/ml_logo.gif';

$guestbook_image

This image will be displayed as the icon hyperlinked to the guestbook.

Example: $guestbook_image     = '/graphics/labels/comments.gif';

$guestbook_page

This contains the address of the guestbook to use. This can be a complete URL to allow external guestbooks to be used.

Example: $guestbook_page = 'http://www.theguestbook.com/egbook/XYZZY.gbook';

$web_master

The name of the person to send comments to on the system. Normally this would be

The webmaster, but it can be set to any valid mail account on the system.

Example: $web_master = 'webmaster';

$web_directory

The directory containing the user's web pages. This directory is relative to user’s home directory.

Example: $web_directory = 'public_html';

$web_counter

The address of the web page counter. This can be a complete URL to allow external counters to be used

Example: $counter = '/cgi-bin/Count.cgi?df=user_list.dat';

$no_info_button

This is the icon to be displayed if the system does not monitor whether the user is currently logged on.

Example: $no_info_button = '/graphics/labels/q_button.gif';

$on_line_button

This is the icon to be displayed if the user is currently on-line.

Example: $on_line_button = '/graphics/labels/on-line.png';

$off_line_button

This is the icon to be displayed if the user is currently off-line.

Example: $off_line_button = '/graphics/labels/off-line.png';

$file_directory

This sets the directory to hold the data files. This directory is relative the user's home directory. A relative path can be specified, or it can be set to

$public_html if the files are held with the web pages

Example: $file_directory = ''; $file_directory = $web_directory;

$default_image

This is an image that will be displayed if the user chooses not to display a personal photo.

Example: $default_image = ‘/graphics/label/unknown_person.gif’;

$max_plan_size

This value determines the maximum size of the biographical data file that will be written into the directory listing. The listing will show an error message if the file is too big. Set the value to 0 to disable the check

Example: $max_plan_size = 1024;

$max_photo_size

The value determines the maximum size of the phot that will be hyper-linked into the directory listing. If the size limit is exceeded, the program will display the default image. Set the value to 0 to disable the check.

Example: $max_photo_size = 50000;

$display_line_status

This flag determines whether the connection status of the user is displayed. This allows the webmaster to remove this option if users log into another node. If this is the case, the status will always be "off-line", making it useless.

Example: $display_line_status = 'true';

$display_photo

This flag allows the webmaster to remove the photo data from the directory listing.

Example: $display_photo = 'false';

$display_contact

This flag allows the webmaster to remove the contact information from the user directory.

Example: $display_contact = 'true';

User Selectable Options

The data file is a simple text file with one parameter per line in the following format: parameter:value

email

This parameter allows the user to alter the default email address displayed in the user listing. This allows users to use mail accounts on other systems is desired.

Example: email:someone@hotmail.com

homepage

This parameter allows the user to alter the default homepage in the user listing. The address should not include http://.

Example: homepage:www.fred.com.au

photo

This parameter points to a photo of the user. The actual size on screen is constrained by the image tags. If the user does not provide this parameter,  a default image will be displayed.

Example: photo:me.jpg

plan

This parameter allows the user to use a filename other than the default (.plan). This allows the user to have different information available to finger and the web.

Example: plan:about_me.txt

monitor

This parameter determines whether the system will display whether the user is currently logged in to the web server node. This function will only work if the log-in node is also the web server node.

Example: monitor:on  

nickname

This parameter allows the users to override the display of their real name by substituting a nickname of their choice. This can be used to increse privacy or use their commonly used name.

Example: nickname:Gandalf