Advanced Troubleshooting
This section contains answers to more advanced questions about using SunForum.
It covers the following topics:
If your problem is related to interoperation with Microsoft NetMeeting,
you may find the support section of the Microsoft
NetMeeting web pages useful.
Controlling the Look and Feel of SunForum
There are a number of ways in which you can control the way SunForum appears
on your desktop.
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Run in background
This option allows you to close SunForum, but keep a small task running
in the background to listen for incoming calls. When a call is received,
SunForum re-opens on your desktop.
To run SunForum in the background:
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Start SunForum as normal.
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Select Call, Run in Background.
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Close SunForum.
Alternatively, to start SunForum in the background, use the following command:
sunforum -runinbackground
If using the Phone GUI, you can start it in the background by using the following command:
phone -nogui
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Always on top (This feature is not
available on all platforms)
You can choose to have the SunForum window always remain on top of all
other windows. In this mode, other windows can gain the focus, but they
will always appear behind the SunForum window.
To choose this mode, select the Always On Top command on the View menu.
This mode can be turned off in two ways:
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Select the Always on Top command on the View menu.
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Click three times in rapid succession (treble-click) on another window's
title bar.
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Compact view
In compact view, the SunForum user interface is reduced to its minimum
size, showing just the title bar and the menu. This occupies as little
space on the screen as possible but shows no status information.
You can switch to compact view by doing any one of the following:
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Select Compact View on the View menu.
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Press Ctrl-Shift-C.
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Click the rollup icon (the tall thin button) at the left hand end of the
SunForum toolbar.
You can switch back from compact view by doing any one of the following:
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Select Compact View on the View menu.
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Press Ctrl-Shift-C.
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Resize the window by dragging its borders in the usual way.
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Other Look and Feel options
Other ways in which you can customize the operation of SunForum include:
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Using SunForum through a Firewall
If you are connected to the Internet via a firewall (as is usual in most
corporate/LAN environments), you can use SunForum to communicate with others
located both inside and outside the firewall. To enable full external communication,
you need to
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Ensure your workstation has its default gateway set to the internal
address of the firewall computer |
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Configure the firewall to allow primary TCP connections over the following
IP ports:
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389 (for communication with Internet Locator Servers)
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1503 (for T.120 data)
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1718 (UDP), for locating H.323 gatekeepers (required only if automatic
gatekeeper discovery is used)
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1719 (UDP), for communication with H.323 gatekeepers
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1720 (TCP), for H.323 call setup
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Ensure that the firewall is configured to allow the use of dynamic
IP ports (both TCP ports for H.323 call control, and UDP ports for audio
and video streams). This may require the use of a special H.323-capable
firewall product. |
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Configure the firewall to map internal IP addresses to external Internet
addresses. [This is not possible with all firewalls. If your firewall cannot
do this, you will be able to call out from inside the firewall, but you
will not be able to receive incoming calls from computers outside the firewall.] |
If you are unsure whether you are connecting to the Internet via a firewall,
consult your system administrator or Internet service provider.
Installing
and using TrueType fonts with SunForum
SunForum is designed to take advantage of a TrueType font server, if one
is installed on your system (or accessible to your system across a local
area
network). The SunForum configuration files are used to specify its location.
With a TrueType font server installed, SunForum will have more fonts
in common with Windows systems, resulting in better quality output and
improved performance in sharing sessions involving both Windows and UNIX
systems. Note that if the "Sun PC File Viewer" software has been installed,
the TrueType fonts have possibly been loaded on the host machine.
Compatible font servers are avaliable from Gallium (evaluation versions
are also available).
Calling into a Conference Server / Multipoint Conferencing
Unit (MCU)
SunForum fully supports conferences hosted on Conference Servers, and has
been tested with various 3rd party MCUs.
When calling an MCU, specify the address of the MCU as normal. You can
also specify the name of the conference to join. If you do not specify
a conference name, and SunForum detects that the machine called is currently
hosting more than one conference, you will be asked which conference you
wish to join. Note that hidden conferences will not be included in the
list of available conferences: you must specify the conference name when
calling into the computer.
See also the section on password-protected
conferences.
Password-protected conferences
When you attempt to join a conference which has been designated as password-protected,
SunForum will prompt you to specify the password.
Some T.120 implementations incorrectly advertise conferences as password
protected, even when no password has been specified. In this case, just
click OK without specifying a password: the conference will be established
as normal.
Note that you cannot create a password-protected conference with SunForum.
TCP timeout settings
SunForum changes the underlying TCP/IP transport timeout before deciding
that a given address is not valid.
The default value for this on Solaris is about 3 minutes. For ease of
use, this is reduced to 60 seconds. This means that any TCP/IP connections
will fail to be established if the called system does not respond within
the specified timeout.
Solving Color Problems
If you experience problems with color operations on a Workstation (such as text highlights)
with Windows applications shared by NetMeeting, try the following remedial
steps:
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If your X Server is running with a Static or DirectColor default visual,
switch it to run with PseudoColor or GrayScale. See your X Server documentation
for information on how to do this. |
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Close any local color-intensive X applications (such as bitmap editors
and web browsers), to make more colors available for SunForum. |
De-installing SunForum
To remove SunForum from your computer:
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Close the main SunForum window, if it is running |
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Exit your X server, continue from the command-line |
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If not already logged on as root, become super-user with the command:
su
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After you became super-user, type:
pkgrm SUNWdat SUNWdatu SUNWphone SUNWkeep
and follow the on-screen prompts |
Sun Ray Audio Settings
The audio settings on SunForum must coincide with the Sun Ray (master) audio settings.
For instance, if line-in is wanted instead of microphone, line-in should be set in
Sun Ray Audio and the SunForum device settings.
Gatekeeper Settings
By default, the SunForum 3.2 clients are set up for auto discover of the gatekeeper server.
This auto discovery uses IP Multicast and may not penetrate routers going across sub-nets.
In this case, you need to specify the gatekeeper by name (you do this in
/opt/SUNWdat/config/system-config).
The default setting for H323.GKDiscovery is 1. It needs to be set to 2. And the server
needs to be specified in H323.GKName.
Gateway Settings
A gateway allows you to connect to a designated server that provides the phone line connections
required to place actual telephone calls when using the SunForum Phone
Once you have updated your gateway configurationoptions, you can then call the gateway server
phone lines that connect your calls to a phone line.
You need to enable the gateway function
and specify it in the /opt/SUNWdat/config/system-config file. H323.CallViaGateway will need
to be set to true. H323.GatewayName will need to be set to the gateway's IP or DNS name.
And H323.GatewayPrefix needs to be set to any prefix required by the gateway to route the call
to a specific phone line.
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Copyright1998 - 2001Sun
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