Your Custom RAIN Mac Software Diskette

A modem configured for the Mac environmentwith no conflicts or errors.

Installing MacTCP and MacPPP

To install MacTCP, first take the RAIN Mac disk you received by RAIN and place it in your floppy drive. Then open the disk on your desktop and go to the Macppp2.0.1 folder and open it. From there you might have to adjust your view to see all the files in that folder, and to best do that go to your View menu and select 'by Name'. You will now clearly see three files in that folder.

To install MacPPP is very simple. Open your harddrive and tile it next to your open floppy folder window that is currently open so that you can see both side to side. Next, drag and drop the Config PPP file into your Control Panels folder. The control panel folder is a sub-folder of your System Folder.

After you have sucessfully copied that file into the Control Panels folder, now you will want to grab, drag and drop the file that states just 'PPP' and drop it into your Extensions folder which is another subfolder of your System Folder. After copying both these files into their respective locations, you will want to restart your system.

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Configuring MacTCP

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After sucessfully restarting system, we need to now configure MacTCP. This is the component that lets you talk on the internet. Open the MacTCP control panel within your Apple Menu/Control Panels item. Select the PPP icon in the top of the window and then click on the More button to get to the MacTCP configuration dialog.

In the Obtain Address box (upper left), click on the Manually radio button and then type in the gateway number: 198.68.144.1.

Now click on the Server radio button; do not click on the Dynamically button.

You do not need to set anything in the IP Addresses because RAIN uses Server Addressing which assigns you a different IP address each time you log in. This scheme conserves the limited supply of Internet IP Addresses.

Next, fill in the Domain Name Server Information in the lower right portion of the MacTCP dialog. Put your cursor in the left hand box and type your domain name, then tab over to the right hand box and type the IP number of your name server, which you get from your provider. Click on the default button next to this entry. Move down to the second left hand box and type a period, and in the right hand box, type the same name server IP number again.

Close MacTCP now, and reboot your Mac. Sometimes MacTCP will tell you to reboot, other times it won't, so I recommend rebooting whenever you change anything.

Open the Config PPP Control Panel located in the Control Panels folder in the system folder. The dialog box that appears will be where you begin your Internet log on.

Under Port Name, select where your modem connects to the computer.

The Idle TimeOut will close your connection after a specific amount of idle time, if you are called away from your computer while logged on. It is a good idea to set something like 15 minutes just incase you're called away from the computer while online. There are only a limited number of modems available and this would free up one for someone wwaiting to connect. We are all sharing a limited resource so please make it a practice to log off when you are not actively using your connection. Remember it could be you who is waiting to get online.

Leave the Echo Interval off.

The terminal window box will bring up a window for diagnosing problems during a log in. This feature is rather crude and you will find it much easier to test your connections using your familiar modem software. If there are any problems. Leave this unchecked.

Check both the Hang-up on Close and the Quiet Mode.

The PPP Server allows you to select multiple internet servers if they are available to you. To configure your RAIN connections, click on the New button to name the server. Type in the name you want to use for your connection and click OK.

Now click on the Configuration button. In this box: set the port speed to at least 38400, for a 14.4 modem, 57600 to 115200 for 28.8 modems, 115200 to 230400 for 56k modems, the flow control to CTS & RTS (DTR), click on the Tone radio button, type in the phone number for your area, type in a modem init string if your modem requires one (if not sure use AT&F as this sets the modem to its default settings), set the Modem connect timeout to 40, (that way, if the connection fails, you don't have to wait to long for the failure dialog box).

Now click on the button labeled Authentication Here you will see two fields. One named Auth. ID:, and the other field is marked Password. In the Auth. ID: field enter your user id/Login in this format: ppp:youruserid, where your user id is in place of where it states "youruserid". Now enter your password in the Password: dialog remembering that when you made your password with RAIN, it is a case sensitive password. Most of the time it would be lowercase. Now leave the retries at 10, and then click OK.

Now to access the internet through your RAIN connection, open the Config PPP control panel. Clicking on the Open will start the log-on process you will see several dialog boxes indicating the progress of MacTCP. The final sequence is Establishment followed by Network. Also, when you open an Internet application(IE: Netscape or Eudora), your default connection which is now RAIN, should open automatically. In some instances this won't happen, and then you would need to go to the Configppp in your control panel.

You're now on the internet. Just launch the application you wish to use whether it be Eudora, Anarchie, Netscape or NewsWatcher.

When you are ready to log off, use the Hard Close button. If you use the Soft Close button, MacPPP will log you off but it will try to log you back on again. This feature is generally used for those who have a constant internet access. So always use Hard Close.