Turbo Pascal NetBios Interface
                          Written by Alon Gingold
                             Hitch Hiker's BBS
                                  Israel

   This Interface represents many hours of work, and of "why for god's sake
   does'nt it work ???" so  if you decide to use this Interface in your
   programs, please send your contributions to me.
   Anything more then 5 USD will do. Please note that if you send a cheque,
   then sending less then 10 USD will most likely cost me more then the
   cheque's value itself !

   Please post your contributions to :

   Alon Gingold
   P.O.B 450
   Raanana
   Israel 43104


   Introduction
   ------------

   This unit is an interface to a comunication way used on some LAN systems
   called NetBios. As far as I know, the only system on which NetBios is not
   built in, is NOVEL, but there is a small utility that comes with Novel
   to give it the NetBios support.

   So, why do I need to comunicate using netbios, if I can simply write to the
   remote's Disk ??  well, I asked myself the same question some time ago, and
   decided to try. I wrote a program the sent pages after a request was recived
   from a remote. the request was written to the host's ramdisk, and the reply
   was written there as well, and read by the remote. it took about 1 sec. for
   the screen to be transfered (It takes some time for the host to prepair the
   screen).
   After I rewritten the program using this NetBios interface, I could send
   about 5 screens per sec !

   I have used CBIS's Netbios text file documentation to learn about NetBios.
   I have included the COMPLETE package of CBIS's text file with no changes
   to the text. That text file is copyrighted by them , and is only added
   here to make it easier for you to find it. it is not a part of my work.

   TIPS
   ----

   1. Never use DataGrams ! they stinks ! when you receive one DataGram , you
      loose two others.

   2. When local names are added to the list, it is , sometimes, imposible
      to delete them from the list. The fact is , that adding and deleting
      names from the list takes quite a while (2 - 3 sec. on lantastic)
      If you write a program that you run, exit from ,and run it again, you
      should NOT try to delete the local name , but simply use the NetStatus
      command , and search to see if the name is allready there. If it is,
      use it, if not, add it.

   3. Local names must be unique to each computer on the lan. If you write
      a program that uses a specific name, run it on one computer, then try
      to run it on another computer, you'll get error. As sometimes it is
      imposible to delete a name from the local list, you better use unique
      names on each computer...

   4. Never call non POST netbios functions from a POST routine. a post routine
      should update a global table, and a global pointer of that table, and
      then execute the same command that brought up the post, with a post to
      itself. this is most likely a LISTEN command.

   5. NetBios's CANCEL command does'nt work that good. it is advised not to use
      it. The way to cancel POST routines is as follows :

      A. add an IF in the post routine , that if a specific boolean is true,
         don't execute the Post command again.

      B. set that boolean to true.

      C. add another name (save the original name, name nunmber) and send a
         command to match the post routine (i.e. A CALL to a listen post).
         then HangUp that session.


Included in this archive are :

 NETBIOS.DOC  -  doc file about NetBios. written by Tom Thompson
                 and copyrighted by CBIS, Inc.

 NETBIOS.PAS  -  full source of NetBios interface unit for Turbo Pascal 6.
                 this will most likely work just as well on older versions
                 of pascal as well.