I'm not at all familiar with this type of thing, but when in Rome...

OK, I've downloaded the software and somehow managed to get logged in and connected. Now what??? I'm assuming I need to go through and manually input all of the user names and email addresses that FT PM'd to me using the Add/Invite radio button from the software. Is this correct? This is gonna take a while so I hope I'm doing something wrong.

PS : It's gonna take some time to get something up worth downloading from me-one step at a time.

Regards,
jc

i'm inviting people in small groups, like a few yesterday, some today, more tomorrow. by the middle of next week, i could be connected to everyone else. i hope no one's offended if they're in the last batch.

OK, so we all will have to invite and approve each other. Shoot, I had hoped I was wrong. Thanks for the reply!

jc

i'm on now but all my boxes are blank. whats the next step after inviting and being invited?

bort

np: the ends

I can't seem to connect, and... how do you invite people? I think I'm too lazy to participate if this thing doesn't work easily.

yeah mine just keeps saying "Connecting..." in the bottom corner. something tells me i'm not "in" yet

Wish I could help but it's gonna be like the blind leading the blind. I've never used anything like this, not even AIM, but it's working.

Some tips that may or may not be useful:

1- When installing the program it asks for a password. It's not one you can make up at first, it's the one that comes via email. It took a few hours for that email to reach me and this silly oversight caused me a lot of grief.

2. When starting from scratch, a fresh install, you have to manually delete two folders. One in program files and another in "documents and settings/user name/cactus files(or something like that). I had everything so screwed up starting over was my only option.

3. Once you are finally logged in and connected you add members by pushing the add/invite button in the upper right of the program. That opens a web page where you can cut and paste the information from the file FT sent out. That creates a "pending file" that must be approved by the user you just entered. Once approved by the user you can start d/ling files. Pretty cool actually.

Well, those were the stumbling blocks I had to deal with and I'm pretty sure If I can get it, you can too.

jc

i finally got this thing working, but i can only see timmyjoe's files, even though it shows others are online. help?

Also, after you add people, hit "Sync with Shareweb" so that it picks them up and makes them available.

i did that and it shows a list of people who are online under my contacts- if i "view folders shared by this contact" it says it can't establish a connection, well except for timmyjoe. eh. weird.

They all have to give you access to their folders... It doesn't happen automatically.

But it should.

I agree. There should be a way to set default sharing options. Maybe they'll add this in the final version.

I've added everybody from the list to my shares so if you want to play around all you should need to do is approve me. I don't have much up yet, but the ones that are are really really good! Guess I need to head off to work now but I'll leave the program running for anyone to experiment with.

jc

Nothing works for me. I can't login to the "My Account" page (I get an error page) and I can't add/invite people (I get an empty page).

Anybody else have these problems? Seriously, just going to share.clevercactus.com gives me a Null Pointer Exception.

Not to mention the fact that I'm on dial-up.

a couple more issues that hopefully someone can help me with.

1. Not all of my shares are showing up for each user. Some people get everything, others see only one file. Short of manually adding each file to every user is there a way to make all shares available to everyone on the network?

2. I try to leave the program running while I'm away but after a period of inactivity it seems to disconnect from the network. Any solutions?

Thanks,

jc

JC,

You have to specify a shared folder for each user, but you only have to do it once, unless you decide to switch to a different shared folder. Once you specify a shared folder for a given user, that same folder will be shared with that user every time you both are connected.

I have not yet had the program disconnect after periods of inactivity, and I leave it up for 8-10 hours at a time each day at work.


FT

JC,

Is it possible that you are losing your internet connection do to inactivity? Before I switched to DSL 18 months ago or so, my internet provider would automatically log me out if I was not actively browsing for 30 minutes or more regardless of whether I was uploading or downloading data. I haven't had any problems with clever cactus shutting down on its own and think its more likely to be a problem with your internet connection.

With regard to the file sharing, you can also share files at a macro level by following the same procedures for sharing with an individual user but doing it with "all" rather than an individual user name. "all" though means all as of that moment in time so you still need to manually share with new users as they sign up and are added to the network. If you are having problems with people seeing different sets of files I'd suggest first, resyncing with shareware (which you'll find under one of the pull down menus - either edit or options I think) and then resetting your share to a macro level share of whatever folder you choose with all users.

Hope that helps.

I have a similar problem.
I leave my work machine on all night, yet when I get home I can't see it all the time, and then all of a sudden it would pop on.

Other times, I see 3 contacts online, and then I do a sync up and it seems to slap itself awake and all of a sudden it's 10 contacts online.
It has to be an issue with the Clevercactus system for connecting contacts.

Thanks for the replies guys. I have been doing the share "all " thing. I guess the problem is that when a user gets around to approving me, they weren't on the list when I added shares so they basically get nothing. Scratching my head, I guess it makes more sense to move all my shared folders into one big "obner" master folder. At that point I should be able to add just the one folder to each contact as they are added.

My internet connection is cable so I can't imagine that I'd be cut off by the provider. I experience a similar problem described by Timmyjoe so perhaps it is indeed a small glitch in the software.

I appreciate your continued replies, hopefully I just about have this baby sorted out now.

Thanks,
jc

ok, i received a list from FT and am sharing all my bounty with all y'all. that's about 21k-worth, so go nuts!

Nice of ya, but reading the FAQ's at CC, the software may shoot craps with file counts over 10,000-15,000. They are working on it though.

BTW, I'm having a blast with this silly thing, bugs and all.

jc