Installation
1. Download
the setup package and unzip all of its contents into a folder in your hard disk drive.
2. You must have Administrator privileges in Windows. Click "setup.exe"
in the extracted files (you can't install it by directly clicking "DICE.msi" on Windows
Vista). If you don't have the required version of .NET Framework installed, you are prompted
to install it here.
(After DICE instllation is done, if you want to use standard Perl modules in your Perl CGI, download the Perl modules pack from the download page and extract its content into the "perl_lib" folder in the DICE application folder.)
Configuration
1. Click the icon of DICE Manager created on your desktop. In the DICE Manager, you have to do 3 things: 1) Configure the listening port of the web server in the DICE 2) Create a new DICE administrator 3) Start the DICE service.
2. First, click "Change Web Server Port" in the "Service" tab. If you have to change the default ports of 80 and 443, change them to other numbers. When you have other applications that use port 80 such as Skype, it may be a good idea to change it to something like 8080.
3. In the "Admin" tab, click "Create New Admin". You are prompted to enter a new user name and a new password (twice). Since this user name and password are required to login the DICE User Control Panel, don't forget them.
4. Back to the "Service" tab, push "Run DICE Service". If it doesn't tell you that the DICE has started normally, go to the "Admin" tab and click "Open Local Log Folder". Read log files in the "global" folder to locate what went wrong.
5. After the DICE service has started, go to the "Admin" tab and click "Open Web Interface" in the DICE Manager. It opens the default web browser and shows the DICE User Control Panel in it. Login to it with the administrator user name and password you created earlier in the DICE Manager.
6. In the DICE User Control Panel in your web browser, click "Administration Tools" in the menu. Then click "Edit Configuration Tools" under "Administration Tools". It shows all of configuration options available in the DICE. Among them, "IRCPublicHostname" and "HTTPPublicHostname" are important to make your server accessible from the internet. If you set up your IRC or web server at the host you own "irc.example.com" for example, put "irc.example.com" in these items. After you modify all items you are interested in, push the "Save Configuration Options" button. When prompted to restart the DICE, push "OK". The DICE restarts with the new configuration.
7. To test if the IRC function is working correctly, open the web UI and open the Web IRC Client, then connect to it.
Firewall and Router Settings
When the UPnP option in the DICE is disabled or your NAT router does not support UPnP, you have to manually open/forward the following ports in your hardware router and/or software firewall. The DICE can bypass the Windows Firewall introduced in Windows XP SP2 and doesn't need manual configuration.
[inbound connection]
TCP port 80 (Web; varies dependent on your setting)
TCP port 443 (Web SSL; varies dependent on your setting)
TCP port 6667 (IRC; varies dependent on your setting)
[outbound connection - configuration is not usually required]
TCP port 80, 1080, 3128, 8080 (IRC insecure proxy scanner)
Administration
All server administration tasks are done in the web UI (DICE User Control Panel).
As for administration jobs in the IRC space, you have to register your nick and password for IRC in the DICE User Control Panel. Then, in IRC, login to the IRC User Shell by typing the "/shell login" command with IRC nick and password. Users authenticated as administrators can use various administration commands in "/shell admin" in IRC. Also the "/kill" command that disconnects other users is available.
Click "Open Local Web Foder" in the "Admin" tab of the DICE Manager to open the local web folder. It's the root directory of the web server. Since all files and folder under it are published on the web, make sure that it doesn't contain any private data.
There are multiple ways to stop the DICE service.
+ Use the DICE Manager
+ Open SCM in Administrative Tools of Windows and stop the DICE service
+ Type "net stop DICE" in a Windows command console
Since DICE is a Windows Service, even after you log out of your Windows account it continues to run in the background.
Uninstallation and Reinstallation / Update
To uninstall the DICE, stop the service and uninstall "DICE" from "Add/Remove Programs" in the Control Panel. If it can't be uninstalled, left-click "setup.exe" in the distribution package of the DICE and choose "Repair", then try uninstallation again. In a rare case in which you must unregister the DICE service manually, open a command console and type "dice.exe -unregserver" in your DICE application folder.
Application data is stored in "C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\DICE" for Windows XP or Windows Server 2003, or "C:\ProgramData\DICE" for Windows Vista.
When you update the DICE, old configuration files are moved to the "backup" folder under the application data folder.
SSL
In addition to the HTTP over SSL (https) for the web server, the DICE supports IRC over SSL. Its merit is that client-server confidential communication is secured by SSL encryption that detects and prevents eavesdropping by a third party. Connect to the DICE IRC port with an IRC client that supports SSL such as mIRC by explicitly telling it as SSL connection in the connection options of the client. Unlike traditional IRC servers, the DICE accepts both plain IRC connection and IRC-over-SSL connection at a single port; if the IRC port is 6667, the port for IRC over SSL is also 6667.
In the default configuration, the DICE generates a dummy self-signed certificate and sends it over to a client whenever challenged by an SSL handshake request. However it has a drawback, SSL connection constructed with it is not protected from a security breach known as "man-in-the-middle attack" (MITM). MITM is prevented only by using a digital certificate signed by major Certificate Authority (CA) companies. Due to this defect, you'll get a message like "invalid SSL certificate" from an IRC client or a web browser when you try to connect to DICE over SSL if a self-signed certificate is used. You can force your client to accept a self-signed certificate by modifying its options, otherwise you have to buy a proper certificate from CA and set it in the DICE in the PEM format.
But a certificate signed by a CA doesn't come cheap. Also the probability of MITM is quite low in a normal situation. Using a self-signed certificate is sufficient for most users who want encryption of client-server communication though it's still recommended to use a proper certificate for the best possible security.
In IRC you can execute the /whois command on a user to know whether he/she is on SSL connection. The +z channel mode allows only SSL users to join in a channel. The DICE configuration has an option to reject all non-SSL IRC users.
Dynamic DNS
When you don't own an internet domain name but want to have a memorable URL for free, dynamic DNS service providers can offer DNS hosting. Such a service requires you to register your global IP address to associate it with a domain name. But a global IP address can be changed by ISP at random occasions. If your network router device supports UPnP, the DICE can detect change and automatically update an entry at a dynamic DNS service provider. In the default setting, DynDNS is supported. You can also customize it for other dynamic DNS providers as long as they use an HTTP-based update protocol. A result of a negotiation with a dynamic DNS service provider is stored in the log of the DICE.