Big Dummy's Guide to the Internet
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Title: Big Dummy's Guide to the Internet
Author: Electronic Frontier Foundation
Author of introduction, etc.: Adam Gaffin
Mitchell Kapor
Release date: March 1, 1994 [eBook #118]
Most recently updated: October 29, 2024
Language: English
Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/118
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK BIG DUMMY'S GUIDE TO THE INTERNET ***
Big Dummy's Guide To The Internet
(C)1993, 1994 by the Electronic Frontier Foundation [EFF]
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Copyright 1993, 1994 Electronic Frontier Foundation, all rights reserved.
Redistribution, excerpting, republication, copying, archiving, and reposting
are permitted, provided that the work is not sold for profit, that EFF
contact information, copyright notice, and distribution information
remains intact, and that the work is not qualitatively modified (translation,
reformatting, and excerpting expressly permitted however - feel free to
produce versions of the Guide for use with typesetting, hypertext,
display, etc. applications, but please do not change the text other than to
translate it to another language. Excerpts should be credited and follow
standard fair use doctrine.) Electronic Frontier Foundation, 1001 G St. NW,
Suite 950 E, Washington DC 20001 USA, +1 202 347 5400 (voice) 393 5509 (fax.)
Basic info: info@eff.org; General and Guide related queries: ask@eff.org.
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Big Dummy's Guide to the Internet, v.2.2
copyright Electronic Frontier Foundation 1993, 1994
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Foreword by Mitchell Kapor, co-founder, Electronic Frontier Foundation.
Preface by Adam Gaffin, senior writer, Network World.
Chapter 1: Setting up and jacking in
1.1 Ready, set...
1.2 Go!
1.3 Public-access Internet providers
1.4 If your town doesn't have direct access
1.5 Net origins
1.6 How it works
1.7 When things go wrong
1.8 FYI
Chapter 2: E-mail
2.1. The basics
2.2 Elm -- a better way
2.3 Pine -- even better than Elm
2.4 Smileys
2.5 Sending e-mail to other networks
2.6 Seven Unix commands you can't live without
Chapter 3: Usenet I
3.1 The global watering hole
3.2 Navigating Usenet with nn
3.3 nn commands
3.4 Using rn
3.5 rn commands
3.6 Essential newsgroups
3.7 Speaking up
3.8 Cross-posting
Chapter 4: Usenet II
4.1 Flame, blather and spew
4.2 Killfiles, the cure for what ails you
4.3 Some Usenet hints
4.4 The Brain-Tumor Boy, the modem tax and the chain letter
4.5 Big Sig
4.6 The First Amendment as local ordinance
4.7 Usenet history
4.8 When things go wrong
4.9 FYI
Chapter 5: Mailing lists and Bitnet
5.1 Internet mailing lists
5.2 Bitnet
Chapter 6: Telnet
6.1 Mining the Net
6.2 Library catalogs
6.3 Some interesting telnet sites
6.4 Telnet bulletin-board systems
6.5 Putting the finger on someone
6.6 Finding someone on the Net
6.7 When things go wrong
6.8 FYI
Chapter 7: FTP
7.1 Tons of files
7.2 Your friend archie
7.3 Getting the files
7.4 Odd letters -- decoding file endings
7.5 The keyboard cabal
7.6 Some interesting ftp sites
7.7 ncftp -- now you tell me!
7.8 Project Gutenberg -- electronic books
7.9 When things go wrong
7.10 FYI
Chapter 8: Gophers, WAISs and the World-Wide Web
8.1 Gophers
8.2 Burrowing deeper
8.3 Gopher commands
8.4 Some interesting gophers
8.5 Wide-Area Information Servers
8.6 The World-Wide Web
8.7 Clients, or how to snare more on the Web
8.8 When things go wrong
8.9 FYI
Chapter 9: Advanced E-mail
9.1 The file's in the mail
9.2 Receiving files
9.3 Sending files to non-Internet sites
9.4 Getting ftp files via e-mail
9.5 The all knowing Oracle
Chapter 10: News of the world
10.1 Clarinet: UPI, Dave Barry and Dilbert
10.2 Reuters
10.3 USA Today
10.4 National Public Radio
10.5 The World Today: From Belarus to Brazil
10.6 E-mailing news organizations
10.7 FYI
Chapter 11: IRC, MUDs and other things that are more fun than they sound
11.1 Talk
11.2 Internet Relay Chat
11.3 IRC commands
11.4 IRC in times of crisis
11.5 MUDs
11.6 Go, go, go (and chess, too)!
11.7 The other side of the coin
11.8 FYI
Chapter 12: Education and the Net
12.1 The Net in the Classroom
12.2 Some specific resources for students and teachers
12.3 Usenet and Bitnet in the classroom
Chapter 13: Business on the Net
13.1 Setting up shop
13.2 FYI
Chapter 14: Conclusion -- The end?
Appendix A: Lingo
Appendix B: Electronic Frontier Foundation Information
Foreword
By Mitchell Kapor,
Co-founder, Electronic Frontier Foundation.
Welcome to the World of the Internet
The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) is proud to have sponsored
the production of the Big Dummy's Guide to the Internet. EFF is a
nonprofit organization based in Washington, D.C., dedicated to ensuring
that everyone has access to the newly emerging communications technologies
vital to active participation in the events of our world. As more and more
information is available online, new doors open up for those who have
access to that information. Unfortunately, unless access is broadly
encouraged, individuals can be disenfranchised and doors can close, as
well. The Big Dummy's Guide to the Internet was written to help open some
doors to the vast amounts of information available on the world's largest
network, the Internet.
The spark for the Big Dummy's Guide to the Internet was ignited in
a few informal conversations that included myself and Steve Cisler of Apple
Computer, Inc., in June of 1991. With the support of Apple Computer, EFF
engaged Adam Gaffin to write the book and actually took on the project in
September of 1991.
The idea was to write a guide to the Internet for people who had
little or no experience with network communications. We intended to post
this guide to the Net in ASCII and HyperCard formats and to give it away on
disk, as well as have a print edition available. We have more than
realized our goal. Individuals from as geographically far away as Germany,
Italy, Canada, South Africa, Japan, Scotland, Norway, and Antarctica have
all sent electronic mail to say that they downloaded the Big Dummy's Guide
to the Internet. The guide is now available in a wide array of formats,
including ACSCII text, HyperCard, World Wide Web, PostScript and
AmigaGuide. And the guide will be published in a printed format by MIT
Press in June of 1994.
EFF would like to thank author Adam Gaffin for doing a terrific job
of explaining the Net in such a nonthreatening way. We'd also like to
thank the folks at Apple, especially Steve Cisler of the Apple Library, for
their support of our efforts to bring this guide to you.
We invite you to join with EFF in our fight to ensure that equal
access to the networks and free speech are protected in newly emerging
technologies. We are a membership organization, and through donations like
yours, we can continue to sponsor important projects to make communications
easier. Information about the Electronic Frontier Foundation and some of
the work that we do can be found at the end of this book.
We hope that the Big Dummy's Guide to the Internet helps you learn
about whole new worlds, where new friends and experiences are sure to be
yours. Enjoy!
Mitch Kapor
Chairman of the Board
Electronic Frontier Foundation
mkapor@eff.org
For comments, questions, or requests regarding EFF or the Big Dummy's Guide
to the Internet, send a note to ask@eff.org.
Preface
By Adam Gaffin,
Senior Writer, Network World, Framingham, Mass.
Welcome to the Internet! You're about to start a journey through a
unique land without frontiers, a place that is everywhere at once -- even
though it exists physically only as a series of electrical impulses.
You'll be joining a growing community of millions of people around the
world who use this global resource on a daily basis.
With this book, you will be able to use the Internet to:
= Stay in touch with friends, relatives and colleagues around the
world, at a fraction of the cost of phone calls or even air
mail.
= Discuss everything from archaeology to zoology with people in
several different languages.
= Tap into thousands of information databases and libraries
worldwide.
= Retrieve any of thousands of documents, journals, books and
computer programs.
= Stay up to date with wire-service news and sports and
with official weather reports.
= Play live, "real time" games with dozens of other people at once.
Connecting to "the Net" today, takes something of a sense of
adventure, a willingness to learn and an ability to take a deep breath
every once in awhile. Visiting the Net today is a lot like journeying to
a foreign country. There are so many things to see and do, but
everything at first will seem so, well, foreign.
When you first arrive, you won't be able to read the street signs.
You'll get lost. If you're unlucky, you may even run into some locals
who'd just as soon you went back to where you came from. If this
weren't enough, the entire country is constantly under construction;
every day, it seems like there's something new for you to figure out.
Fortunately, most of the locals are actually friendly. In fact, the
Net actually has a rich tradition of helping out visitors and newcomers.
Until very recently, there were few written guides for ordinary people,
and the Net grew largely through an "oral" tradition in which the old-
timers helped the newcomers.
So when you connect, don't be afraid to ask for help. You'll be
surprised at how many people will lend a hand!
Without such folks, in fact, this guide would not be possible. My
thanks to all the people who have written with suggestion, additions and
corrections since the Big Dummy's Guide first appeared on the Internet in
1993.
Special thanks go to my loving wife Nancy. I would also like to
thank the following people, who, whether they know it or not, provided
particular help.
Rhonda Chapman, Jim Cocks, Tom Czarnik, Christopher Davis, David
DeSimone, Jeanne deVoto, Phil Eschallier, Nico Garcia, Joe Granrose,
Joerg Heitkoetter, Joe Ilacqua, Jonathan Kamens, Peter Kaminski, Thomas
A. Kreeger, Stanton McCandlish, Leanne Phillips, Nancy Reynolds, Helen
Trillian Rose, Barry Shein, Jennifer "Moira" Smith, Gerard van der Leun
and Scott Yanoff.
If you have any suggestions or comments on how to make this guide
better, I'd love to hear them. You can reach me via e-mail at
adamg@world.std.com.
Boston, Mass., February, 1994.
Chapter 1: SETTING UP AND JACKING IN
1.1 READY, SET ...
The world is just a phone call away. With a computer and modem,
you'll be able to connect to the Internet, the world's largest computer
network (and if you're lucky, you won't even need the modem; many
colleges and companies now give their students or employees direct access
to the Internet).
The phone line can be your existing voice line -- just remember
that if you have any extensions, you (and everybody else in the house
or office) won't be able to use them for voice calls while you are connected
to the Net.
A modem is a sort of translator between computers and the phone
system. It's needed because computers and the phone system process and
transmit data, or information, in two different, and incompatible
ways. Computers "talk" digitally; that is, they store and process
information as a series of discrete numbers. The phone network relies
on analog signals, which on an oscilloscope would look like a series
of waves. When your computer is ready to transmit data to another
computer over a phone line, your modem converts the computer numbers
into these waves (which sound like a lot of screeching) -- it
"modulates" them. In turn, when information waves come into your
modem, it converts them into numbers your computer can process, by
"demodulating" them.
Increasingly, computers come with modems already installed. If
yours didn't, you'll have to decide what speed modem to get. Modem
speeds are judged in "bps rate" or bits per second. One bps means
the modem can transfer roughly one bit per second; the greater the
bps rate, the more quickly a modem can send and receive information.
A letter or character is made up of eight bits.
You can now buy a 2400-bps modem for well under $60 -- and most now
come with the ability to handle fax messages as well. At prices that now
start around $150, you can buy a modem that can transfer data at 14,400
bps (and often even faster, using special compression techniques). If you
think you might be using the Net to transfer large numbers of files, a
faster modem is always worth the price. It will dramatically reduce the
amount of time your modem or computer is tied up transferring files and, if
you are paying for Net access by the hour, will save you quite a bit in
online charges.
Like the computer to which it attaches, a modem is useless
without software to tell it how to work. Most modems today come with
easy-to-install software. Try the program out. If you find it
difficult to use or understand, consider a trip to the local software
store to find a better program. You can spend several hundred dollars
on a communications program, but unless you have very specialized
needs, this will be a waste of money, as there are a host of excellent
programs available for around $100 or less. Among the basic features you
want to look for are a choice of different "protocols" (more on them in a
bit) for transferring files to and from the Net and the ability to write
"script" or "command" files that let you automate such steps as logging
into a host system.
When you buy a modem and the software, ask the dealer how to
install and use them. Try out the software if you can. If the dealer
can't help you, find another dealer. You'll not only save yourself a
lot of frustration, you'll also have practiced the prime Internet
directive: "Ask. People Know."
To fully take advantage of the Net, you must spend a few minutes
going over the manuals or documentation that comes with your software.
There are a few things you should pay special attention to: uploading
and downloading; screen capturing (sometimes called "screen dumping");
logging; how to change protocols; and terminal emulation. It is also
essential to know how to convert a file created with your word
processing program into "ASCII" or "text" format, which will let you
share your thoughts with others across the Net.
Uploading is the process of sending a file from your computer to a
system on the Net. Downloading is retrieving a file from somewhere on
the Net to your computer. In general, things in cyberspace go "up" to
the Net and come "down" to you.
Chances are your software will come with a choice of several
"protocols" to use for these transfers. These protocols are systems
designed to ensure that line noise or static does not cause errors that
could ruin whatever information you are trying to transfer.
Essentially, when using a protocol, you are transferring a file in a
series of pieces. After each piece is sent or received, your computer
and the Net system compare it. If the two pieces don't match exactly,
they transfer it again, until they agree that the information they both
have is identical. If, after several tries, the information just
doesn't make it across, you'll either get an error message or your
screen will freeze. In that case, try it again. If, after five tries,
you are still stymied, something is wrong with a) the file; b) the
telephone line; c) the system you're connected to; or d) your own
computer.
From time to time, you will likely see messages on the Net that
you want to save for later viewing -- a recipe, a particularly witty
remark, something you want to write your congressman about, whatever.
This is where screen capturing and logging come in.
When you tell your communications software to capture a screen, it
opens a file in your computer (usually in the same directory or folder
used by the software) and "dumps" an image of whatever happens to be
on your screen at the time.
Logging works a bit differently. When you issue a logging
command, you tell the software to open a file (again, usually in the
same directory or folder as used by the software) and then give it a
name. Then, until you turn off the logging command, everything that
scrolls on your screen is copied into that file, sort of like
recording on videotape. This is useful for capturing long documents
that scroll for several pages -- using screen capture, you would have
to repeat the same command for each new screen.
Terminal emulation is a way for your computer to mimic, or
emulate, the way other computers put information on the screen and
accept commands from a keyboard. In general, most systems on the Net
use a system called VT100. Fortunately, almost all communications
programs now on the market support this system as well -- make sure
yours does.
You'll also have to know about protocols. There are several
different ways for computers to transmit characters. Fortunately,
there are only two protocols that you're likely to run across: 8-1-N
(which stands for "8 bits, 1 stop bit, no parity" -- yikes!) and 7-1-E
(7 bits, 1 stop bit, even parity).
In general, Unix-based systems use 7-1-E, while MS-DOS-based
systems use 8-1-N. What if you don't know what kind of system you're
connecting to? Try one of the settings. If you get what looks like
gobbledygook when you connect, you may need the other setting.
If so, you can either change the setting while connected, and then hit
enter, or hang up and try again with the other setting. It's also
possible your modem and the modem at the other end can't agree on the
right bps rate. If changing the protocols doesn't work, try using
another bps rate (but no faster than the one listed for your modem).
Don't worry, remember, you can't break anything! If something looks wrong,
it probably is wrong. Change your settings and try again. Nothing is
learned without trial, error and effort.
There are the basics. Now on to the Net!
1.2 GO!
Once, only people who studied or worked at an institution
directly tied to the Net could connect to the world. Today, though,
an ever-growing number of "public-access" systems provide access for
everybody. These systems can now be found in several states, and there
are a couple of sites that can provide access across the country.
There are two basic kinds of these host systems. The more common
one is known as a UUCP site (UUCP being a common way to transfer
information among computers using the Unix operating system) and
offers access to international electronic mail and conferences.
However, recent years have seen the growth of more powerful sites
that let you tap into the full power of the Net. These Internet sites
not only give you access to electronic mail and conferences but to
such services as databases, libraries and huge file and program
collections around the world. They are also fast -- as soon as you
finish writing a message, it gets zapped out to its destination.
Some sites are run by for-profit companies; others by non-profit
organizations. Some of these public-access, or host, systems, are
free of charge. Others charge a monthly or yearly fee for unlimited
access. And a few charge by the hour. Systems that charge for access
will usually let you sign up online with a credit card. Some also let
you set up a billing system.
But cost should be only one consideration in choosing a host
system, especially if you live in an area with more than one provider.
Most systems let you look around before you sign up. What is the range
of each of their services? How easy is each to use? What kind of support or
help can you get from the system administrators?
The last two questions are particularly important because many
systems provide no user interface at all; when you connect, you are
dumped right into the Unix operating system. If you're already
familiar with Unix, or you want to learn how to use it, these systems
offer phenomenal power -- in addition to Net access, most also let you
tap into the power of Unix to do everything from compiling your own
programs to playing online games.
But if you don't want to have to learn Unix, there are other
public-access systems that work through menus (just like the ones in
restaurants; you are shown a list of choices and then you make your
selection of what you want), or which provide a "user interface" that
is easier to figure out than the ever cryptic Unix.
If you don't want or need access to the full range of Internet
services, a UUCP site makes good financial sense. They tend to charge
less than commercial Internet providers, although their messages may
not go out as quickly.
Some systems also have their own unique local services, which can
range from extensive conferences to large file libraries.
1.3 PUBLIC-ACCESS INTERNET PROVIDERS
When you have your communications program dial one of these host
systems, one of two things will happen when you connect. You'll
either see a lot of gibberish on your screen, or you'll be asked to
log in. If you see gibberish, chances are you have to change your
software's parameters (to 7-1-E or 8-1-N as the case may be). Hang
up, make the change and then dial in again.
When you've connected, chances are you'll see something like
this:
Welcome to THE WORLD
Public Access UNIX for the '90s
Login as 'new' if you do not have an account
login:
That last line is a prompt asking you to do something. Since
this is your first call, type
new
and hit enter. Often, when you're asked to type something by a host
system, you'll be told what to type in quotation marks (for example,
'new'). Don't include the quotation marks. Repeat: Don't
include the quotation marks.
What you see next depends on the system, but will generally
consist of information about its costs and services (you might want to
turn on your communication software's logging function, to save this
information). You'll likely be asked if you want to establish an
account now or just look around the system.
You'll also likely be asked for your "user name." This is not
your full name, but a one-word name you want to use while online. It
can be any combination of letters or numbers, all in lower case. Many
people use their first initial and last name (for example,
"jdoe"); their first name and the first letter of their last name
(for example, "johnd"); or their initials ("jxd"). Others use a
nickname. You might want to think about this for a second, because this
user name will become part of your electronic-mail address (see chapter
2 for more on that). The one exception are the various Free-Net
systems, all of which assign you a user name consisting of an arbitrary
sequence of letters and numbers.
You are now on the Net. Look around the system. See if there
are any help files for you to read. If it's a menu-based host system,
choose different options just to see what happens. Remember: You can't
break anything. The more you play, the more comfortable you'll be.
What follows is a list of public-access Internet sites, which are
computer systems that offer access to the Net. All offer international
e-mail and Usenet (international conferences). In addition, they offer:
FTP: File-transfer protocol -- access to hundreds of file
libraries (everything from computer software to historical
documents to song lyrics). You'll be able to transfer
these files from the Net to your own computer.
Telnet: Access to databases, computerized library card
catalogs, weather reports and other information services,
as well as live, online games that let you compete with
players from around the world.
Additional services that may be offered include:
WAIS: Wide-area Information Server; a program that
can search dozens of databases in one search.
Gopher: A program that gives you easy access to dozens
of other online databases and services by making
selections on a menu. You'll also be able to use these
to copy text files and some programs to your mailbox.
IRC: Internet Relay Chat, a CB simulator that lets
you have live keyboard chats with people around the
world.
However, even on systems that do not provide these services
directly, you will be able to use a number of them through telnet (see
Chapter 6). In the list that follows,
systems that let you access services through menus are noted; otherwise
assume that when you connect, you'll be dumped right into Unix (a.k.a.
MS-DOS with a college degree). Several of these sites are available
nationwide through national data networks such as the CompuServe Packet
Network and SprintNet.
Please note that all listed charges are subject to change. Many
sites require new or prospective users to log on a particular way on
their first call; this list provides the name you'll use in such cases.
ALABAMA
Huntsville. Nuance. Call voice number for modem number. $35 setup;
$25 a month. Voice: (205) 533-4296.
ALASKA
Anchorage. University of Alaska Southeast, Tundra Services, (907)
789-1314; has local dial-in service in several other cities. $20 a month.
Voice: (907) 465-6453.
ALBERTA
Edmonton. PUCNet Computer Connections, (403) 484-5640. Log
on as: guest. $10 setup fee; $25 for 20 hours a month plus $6.25 an hour
for access to ftp and telnet. Voice: (403) 448-1901.
ARIZONA
Tucson. Data Basics, (602) 721-5887. $25 a month or $180 a year.
Voice: (602) 721-1988.
Phoenix/Tucson. Internet Direct, (602) 274-9600 (Phoenix); (602)
321-9600 (Tucson). Log on as: guest. $20 a month. Voice: (602) 274-0100
(Phoenix); (602) 324-0100 (Tucson).
BRITISH COLUMBIA
Victoria Victoria Free-Net, (604) 595-2300. Menus. Access to all
features requires completion of a written form. Users can "link" to
other Free-Net systems in Canada and the United States. Free. Log on as:
guest Voice: (604) 389-6026.
CALIFORNIA
Berkeley. Holonet. Menus. For free trial, modem number is (510)
704-1058. For information or local numbers, call the voice number. $60 a
year for local access, $2 an hour during offpeak hours. Voice: (510)
704-0160.
Cupertino. Portal. Both Unix and menus. (408) 725-0561 (2400
bps); (408) 973-8091 (9600/14,400 bps). $19.95 setup fee, $19.95 a month.
Voice: (408) 973-9111.
Irvine. Dial N' CERF. See under San Diego.
Los Angeles/Orange County. Kaiwan Public Access Internet, (714)
539-5726; (310) 527-7358. $15 signup; $11 a month (credit card). Voice:
(714) 638-2139.
Los Angeles. Dial N' CERF. See under San Diego.
Oakland. Dial N' CERF. See under San Diego.
Pasadena. Dial N' CERF See under San Diego.
Palo Alto. Institute for Global Communications., (415) 322-0284.
Unix. Local conferences on environmental/peace issues. Log on as: new.
$10 a month and $3 an hour after first hour. Voice: (415) 442-0220.
San Diego. Dial N' CERF USA, run by the California Education and
Research Federation. Provides local dial-up numbers in San Diego, Los
Angeles, Oakland, Pasadena and Irvine. For more information, call voice
(800) 876-CERF or (619) 534-5087. $50 setup fee; $20 a month plus $5 an
hour ($3 on weekends). Voice: (800) 876-2373.
San Diego. CTS Network Services, (619) 637-3660. Log on as:
help. $15 set-up fee, monthly fee of $10 to $23 depending on services
used. Voice: (619) 637-3637.
San Diego. Cyberspace Station, (619) 634-1376. Unix. Log on as:
guest. Charges: $10 sign-up fee; $15 a month or $60 for six months.
San Francisco. Pathways, call voice number for number. Menus. $25
setup fee; $8 a month and $3 an hour. Voice: (415) 346-4188.
San Jose. Netcom, (510) 865-9004 or 426-6610; (408) 241-9760;
(415) 424-0131, up to 9600 bps. Unix. Maintains archives of Usenet
postings. Log on as: guest. $15 startup fee and then $17.50 a month for
unlimited use if you agree to automatic billing of your credit-card
account (otherwise $19.50 a month for a monthly invoice). Voice: (408)
554-UNIX.
San Jose. A2i, (408) 293-9010. Log on as: guest. $20 a month; $45
for three months; $72 for six months.
Sausalito. The Whole Earth 'Lectronic Link (WELL), (415) 332-
6106. Uses moderately difficult Picospan software, which is sort of a
cross between Unix and a menu system. New users get a written manual.
More than 200 WELL-only conferences. Log on as: newuser. $15 a month
plus $2 an hour. Access through the nationwide CompuServe Packet Network
available for another $4.50 an hour. Voice: (415) 332-4335. Recorded
message about the system's current status: (800) 326-8354 (continental U.S.
only).
COLORADO
Colorado Springs/Denver. CNS, (719) 570-1700 (Colorado Springs);
(303) 758-2656 (Denver). Local calendar listings and ski and stock
reports. Users can choose between menus or Unix. Log on as: new. $35
setup fee; $2.75 an hour (minimum fee of $10 a month). Voice: (719) 592-
1240.
Colorado Springs. Old Colorado City Communications, (719) 632-
4111. Log on as: newuser. $25 a month. Voice: (719) 632-4848.
Denver. Denver Free-Net, (303) 270-4865. Menus. Access to all
services requires completion of a written form. Users can "link" to
other Free-Net systems across the country. Free. Log on as: guest.
Golden. Colorado SuperNet. E-mail to fax service. Available only
to Colorado residents. Local dial-in numbers available in several
Colorado cities. For dial-in numbers, call the number below. $3 an hour
($1 an hour between midnight and 6 a.m.); one-time $20 sign-up fee.
Voice: (303) 273-3471.
DELAWARE
Middletown. Systems Solutions, (302) 378-1881. $20 setup fee; $25 a
month for full Internet access. Voice: (800) 331-1386
FLORIDA
Talahassee. Talahassee Free-Net, (904) 488-5056. Menus. Full access
requires completion of a registration form. Can "link" to other Free-Net
systems around the country. Voice: (904) 488-5056.
GEORGIA
Atlanta. Netcom, (303) 758-0101. See under Los Angeles,
California, for information on rates.
ILLINOIS
Champaign. Prarienet Free-Net, (217) 255-9000. Menus. Log on as:
visitor. Free for Illinois residents; $25 a year for others. Voice: (217)
244-1962.
Chicago. MCSNet, (312) 248-0900. $25/month or $65 for three months
of unlimited access; $30 for three months of access at 15 hours a month.
Voice: (312) 248-UNIX.
Peoria. Peoria Free-Net, (309) 674-1100. Similar to Cleveland
Free-Net (see Ohio, below). Users can "link" to the larger Cleveland
system for access to Usenet and other services. There are also Peoria
Free-Net public-access terminals in numerous area libraries,
other government buildings and senior-citizen centers. Contact the
number below for specific locations. Full access (including access to
e-mail) requires completion of a written application. Free. Voice: (309)
677-2544.
MARYLAND
Baltimore. Express Access, (410) 766-1855; (301) 220-0462; (714)
377-9784. Log on as: new. $20 setup fee; $25 a month or $250 a year.
Voice: (800 969-9090.
Baltimore. Clarknet, (410) 730-9786; (410) 995-0271; (301) 596-
1626; (301) 854-0446. Log on as: guest. $23 a month, $126 for six months
or $228 a year. Voice: (410) 730-9765.
MASSACHUSETTS
Bedford. The Internet Access Company, (617) 275-0331. To log on,
follow on-line prompts. $20 setup fee; $19.50 a month. Voice: (617)
275-2221.
Brookline. The World, (617) 739-9753. "Online Book Initiative"
collection of electronic books, poetry and other text files. Log on as:
new. $5 a month plus $2 an hour or $20 for 20 hours a month. Available
nationwide through the CompuServe Packet Network for another $5.60 an hour.
Voice: (617) 739-0202.
Lynn. North Shore Access, (617) 593-4557. Log on as: new. $10 for
10 hours a month; $1 an hour after that. Voice: (617) 593-3110.
Worcester. NovaLink, (508) 754-4009. Log on as: info. $12.95 sign-up
(includes first two hours); $9.95 a month (includes five daytime hours),
$1.80 an hour after that. Voice: (800) 274-2814.
MICHIGAN
Ann Arbor. MSEN. Call voice number for dial-in number. Unix.
Charges: $20 setup; $20 a month. Voice: (313) 998-4562.
Ann Arbor. Michnet. Has local dial-in numbers in several Michigan
numbers. For local numbers, call voice number below. $35 a month plus
one-time $40 sign-up fee. Additional network fees for access through
non-Michnet numbers. Voice: (313) 764-9430.
NEW HAMPSHIRE
Manchester. MV Communications, Inc. For local dial-up numbers call
voice line below. $5 a month mininum plus variable hourly rates
depending on services used. Voice: (603) 429-2223.
NEW JERSEY
New Brunswick. Digital Express, (908) 937-9481. Log on as: new.
$20 setup fee; $25 a month or $250 a year. Voice: (800) 969-9090.
NEW YORK
New York. Panix, (212) 787-3100. Unix or menus. Log on as:
newuser. $40 setup fee; $19 a month or $208 a year. Voice: (212) 877-
4854.
New York. Echo, (212) 989-8411. Unix, but with local
conferencing software. Log on as: newuser. $19.95 ($13.75 students and
seniors) a month. Voice: (212) 255-3839.
New York. MindVox, (212) 989-4141. Local conferences. Log on as:
guest. $10 setup fee for non-credit-card accounts; $15 a month. Voice:
(212) 989-2418.
New York. Pipeline, (212) 267-8606 (9600 bps and higher); (212)
267-7341 (2400 bps). Offers graphical interface for Windows for $90. Log
on as: guest. $20 a month and $2 an hour after first 20 hours or $35 a
month unlimited hours. Voice: (212) 267-3636.
New York. Maestro, (212) 240-9700. Log on as: newuser. $12 a month
or $140 a year. Voice: (212) 240-9600.
NORTH CAROLINA
Charlotte. Vnet Internet Access, (704) 347-8839; (919) 406-1544.
Log on as: new. $25 a month. Voice: (704) 374-0779.
Triangle Research Park. Rock Concert Net. Call number below for
local modem numbers in various North Carolina cities. $30 a month; one-
time $50 sign-up fee. Voice: (919) 248-1999.
OHIO
Cleveland. Cleveland Free-Net, (216) 368-3888. Ohio and US Supreme
Court decisions, historical documents, many local conferences. Full
access (including access to e-mail) requires completion of a written
application. Free. Voice: (216) 368-8737.
Cincinnati. Tri-State Free-Net, (513) 579-1990. Similar to
Cleveland Free-Net. Full access (including access to e-mail) requires
completion of a written application. Free.
Cleveland. Wariat, (216) 481-9436. Unix or menus. $20 setup fee;
$35 a month. Voice: (216) 481-9428.
Dayton. Freelance Systems Programming, (513) 258-7745. $20 setup
fee; $1 an hour. Voice: (513) 254-7246.
Lorain. Lorain County Free-Net, (216) 277-2359 or 366-9753.
Similar to Cleveland Free-Net. Users can "link" to the larger
Cleveland system for additional services. Full access (including
access to e-mail) requires completion of a written application. Free.
Voice: (216) 366-4200.
Medina. Medina Free-Net, (216) 723-6732, 225-6732 or 335-6732.
Users can "link" to the larger Cleveland Free-Net for additional
services. Full access (including access to e-mail) requires
completion of a written application. Free.
Youngstown. Youngstown Free-Net, (216) 742-3072. Users can
"link" to the Cleveland system for services not found locally. Full
access (including access to e-mail) requires completion of a written
application. Free.
ONTARIO
Ottawa. National Capital FreeNet, (613) 780-3733 or (613) 564-3600.
Free, but requires completion of a written form for access to all
services.
Toronto. UUNorth. Call voice number below for local dial-in
numbers. $20 startup fee; $25 for 20 hours a month of offpeak use. Voice:
(416) 225-8649.
Toronto. Internex Online, (416) 363-3783. Both Unix and menus. $40
a year for one hour a day. Voice: (416) 363-8676.
OREGON
Portland. Agora, (503) 293-1772 (2400 bps), (503) 293-2059 (9600
bps or higher). Log on as: apply. $6 a month for one hour per day.
Portland. Teleport, (503) 220-0636 (2400 bps); (503) 220-1016
(9600 and higher). Log on as: new. $10 a month for one hour per day.
Voice: (503) 223-4245.
PENNSYLVANIA
Pittsburgh. Telerama, (412) 481-5302. $6 for 10 hours a month, 60
cents for each additional hour. Voice: (412) 481-3505.
QUEBEC
Montreal. Communications Accessibles Montreal, (514) 931-7178 (9600
bps); (514) 931-2333 (2400 bps). $25 a month. Voice: (514) 931-0749.
RHODE ISLAND
East Greenwich. IDS World Network, (401) 884-9002. In addition
to Usenet, has conferences from the Fidonet and RIME networks. $10 a
month; $50 for six months; $100 for a year.
Providence/Seekonk. Anomaly, (401) 331-3706. $125 for six months
or $200 a year. Educational rate of $75 for six months or $125 a year.
Voice: (401) 273-4669.
TEXAS
Austin. RealTime Communications, (512) 459-4391. Log on as: new.
$75 a year. Voice: (512) 451-0046.
Dallas. Texas Metronet, (214) 705-2901; (817) 261-1127. Log on as:
info or signup. $10 to $35 setup fee, depending on service; $10 to $45 a
month, depending on service. Voice: (214) 705-2900 or (817) 543-8756.
Houston. The Black Box, (713) 480-2686. $21.65 a month. Voice: (713)
480-2684.
VIRGINIA
Norfolk/Peninsula. Wyvern Technologies, (804) 627-1828 (Norfolk);
(804) 886-0662 (Peninsula). $10 startup fee; $15 a month or $144 a year.
Voice: (804) 622-4289.
WASHINGTON, DC
The Meta Network. Call voice number below for local dial-in
numbers. Caucus conferencing, menus. $15 setup fee; $20 a month. Voice:
(703) 243-6622.
CapAccess, (202), 784-1523. Log on as guest with a password of
visitor. A Free-Net system (see under Cleveland, Ohio, for information).
Free. Voice: (202) 994-4245.
See also: listing under Baltimore, MD for Express Access and
Clarknet.
WASHINGTON STATE
Seattle. Halcyon, (206) 382-6245. Users can choose between menus
and Unix. Log on as: new. $10 setup fee; $60 a quarter or $200 a year.
Voice: (206) 955-1050.
Seattle. Eskimo North, (206) 367-3837 (all speeds), (206) 362-6731
(9600/14.4K bps). $10 a month or $96 a year. Voice: (206) 367-7457.
UNITED KINGDOM
London. Demon Internet Systems, 44 (0)81 343 4848. 12.50 setup
fee; 10 a month or 132.50 a year. Voice: 44 (0)81 349 0063
1.4 IF YOUR TOWN HAS NO DIRECT ACCESS
If you don't live in an area with a public-access site, you'll still
be able to connect to the Net. Several services offer access
through national data networks such as the CompuServe Packet Network and
SprintNet, which have dozens, even hundreds of local dial-in numbers across
the country. These include Holonet in Berkeley, Calf., Portal in
Cupertino, Calf., the WELL in Sausalito, Calf., Dial 'N CERF in San Diego,
Calf., the World in Brookline, Mass., and Michnet in Ann Arbor, Mich. Dial
'N CERF offers access through an 800 number. Expect to pay from $2 to $12
an hour to use these networks, above each provider's basic charges. The
exact amount depends on the network, time of day and type of modem you use.
For more information, contact the above services.
Four other providers deliver Net access to users across the
country:
Delphi, based in Cambridge, Mass., is a consumer-oriented network
much like CompuServe or America Online -- only it now offers
subscribers access to Internet services. Delphi charges: $3 a month for
Internet access, in addition to standard charges. These are $10 a month
for four hours of off-peak (non-working hours) access a month and $4 an
hour for each additional hour or $20 for 20 hours of access a month and
$1.80 an hour for each additional hour. For more information, call (800)
695-4005.
BIX (the Byte Information Exchange) offers FTP, Telnet and e-mail
access to the Internet as part of their basic service. Owned by the same
company as Delphi, it also offers 20 hours of access a month for $20.
For more information, call (800) 695-4775.
PSI, based in Reston, Va., provides nationwide access to Internet
services through scores of local dial-in numbers to owners of IBM and
compatible computers. PSILink. which includes access to e-mail,
Usenet and ftp, costs $29 a month, plus a one-time $19 registration
fee. Special software is required, but is available free from PSI.
PSI's Global Dialup Service provides access to telnet for $39 a month
plus a one-time $39 set-up fee. For more information, call (800)
82PSI82 or (703) 620-6651.
NovX Systems Integration, based in Seattle, Washington, offers full
Internet access through an 800 number reachable across the United States.
There is a $24.95 setup fee, in addition to a monthly fee of $19.95 and a
$10.5 hourly charge. For more information, call (206) 447-0800.
1.5 NET ORIGINS
In the 1960s, researchers began experimenting with linking computers
to each other and to people through telephone hook-ups, using funds from
the U.S Defense Department's Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA).
ARPA wanted to see if computers in different locations could be
linked using a new technology known as packet switching. This technology,
in which data meant for another location is broken up into little pieces,
each with its own "forwarding address" had the promise of letting several
users share just one communications line. Just as important, from ARPA's
viewpoint, was that this allowed for creation of networks that could
automatically route data around downed circuits or computers. ARPA's
goal was not the creation of today's international computer-using
community, but development of a data network that could survive a nuclear
attack.
Previous computer networking efforts had required a line between
each computer on the network, sort of like a one-track train route. The
packet system allowed for creation of a data highway, in which large
numbers of vehicles could essentially share the same lane. Each packet
was given the computer equivalent of a map and a time stamp, so that it
could be sent to the right destination, where it would then be
reassembled into a message the computer or a human could use.
This system allowed computers to share data and the researchers to
exchange electronic mail, or e-mail. In itself, e-mail was something
of a revolution, offering the ability to send detailed letters at the
speed of a phone call.
As this system, known as ARPANet, grew, some enterprising college
students (and one in high school) developed a way to use it to conduct
online conferences. These started as science-oriented discussions, but
they soon branched out into virtually every other field, as people
recognized the power of being able to "talk" to hundreds, or even
thousands, of people around the country.
In the 1970s, ARPA helped support the development of rules, or
protocols, for transferring data between different types of computer
networks. These "internet" (from "internetworking") protocols made it
possible to develop the worldwide Net we have today that links all sorts
of computers across national boundaries. By the close of the 1970s, links
developed between ARPANet and counterparts in other countries. The world
was now tied together in a computer web.
In the 1980s, this network of networks, which became known
collectively as the Internet, expanded at a phenomenal rate. Hundreds,
then thousands, of colleges, research companies and government agencies
began to connect their computers to this worldwide Net. Some
enterprising hobbyists and companies unwilling to pay the high costs of
Internet access (or unable to meet stringent government regulations for
access) learned how to link their own systems to the Internet, even if
"only" for e-mail and conferences. Some of these systems began
offering access to the public. Now anybody with a computer and modem --
and persistence -- could tap into the world.
In the 1990s, the Net continues to grow at exponential rates. Some
estimates are that the volume of messages transferred through the Net
grows 20 percent a month. In response, government and other users have
tried in recent years to expand the Net itself. Once, the main Net
"backbone" in the U.S. moved data at 56,000 bits per second. That proved
too slow for the ever increasing amounts of data being sent over it, and
in recent years the maximum speed was increased to 1.5 million and then
45 million bits per second. Even before the Net was able to reach that
latter speed, however, Net experts were already figuring out ways to pump
data at speeds of up to 2 billion bits per second -- fast enough to send
the entire Encyclopedia Britannica across the country in just one or two
seconds. Another major change has been the development of commercial
services that provide internetworking services at speeds comparable to
those of the government system. In fact, by mid-1994, the U.S.
government will remove itself from any day-to-day control over the
workings of the Net, as regional and national providers continue to
expand.
1.6 HOW IT WORKS
The worldwide Net is actually a complex web of smaller regional
networks. To understand it, picture a modern road network of trans-
continental superhighways connecting large cities. From these large cities
come smaller freeways and parkways to link together small towns, whose
residents travel on slower, narrow residential ways.
The Net superhighway is the high-speed Internet. Connected to
this are computers that use a particular system of transferring data
at high speeds. In the U.S., the major Internet "backbone"
theoretically can move data at rates of 45 million bits per second
(compare this to the average home modem, which has a top speed of roughly
9,600 to 14,400 bits per second).
Connected to the backbone computers are smaller networks serving
particular geographic regions, which generally move data at speeds
around 1.5 million bits per second.
Feeding off these in turn are even smaller networks or individual
computers.
Unlike with commercial networks such as CompuServe or Prodigy, there
is no one central computer or computers running the Internet -- its
resources are to be found among thousands of individual computers. This
is both its greatest strength and its greatest weakness. The approach
means it is virtually impossible for the entire Net to crash at once --
even if one computer shuts down, the rest of the network stays up. The
design also reduces the costs for an individual or organization to get
onto the network. But thousands of connected computers can also make it
difficult to navigate the Net and find what you want -- especially as
different computers may have different commands for plumbing their
resources. It is only recently that Net users have begun to develop the
sorts of navigational tools and "maps" that will let neophytes get around
without getting lost.
Nobody really knows how many computers and networks actually make
up this Net. Some estimates say there are now as many as 5,000
networks connecting nearly 2 million computers and more than 15 million
people around the world. Whatever the actual numbers, however, it is
clear they are only increasing.
The Net is more than just a technological marvel. It is human
communication at its most fundamental level. The pace may be a little
quicker when the messages race around the world in a few seconds, but
it's not much different from a large and interesting party. You'll see
things in cyberspace that will make you laugh; you'll see things that
will anger you. You'll read silly little snippets and new ideas that
make you think. You'll make new friends and meet people you wish would
just go away.
Major network providers continue to work on ways to make it
easier for users of one network to communicate with those of another.
Work is underway on a system for providing a universal "white pages"
in which you could look up somebody's electronic-mail address, for
example. This connectivity trend will likely speed up in coming years
as users begin to demand seamless network access, much as telephone
users can now dial almost anywhere in the world without worrying about
how many phone companies actually have to connect their calls.
And today, the links grow ever closer between the Internet and such
commercial networks as CompuServe and Prodigy, whose users can now
exchange electronic mail with their Internet friends. Some commercial
providers, such as Delphi and America Online, are working to bring their
subscribers direct access to Internet services.
And as it becomes easier to use, more and more people will join
this worldwide community we call the Net.
Being connected to the Net takes more than just reading
conferences and logging messages to your computer; it takes asking and
answering questions, exchanging opinions -- getting involved.
If you choose to go forward, to use and contribute, you will become
a citizen of Cyberspace. If you're reading these words for the first
time, this may seem like an amusing but unlikely notion -- that one
could "inhabit" a place without physical space. But put a mark beside
these words. Join the Net and actively participate for a year. Then
re-read this passage. It will no longer seem so strange to be a
"citizen of Cyberspace." It will seem like the most natural thing in
the world.
And that leads to another fundamental thing to remember:
You can't break the Net!
As you travel the Net, your computer may freeze, your screen may
erupt into a mass of gibberish. You may think you've just disabled a
million-dollar computer somewhere -- or even your own personal
computer. Sooner or later, this feeling happens to everyone -- and
likely more than once. But the Net and your computer are hardier than
you think, so relax. You can no more break the Net than you can the
phone system. If something goes wrong, try again. If nothing at all
happens, you can always disconnect. If worse comes to worse, you can
turn off your computer. Then take a deep breath. And dial right back
in. Leave a note for the person who runs the computer to which you've
connected to ask for advice. Try it again. Persistence pays.
Stay and contribute. The Net will be richer for it -- and so will
you.
1.7 WHEN THINGS GO WRONG
* Your computer connects with a public-access site and get gibberish
on your screen.
If you are using parameters of 8-1-N, try 7-1-e (or vice-versa). If
that doesn't work, try another modem speed.
* You have your computer dial a public-access site, but nothing
happens.
Check the phone number you typed in. If correct, turn on your modem's
speaker (on Hayes-compatible modems, you can usually do this by typing ATM1
in your communications software's "terminal mode"). If the phone just
rings and rings, the public-access site could be down for maintenance or
due to a crash or some other problem. If you get a "connect" message, but
nothing else, try hitting enter or escape a couple of times.
* You try to log in, but after you type your password, nothing
happens, or you get a "timed out" message followed by a disconnect.
Re-dial the number and try it again.
* Always remember, if you have a problem that just doesn't go away,
ask! Ask your system administrator, ask a friend, but ask. Somebody will
know what to do.
1.8 FYI
The Net grows so fast that even the best guide to its resources
would be somewhat outdated the day it was printed. At the end of each
chapter, however, you'll find FYI pointers to places on the Net where you
can go for more information or to keep updated on new resources and
services.
Peter Kaminski maintains a list of systems that provide public
access to Internet services. It's availble on the network itself, which
obviously does you little good if you currently have no access, but which
can prove invaluable should you move or want to find a new system. Look
for his "PDIAL" file in the alt.bbs.lists or news.answers newsgroups in
Usenet (for information on accessing Usenet, see Chapter 3).
Steven Levy's book, "Hackers: Heroes of the Computer Revolution,"
(Anchor Press/Doubleday, 1984). describes the early culture and ethos
that ultimately resulted in the Internet and Usenet.
John Quarterman's "The Matrix: Computer Networks and Conferencing
Systems Worldwide" (Digital Press, 1990) is an exhaustive look at
computer networks and how they connect with each other.
You'll find numerous documents about the Internet, its history and
its resources in the pub/Net_info directory on the Electronic Frontier
Foundation's FTP server (see chapter 7 to decipher this).
Chapter 2: E-MAIL
2.1 THE BASICS
Electronic mail, or e-mail, is your personal connection to the
world of the Net.
All of the millions of people around the world who use the
Net have their own e-mail addresses. A growing number of "gateways" tie
more and more people to the Net every day. When you logged onto the host
system you are now using, it automatically generated an address for you,
as well.
The basic concepts behind e-mail parallel those of regular mail.
You send mail to people at their particular addresses. In turn, they
write to you at your e-mail address. You can subscribe to the
electronic equivalent of magazines and newspapers. You might even get
electronic junk mail.
E-mail has two distinct advantages over regular mail. The most
obvious is speed. Instead of several days, your message can reach the
other side of the world in hours, minutes or even seconds (depending on
where you drop off your mail and the state of the connections between
there and your recipient). The other advantage is that once you master
the basics, you'll be able to use e-mail to access databases and file
libraries. You'll see how to do this later, along with learning how to
transfer program and data files through e-mail.
E-mail also has advantages over the telephone. You send your
message when it's convenient for you. Your recipients respond at their
convenience. No more telephone tag. And while a phone call across
the country or around the world can quickly result in huge phone
bills, e-mail lets you exchange vast amounts of mail for only a few
pennies -- even if the other person is in New Zealand.
E-mail is your connection to help -- your Net lifeline. The
Net can sometimes seem a frustrating place! No matter how hard you
try, no matter where you look, you just might not be able to find the
answer to whatever is causing you problems. But when you know how to
use e-mail, help is often just a few keystrokes away: you can ask your
system administrator or a friend for help in an e-mail message.
The quickest way to start learning e-mail is to send yourself a
message. Most public-access sites actually have several different types
of mail systems, all of which let you both send and receive mail. We'll
start with the simplest one, known, appropriately enough, as "mail," and
then look at a couple of other interfaces. At your host system's command
prompt, type:
mail username
where username is the name you gave yourself when you first logged on.
Hit enter. The computer might respond with
subject:
Type
test
or, actually, anything at all (but you'll have to hit enter before
you get to the end of the screen). Hit enter.
The cursor will drop down a line. You can now begin writing the
actual message. Type a sentence, again, anything at all. And here's
where you hit your first Unix frustration, one that will bug you
repeatedly: you have to hit enter before you get to the very end of the
line. Just like typewriters, many Unix programs have no word-wrapping
(although there are ways to get some Unix text processors, such as emacs,
to word-wrap).
When done with your message, hit return. Now hit control-D (the
control and the D keys at the same time). This is a Unix command that
tells the computer you're done writing and that it should close your
"envelope" and mail it off (you could also hit enter once and then, on
a blank line, type a period at the beginning of the line and hit enter
again).
You've just sent your first e-mail message. And because you're
sending mail to yourself, rather than to someone somewhere else on the
Net, your message has already arrived, as we'll see in a moment.
If you had wanted, you could have even written your message on
your own computer and then uploaded it into this electronic
"envelope." There are a couple of good reasons to do this with long
or involved messages. One is that once you hit enter at the end of a
line in "mail" you can't readily fix any mistakes on that line (unless
you use some special commands to call up a Unix text processor). Also,
if you are paying for access by the hour, uploading a prepared
message can save you money. Remember to save the document in ASCII or
text format. Uploading a document you've created in a word processor
that uses special formatting commands (which these days means many
programs) will cause strange effects.
When you get that blank line after the subject line, upload the
message using the ASCII protocol. Or you can copy and paste the text,
if your software allows that. When done, hit control-D as above.
Now you have mail waiting for you. Normally, when you log on,
your public-access site will tell you whether you have new mail
waiting. To open your mailbox and see your waiting mail, type
mail
and hit enter.
When the host system sees "mail" without a name after it, it
knows you want to look in your mailbox rather than send a message.
Your screen, on a plain-vanilla Unix system will display:
Mail version SMI 4.0 Mon Apr 24 18:34:15 PDT 1989 Type ? for help.
"/usr/spool/mail/adamg": 1 message 1 new 1 unread
>N 1 adamg Sat Jan 15 20:04 12/290 test
Ignore the first line; it's just computerese of value only to the
people who run your system. You can type a question mark and hit
return, but unless you're familiar with Unix, most of what you'll see
won't make much sense at this point.
The second line tells you the directory on the host system where
your mail messages are put, which again, is not something you'll likely
need to know. The second line also tells you how many messages are in your
mailbox, how many have come in since the last time you looked and how
many messages you haven't read yet.
It's the third line that is of real interest -- it tells you who
the message is from, when it arrived, how many lines and characters
it takes up, and what the subject is. The "N" means it is a new
message -- it arrived after the last time you looked in your mailbox.
Hit enter. And there's your message -- only now it's a lot
longer than what you wrote!
Message 1:
From adamg Jan 15 20:04:55 1994
Received: by eff.org id AA28949
(5.65c/IDA-1.4.4/pen-ident for adamg); Sat, 15 Jan 1994 20:04:55 -0400
(ident-sender: adamg@eff.org)
Date: Sat, 15 Jan 1994 21:34:55 -0400
From: Adam Gaffin <adamg>
Message-Id: <199204270134.AA28949@eff.org>
To: adamg
Subject: test
Status: R
This is only a test!
Whoa! What is all that stuff? It's your message with a postmark
gone mad. Just as the postal service puts its marks on every piece of
mail it handles, so do Net postal systems. Only it's called a
"header" instead of a postmark. Each system that handles or routes
your mail puts its stamp on it. Since many messages go through a
number of systems on their way to you, you will often get messages
with headers that seem to go on forever. Among other things, a header
will tell you exactly when a message was sent and received (even the
difference between your local time and Greenwich Mean Time -- as at the end
of line 4 above).
If this had been a long message, it would just keep scrolling
across and down your screen -- unless the people who run your public-
access site have set it up to pause every 24 lines. One way to deal
with a message that doesn't stop is to use your telecommunication
software's logging or text-buffer function. Start it before you hit
the number of the message you want to see. Your computer will ask you
what you want to call the file you're about to create. After you name
the file and hit enter, type the number of the message you want to see
and hit enter. When the message finishes scrolling, turn off the
text-buffer function. The message is now saved in your computer.
This way, you can read the message while not connected to the Net
(which can save you money if you're paying by the hour) and write a
reply offline.
But in the meantime, now what? You can respond to the message,
delete it or save it. To respond, type a lowercase r and hit
enter. You'll get something like this:
To: adamg
Subject: Re: test
Note that this time, you don't have to enter a user name. The
computer takes it from the message you're replying to and
automatically addresses your message to its sender. The computer also
automatically inserts a subject line, by adding "Re:" to the original
subject. From here, it's just like writing a new message. But say you
change your mind and decide not to reply after all. How do you get out
of the message? Hit control-C once. You'll get this:
(Interrupt -- one more to kill letter)
If you hit control-C once more, the message will disappear and you'll
get back to your mail's command line.
Now, if you type a lowercase d and then hit enter, you'll
delete the original message. Type a lowercase q to exit your
mailbox.
If you type a q without first hitting d, your message is
transferred to a file called mbox. This file is where all read, but
un-deleted messages go. If you want to leave it in your mailbox for
now, type a lowercase x and hit enter. This gets you out of mail
without making any changes.
The mbox file works a lot like your mailbox. To access it,
type
mail -f mbox
at your host system's command line and hit enter.
You'll get a menu identical to the one in your mailbox from which
you can read these old messages, delete them or respond to them. It's
probably a good idea to clear out your mailbox and mbox file from
time to time, if only to keep them uncluttered.
Are there any drawbacks to e-mail? There are a few. One is that
people seem more willing to fly off the handle electronically than in
person, or over the phone. Maybe it's because it's so easy to hit r
and reply to a message without pausing and reflecting a moment.
That's why we have smileys (see section 2.4)! There's no online
equivalent yet of a return receipt: chances are your message got to where
it's going, but there's no absolute way for you to know for sure unless
you get a reply from the other person.
So now you're ready to send e-mail to other people on the Net.
Of course, you need somebody's address to send them mail. How do you
get it?
Alas, the simplest answer is not what you'd call the most
elegant: you call them up on the phone or write them a letter on paper
and ask them. Residents of the electronic frontier are only beginning
to develop the equivalent of phone books, and the ones that exist
today are far from complete (still, later on, in Chapter 6, we'll show
you how to use some of these directories).
Eventually, you'll start corresponding with people, which means
you'll want to know how to address mail to them. It's vital to know
how to do this, because the smallest mistake -- using a comma when you
should have used a period, for instance, can bounce the message back
to you, undelivered. In this sense, Net addresses are like phone
numbers: one wrong digit and you get the wrong person. Fortunately,
most net addresses now adhere to a relatively easy-to-understand
system.
Earlier, you sent yourself a mail message using just your user-
name. This was sort of like making a local phone call -- you didn't
have to dial a 1 or an area code. This also works for mail to anybody
else who has an account on the same system as you.
Sending mail outside of your system, though, will require the use
of the Net equivalent of area codes, called "domains." A basic Net
address will look something like this:
tomg@world.std.com
Tomg is somebody's user ID, and he is at (hence the @ sign) a site
(or in Internetese, a "domain") known as std.com. Large organizations
often have more than one computer linked to the Internet; in this case,
the name of the particular machine is world (you will quickly notice
that, like boat owners, Internet computer owners always name their
machines).
Domains tell you the name of the organization that runs a given
e-mail site and what kind of site it is or, if it's not in the U.S.,
what country it's located in. Large organizations may have more than
one computer or gateway tied to the Internet, so you'll often see a
two-part domain name; and sometimes even three- or four-part domain
names.
In general, American addresses end in an organizational suffix,
such as ".edu," which means the site is at a college or university.
Other American suffixes include:
.com for businesses
.org for non-profit organizations
.gov and .mil for government and military agencies
.net for companies or organizations that run large networks.
Sites in the rest of the world tend to use a two-letter code that
represents their country. Most make sense, such as .ca for Canadian
sites, but there are a couple of seemingly odd ones. Swiss sites end
in .ch, while South African ones end in .za. Some U.S. sites have
followed this international convention (such as well.sf.ca.us).
You'll notice that the above addresses are all in lower-case.
Unlike almost everything else having anything at all to do with Unix,
most Net mailing systems don't care about case, so you generally don't
have to worry about capitalizing e-mail addresses. Alas, there are a few
exceptions -- some public-access sites do allow for capital letters in
user names. When in doubt, ask the person you want to write to, or let
her send you a message first (recall how a person's e-mail address is
usually found on the top of her message). The domain name, the part of the
address after the @ sign, never has to be capitalized.
It's all a fairly simple system that works very well, except,
again, it's vital to get the address exactly right -- just as you have
to dial a phone number exactly right. Send a message to tomg@unm.edu
(which is the University of New Mexico) when you meant to send it to
tomg@umn.edu (the University of Minnesota), and your letter will either
bounce back to you undelivered, or go to the wrong person.
If your message is bounced back to you as undeliverable, you'll
get an ominous looking-message from MAILER-DAEMON (actually a rather
benign Unix program that exists to handle mail), with an evil-looking
header followed by the text of your message. Sometimes, you can tell
what went wrong by looking at the first few lines of the bounced
message. Besides an incorrect address, it's possible your host system
does not have the other site in the "map" it maintains of other host
systems. Or you could be trying to send mail to another network, such
as Bitnet or CompuServe, that has special addressing requirements.
Sometimes, figuring all this out can prove highly frustrating.
But remember the prime Net commandment: Ask. Send a message to your
system administrator. He or she might be able to help decipher the
problem.
There is one kind of address that may give your host system
particular problems. There are two main ways that Unix systems
exchange mail. One is known as UUCP and started out with a different
addressing system than the rest of the Net. Most UUCP systems have
since switched over to the standard Net addressing system, but a few
traditional sites still cling to their original type, which tends to
have lots of exclamation points in it, like this:
uunet!somesite!othersite!mybuddy
The problem for many host sites is that exclamation points (also
known as "bangs") now mean something special in the more common systems
or "shells" used to operate many Unix computers. This means that
addressing mail to such a site (or even responding to a message you
received from one) could confuse the poor computer to no end and your
message never gets sent out. If that happens, try putting backslashes in
front of each exclamation point, so that you get an address that looks
like this:
uunet\!somesite\!othersite\!mybuddy
Note that this means you may not be able to respond to such a message
by typing a lowercase r -- you may get an error message and you'll
have to create a brand-new message.
If you want to get a taste of what's possible through e-mail,
start an e-mail message to
almanac@oes.orst.edu
Leave the "subject:" line blank. As a message, write this:
send quote
Or, if you're feeling a little down, write this instead:
send moral-support
In either case, you will get back a message within a few seconds to
a few hours (depending on the state of your host system's Internet
connection). If you simply asked for a quote, you'll get back a
fortune-cookie-like saying. If you asked for moral support, you'll also
get back a fortune-cookie-like saying, only supposedly more uplifting.
This particular "mail server" is run by Oregon State University.
Its main purpose is actually to provide a way to distribute agricultural
information via e-mail. If you'd like to find out how to use the
server's full range of services, send a message to its address with this
line in it:
send help
You'll quickly get back a lengthy document detailing just what's
available and how to get it.
Feeling opinionated? Want to give the President of the United
States a piece of your mind? Send a message to president@whitehouse.gov.
Or if the vice president will do, write vice-president@whitehouse.gov.
The "mail" program is actually a very powerful one and a Netwide
standard, at least on Unix computers. But it can be hard to figure
out -- you can type a question mark to get a list of commands, but
these may be of limited use unless you're already familiar with Unix.
Fortunately, there are a couple of other mail programs that are easier
to use.
2.2 ELM -- A BETTER WAY
Elm is a combination mailbox and letter-writing system that uses
menus to help you navigate through mail. Most Unix-based host systems
now have it online. To use it, type
elm
and hit enter. You'll get a menu of your waiting mail, along with a
list of commands you can execute, that will look something like this:
Mailbox is '/usr/spool/mail/adamg' with 38 messages [ELM 2.3 PL11]
1 Sep 1 Christopher Davis (13) here's another message.
2 Sep 1 Christopher Davis (91) This is a message from Eudora
3 Aug 31 Rita Marie Rouvali (161) First Internet Hunt !!! (fwd)
4 Aug 31 Peter Scott/Manage (69) New File <UK077> University of Londo
5 Aug 30 Peter Scott/Manage (64) New File <DIR020> X.500 service at A
6 Aug 30 Peter Scott/Manage (39) New File <NET016> DATAPAC Informatio
7 Aug 28 Peter Scott/Manage (67) Proposed Usenet group for HYTELNET n
8 Aug 28 Peter Scott/Manage (56) New File <DIR019> JANET Public Acces
9 Aug 26 Helen Trillian Ros (15) Tuesday
10 Aug 26 Peter Scott/Manage (151) Update <CWK004> Oxford University OU
You can use any of the following commands by pressing the first character;
d)elete or u)ndelete mail, m)ail a message, r)eply or f)orward mail, q)uit
To read a message, press <return>. j = move down, k = move up, ? = help
Each line shows the date you received the message, who sent it,
how many lines long the message is, and the message's subject.
If you are using VT100 emulation, you can move up and down the
menu with your up and down arrow keys. Otherwise, type the line number
of the message you want to read or delete and hit enter.
When you read a message, it pauses every 24 lines, instead of
scrolling until it's done. Hit the space bar to read the next page.
You can type a lowercase r to reply or a lower-case q or i
to get back to the menu (the I stands for "index").
At the main menu, hitting a lowercase m followed by enter
will let you start a message. To delete a message, type a lower-case
d. You can do this while reading the message. Or, if you are in
the menu, move the cursor to the message's line and then hit d.
When you're done with elm, type a lower-case q. The program
will ask if you really want to delete the messages you marked. Then,
it will ask you if you want to move any messages you've read but
haven't marked for deletion to a "received" file. For now, hit your n
key.
Elm has a major disadvantage for the beginner. The default text
editor it generally calls up when you hit your r or m key is often a
program called emacs. Unixoids swear by emacs, but everybody else almost
always finds it impossible. Unfortunately, you can't always get away
from it (or vi, another text editor often found on Unix systems), so
later on we'll talk about some basic commands that will keep you from
going totally nuts.
If you want to save a message to your own computer, hit s, either
within the message or with your cursor on the message entry in the elm
menu. A filename will pop up. If you do not like it, type a new name
(you won't have to backspace). Hit enter, and the message will be saved
with that file name in your "home directory" on your host system. After
you exit elm, you can now download it (ask your system administrator for
specifics on how to download -- and upload -- such files).
2.3 PINE -- AN EVEN BETTER WAY
Pine is based on elm but includes a number of improvements that
make it an ideal mail system for beginners. Like elm, pine starts
you with a menu. It also has an "address book" feature that is handy
for people with long or complex e-mail addresses. Hitting A at the
main menu puts you in the address book, where you can type in the
person's first name (or nickname) followed by her address. Then, when
you want to send that person a message, you only have to type in her
first name or nickname, and pine automatically inserts her actual
address. The address book also lets you set up a mailing list. This
feature allows you to send the same message to a number of people at
once.
What really sets pine apart is its built-in text editor,
which looks and feels a lot more like word-processing programs
available for MS-DOS and Macintosh users. Not only does it have
word wrap (a revolutionary concept if ever there was one), it also has a
spell-checker and a search command. Best of all, all of the commands
you need are listed in a two-line mini-menu at the bottom of each
screen. The commands look like this:
^W Where is
The little caret is a synonym for the key marked "control" on your
keyboard. To find where a particular word is in your document, you'd
hit your control key and your W key at the same time, which would bring
up a prompt asking you for the word to look for.
Some of pine's commands are a tad peculiar (control-V for "page
down" for example), which comes from being based on a variant of
emacs (which is utterly peculiar). But again, all of the commands you
need are listed on that two-line mini-menu, so it shouldn't take you
more than a couple of seconds to find the right one.
To use pine, type
pine
at the command line and hit enter. It's a relatively new program, so
some systems may not yet have it online. But it's so easy to use, you
should probably send e-mail to your system administrator urging him to
get it!
2.4 SMILEYS
When you're involved in an online discussion, you can't see the
smiles or shrugs that the other person might make in a live
conversation to show he's only kidding. But online, there's no body
language. So what you might think is funny, somebody else might take as
an insult. To try to keep such misunderstandings from erupting into
bitter disputes, we have smileys. Tilt your head to the left and look at
the following sideways. :-). Or simply :). This is your basic "smiley."
Use it to indicate people should not take that comment you just made as
seriously as they might otherwise. You make a smiley by typing a colon,
a hyphen and a right parenthetical bracket. Some people prefer using the
word "grin," usually in this form:
<grin>
Sometimes, though, you'll see it as *grin* or even just <g> for short.
Some other smileys include:
;-) Wink;
:-( Frown;
:-O Surprise;
8-) Wearing glasses;
=|:-)= Abe Lincoln.
OK, so maybe the last two are a little bogus :-).
2.5 SENDING E-MAIL TO OTHER NETWORKS
There are a number of computer networks that are not directly
part of the Net, but which are now connected through "gateways" that
allow the passing of e-mail. Here's a list of some of the larger
networks, how to send mail to them and how their users can send mail to
you:
America Online
Remove any spaces from a user's name and append "aol.com," to get
user@aol.com
America Online users who want to send mail to you need only put
your Net address in the "to:" field before composing a message.
ATTMail
Address your message to user@attmail.com.
From ATTMail, a user would send mail to you in this form:
internet!domain!user
So if your address were nancyr@world.std.com, your correspondent
would send a message to you at
internet!world.std.com!nancyr
Bitnet
Users of Bitnet (and NetNorth in Canada and EARN in Europe) often
have addresses in this form: IZZY@INDVMS. If you're lucky, all you'll
have to do to mail to that address is add "bitnet" at the end, to get
izzy@indvms.bitnet. Sometimes, however, mail to such an address will
bounce back to you, because Bitnet addresses do not always translate
well into an Internet form. If this happens, you can send mail
through one of two Internet/Bitnet gateways. First, change the @ in
the address to a %, so that you get username%site.bitnet. Then add
either @vm.marist.edu or @cunyvm.cuny.edu, so that, with the above
example, you would get izzy%indyvms.bitnet@vm.marist.edu or
izzy%indvyvms.bitnet@cunyvm.cuny.edu
Bitnet users have it a little easier: They can usually send mail
directly to your e-mail address without fooling around with it at all.
So send them your address and they should be OK.
CompuServe
CompuServe users have numerical addresses in this form:
73727,545. To send mail to a CompuServe user, change the comma to a
period and add "@compuserve.com"; for example:
73727.545@compuserve.com.
Note that some CompuServe users must pay extra to receive mail from
the Internet.
If you know CompuServe users who want to send you mail, tell them
to GO MAIL and create a mail message. In the address area, instead of
typing in a CompuServe number, have them type your address in this
form:
>INTERNET:YourID@YourAddress.
For example, >INTERNET:adamg@world.std.com. Note that both the
">" and the ":" are required.
Delphi
To send mail to a Delphi user, the form is username@delphi.com.
Fidonet
To send mail to people using a Fidonet BBS, you need the name
they use to log onto that system and its "node number.'' Fidonet node
numbers or addresses consist of three numbers, in this form:
1:322/190. The first number tells which of several broad geographic
zones the BBS is in (1 represents the U.S. and Canada, 2 Europe and
Israel, 3 Pacific Asia, 4 South America). The second number
represents the BBS's network, while the final number is the BBS's
"FidoNode'' number in that network. If your correspondent only gives
you two numbers (for example, 322/190), it means the system is in zone
1.
Now comes the tricky part. You have to reverse the numbers and
add to them the letters f, n and z (which stand for
"FidoNode,''"network,'' and "zone'). For example, the address above
would become
f190.n322.z1.
Now add "fidonet.org'' at the end, to get
f190.n322.z1.fidonet.org. Then add "FirstName.LastName@', to get
FirstName.LastName@f190.n322.z1.fidonet.org
Note the period between the first and last names. Also, some countries
now have their own Fidonet "backbone" systems, which might affect
addressing. For example, were the above address in Germany, you would
end it with "fido.de" instead of "fidonet.org."
Whew!
The reverse process is totally different. First, the person has
to have access to his or her BBS's "net mail" area and know the
Fidonet address of his or her local Fidonet/UUCP gateway (often their
system operator will know it). Your Fidonet correspondent should
address a net-mail message to UUCP (not your name) in the "to:" field.
In the node-number field, they should type in the node number of the
Fidonet/UUCP gateway (if the gateway system is in the same regional
network as their system, they need only type the last number, for
example, 390 instead of 322/390). Then, the first line of the message
has to be your Internet address, followed by a blank line. After
that, the person can write the message and send it.
Because of the way Fidonet moves mail, it could take a day or two
for a message to be delivered in either direction. Also, because many
Fidonet systems are run as hobbies, it is considered good form to ask
the gateway sysop's permission if you intend to pass large amounts of
mail back and forth. Messages of a commercial nature are strictly
forbidden (even if it's something the other person asked for). Also,
consider it very likely that somebody other than the recipient will
read your messages.
GEnie
To send mail to a GEnie user, add "@genie.com" to the end
of the GEnie user name, for example: walt@genie.com.
MCIMail
To send mail to somebody with an MCIMail account, add
"@mcimail.com to the end of their name or numerical address. For
example:
555-1212@mcimail.com
or
jsmith@mcimail.com
Note that if there is more than one MCIMail subscriber with that
name, you will get a mail message back from MCI giving you their names
and numerical addresses. You'll then have to figure out which one you
want and re-send the message.
From MCI, a user would type
Your Name (EMS)
at the "To:" prompt. At the EMS prompt, he or she would type
internet
followed by your Net address at the "Mbx:" prompt.
Peacenet
To send mail to a Peacenet user, use this form:
username@igc.org
Peacenet subscribers can use your regular address to send you
mail.
Prodigy
UserID@prodigy.com. Note that Prodigy users must pay extra for
Internet e-mail.
2.6 SEVEN UNIX COMMANDS YOU CAN'T LIVE WITHOUT:
If you connect to the Net through a Unix system, eventually you'll
have to come to terms with Unix. For better or worse, most Unix systems do
NOT shield you from their inner workings -- if you want to copy a Usenet
posting to a file, for example, you'll have to use some Unix commands if
you ever want to do anything with that file.
Like MS-DOS, Unix is an operating system - it tells the computer how
to do things. Now while Unix may have a reputation as being even more
complex than MS-DOS, in most cases, a few basic, and simple, commands
should be all you'll ever need.
If your own computer uses MS-DOS or PC-DOS, the basic concepts will
seem very familiar -- but watch out for the cd command, which works
differently enough from the similarly named DOS command that it will drive
you crazy. Also, unlike MS-DOS, Unix is case sensitive -- if you type
commands or directory names in the wrong case, you'll get an error message.
If you're used to working on a Mac, you'll have to remember that Unix
stores files in "directories" rather than "folders." Unix directories are
organized like branches on a tree. At the bottom is the "root" directory,
with sub-directories branching off that (and sub-directories in turn can
have sub-directories). The Mac equivalent of a Unix sub-directory is a
folder within another folder.
cat Equivalent to the MS-DOS "type" command. To pause a file
every screen, type
cat file |more
where "file" is the name of the file you want to see.
Hitting control-C will stop the display. Alternately,
you could type
more file
to achieve the same result. You can also use cat for
writing or uploading text files to your name or home
directory (similar to the MS-DOS "copy con" command). If
you type
cat>test
you start a file called "test." You can either write
something simple (no editing once you've finished a line and
you have to hit return at the end of each line) or upload
something into that file using your communications software's
ASCII protocol). To close the file, hit control-D.
cd The "change directory" command. To change from your present
directory to another, type
cd directory
and hit enter. Unlike MS-DOS, which uses a \ to denote sub-
directories (for example: \stuff\text), Unix uses a / (for
example: /stuff/text). So to change from your present
directory to the stuff/text sub-directory, you would type
cd stuff/text
and then hit enter. As in MS-DOS, you do not need the first
backslash if the subdirectory comes off the directory you're
already in. To move back up a directory tree, you would type
cd ..
followed by enter. Note the space between the cd and the two
periods -- this is where MS-DOS users will really go nuts.
cp Copies a file. The syntax is
cp file1 file2
which would copy file1 to file2 (or overwrite file2 with
file1).
ls This command, when followed by enter, tells you what's in the
directory, similar to the DOS dir command, except in
alphabetical order.
ls | more
will stop the listing every 24 lines -- handy if there are a
lot of things in the directory. The basic ls command does not
list "hidden" files, such as the .login file that controls
how your system interacts with Unix. To see these files, type
ls -a or ls -a | more
ls -l will tell you the size of each file in bytes and tell
you when each was created or modified.
mv Similar to the MS-DOS rename command.
mv file1 file2
will rename file1 as file2, The command can
also be used to move files between directories.
mv file1 News
would move file1 to your News directory.
rm Deletes a file. Type
rm filename
and hit enter (but beware: when you hit enter, it's gone for
good).
WILDCARDS: When searching for, copying or deleting files, you can
use "wildcards" if you are not sure of the file's exact name.
ls man*
would find the following files:
manual, manual.txt, man-o-man.
Use a question mark when you're sure about all but one or two characters.
For example,
ls man?
would find a file called mane, but not one called manual.
2.7 WHEN THINGS GO WRONG
* You send a message but get back an ominous looking message from
MAILER-DAEMON containing up to several dozen lines of computerese
followed by your message.
Somewhere in those lines you can often find a clue to what went
wrong. You might have made a mistake in spelling the e-mail address.
The site to which you're sending mail might have been down for
maintenance or a problem. You may have used the wrong "translation" for
mail to a non-Internet network.
* You call up your host system's text editor to write a message or
reply to one and can't seem to get out.
If it's emacs, try control-X, control-C (in other words, hit your
control key and your X key at the same time, followed by control and C).
If worse comes to worse, you can hang up.
* In elm, you accidentally hit the D key for a message you want to
save.
Type the number of the message, hit enter and then U, which will
"un-delete" the message. This works only before you exit Elm; once you
quit, the message is gone.
* You try to upload an ASCII message you've written on your own
computer into a message you're preparing in Elm or Pine and you get a
lot of left brackets, capital Ms, Ks and Ls and some funny-looking
characters.
Believe it or not, your message will actually wind up looking fine;
all that garbage is temporary and reflects the problems some Unix text
processors have with ASCII uploads. But it will take much longer for
your upload to finish. One way to deal with this is to call up the
simple mail program, which will not produce any weird characters when you
upload a text file into a message. Another way (which is better if your
prepared message is a response to somebody's mail), is to create a text
file on your host system with cat, for example,
cat>file
and then upload your text into that. Then, in elm or pine, you can
insert the message with a simple command (control-R in pine, for
example); only this time you won't see all that extraneous stuff.
* You haven't cleared out your Elm mailbox in awhile, and you
accidentally hit "y" when you meant to hit "n" (or vice-versa) when
exiting and now all your messages have disappeared. Look in your News
directory (at the command line, type: cd News) for a file called
recieved. Those are all your messages. Unfortunately, there's no way to
get them back into your Elm mailbox -- you'll have to download the file
or read it online.
Chapter 3: USENET I
3.1 THE GLOBAL WATERING HOLE
Imagine a conversation carried out over a period of hours and days,
as if people were leaving messages and responses on a bulletin board. Or
imagine the electronic equivalent of a radio talk show where everybody
can put their two cents in and no one is ever on hold.
Unlike e-mail, which is usually "one-to-one," Usenet is "many-to-
many." Usenet is the international meeting place, where people gather to
meet their friends, discuss the day's events, keep up with computer
trends or talk about whatever's on their mind. Jumping into a Usenet
discussion can be a liberating experience. Nobody knows what you look or
sound like, how old you are, what your background is. You're judged
solely on your words, your ability to make a point.
To many people, Usenet IS the Net. In fact, it is often confused
with Internet. But it is a totally separate system. All Internet sites
CAN carry Usenet, but so do many non-Internet sites, from sophisticated
Unix machines to old XT clones and Apple IIs.
Technically, Usenet messages are shipped around the world, from
host system to host system, using one of several specific Net
protocols. Your host system stores all of its Usenet messages in one
place, which everybody with an account on the system can access. That
way, no matter how many people actually read a given message, each
host system has to store only one copy of it. Many host systems "talk"
with several others regularly in case one or another of their links goes
down for some reason. When two host systems connect, they basically
compare notes on which Usenet messages they already have. Any that one
is missing the other then transmits, and vice-versa. Because they are
computers, they don't mind running through thousands, even millions, of
these comparisons every day.
Yes, millions. For Usenet is huge. Every day, Usenet users
pump upwards of 40 million characters a day into the system -- roughly
the equivalent of volumes A-G of the Encyclopedia Britannica. Obviously,
nobody could possibly keep up with this immense flow of messages. Let's
look at how to find conferences and discussions of interest to you.
The basic building block of Usenet is the newsgroup, which is a
collection of messages with a related theme (on other networks, these
would be called conferences, forums, bboards or special-interest
groups). There are now more than 5,000 of these newsgroups, in several
diferent languages, covering everything from art to zoology, from
science fiction to South Africa.
Some public-access systems, typically the ones that work through
menus, try to make it easier by dividing Usenet into several broad
categories. Choose one of those and you're given a list of newsgroups in
that category. Then select the newsgroup you're interested in and start
reading.
Other systems let you compile your own "reading list" so that you
only see messages in conferences you want. In both cases, conferences
are arranged in a particular hierarchy devised in the early 1980s.
Newsgroup names start with one of a series of broad topic names. For
example, newsgroups beginning with "comp." are about particular computer-
related topics. These broad topics are followed by a series of more
focused topics (so that "comp.unix" groups are limited to discussion
about Unix). The main hierarchies are:
bionet Research biology
bit.listserv Conferences originating as Bitnet mailing lists
biz Business
comp Computers and related subjects
misc Discussions that don't fit anywhere else
news News about Usenet itself
rec Hobbies, games and recreation
sci Science other than research biology
soc "Social" groups, often ethnically related
talk Politics and related topics
alt Controversial or unusual topics; not
carried by all sites
In addition, many host systems carry newsgroups for a particular
city, state or region. For example, ne.housing is a newsgroup where
New Englanders look for apartments. A growing number also carry K12
newsgroups, which are aimed at elementary and secondary teachers and
students. And a number of sites carry clari newsgroups, which is
actually a commercial service consisting of wire-service stories and
a unique online computer news service (more on this in chapter 10).
3.2 NAVIGATING USENET WITH nn
How do you dive right in? As mentioned, on some systems, it's all
done through menus -- you just keep choosing from a list of choices until
you get to the newsgroup you want and then hit the "read" command. On
Unix systems, however, you will have to use a "newsreader" program. Two
of the more common ones are known as rn (for "read news") and nn (for "no
news" -- because it's supposed to be simpler to use).
For beginners, nn may be the better choice because it works with
menus -- you get a list of articles in a given newsgroup and then you
choose which ones you want to see. To try it out, connect to your host
system and, at the command line, type
nn news.announce.newusers
and hit enter. After a few seconds, you should see something like
this:
Newsgroup: news.announce.newusers Articles: 22 of 22/1 NEW
a Gene Spafford 776 Answers to Frequently Asked Questions
b Gene Spafford 362 A Primer on How to Work With the Usenet Community
c Gene Spafford 387 Emily Postnews Answers Your Questions on Netiquette
d Gene Spafford 101 Hints on writing style for Usenet
e Gene Spafford 74 Introduction to news.announce
f Gene Spafford 367 USENET Software: History and Sources
g Gene Spafford 353 What is Usenet?
h taylor 241 A Guide to Social Newsgroups and Mailing Lists
i Gene Spafford 585 Alternative Newsgroup Hierarchies, Part I
j Gene Spafford 455 >Alternative Newsgroup Hierarchies, Part II
k David C Lawrenc 151 How to Create a New Newsgroup
l Gene Spafford 106 How to Get Information about Networks
m Gene Spafford 888 List of Active Newsgroups
n Gene Spafford 504 List of Moderators
o Gene Spafford 1051 Publicly Accessible Mailing Lists, Part I
p Gene Spafford 1123 Publicly Accessible Mailing Lists, Part II
q Gene Spafford 1193 >Publicly Accessible Mailing Lists, Part III
r Jonathan Kamens 644 How to become a USENET site
s Jonathan Kamen 1344 List of Periodic Informational Postings, Part I
-- 15:52 -- SELECT -- help:? -----Top 85%-----
Explanatory postings for new users. (Moderated)
Obviously, this is a good newsgroup to begin your exploration of
Usenet! Here's what all this means: The first letter on each line is
the letter you type to read that particular "article" (it makes sense
that a "newsgroup" would have "articles"). Next comes the name of the
person who wrote that article, followed by its length, in lines, and
what the article is about. At the bottom, you see the local time at your
access site, what you're doing right now (i.e., SELECTing articles),
which key to hit for some help (the ? key) and how many of the articles
in the newsgroup you can see on this screen. The "(moderated)" means the
newsgroup has a "moderator" who is the only one who can directly post
messages to it. This is generally limited to groups such as this, which
contain articles of basic information, or for digests, which are
basically online magazines (more on them in a bit).
Say you're particularly interested in what "Emily Postnews" has to
say about proper etiquette on Usenet. Hit your c key (lower case!), and
the line will light up. If you want to read something else, hit the key
that corresponds to it. And if you want to see what's on the next page
of articles, hit return or your space bar.
But you're impatient to get going, and you want to read that
article now. The command for that in nn is a capital Z. Hit it and
you'll see something like this:
Gene Spafford: Emily Postnews Answers Your Questions on NetiquetteSep 92 04:17
Original-author: brad@looking.on.ca (Brad Templeton)
Archive-name: emily-postnews/part1
Last-change: 30 Nov 91 by brad@looking.on.ca (Brad Templeton)
**NOTE: this is intended to be satirical. If you do not recognize
it as such, consult a doctor or professional comedian. The
recommendations in this article should recognized for what
they are -- admonitions about what NOT to do.
"Dear Emily Postnews"
Emily Postnews, foremost authority on proper net behaviour,
gives her advice on how to act on the net.
============================================================================
Dear Miss Postnews: How long should my signature be? -- verbose@noisy
A: Dear Verbose: Please try and make your signature as long as you
-- 09:57 --.announce.newusers-- LAST --help:?--Top 4%--
The first few lines are the message's header, similar to the header
you get in e-mail messages. Then comes the beginning of the message.
The last line tells you the time again, the newsgroup name (or part of
it, anyway), the position in your message stack that this message
occupies, how to get help, and how much of the message is on screen. If
you want to keep reading this message, just hit your space bar (not your
enter key!) for the next screen and so on until done. When done, you'll
be returned to the newsgroup menu. For now hit Q (upper case this time),
which quits you out of nn and returns you to your host system's command
line.
To get a look at another interesting newsgroup, type
nn comp.risks
and hit enter. This newsgroup is another moderated group, this time a
digest of all the funny and frightening ways computers and the people
who run and use them can go wrong. Again, you read articles by
selecting their letters. If you're in the middle of an article and
decide you want to go onto the next one, hit your n key.
Now it's time to look for some newsgroups that might be of
particular interest to you. Unix host systems that have nn use a program
called nngrep (ever get the feeling Unix was not entirely written in
English?) that lets you scan newsgroups. Exit nn and at your host
system's command line, type
nngrep word
where word is the subject you're interested in. If you use a Macintosh
computer, you might try
nngrep mac
You'll get something that looks like this:
alt.music.machines.of.loving.grace
alt.religion.emacs
comp.binaries.mac
comp.emacs
comp.lang.forth.mac
comp.os.mach
comp.sources.mac
comp.sys.mac.announce
comp.sys.mac.apps
comp.sys.mac.comm
comp.sys.mac.databases
comp.sys.mac.digest
comp.sys.mac.games
comp.sys.mac.hardware
comp.sys.mac.hypercard
comp.sys.mac.misc
comp.sys.mac.programmer
comp.sys.mac.system
comp.sys.mac.wanted
gnu.emacs.announce
gnu.emacs.bug
gnu.emacs.gnews
gnu.emacs.gnus
gnu.emacs.help
gnu.emacs.lisp.manual
gnu.emacs.sources
gnu.emacs.vm.bug
gnu.emacs.vm.info
gnu.emacs.vms
Note that some of these obviously have something to do with
Macintoshes while some obviously do not; nngrep is not a perfect system.
If you want to get a list of ALL the newsgroups available on your host
system, type
nngrep -a |more
or
nngrep -a |pg
and hit enter (which one to use depends on the Unix used on your host
system; if one doesn't do anything, try the other). You don't
absolutely need the |more or |pg, but if you don't include it, the list
will keep scrolling, rather than pausing every 24 lines. If you are in
nn, hitting a capital Y will bring up a similar list.
Typing "nn newsgroup" for every newsgroup can get awfully tiring
after awhile. When you use nn, your host system looks in a file called
.newsrc. This is basically a list of every newsgroup on the host system
along with notations on which groups and articles you have read (all
maintained by the computer). You can also use this file to create a
"reading list" that brings up each newsgroup to which you want to
"subscribe." To try it out, type
nn
without any newsgroup name, and hit enter.
Unfortunately, you will start out with a .newsrc file that has you
"subscribed" to every single newsgroup on your host system! To delete
a newsgroup from your reading list, type a capital U while its menu is
on the screen. The computer will ask you if you're sure you want to
"unsubscribe." If you then hit a Y, you'll be unsubscribed and put in
the next group.
With many host systems carrying thousands of newsgroups, this will
take you forever.
Fortunately, there are a couple of easier ways to do this. Both
involve calling up your .newsrc file in a word or text processor. In a
.newsrc file, each newsgroup takes up one line, consisting of the
group's name, an exclamation point or a colon and a range of numbers.
Newsgroups with a colon are ones to which you are subscribed; those
followed by an exclamation point are "un-subscribed." To start with a
clean slate, then, you have to change all those colons to exclamation
points.
If you know how to use emacs or vi, call up the .newsrc file (you
might want to make a copy of .newsrc first, just in case), and use the
search-and-replace function to make the change.
If you're not comfortable with these text processor, you can
download the .newsrc file, make the changes on your own computer and
then upload the revised file. Before you download the file, however,
you should do a couple of things. One is to type
cp .newsrc temprc
and hit enter. You will actually download this temprc file (note the
name does not start with a period -- some computers, such as those using
MS-DOS, do not allow file names starting with periods). After you
download the file, open it in your favorite word processor and use its
search-and-replace function to change the exclamation points to colons.
Be careful not to change anything else! Save the document in ASCII or
text format. Dial back into your host system. At the command line,
type
cp temprc temprc1
and hit enter. This new file will serve as your backup .newsrc file
just in case something goes wrong. Upload the temprc file from your
computer. This will overwrite the Unix system's old temprc file. Now
type
cp temprc .newsrc
and hit enter. You now have a clean slate to start creating a reading
list.
3.3 nn COMMANDS
To mark a specific article for reading, type the letter next to it (in lower
case). To mark a specific article and all of its responses, type the letter
and an asterisk, for example:
a*
To un-select an article, type the letter next to it (again, in lower case).
C Cancels an article (around the world) that you wrote.
Every article posted on Usenet has a unique ID number.
Hitting a capital C sends out a new message that tells host
systems that receive it to find earlier message and delete
it.
F To post a public response, or follow-up. If selected while
still on a newsgroup "page", asks you which article to
follow up. If selected while in a specific article, will
follow up that article. In either case, you'll be asked if
you want to include the original article in yours. Caution:
puts you in whatever text editor is your default.
N Goes to the next subscribed newsgroup with unread articles.
P Goes to the previous subscribed newsgroup with unread
articles.
G news.group Goes to a specific newsgroup. Can be used to subscribe to
new newsgroups. Hitting G brings up a sub-menu:
u Goes to the group and shows only un-read
articles.
a Goes to the group and shows all articles,
even ones you've already read.
s Will show you only articles with a specific
subject.
n Will show you only articles from a specific
person.
M Mails a copy of the current article to somebody. You'll be
asked for the recipient's e-mail address and whether you
want to add any comments to the article before sending it
off. As with F, puts you in the default editor.
:post Post an article. You'll be asked for the name of the group.
Q Quit, or exit, nn.
U Un-subscribe from the current newsgroup.
R Responds to an article via e-mail.
space Hitting the space bar brings up the next page of articles.
X If you have selected articles, this will show them to you
and then take you to the next subscribed newsgroup with
unread articles. If you don't have any selected articles,
it marks all articles as read and takes you to the next
unread subscribed newsgroup.
=word Finds and marks all articles in the newsgroup with a
specific word in the "subject:" line, for example:
=modem
Z Shows you selected articles immediately and then returns
you to the current newsgroup.
? Brings up a help screen.
< Goes to the previous page in the newsgroup.
> Goes to the next page in the newsgroup.
$ Goes to the last page in an article.
^ Goes to the first page in an article.
3.4 USING rn
Some folks prefer this older newsreader.
If you type
rn news.announce.newusers
at your host system's command line, you'll see something like this:
******** 21 unread articles in news.announce.newusers--read now? [ynq]
If you hit your Y key, the first article will appear on your screen. If
you want to see what articles are available first, though, hit your
computer's = key and you'll get something like this:
152 Introduction to news.announce
153 A Primer on How to Work With the Usenet Community
154 What is Usenet?
155 Answers to Frequently Asked Questions
156 Hints on writing style for Usenet
158 Alternative Newsgroup Hierarchies, Part I
159 Alternative Newsgroup Hierarchies, Part II
160 Emily Postnews Answers Your Questions on Netiquette
161 USENET Software: History and Sources
162 A Guide to Social Newsgroups and Mailing Lists
163 How to Get Information about Networks
164 How to Create a New Newsgroup
169 List of Active Newsgroups
170 List of Moderators
171 Publicly Accessible Mailing Lists, Part I
172 Publicly Accessible Mailing Lists, Part II
173 Publicly Accessible Mailing Lists, Part III
174 How to become a USENET site
175 List of Periodic Informational Postings, Part I
176 List of Periodic Informational Postings, Part II
177 List of Periodic Informational Postings, Part III
End of article 158 (of 178)--what next? [npq]
Notice how the messages are in numerical order this time, and don't
tell you who sent them. Article 154 looks interesting. To read it,
type in 154 and hit enter. You'll see something like this:
Article 154 (20 more) in news.announce.newusers (moderated):
From: spaf@cs.purdue.EDU (Gene Spafford)
Newsgroups: news.announce.newusers,news.admin,news.answers
Subject: What is Usenet?
Date: 20 Sep 92 04:17:26 GMT
Followup-To: news.newusers.questions
Organization: Dept. of Computer Sciences, Purdue Univ.
Lines: 353
Supersedes: <spaf-whatis_715578719@cs.purdue.edu>
Archive-name: what-is-usenet/part1
Original from: chip@tct.com (Chip Salzenberg)
Last-change: 19 July 1992 by spaf@cs.purdue.edu (Gene Spafford)
The first thing to understand about Usenet is that it is widely
misunderstood. Every day on Usenet, the "blind men and the elephant"
phenomenon is evident, in spades. In my opinion, more flame wars
arise because of a lack of understanding of the nature of Usenet than
from any other source. And consider that such flame wars arise, of
necessity, among people who are on Usenet. Imagine, then, how poorly
understood Usenet must be by those outside!
--MORE--(7%)
This time, the header looks much more like the gobbledygook you get
in e-mail messages. To keep reading, hit your space bar. If you hit
your n key (lower case), you'll go to the next message in the
numerical order.
To escape rn, just keep hitting your q key (in lower case), until
you get back to the command line. Now let's set up your reading list.
Because rn uses the same .newsrc file as nn, you can use one of the
search-and-replace methods described above. Or you can do this: Type
rn
and hit enter. When the first newsgroup comes up on your screen, hit
your u key (in lower case). Hit it again, and again, and again. Or
just keep it pressed down (if your computer starts beeping, let up for a
couple of seconds). Eventually, you'll be told you're at the end of the
newsgroups, and asked what you want to do next.
Here's where you begin entering newsgroups. Type
g newsgroup
(for example, g comp.sys.mac.announce) and hit enter. You'll be asked
if you want to "subscribe." Hit your y key. Then type
g next newsgroup
(for example, g comp.announce.newusers) and hit enter. Repeat until
done. This process will also set up your reading list for nn, if you
prefer that newsreader. But how do you know which newsgroups to
subscribe? Typing a lowercase l and then hitting enter will show you a
list of all available newsgroups. Again, since there could be more than
2,000 newsgroups on your system, this might not be something you want to
do. Fortunately, you can search for groups with particular words in
their names, using the l command. Typing
l mac
followed by enter, will bring up a list of newsgroups with those letters
in them (and as in nn, you will also see groups dealing with emacs and
the like, in addition to groups related to Macintosh computers).
Because of the vast amount of messages transmitted over Usenet,
most systems carry messages for only a few days or weeks. So if there's
a message you want to keep, you should either turn on your computer's
screen capture or save it to a file which you can later download). To
save a message as a file in rn, type
s filename
where filename is what you want to call the file. Hit enter. You'll be
asked if you want to save it in "mailbox format." In most cases, you
can answer with an n (which will strip off the header). The message
will now be saved to a file in your News directory (which you can access
by typing cd News and then hitting enter).
Also, some newsgroups fill up particularly quickly -- go away for a
couple of days and you'll come back to find hundreds of articles! One
way to deal with that is to mark them as "read" so that they no longer
appear on your screen. In nn, hit a capital J; in rn, a small c.
3.5 rn COMMANDS
Different commands are available to you in rn depending on whether you
are already in a newsgroup or reading a specific article. At any point,
typing a lowercase h will bring up a list of available commands and some
terse instructions for using them. Here are some of them:
After you've just called up rn, or within a newsgroup:
c Marks every article in a newsgroup as read (or "caught up")
so that you don't have to see them again. The system will ask
you if you are sure. Can be done either when asked if you
want to read a particular newsgroup or once in the newsgroup.
g Goes to a newsgroup, in this form:
g news.group
Use this both for going to groups to which you're already
subscribed and subscribing to new groups.
h Provides a list of available commands with terse
instructions.
l Gives a list of all available newsgroups.
p Goes to the first previous subscribed newsgroup with un-read
articles.
q Quits, or exits, rn if you have not yet gone into a newsgroup.
If you are in a newsgroup, it quits that one and brings you to
the next subscribed newsgroup.
Only within a newsgroup:
= Gives a list of all available articles in the newsgroup.
m Marks a specific article or series of articles as "un-read"
again so that you can come back to them later. Typing
1700m
and hitting enter would mark just that article as un-read.
Typing
1700-1800m
and hitting enter would mark all of those articles as un-
read.
space Brings up the next page of article listings. If already on
the last page, displays the first article in the newsgroup.
u Un-subscribe from the newsgroup.
/text/ Searches through the newsgroup for articles with a specific
word or phrase in the "subject:" line, from the current
article to the end of the newsgroup. For example,
/EFF/
would bring you to the first article with "EFF" in the
"subject:" line.
?text? The same as /text/ except it searches in reverse order from
the current article.
Only within a specific article:
e Some newsgroups consist of articles that are binary files,
typically programs or graphics images. Hitting e will convert
the ASCII characters within such an article into a file you
can then download and use or view (assuming you have the proper
computer and software). Many times, such files will be split
into several articles; just keep calling up the articles and
hitting e until done. You'll find the resulting file in your
News subdirectory.
C If you post an article and then decide it was a mistake, call
it up on your host system and hit this. The message will soon
begin disappearing on systems around the world.
F Post a public response in the newsgroup to the current
article. Includes a copy of her posting, which you can then
edit down using your host system's text editor.
f The same as above except it does not include a copy of the
original message in yours.
m Marks the current article as "un-read" so that you can come
back to it later. You do not have to type the article
number.
Control-N Brings up the first response to the article. If there is no
follow-up article, this returns you to the first unread article
in the newsgroup).
Control-P Goes to the message to which the current article is a reply.
n Goes to the next unread article in the newsgroup.
N Takes you to the next article in the newsgroup even if you've
already read it.
q Quits, or exits, the current article. Leaves you in the current
newsgroup.
R Reply, via e-mail only, to the author of the current article.
Includes a copy of his message in yours.
r The same as above, except it does not include a copy of his
article.
s file Copies the current article to a file in your News directory,
where "file" is the name of the file you want to save it to.
You'll be asked if you want to use "mailbox" format when
saving. If you answer by hitting your N key, most of the
header will not be saved.
s|mail user Mails a copy of the article to somebody. For "user" substitute
an e-mail address. Does not let you add comments to the
message first, however.
space Hitting the space bar shows the next page of the article, or, if
at the end, goes to the next un-read article.
3.6 ESSENTIAL NEWSGROUPS
With so much to choose from, everybody will likely have their own
unique Usenet reading list. But there are a few newsgroups that are
particularly of interest to newcomers. Among them:
news.announce.newusers This group consists of a series of
articles that explain various facets of
Usenet.
news.newusers.questions This is where you can ask questions
(we'll see how in a bit) about how
Usenet works.
news.announce.newsgroups Look here for information about new or
proposed newsgroups.
news.answers Contains lists of "Frequently Asked
Questions" (FAQs) and their answers from
many different newsgroups. Learn how to
fight jet lag in the FAQ from
rec.travel.air; look up answers to common
questions about Microsoft Windows in
an FAQ from comp.os.ms-windows; etc.
alt.internet.services Looking for something in particular on
the Internet? Ask here.
alt.infosystems.announce People adding new information services to
the Internet will post details here.
3.7 SPEAKING UP
"Threads" are an integral part of Usenet. When somebody posts a
message, often somebody else will respond. Soon, a thread of
conversation begins. Following these threads is relatively easy. In
nn, related messages are grouped together. In rn, when you're done
with a message, you can hit control-N to read the next related
message, or followup. As you explore Usenet, it's probably a good
idea to read discussions for awhile before you jump in. This way, you
can get a feel for the particular newsgroup -- each has its
own rhythms.
Eventually, though, you'll want to speak up. There are two main
ways to do this. You join an existing conversation, or you can start
a whole new thread.
If you want to join a discussion, you have to decide if you want
to include portions of the message you are responding to in your
message. The reason to do this is so people can see what you're
responding to, just in case the original message has disappeared from
their system (remember that most Usenet messages have a short life span
on the average host system) or they can't find it.
If you're using a Unix host system, joining an existing
conversation is similar in both nn and rn: hit your F key when done
with a given article in the thread. In rn, type a small f if you
don't want to include portions of the message you're responding to; an
uppercase F if you do. In nn, type a capital F. You'll then be asked
if you want to include portions of the original message.
And here's where you hit another Unix wall. When you hit your F
key, your host system calls up its basic Unix text editor. If you're
lucky, that'll be pico, a very easy system. More likely, however,
you'll get dumped into emacs (or possibly vi), which you've already met
in the chapter on e-mail.
The single most important emacs command is
control-x control-c
This means, depress your control key and hit x. Then depress the
control key and hit c. Memorize this. In fact, it's so important, it
bears repeating:
control-x control-c
These keystrokes are how you get out of emacs. If they work well,
you'll be asked if you want to send, edit, abort or list the message you
were working on. If they don't work well (say you accidentally hit some
other weird key combination that means something special to emacs) and
nothing seems to happen, or you just get more weird-looking emacs
prompts on the bottom of your screen, try hitting control-g. This should
stop whatever emacs was trying to do (you should see the word "quit" on
the bottom of your screen), after which you can hit control-x control-c.
But if this still doesn't work, remember that you can always disconnect
and dial back in!
If you have told your newsreader you do want to include portions
of the original message in yours, it will automatically put the entire
thing at the top of your message. Use the arrow keys to move down to
the lines you want to delete and hit control-K, which will delete one
line at a time.
You can then write your message. Remember that you have to hit
enter before your cursor gets to the end of the line, because emacs
does not have word wrapping.
When done, hit control-X control-C. You'll be asked the
question about sending, editing, aborting, etc. Choose one. If you
hit Y, your host system will start the process to sending your
message across the Net.
The nn and rn programs work differently when it comes to posting
entirely new messages. In nn, type
:post
and hit enter in any newsgroup. You'll be asked which newsgroup to
post a message to. Type in its name and hit enter. Then you'll be
asked for "keywords." These are words you'd use to attract somebody
scanning a newsgroup. Say you're selling your car. You might type
the type of car here. Next comes a "summary" line, which is somewhat
similar. Finally, you'll be asked for the message's "distribution."
This is where you put how widely you want your message disseminated.
Think about this one for a second. If you are selling your car, it
makes little sense to send a message about it all over the world. But
if you want to talk about the environment, it might make a lot of
sense. Each host system has its own set of distribution
classifications, but there's generally a local one (just for users of
that system), one for the city, state or region it's in, another for
the country (for example, usa), one for the continent (for Americans
and Canadians, na) and finally, one for the entire world (usually:
world).
Which one to use? Generally, a couple of seconds' thought will
help you decide. If you're selling your car, use your city or regional
distribution -- people in Australia won't much care and may even get
annoyed. If you want to discuss presidential politics, using a USA
distribution makes more sense. If you want to talk about events in the
Middle East, sending your message to the entire world is perfectly
acceptable.
Then you can type your message. If you've composed your message
offline (generally a good idea if you and emacs don't get along), you
can upload it now. You may see a lot of weird looking characters as
it uploads into emacs, but those will disappear when you hit control-X
and then control-C. Alternately: "save" the message (for example, by
hitting m in rn), log out, compose your message offline, log back on and
upload your message into a file on your host system. Then call up
Usenet, find the article you "saved." Start a reply, and you'll be asked
if you want to include a prepared message. Type in the name of the file
you just created and hit enter.
In rn, you have to wait until you get to the end of a newsgroup
to hit F, which will bring up a message-composing system.
Alternately, at your host system's command line, you can type
Pnews
and hit enter. You'll be prompted somewhat similarly to the nn
system, except that you'll be given a list of possible distributions.
If you chose "world," you'll get this message:
This program posts news to thousands of machines throughout the entire
civilized world. Your message will cost the net hundreds if not thousands of
dollars to send everywhere. Please be sure you know what you are doing.
Are you absolutely sure that you want to do this? [ny]
Don't worry -- your message won't really cost the Net untold
amounts, although, again, it's a good idea to think for a second
whether your message really should go everywhere.
If you want to respond to a given post through e-mail, instead of
publicly, hit R in nn or r or R in rn. In rn, as with follow-up
articles, the upper-case key includes the original message in yours.
Most newsgroups are unmoderated, which means that every message
you post will eventually wind up on every host system within the
geographic region you specified that carries that newsgroup.
Some newsgroups, however, are moderated, as you saw earlier with
comp.risks. In these groups, messages are shipped to a single
location where a moderator, acting much like a magazine editor,
decides what actually gets posted. In some cases, groups are
moderated like scholarly journals. In other cases, it's to try to cut
down on the massive number of messages that might otherwise be posted.
You'll notice that many articles in Usenet end with a fancy
"signature" that often contains some witty saying, a clever drawing
and, almost incidentally, the poster's name and e-mail address. You
too can have your own "signature" automatically appended to everything
you post. On your own computer, create a signature file. Try to keep
it to four lines or less, lest you annoy others on the Net. Then,
while connected to your host system, type
cat>.signature
and hit enter (note the period before the s). Upload your signature
file into this using your communications software's ASCII upload
protocol. When done, hit control-D, the Unix command for closing a
file. Now, every time you post a message, this will be appended to it.
There are a few caveats to posting. Usenet is no different from
a Town Meeting or publication: you're not supposed to break the law,
whether that's posting copyrighted material or engaging in illegal
activities. It is also not a place to try to sell products (except in
certain biz. and for-sale newsgroups).
3.8 CROSS-POSTING
Sometimes, you'll have an issue you think should be discussed in
more than one Usenet newsgroup. Rather than posting individual messages
in each group, you can post the same message in several groups at once,
through a process known as cross-posting.
Say you want to start a discussion about the political
ramifications of importing rare tropical fish from Brazil. People who
read rec.aquaria might have something to say. So might people who read
alt.politics.animals and talk.politics.misc.
Cross-posting is easy. It also should mean that people on other
systems who subscribe to several newsgroups will see your message only
once, rather than several times -- news-reading software can cancel out
the other copies once a person has read the message. When you get ready
to post a message (whether through Pnews for rn or the :post command in
nn), you'll be asked in which newsgroups. Type the names of the various
groups, separated by a comma, but no space, for example:
rec.aquaria,alt.politics.animals,talk.politics.misc
and hit enter. After answering the other questions (geographic
distribution, etc.), the message will be posted in the various
groups (unless one of the groups is moderated, in which case the
message goes to the moderator, who decides whether to make it public).
It's considered bad form to post to an excessive number of
newsgroups, or inappropriate newsgroups. Probably, you don't really have
to post something in 20 different places. And while you may think your
particular political issue is vitally important to the fate of the world,
chances are the readers of rec.arts.comics will not, or at least not
important enough to impose on them. You'll get a lot of nasty e-mail
messages demanding you restrict your messages to the "appropriate"
newsgroups.
Chapter 4: USENET II
4.1 FLAME, BLATHER AND SPEW
Something about online communications seems to make some people
particularly irritable. Perhaps it's the immediacy and semi-anonymity
of it all. Whatever it is, there are whole classes of people you will
soon think seem to exist to make you miserable.
Rather than pausing and reflecting on a message as one might do
with a letter received on paper, it's just so easy to hit your R key
and tell somebody you don't really know what you really think of them.
Even otherwise calm people sometimes find themselves turning into
raving lunatics. When this happens, flames erupt.
A flame is a particularly nasty, personal attack on somebody for
something he or she has written. Periodically, an exchange of flames
erupts into a flame war that begin to take up all the space in a given
newsgroup (and sometimes several; flamers like cross-posting to let the
world know how they feel). These can go on for weeks (sometimes they go
on for years, in which case they become "holy wars," usually on such
topics as the relative merits of Macintoshes and IBMs). Often, just when
they're dying down, somebody new to the flame war reads all the messages,
gets upset and issues an urgent plea that the flame war be taken to e-
mail so everybody else can get back to whatever the newsgroup's business
is. All this usually does, though, is start a brand new flame war, in
which this poor person comes under attack for daring to question the
First Amendment, prompting others to jump on the attackers for impugning
this poor soul... You get the idea.
Every so often, a discussion gets so out of hand that somebody
predicts that either the government will catch on and shut the whole
thing down or somebody will sue to close down the network, or maybe
even the wrath of God will smote everybody involved. This brings what
has become an inevitable rejoinder from others who realize that the
network is, in fact, a resilient creature that will not die easily:
"Imminent death of Usenet predicted. Film at 11.''
Flame wars can be tremendously fun to watch at first. They
quickly grow boring, though. And wait until the first time you're
attacked!
Flamers are not the only net.characters to watch out for.
Spewers assume that whatever they are particularly concerned about
either really is of universal interest or should be rammed down the
throats of people who don't seem to care -- as frequently as possible.
You can usually tell a spewer's work by the number of articles he posts
in a day on the same subject and the number of newsgroups to which he
then sends these articles -- both can reach well into double digits.
Often, these messages relate to various ethnic conflicts around the
world. Frequently, there is no conceivable connection between the issue
at hand and most of the newsgroups to which he posts. No matter. If you
try to point this out in a response to one of these messages, you will be
inundated with angry messages that either accuse you of being an
insensitive racist/American/whatever or ignore your point entirely to
bring up several hundred more lines of commentary on the perfidy of
whoever it is the spewer thinks is out to destroy his people.
Closely related to these folks are the Holocaust revisionists, who
periodically inundate certain groups (such as soc.history) with long
rants about how the Holocaust never really happened. Some people
attempt to refute these people with facts, but others realize this only
encourages them.
Blatherers tend to be more benign. Their problem is that they
just can't get to the point -- they can wring three or four screenfuls
out of a thought that others might sum up in a sentence or two. A
related condition is excessive quoting. People afflicted with this will
include an entire message in their reply rather than excising the
portions not relevant to whatever point they're trying to make. The
worst quote a long message and then add a single line:
"I agree!"
or some such, often followed by a monster .signature (see section 4.5)
There are a number of other Usenet denizens you'll soon come to
recognize. Among them:
Net.weenies. These are the kind of people who enjoy Insulting
others, the kind of people who post nasty messages in a sewing
newsgroup just for the hell of it.
Net.geeks. People to whom the Net is Life, who worry about what
happens when they graduate and they lose their free, 24-hour access.
Net.gods. The old-timers; the true titans of the Net and the
keepers of its collective history. They were around when the Net
consisted of a couple of computers tied together with baling wire.
Lurkers. Actually, you can't tell these people are there, but
they are. They're the folks who read a newsgroup but never post or
respond.
Wizards. People who know a particular Net-related topic inside
and out. Unix wizards can perform amazing tricks with that operating
system, for example.
Net.saints. Always willing to help a newcomer, eager to share
their knowledge with those not born with an innate ability to navigate
the Net, they are not as rare as you might think. Post a question
about something and you'll often be surprised how many responses you
get.
The last group brings us back to the Net's oral tradition. With
few written guides, people have traditionally learned their way around
the Net by asking somebody, whether at the terminal next to them or on
the Net itself. That tradition continues: if you have a question, ask.
Today, one of the places you can look for help is in the
news.newusers.questions newsgroup, which, as its name suggests, is a
place to learn more about Usenet. But be careful what you post. Some
of the Usenet wizards there get cranky sometimes when they have to
answer the same question over and over again. Oh, they'll eventually
answer your question, but not before they tell you should have
asked your host system administrator first or looked at the postings in
news.announce.newusers.
4.2 KILLFILES, THE CURE FOR WHAT AILS YOU
As you keep reading Usenet, you are going to run across things or
people that really drive you nuts -- or that you just get tired of
seeing.
Killfiles are just the thing for you. When you start your
newsreader, it checks to see if you have any lists of words, phrases
or names you don't want to see. If you do, then it blanks out any
messages containing those words.
Such as cascades.
As you saw earlier, when you post a reply to a message and
include parts of that message, the original lines show up with a > in
front of them. Well, what if you reply to a reply? Then you get a >>
in front of the line. And if you reply to that reply? You get >>>.
Keep this up, and soon you get a triangle of >'s building up in your
message.
There are people who like building up these triangles, or
cascades. They'll "respond" to your message by deleting everything
you've said, leaving only the "In message 123435, you said:" part and
the last line of your message, to which they add a nonsensical
retort. On and on they go until the triangle has reached the right
end of the page. Then they try to expand the triangle by deleting one
> with each new line. Whoever gets to finish this mega-triangle wins.
There is even a newsgroup just for such folks: alt.cascade.
Unfortunately, cascaders would generally rather cascade in other
newsgroups. Because it takes a lot of messages to build up a completed
cascade, the targeted newsgroup soon fills up with these messages. Of
course, if you complain, you'll be bombarded with messages about the
First Amendment and artistic expression -- or worse, with another
cascade. The only thing you can do is ignore them, by setting up a
killfile.
There are also certain newsgroups where killfiles will come in
handy because of the way the newsgroups are organized. For example,
readers of rec.arts.tv.soaps always use an acronym in their subject: line
for the show they're writing about (AMC, for example, for "All My
Children"). This way, people who only want to read about "One Life to
Live" can blank out all the messages about "The Young and the Restless"
and all the others (to keep people from accidentally screening out
messages that might contain the letters "gh" in them, "General Hospital"
viewers always use "gh:" in their subject lines).
Both nn and rn let you create killfiles, but in different ways.
To create a killfile in nn, go into the newsgroup with the
offending messages and type a capital K. You'll see this at the
bottom of your screen:
AUTO (k)ill or (s)elect (CR => Kill subject 30 days)
If you hit return, nn will ask you which article's subject you're
tired of. Choose one and the article and any follow-ups will disappear,
and you won't see them again for 30 days.
If you type a lower-case k instead, you'll get this:
AUTO KILL on (s)ubject or (n)ame (s)
If you hit your S key or just enter, you'll see this:
KILL Subject: (=/)
Type in the name of the offending word or phrase and hit enter.
You'll then be prompted:
KILL in (g)roup 'eff.test' or in (a)ll groups (g)
except that the name of the group you see will be the one you're
actually in at the moment. Because cascaders and other annoying
people often cross-post their messages to a wide range of newsgroups,
you might consider hitting a instead of g. Next comes:
Lifetime of entry in days (p)ermanent (30)
The P key will screen out the offending articles forever, while
hitting enter will do it for 30 days. You can also type in a number
of days for the blocking.
Creating killfiles in rn works differently -- its default
killfile generator only works for messages in specific groups, rather
than globally for your entire newsgroup list. To create a global
killfile, you'll have to write one yourself.
To create a killfile in rn, go into the newsgroup where the
offending messages are and type in its number so you get it on your
screen. Type a capital K. From now on, any message with that subject
line will disappear before you read the group. You should probably
choose a reply, rather than the original message, so that you will get
all of the followups (the original message won't have a "Re: " in its
subject line). The next time you call up that newsgroup, rn will tell
you it's killing messages. When it's done, hit the space bar to go
back into reading mode.
To create a "global" kill file that will automatically wipe out
articles in all groups you read, start rn and type control-K. This
will start your whatever text editor you have as your default on your
host system and create a file (called KILL, in your News
subdirectory).
On the first line, you'll type in the word, phrase or name you
don't want to see, followed by commands that tell rn whether to search
an entire message for the word or name and then what to do when it
finds it.
Each line must be in this form
/pattern/modifier:j
"Pattern" is the word or phrase you want rn to look for. It's
case-insensitive: both "test" and "Test" will be knocked out. The
modifier tells rn whether to limit its search to message headers
(which can be useful when the object is to never see messages from a
particular person):
a: Looks through an entire message
h: Looks just at the header
You can leave out the modifier command, in which case rn will
look only at the subject line of messages. The "j" at the end tells rn to
screen out all articles with the offending word.
So if you never want to see the word "foo" in any header, ever again,
type this:
/foo/h:j
This is particularly useful for getting rid of articles from
people who post in more than one newsgroup, such as cascaders, since
an article's newsgroup name is always in the header.
If you just want to block messages with a subject line about
cascades, you could try:
/foo/:j
To kill anything that is a followup to any article, use this
pattern:
/Subject: *Re:/:j
When done writing lines for each phrase to screen, exit the text
editor as you normally would, and you'll be put back in rn.
One word of caution: go easy on the global killfile. An
extensive global killfile, or one that makes frequent use of the a:
modifier can dramatically slow down rn, since the system will now have
to look at every single word in every single message in all the
newsgroups you want to read.
If there's a particular person whose posts you never want to see
again, first find his or her address (which will be in the "from:" line
of his postings) and then write a line in your killfile like this:
/From: *name@address\.all/h:j
4.3 SOME USENET HINTS
Case counts in Unix -- most of the time. Many Unix commands,
including many of those used for reading Usenet articles, are case
sensitive. Hit a d when you meant a D and either nothing will happen,
or something completely different from what you expected will happen.
So watch that case!
In nn, you can get help most of the time by typing a question mark
(the exception is when you are writing your own message, because then
you are inside the text-processing program). In rn, type a lower-case h
at any prompt to get some online help.
When you're searching for a particular newsgroup, whether through
the l command in rn or with nngrep for nn, you sometimes may have to
try several keywords. For example, there is a newsgroup dedicated to
the Grateful Dead, but you'd never find it if you tried, say, l grateful
dead, because the name is rec.music.gdead. In general, try the smallest
possible part of the word or discussion you're looking for, for example,
use "trek" to find newsgroups about "Star Trek." If one word doesn't
produce anything, try another.
4.4 THE BRAIN-TUMOR BOY, THE MODEM TAX AND THE CHAIN LETTER
Like the rest of the world, Usenet has its share of urban legends
and questionable activities. There are three in particular that plague
the network. Spend more than, oh, 15 minutes within Usenet and you're
sure to run into the Brain Tumor Boy, the plot by the evil FCC to tax
your modem and Dave Rhode's miracle cure for poverty. For the record,
here's the story on all of them:
There once was a seven-year-old boy in England named Craig
Shergold who was diagnosed with a seemingly incurable brain tumor. As
he lay dying, he wished only to have friends send him postcards. The
local newspapers got a hold of the tear-jerking story. Soon, the boy's
wish had changed: he now wanted to get into the Guinness Book of World
Records for the largest postcard collection. Word spread around the
world. People by the millions sent him postcards.
Miraculously, the boy lived. An American billionaire even flew
him to the U.S. for surgery to remove what remained of the tumor. And
his wish succeeded beyond his wildest dreams -- he made the Guinness
Book of World Records.
But with Craig now well into his teens, his dream has turned into
a nightmare for the post office in the small town outside London where
he lives. Like Craig himself, his request for cards just refuses to
die, inundating the post office with millions of cards every year.
Just when it seems like the flow is slowing, along comes somebody else
who starts up a whole new slew of requests for people to send Craig
post cards (or greeting cards or business cards -- Craig letters have
truly taken on a life of their own and begun to mutate). Even Dear Abby
has been powerless to make it stop!
What does any of this have to do with the Net? The Craig letter
seems to pop up on Usenet as often as it does on cork boards at major
corporations. No matter how many times somebody like Gene Spafford
posts periodic messages to ignore them or spend your money on something
more sensible (a donation to the local Red Cross, say), somebody
manages to post a letter asking readers to send cards to poor little
Craig.
Don't send any cards to the Federal Communications Commission,
either.
In 1987, the FCC considered removing a tax break it had granted
CompuServe and other large commercial computer networks for use of the
national phone system. The FCC quickly reconsidered after alarmed users
of bulletin-board systems bombarded it with complaints about this "modem
tax."
Now, every couple of months, somebody posts an "urgent" message
warning Net users that the FCC is about to impose a modem tax. This is
NOT true. The way you can tell if you're dealing with the hoax story
is simple: it ALWAYS mentions an incident in which a talk-show host on
KGO radio in San Francisco becomes outraged on the air when he reads a
story about the tax in the New York Times.
Another way to tell it's not true is that it never mentions a
specific FCC docket number or closing date for comments.
Save that letter to your congressman for something else.
Sooner or later, you're going to run into a message titled "Make
Money Fast." It's your basic chain letter. The Usenet version is always
about some guy named Dave Rhodes who was on the verge of death, or
something, when he discovered a perfectly legal way to make tons of money
-- by posting a chain letter on computer systems around the world. Yeah,
right.
4.5 BIG SIG
There are .sigs and there are .sigs. Many people put only bare-bones
information in their .sig files -- their names and e-mail addresses,
perhaps their phone numbers. Others add a quotation they think is funny or
profound and a disclaimer that their views are not those of their employer.
Still others add some ASCII-art graphics. And then there are
those who go totally berserk, posting huge creations with multiple quotes,
hideous ASCII "barfics" and more e-mail addresses than anybody could
humanly need. College freshmen unleashed on the Net seem to excel at
these. You can see the best of the worst in the alt.fan.warlord
newsgroup, which exists solely to critique .sigs that go too far, such as:
___________________________________________________________________________
|#########################################################################|
|#| |#|
|#| ***** * * ***** * * ***** ***** ***** |#|
|#| * * * * ** ** * * * * |#|
|#| * ****** *** * * * *** * ** ***** ***** |#|
|#| * * * * * * * * * * * |#|
|#| * * * ***** * * ***** ***** * * |#|
|#| |#|
|#| **** ***** ***** ***** ***** ***** ***** ***** |#|
|#| * ** * * * * * * * * |#|
|#| **** * * ** ***** * * ** * * * |#|
|#| * ** * * * ** * * * * * * * |#|
|#| **** ***** ***** ** ***** ***** ***** ***** ***** |#|
|#| |#|
|#| T-H-E M-E-G-A B-I-G .S-I-G C-O-M-P-A-N-Y |#|
|#| ~-----------------------------~ |#|
|#| "Annoying people with huge net.signatures for over 20 years..." |#|
|#| |#|
|#|---------------------------------------------------------------------|#|
|#| "The difference between a net.idiot and a bucket of shit is that at |#|
|#| least a bucket can be emptied. Let me further illustrate my point |#|
|#| by comparing these charts here. (pulls out charts) Here we have a |#|
|#| user who not only flames people who don't agree with his narrow- |#|
|#| minded drivel, but he has this huge signature that takes up many |#|
|#| pages with useless quotes. This also makes reading his frequented |#|
|#| newsgroups a torture akin to having at 300 baud modem on a VAX. I |#|
|#| might also add that his contribution to society rivals only toxic |#|
|#| dump sites." |#|
|#| -- Robert A. Dumpstik, Jr |#|
|#| President of The Mega Big Sig Company |#|
|#| September 13th, 1990 at 4:15pm |#|
|#| During his speech at the "Net.abusers |#|
|#| Society Luncheon" during the |#|
|#| "1990 Net.idiots Annual Convention" |#|
|#|_____________________________________________________________________|#|
|#| |#|
|#| Thomas Babbit, III: 5th Assistant to the Vice President of Sales |#|
|#| __ |#|
|#| ========== ______ Digital Widget Manufacturing Co. |#|
|#| \\ / 1147 Complex Incorporated Drive |#|
|#| )-======= Suite 215 |#|
|#| Nostromo, VA 22550-1147 |#|
|#| #NC-17 Enterpoop Ship :) Phone # 804-844-2525 |#|
|#| ---------------- Fax # 804-411-1115 |#|
|#| "Shut up, Wesley!" Online Service # 804-411-1100 |#|
|#| -- Me at 300-2400, and now 9600 baud! |#|
|#| PUNet: tbabb!digwig!nostromo |#|
|#| Home address: InterNet: dvader@imperial.emp.com |#|
|#| Thomas Babbit, III Prodigy: Still awaiting author- |#|
|#| 104 Luzyer Way ization |#|
|#| Sulaco, VA 22545 "Manufacturing educational widget |#|
|#| Phone # 804-555-1524 design for over 3 years..." |#|
|#|=====================================================================|#|
|#| |#|
|#| Introducing: |#|
|#| ______ |#|
|#| The |\ /| / |#|
|#| | \/ | / |#|
|#| | | / |#|
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|#| | | ETELHED /_____ ONE |#|
|#|'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'|#|
|#| 50Megs Online! The k00l BBS for rad teens! Lots of games and many |#|
|#| bases for kul topix! Call now and be validated to the Metelhed Zone|#|
|#| -- 804-555-8500 -- |#|
|#|\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\V/////////////////////////////////////|#|
|#| "This is the end, my friend..." -- The Doors |#|
|#########################################################################|
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Hit "b" to continue
Hahahha... fooled u!
4.6 THE FIRST AMENDMENT AS LOCAL ORDINANCE
Usenet's international reach raises interesting legal questions that
have yet to be fully resolved. Can a discussion or posting that is legal
in one country be transmitted to a country where it is against the law?
Does the posting even become illegal when it reaches the border? And
what if that country is the only path to a third country where the
message is legal as well? Several foreign colleges and other
institutions have cut off feeds of certain newsgroups where Americans
post what is, in the U.S., perfectly legal discussions of drugs or
alternative sexual practices. Even in the U.S., some universities have
discontinued certain newsgroups their administrators find offensive,
again, usually in the alt. hierarchy.
An interesting example of this sort of question happened in 1993,
when a Canadian court issued a gag order on Canadian reporters covering a
particularly controversial murder case. Americans, not bound by the gag
order, began posting accounts of the trial -- which any Canadian with a
Net account could promptly read.
4.7 USENET HISTORY
In the late 1970s, Unix developers came up with a new feature: a
system to allow Unix computers to exchange data over phone lines.
In 1979, two graduate students at Duke University in North
Carolina, Tom Truscott and Jim Ellis, came up with the idea of using
this system, known as UUCP (for Unix-to-Unix CoPy), to distribute
information of interest to people in the Unix community. Along with
Steve Bellovin, a graduate student at the University of North Carolina
and Steve Daniel, they wrote conferencing software and linked together
computers at Duke and UNC.
Word quickly spread and by 1981, a graduate student at Berkeley,
Mark Horton and a nearby high school student, Matt Glickman, had
released a new version that added more features and was able to handle
larger volumes of postings -- the original North Carolina program was
meant for only a few articles in a newsgroup each day.
Today, Usenet connects tens of thousands of sites around the world,
from mainframes to Amigas. With more than 3,000 newsgroups and untold
thousands of readers, it is perhaps the world's largest computer
network.
4.8 WHEN THINGS GO WRONG
* When you start up rn, you get a "warning" that "bogus
newsgroups" are present.
Within a couple of minutes, you'll be asked whether to keep these or
delete them. Delete them. Bogus newsgroups are newsgroups that your
system administrator or somebody else has determined are no longer
needed.
* While in a newsgroup in rn, you get a message: "skipping
unavailable article."
This is usually an article that somebody posted and then decided to
cancel.
* You upload a text file to your Unix host system for use in a
Usenet message or e-mail, and when you or your recipient reads the file,
every line ends with a ^M.
This happens because Unix handles line endings differently than MS-
DOS or Macintosh computers. Most Unix systems have programs to convert
incoming files from other computers. To use it, upload your file and
then, at your command line, type
dos2unix filename filename or
mac2unix filename filename
depending on which kind of computer you are using and where filename is
the name of the file you've just uploaded. A similar program can prepare
text files for downloading to your computer, for example:
unix2dos filename filename or
unix2mac filename filename
will ensure that a text file you are about to get will not come out
looking odd on your computer.
4.9 FYI
Leanne Phillips periodically posts a list of frequently asked
questions (and answers) about use of the rn killfile function in the
news.newusers.questions and news.answers newsgroups on Usenet. Bill
Wohler posts a guide to using the nn newsreader in the news.answers and
news.software newsgroups. Look in the news.announce.newusers and
news.groups newsgroups on Usenet for "A Guide to Social Newsgroups and
Mailing Lists,'' which gives brief summaries of the various soc.
newsgroups.
"Managing UUCP and Usenet,' by Tim O'Reilly and Grace Todino
(O'Reilly & Associates, 1992) is a good guide for setting up your own
Usenet system.
Chapter 5: MAILING LISTS AND BITNET
5.1 INTERNET MAILING LISTS
Usenet is not the only forum on the Net. Scores of "mailing
lists" represent another way to interact with other Net users.
Unlike Usenet messages, which are stored in one central location on
your host system's computer, mailing-list messages are delivered right
to your e-mail box, unlike Usenet messages.
You have to ask for permission to join a mailing list. Unlike
Usenet, where your message is distributed to the world, on a mailing
list, you send your messages to a central moderator, who either re-mails
it to the other people on the list or uses it to compile a periodic
"digest" mailed to subscribers.
Given the number of newsgroups, why would anybody bother with a
mailing list?
Even on Usenet, there are some topics that just might not generate
enough interest for a newsgroup; for example, the Queen list, which is
all about the late Freddie Mercury's band.
And because a moderator decides who can participate, a mailing list
can offer a degree of freedom to speak one's mind (or not worry about
net.weenies) that is not necessarily possible on Usenet. Several
groups offer anonymous postings -- only the moderator knows the real
names of people who contribute. Examples include 12Step, where people
enrolled in such programs as Alcoholics Anonymous can discuss their
experiences, and sappho, a list limited to gay and bisexual women.
You can find mailing addresses and descriptions of these lists
in the news.announce.newusers newsgroup with the subject of "Publicly
Accessible Mailing Lists." Mailing lists now number in the hundreds,
so this posting is divided into three parts.
If you find a list to which you want to subscribe, send an e-
mail message to
list-request@address
where "list" is the name of the mailing list and "address" is the
moderator's e-mail address, asking to be added to the list. Include
your full e-mail address just in case something happens to your
message's header along the way, and ask, if you're accepted, for the
address to mail messages to the list.
5.2 BITNET
As if Usenet and mailing lists were not enough, there are Bitnet
"discussion groups" or "lists."
Bitnet is an international network linking colleges and
universities, but it uses a different set of technical protocols for
distributing information from the Internet or Usenet. It offers hundreds
of discussion groups, comparable in scope to Usenet newsgroups.
One of the major differences is the way messages are
distributed. Bitnet messages are sent to your mailbox, just as with a
mailing list. However, where mailing lists are often maintained by a
person, all Bitnet discussion groups are automated -- you subscribe to
them through messages to a "listserver" computer. This is a kind of
robot moderator that controls distribution of messages on the list. In
many cases, it also maintains indexes and archives of past postings in a
given discussion group, which can be handy if you want to get up to
speed with a discussion or just search for some information related to
it.
Many Bitnet discussion groups are now "translated" into Usenet
form and carried through Usenet in the bit.listserv hierarchy. In
general, it's probably better to read messages through Usenet if you
can. It saves some storage space on your host system's hard drives.
If 50 people subscribe to the same Bitnet list, that means 50
copies of each message get stored on the system; whereas if 50 people
read a Usenet message, that's still only one message that needs storage
on the system. It can also save your sanity if the discussion group
generates large numbers of messages. Think of opening your e-mailbox
one day to find 200 messages in it -- 199 of them from a discussion
group and one of them a "real" e-mail message that's important to you.
Subscribing and canceling subscriptions is done through an e-
mail message to the listserver computer. For addressing, all
listservers are known as "listserv" (yep) at some Bitnet address.
This means you will have to add ".bitnet" to the end of the
address, if it's in a form like this: listserv@miamiu. For example, if
you have an interest in environmental issues, you might want to
subscribe to the Econet discussion group. To subscribe, send an e-mail
message to
listserv@miamiu.bitnet
Some Bitnet listservers are also connected to the Internet, so if you
see a listserver address ending in ".edu", you can e-mail the
listserver without adding ".bitnet" to the end.
Always leave the "subject:" line blank in a message to a
listserver. Inside the message, you tell the listserver what you
want, with a series of simple commands:
subscribe group Your Name To subscribe to a list, where "group"
is the list name and "Your Name" is
your full name, for example:
subscribe econet Henry Fielding
unsubscribe group Your Name To discontinue a group, for example:
unsubscribe econet Henry Fielding
list global This sends you a list of all available
Bitnet discussion groups. But be careful
-- the list is VERY long!
get refcard Sends you a list of other commands you
can use with a listserver, such as
commands for retrieving past postings
from a discussion group.
Each of these commands goes on a separate line in your message
(and you can use one or all of them). If you want to get a list of
all Bitnet discussion groups, send e-mail to
listserv@bitnic.educom.edu
Leave the "subject:" line blank and use the list global command.
When you subscribe to a Bitnet group, there are two important
differences from Usenet.
First, when you want to post a message for others to read in the
discussion group, you send a message to the group name at its Bitnet
address. Using Econet as an example, you would mail the message to:
econet@miamiu.bitnet
Note that this is different from the listserv address you used to
subscribe to the group to begin with. Use the listserv address ONLY
to subscribe to or unsubscribe from a discussion group. If you use the
discussion-group address to try to subscribe or unsubscribe, your message
will go out to every other subscriber, many of whom will think unkind
thoughts, which they may share with you in an e-mail message).
The second difference relates to sending an e-mail message to the
author of a particular posting. Usenet newsreaders such as rn and nn
let you do this with one key. But if you hit your R key to respond to
a discussion-group message, your message will go to the listserver,
and from there to everybody else on the list! This can prove
embarrassing to you and annoying to others. To make sure your
message goes just to the person who wrote the posting, take down his
e-mail address from the posting and then compose a brand-new message.
Remember, also, that if you see an e-mail address like IZZY@INDYVMS, it's
a Bitnet address.
Two Bitnet lists will prove helpful for delving further into the
network. NEW-LIST tells you the names of new discussion groups. To
subscribe, send a message to listserv@ndsuvm1.bitnet:
sub NEW-LIST Your Name
INFONETS is the place to go when you have questions about Bitnet.
It is also first rate for help on questions about all major computer
networks and how to reach them. To subscribe, send e-mail to info-nets-
request@think.com:
sub INFONETS Your Name
Both of these lists are also available on Usenet, the former as
bit.listserv.new-list; the latter as bit.listserv.infonets (sometimes
bit.listserv.info-nets).
Chapter 6: TELNET
6.1 MINING THE NET
Like any large community, cyberspace has its libraries, places you
can go to look up information or take out a good book. Telnet is one of
your keys to these libraries.
Telnet is a program that lets you use the power of the Internet to
connect you to databases, library catalogs, and other information
resources around the world. Want to see what the weather's like in
Vermont? Check on crop conditions in Azerbaijan? Get more information
about somebody whose name you've seen online? Telnet lets you do this,
and more.
Alas, there's a big "but!'' Unlike the phone system, Internet is not
yet universal; not everybody can use all of its services. Almost all
colleges and universities on the Internet provide telnet access. So do
all of the for-fee public-access systems listed in Chapter 1. But the
Free-Net systems do not give you access to every telnet system. And if
you are using a public-access UUCP or Usenet site, you will not have
access to telnet. The main reason for this is cost. Connecting to the
Internet can easily cost $1,000 or more for a leased, high-speed phone
line. Some databases and file libraries can be queried by e-mail,
however; we'll show you how to do that later on. In the meantime, the
rest of this chapter assumes you are connected to a site with at least
partial Internet access.
Most telnet sites are fairly easy to use and have online help systems.
Most also work best (and in some cases, only) with VT100 emulation.
Let's dive right in and try one.
At your host system's command line, type
telnet access.usask.ca
and hit enter. That's all you have to do to connect to a telnet site!
In this case, you'll be connecting to a service known as Hytelnet, which
is a database of computerized library catalogs and other databases
available through telnet. You should see something like this:
Trying 128.233.3.1 ...
Connected to access.usask.ca.
Escape character is '^]'.
Ultrix UNIX (access.usask.ca)
login:
Every telnet site has two addresses -- one composed of words that
are easier for people to remember; the other a numerical address better
suited for computers. The "escape character" is good to remember. When
all else fails, hitting your control key and the ] key at the same time
will disconnect you and return you to your host system. At the login
prompt, type
hytelnet
and hit enter. You'll see something like this:
Welcome to HYTELNET
version 6.2
...................
What is HYTELNET? <WHATIS> . Up/Down arrows MOVE
Library catalogs <SITES1> . Left/Right arrows SELECT
Other resources <SITES2> . ? for HELP anytime
Help files for catalogs <OP000> .
Catalog interfaces <SYS000> . m returns here
Internet Glossary <GLOSSARY> . q quits
Telnet tips <TELNET> .
Telnet/TN3270 escape keys <ESCAPE.KEY> .
Key-stroke commands <HELP.TXT> .
........................
HYTELNET 6.2 was written by Peter Scott,
U of Saskatchewan Libraries, Saskatoon, Sask, Canada. 1992
Unix and VMS software by Earl Fogel, Computing Services, U of S 1992
The first choice, "<WHATIS>" will be highlighted. Use your down
and up arrows to move the cursor among the choices. Hit enter when you
decide on one. You'll get another menu, which in turn will bring up
text files telling you how to connect to sites and giving any special
commands or instructions you might need. Hytelnet does have one quirk.
To move back to where you started (for example, from a sub-menu to a
main menu), hit the left-arrow key on your computer.
Play with the system. You might want to turn on your computer's
screen-capture, or at the very least, get out a pen and paper. You're
bound to run across some interesting telnet services that you'll want to
try -- and you'll need their telnet "addresses.''
As you move around Hytelnet, it may seem as if you haven't left
your host system -- telnet can work that quickly. Occasionally, when
network loads are heavy, however, you will notice a delay between the
time you type a command or enter a request and the time the remote
service responds.
To disconnect from Hytelnet and return to your system, hit your q
key and enter.
Some telnet computers are set up so that you can only access them
through a specific "port." In those cases, you'll always see a number
after their name, for example: india.colorado.edu 13. It's important to
include that number, because otherwise, you may not get in.
In fact, try the above address. Type
telnet india.colorado.edu 13
and hit enter. You should see something like this:
Trying 128.138.140.44 ...
Followed very quickly by this:
telnet india.colorado.edu 13
Escape character is '^]'.
Sun Jan 17 14:11:41 1994
Connection closed by foreign host.
What we want is the middle line, which tells you the exact
Mountain Standard Time, as determined by a government-run atomic clock
in Boulder, Colo.
6.2 LIBRARY CATALOGS
Several hundred libraries around the world, from the Snohomish
Public Library in Washington State to the Library of Congress are now
available to you through telnet. You can use Hytelnet to find their
names, telnet addresses and use instructions.
Why would you want to browse a library you can't physically get to?
Many libraries share books, so if yours doesn't have what you're looking
for, you can tell the librarian where he or she can get it. Or if you live
in an area where the libraries are not yet online, you can use telnet to do
some basic bibliographic research before you head down to the local branch.
There are several different database programs in use by online
libraries. Harvard's is one of the easier ones to use, so let's try it.
Telnet to hollis.harvard.edu. When you connect, you'll see:
***************** H A R V A R D U N I V E R S I T Y
***************** OFFICE FOR INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY
*** *** ***
*** VE *** RI ***
*** *** *** HOLLIS (Harvard OnLine LIbrary System)
***** *****
**** TAS **** HUBS (Harvard University Basic Services)
*** ***
***** IU (Information Utility)
***
CMS (VM/CMS Timesharing Service)
** HOLLIS IS AVAILABLE WITHOUT ACCESS RESTRICTIONS **
Access to other applications is limited to individuals who have been
granted specific permission by an authorized person.
To select one of the applications above, type its name on the command
line followed by your user ID, and press RETURN.
** HOLLIS DOES NOT REQUIRE A USERID **
EXAMPLES: HOLLIS (press RETURN) or HUBS userid (press RETURN)
===>
Type
hollis
and hit enter. You'll see several screens flash by quickly until finally the
system stops and you'll get this:
WELCOME TO HOLLIS
(Harvard OnLine Library Information System)
To begin, type one of the 2-character database codes listed below:
HU Union Catalog of the Harvard libraries
OW Catalog of Older Widener materials
LG Guide to Harvard Libraries and Computing Resources
AI Expanded Academic Index (selective 1987-1988, full 1989- )
LR Legal Resource Index (1980- )
PA PAIS International (1985- )
To change databases from any place in HOLLIS, type CHOOSE followed by a
2-character database code, as in: CHOOSE HU
For general help in using HOLLIS, type HELP. For HOLLIS news, type
HELP NEWS. For HOLLIS hours of operation, type HELP HOURS.
ALWAYS PRESS THE ENTER OR RETURN KEY AFTER TYPING YOUR COMMAND
The first thing to notice is the name of the system: Hollis.
Librarians around the world seem to be inordinately found of cutesy,
anthropomorphized acronyms for their machines (not far from Harvard, the
librarians at Brandeis University came up with Library On-Line User
Information Service, or Louis; MIT has Barton).
If you want to do some general browsing, probably the best bet on the
Harvard system is to choose HU, which gets you access to their main
holdings, including those of its medical libraries. Choose that, and you'll
see this:
THE HARVARD UNIVERSITY LIBRARY UNION CATALOG
To begin a search, select a search option from the list below and type its
code on the command line. Use either upper or lower case.
AU Author search
TI Title search
SU Subject search
ME Medical subject search
KEYWORD Keyword search options
CALL Call number search options
OTHER Other search options
For information on the contents of the Union Catalog, type HELP.
To exit the Union Catalog, type QUIT.
A search can be entered on the COMMAND line of any screen.
ALWAYS PRESS THE ENTER OR RETURN KEY AFTER TYPING YOUR COMMAND.
Say you want to see if Harvard has shed the starchy legacy of the
Puritans, who founded the school. Why not see if they have "The Joy of
Sex" somewhere in their stacks? Type
TI Joy of Sex
and hit enter. This comes up:
HU: YOUR SEARCH RETRIEVED NO ITEMS. Enter new command or HELP. You typed:
TI JOY OF SEX
*******************************************************************************
ALWAYS PRESS THE ENTER OR RETURN KEY AFTER TYPING YOUR COMMAND.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
OPTIONS: FIND START - search options HELP
QUIT - exit database
COMMAND?
Oh, well! Do they have anything that mentions "sex" in the title? Try
another TI search, but this time just: TI sex. You get:
HU GUIDE: SUMMARY OF SEARCH RESULTS 2086 items retrieved by your search:
FIND TI SEX
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1 SEX
2 SEX A
823 SEXA
827 SEXBO
831 SEXCE
833 SEXDR
834 SEXE
879 SEXIE
928 SEXJA
929 SEXLE
930 SEXO
965 SEXPI
968 SEXT
1280 SEXUA
2084 SEXWA
2085 SEXY
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
OPTIONS: INDEX (or I 5 etc) to see list of items HELP
START - search options
REDO - edit search QUIT - exit database
COMMAND?
If you want to get more information on the first line, type 1 and hit enter:
HU INDEX: LIST OF ITEMS RETRIEVED 2086 items retrieved by your search:
FIND TI SEX
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
SEX
1 geddes patrick sir 1854 1932/ 1914 bks
SEX A Z
2 goldenson robert m/ 1987 bks
SEX ABUSE HYSTERIA SALEM WITCH TRIALS REVISITED
3 gardner richard a/ 1991 bks
SEX AETATES MUNDI ENGLISH AND IRISH
4 irish sex aetates mundi/ 1983 bks
SEX AFTER SIXTY A GUIDE FOR MEN AND WOMEN FOR THEIR LATER YEARS
5 butler robert n 1927/ 1976 bks
------------------------------------------------------ (CONTINUES) ------------
OPTIONS: DISPLAY 1 (or D 5 etc) to see a record HELP
GUIDE MORE - next page START - search options
REDO - edit search QUIT - exit database
COMMAND?
Most library systems give you a way to log off and return to your host
system. On Hollis, hit escape followed by
xx
One particularly interesting system is the one run by the Colorado
Alliance of Research Libraries, which maintains databases for libraries
throughout Colorado, the West and even in Boston.
Telnet pac.carl.org.
Follow the simple log-in instructions. When you get a menu, type 72
(even though that is not listed), which takes you to the Pikes Peak Library
District, which serves the city of Colorado Springs.
Several years ago, its librarians realized they could use their
database program not just for books but for cataloging city records and
community information, as well. Today, if you want to look up municipal
ordinances or city records, you only have to type in the word you're
looking for and you'll get back cites of the relevant laws or decisions.
Carl will also connect you to the University of Hawaii library, which,
like the one in Colorado Springs, has more than just bibliographic material
online. One of its features is an online Hawaiian almanac that can tell
you everything you ever wanted to know about Hawaiians, including the
number injured in boogie-board accidents each year (seven).
6.3 SOME INTERESTING TELNET SITES
AGRICULTURE
PENPages, run by Pennsylvania State University's College of
Agricultural Sciences, provides weekly world weather and crop reports
from the U.S. Department of Agriculture. These reports detail
everything from the effect of the weather on palm trees in Malaysia to
the state of the Ukrainian wheat crop. Reports from Pennsylvania
country extension officers offer tips for improving farm life. One
database lists Pennsylvania hay distributors by county -- and rates
the quality of their hay!
The service lets you search for information two different ways. A
menu system gives you quick access to reports that change frequently,
such as the weekly crop/weather reports. An index system lets you
search through several thousand online documents by keyword. At the
main menu, you can either browse through an online manual or choose
"PENPages,'' which puts you into the agriculture system.
Telnet: psupen.psu.edu
User name: Your 2-letter state code or WORLD
California State University's Advanced Technology Information
Network provides similar information as PENPages, only focusing on
California crops. It also maintains lists of upcoming California trade
shows and carries updates on biotechnology.
Telnet: caticsuf.cati.csufresno.edu
Log in: public
You will then be asked to register and will be given a user name
and password. Hit "a'' at the main menu for agricultural information.
Hit "d'' to call up a menu that includes a biweekly biotechnology
report.
AIDS
The University of Miami maintains a database of AIDS health
providers in southern Florida.
Telnet: callcat.med.miami.edu
Log in: library
At the main menu, select P (for "AIDS providers" and you'll be able
to search for doctors, hospitals and other providers that care for
patients with AIDS. You can also search by speciality.
See also under Conversation and Health.
AMATEUR RADIO:
The National Ham Radio Call-Sign Callbook lets you search for
American amateur operators by callsign, city, last name or Zip code. A
successful search will give you the ham's name, address, callsign,
age, type of license and when he or she got it.
Telnet: callsign.cs.buffalo.edu 2000 or ham.njit.edu 2000.
When you connect, you tell the system how you want to search and
what you're looking for. For example, if you want to search for hams
by city, you would type
city city name
and hit enter (for example: city Kankakee).
Other search choices are "call" (after which you would type a
ham's name), "name," and "zip" (which you would follow with a Zip
code). Be careful when searching for hams in a large city; there
doesn't seem to be anyway to shut off the list once it starts except
by using control-]. Otherwise, when done, type
quit
and hit enter to disconnect.
ANIMALS
See under Health.
CALCULATORS
Hewlett-Packard maintains a free service on which you can seek
advice about their line of calculators.
Telnet: hpcvbbs.cv.hp.com
No log-in is needed.
CHEMISTRY
The Electronic Periodic Table of the Elements draws the table on
your screen and then lets you look up various properties of individual
elements.
Telnet: camms2.caos.kun.nl
No password needed.
CONGRESS
The Library of Congress Information Service lets you search current
and past legislation (dating to 1982).
Telnet: locis.loc.gov
Password: none needed.
When you connect, you'll get a main menu that lets you select
from several databases, including the Library of Congress card catalog
(with book entries dating to 1978) and a database of information on
copyright laws.
For the congressional database, select the number next to its
entry and hit enter. You'll then be asked to choose which legislative year
to search. After that, a menu similar to this will come up:
***C103- THE LEGISLATIVE INFORMATION FILE FOR THE 103RD CONGRESS,
which was updated on 05/10/93 and contains 4,044 records,
is now available for your search.
CURRENCY: All information is NOT current through the above date, which is
machine generated when ANY information is added to the file.
Bill numbers, official titles, sponsors, and status (STEP) added
within 48 hours. Indexing terms and digests added later, in
some cases several weeks after the bill is added to the file.
TO START RETRIEVE to find: EXAMPLES:
SEARCH: member name --------------> retrieve rep gingrich
retrieve sen kennedy
bill number --------------> retrieve h.r. 1
subject keywords ---------> retrieve day care
FOR HELP: Type the word HELP and press the ENTER key.
READY FOR NEW COMMAND:
CONVERSATION
Communications Canada, a Canadian government agency is developing
Conversational Hypertext Access Technology (CHAT) is a system being
developed by Communications Canada to provide easy database access to
people with little or no computer experience, using what are known as
hypertext links. Instead of cryptic computer commands, users type
questions in English.
Telnet: debra.doc.ca
Log in: chat
You choose one of the three databases now online, one on AIDS, and
then ask questions in English.
Ask the AIDS database, "When was AIDS first discovered?'' and it
answers:
"The first case of AIDS in North America was diagnosed in 1979.
Before that, it existed in Africa, probably beginning in the 1950's.
AIDS was discovered in North America when a number of young men with a
history of homosexuality developed a rare type of cancer called
Kaposi's sarcoma.''
Sometimes, you do have to rephrase your question. For example,
when asked "What is the link between AIDS and drug use?'' the computer
responds:
"I know two things about drugs: the drugs that are used to treat
people with AIDS, and the risks that drug users have in getting AIDS.
Please ask about treatments or drug users.''
COPYRIGHT LAW
See under Congress.
CURRENT EVENTS
Every year, the CIA publishes a Fact Book that is essentially an
almanac of all the world's countries and international organizations,
including such information as major products, type of government and
names of its leaders. It's available for searching through the
University of Maryland Info Database.
Telnet: info.umd.edu
Choose a terminal type and hit enter (or just hit enter if you are
using VT100). At the main menu, choose the number next to "Educational
Resources." Then select the number next to "International," followed by
"Factbook." You can then search by country or agency.
This site also maintains copies of the U.S. budget, documents related
to the North American Free Trade Agreement and other government
initiatives. At the "Educational Resources" menu, select the number next to
"United States" and then the one next to "Government."
The Access Legislative Information Service lets you browse through
and look up bills before the Hawaiian legislature.
Telnet: access.uhcc.hawaii.edu
ENVIRONMENT
Envirolink is a large database and conference system about the
environment, based in Pittsburgh.
Telnet: envirolink.org
Log on: gopher
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency maintains online
databases of materials related to hazardous waste, the Clean Lakes
program and cleanup efforts in New England. The agency plans to
eventually include cleanup work in other regions, as well. The
database is actually a computerized card catalog of EPA documents --
you can look the documents up, but you'll still have to visit your
regional EPA office to see them.
Telnet: epaibm.rtpnc.epa.gov
No password or user name is needed. At the main menu, type
public
and hit enter (there are other listed choices, but they are only for
use by EPA employees). You'll then see a one-line menu. Type
ols
and hit enter, and you'll see something like this:
NET-106 Logon to TSO04 in progress.
DATABASES:
N NATIONAL CATALOG CH CHEMICAL COLL. SYSTEM
H HAZARDOUS WASTE 1 REGION I
L CLEAN LAKES
OTHER OPTIONS:
? HELP
Q QUIT
ENTER SELECTION -->
Choose one and you'll get a menu that lets you search by document
title, keyword, year of publication or corporation. After you enter
the search word and hit enter, you'll be told how many matches were
found. Hit 1 and then enter to see a list of the entries. To view
the bibliographic record for a specific entry, hit V and enter and
then type the number of the record.
The University of Michigan maintains a database of newspaper and
magazine articles related to the environment, with the emphasis on
Michigan, dating back to 1980.
Telnet: hermes.merit.edu
Host: mirlyn
Log in: meem
GEOGRAPHY
The University of Michigan Geographic Name Server can provide
basic information, such as population, latitude and longitude of U.S.
cities and many mountains, rivers and other geographic features.
Telnet: martini.eecs.umich.edu 3000
No password or user name is needed. Type in the name of a city, a
Zip code or a geographic feature and hit enter. The system doesn't like
names with abbreviations in them (for example, Mt. McKinley), so spell
them out (for example, Mount McKinley).
By typing in a town's name or zip code, you can find out a
community's county, Zip code and longitude and latitude. Not all
geographic features are yet included in the database.
GOVERNMENT
The National Technical Information Service runs a system that not
only provides huge numbers of federal documents of all sorts -- from
environmental factsheets to patent abstract -- but serves as a gateway to
dozens of other federal information systems.
Telnet: fedworld.gov
Log on as: new
See also under Congress and Current Events.
HEALTH
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration runs a database of health-
related information.
Telnet: fdabbs.fda.gov
Log in: bbs
You'll then be asked for your name and a password you want to use
in the future. After that, type
topics
and hit enter. You'll see this:
TOPICS DESCRIPTION
* NEWS News releases
* ENFORCE Enforcement Report
* APPROVALS Drug and Device Product Approvals list
* CDRH Centers for Devices and Radiological Health Bulletins
* BULLETIN Text from Drug Bulletin
* AIDS Current Information on AIDS
* CONSUMER FDA Consumer magazine index and selected articles
* SUBJ-REG FDA Federal Register Summaries by Subject
* ANSWERS Summaries of FDA information
* INDEX Index of News Releases and Answers
* DATE-REG FDA Federal Register Summaries by Publication Date
* CONGRESS Text of Testimony at FDA Congressional Hearings
* SPEECH Speeches Given by FDA Commissioner and Deputy
* VETNEWS Veterinary Medicine News
* MEETINGS Upcoming FDA Meetings
* IMPORT Import Alerts
* MANUAL On-Line User's Manual
You'll be able to search these topics by key word or
chronologically. It's probably a good idea, however, to capture a copy
of the manual, first, because the way searching works on the system is a
little odd. To capture a copy, type
manual
and hit enter. Then type
scan
and hit enter. You'll see this:
FOR LIST OF AVAILABLE TOPICS TYPE TOPICS
OR ENTER THE TOPIC YOU DESIRE ==>
MANUAL
BBSUSER
08-OCT-91
1 BBS User Manual
At this point, turn on your own computer's screen-capture or logging
function and hit your 1 key and then enter. The manual will begin to
scroll on your screen, pausing every 24 lines.
HIRING AND COLLEGE PROGRAM INFORMATION
The Federal Information Exchange in Gaithersburg, MD, runs two
systems at the same address: FEDIX and MOLIS. FEDIX offers research,
scholarship and service information for several federal agencies,
including NASA, the Department of Energy and the Federal Aviation
Administration. Several more federal agencies provide minority hiring
and scholarship information. MOLIS provides information about minority
colleges, their programs and professors.
Telnet: fedix.fie.com
User name: fedix (for the federal hiring database) or
molis (for the minority-college system)
Both use easy menus to get you to information.
HISTORY
Stanford University maintains a database of documents related to
Martin Luthor King.
Telnet: forsythetn.stanford.edu
Account: socrates
At the main menu, type
select mlk
and hit enter.
SKI REPORTS
See under weather.
SPACE
NASA Spacelink in Huntsville, Ala., provides all sorts of
reports and data about NASA, its history and its various missions,
past and present. You'll find detailed reports on every single probe,
satellite and mission NASA has ever launched along with daily updates
and lesson plans for teachers.
The system maintains a large file library of GIF-format space
graphics, but you can't download these through telnet. If you want
them, you have to dial the system directly, at (205) 895-0028.
Telnet: spacelink.msfc.nasa.gov
When you connect, you'll be given an overview of the system and
asked to register and choose a password.
The NED-NASA/IPAC Extragalactic Database lists data on more than
100,000 galaxies, quasars and other objects outside the Milky Way.
Telnet: ipac.caltech.edu.
Log in: ned
You can learn more than you ever wanted to about quasars, novae and
related objects on a system run by the Smithsonian Astrophysical
Observatory in Cambridge, Mass.
Telnet: cfa204.harvard.edu
Log in: einline
The physics department at the University of Massachusetts at
Amherst runs a bulletin-board system that provides extensive conferences
and document libraries related to space.
Telnet: spacemet.phast.umass.edu
Log on with your name and a password.
SUPREME COURT DECISIONS
The University of Maryland Info Database maintains U.S. Supreme
Court decisions from 1991 on.
Telnet: info.umd.edu
Choose a terminal type and hit enter (or just hit enter if you are
using VT100). At the main menu, choose the number next to "Educational
Resources" and hit enter. One of your options will then be for "United
States." Select that number and then, at the next menu, choose the one
next to "Supreme Court."
TELNET
Hytelnet, at the University of Saskatchewan, is an online guide to
hundreds of telnet sites around the world.
Telnet: access.usask.ca
Log in: hytelnet
TIME
To find out the exact time:
Telnet: india.colorado.edu 13
You'll see something like this:
Escape character is '^]'.
Sun Apr 5 14:11:41 1992
Connection closed by foreign host.
The middle line tells you the date and exact Mountain Standard
Time, as determined by a federal atomic clock.
TRANSPORTATION
The Subway Navigator in Paris can help you learn how long it will
take to get from point A to point B on subway systems around the world.
Telnet: metro.jussieu.fr 10000
No log-in is needed.
When you connect, you'll be asked to choose a language in which to
search (you can choose English or French) and then a city to search.
You'll be asked for the station you plan to leave from and the station
you want to get to.
WEATHER
The University of Michigan's Department of Atmospheric, Oceanographic
and Space Sciences supplies weather forecasts for U.S. and foreign cities,
along with skiing and hurricane reports.
Telnet: madlab.sprl.umich.edu 3000 (note the 3000).
No log-in name is needed.
Also see under Weather in the FTP list for information on downloading
satellite and radar weather images.
6.4 TELNET BULLETIN-BOARD SYSTEMS
You might think that Usenet, with its hundreds of newsgroups,
would be enough to satisfy the most dedicated of online communicators.
But there are a number of "bulletin-board" and other systems that
provide even more conferences or other services, many not found
directly on the Net. Some are free; others charge for access. They
include:
Bookstacks Unlimited is a Cleveland bookstore that uses the Internet
to advertise its services. Its online system features not only a catalog,
however, but conferences on books and literature.
Telnet: books.com
Log in with your own name and select a password for future connections.
Cimarron. Run by the Instituto Technical in Monterey, Mexico,
this system has Spanish conferences, but English commands, as you can
see from this menu of available conferences:
List of Boards
Name Title
General Board general
Dudas Dudas de Cimarron
Comentarios Comentarios al SYSOP
Musica Para los afinados........
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