2020202020 2020202020 2020202020 2020202020 2020 2020 2020 2020202020 2020 2020 2020 202020202020 20202020 2020202020 20202020 202020202020 20202020 2020 2020 2020 20202020 2020 2020 2020 2020 2020 2020 2020 2020 2020 2020 2020 2020202020 2020 2020202020 2020202020 2020 2020 2020202020 2020 2020202020 2020202020 2020 2020 No 20 %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% BIO-NAUT NEWSLETTER << EDITED BY ROBERT HARPER >> %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% When I write about newsreaders and usenet it seems to stir up the appetite of people on bitnet or internet who want to taste the delights of usenet but who do not have a usenet feed to their computer centre. Here is a recent letter that I received which outlines the problem. "Hi I am a great fan of yours (seriously). I am on bitnet and Internet and I can telnet and ftp, but unfortunately our computer centre does not have a usenet feed. Is there any place that I could telnet to that would allow me to read Usenet newsgroups" There seems to be need for people to be given the chance to experience how a big well organised computer centre works. Life can be rather restricted if your view of the outside world is only seen through what happens in your E-mail box. I have long wondered how would it be possible to remove the blinkers from the eyes of the E-mail user and show them something of the "big picture". It is all very well to talk about newsreading software, and give descriptions of how it works. Perhaps it is like spreading a table for a feast, and inviting E-mail users to look at all the goodies but never providing them with the opportunity to eat and enjoy themselves. I can imagine how frustrating that could be. So what can be done to provide access to the "moveable feast" that is enjoyed by usenetters? Well I wrote about Cleveland Free-net in Bionauts about three months ago, basically because some Finns were involved in some projects there and when I received the above letter it suddenly clicked that access to Cleveland Free-net could be the way to open the window on the world to anyone who is on Internet and has access to telnet. So this edition of BioBit is a demo on how to use the Cleveland Free-net using telnet. I will punctuate the text the comments proceeded with exclamation marks which will serve as explanations of what is going on. Here it goes. ! To get into the system you have to give the command telnet 129.22.8.82 ! I logged on from our local VAX where the prompt is a $ sign. $ telnet 129.22.8.82 Trying... Connected to 129.22.8.82. Escape character is '^X'. Interrupt remote process character is '^C'. CWRU INS 4.3 BSD (cwns16) (ttyp1) /™ WELCOME TO THE... _! !_ _!__ __!_ __ ! ! _! !_ ! ! ! ! ! ! /™ ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! !___ ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! !_!_ ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! _! ! !_!_ ! ! !_ ! ! !_! ! ! ! ! ! CLEVELAND FREE-NET ! ! COMMUNITY COMPUTER SYSTEM ! !____________________________________! brought to you by Case Western Reserve University Community Telecomputing Laboratory Are you: 1. A registered user 2. A visitor Please enter 1 or 2: 2 ! You then get some welcome from the system and the first question that ! is asked is if you are a registered user or a visitor. Since mostly ! everyone who reads this will never have used the system before then you ! would reply with a "2" Would you like to: 1. Apply for an account 2. Explore the system 3. Exit the system ! Now registered user are given privileges that visitors do not have, ! so if you want to apply for an account and become a registered user ! then you would choose option "1". In which case you will be asked for ! your name and address and an application form will be sent to you ! which outlines the charter of Cleveland Free-net and informs you of ! your responsibilities as a registered user. But since this is only ! a demo I chose option "2" so that I could explore the system. Please enter 1, 2 or 3: 2 ! Now comes the WELCOME text which explains what you can do on the system ! when you are logged in as a visitor... and some disclaimers for Free-net's ! legal protection. WELCOME: As a visitor to the Cleveland Free-Net you are allowed to go anywhere and read anything on the system. However, to post messages, and send or receive electronic mail, use the Cafe (chat area) and other features, you must be a REGISTERED USER. To register, simply use the "Apply for an account" option from the visitors menu, leave us your name and address and we'll send you the forms. The registration process and all system usage is FREE. You are limited to one hour per visit but there is no limit to the number of visits you can have per day. Before you enter the system however, there are two things we need to tell you. First we need to tell you that: By entering this system, in consideration for the privilege of using the Cleveland Free-Net and in consideration for having access to the free information contained on it, that you hereby release Case Western Reserve University, the National Public Telecomputing Network, the Cleveland Free-Net Project, its operators, and any institutions with which they are affiliated for any and all claims of any nature arising from your use of this system. (See, aren't you glad we told you that?) Second, once you are in the system you may want to try some of these commands from any arrow ==> prompt: who - who is online with you. The Cleveland Free-Net handles as many as 2200 logins a day. You might want to see who else is online at the same time you are. time - tells you the date and time ('case ya don't know), how long you have been online, and how much time you have remaining in your session. go - takes you to the place on the system you name (like a building or an area). See the Index in the Administration Building for a (more or less) complete list of the features available. x - logs you off the system from any arrow prompt Thank you for visiting the Free-Net. We hope you will become a registered user and that we'll see you online often. Enjoy and Learn! ! It would appear that what you are loging into is a BBS system ! called CWRUbbs which is menu driven. CWRUbbs Software copyright 1991 Case Western Reserve University All rights reserved <<< FROM THE ADMINISTRATOR >>> FREE-NET INTERNATIONAL: We would like to extend a greeting to two international groups who will be on the Free-Net during the next few days. First, a welcome to some 200 Swedish and Finnish teachers who are coming in from LAPPEENRANTA, FINLAND as part of a three- day educational conference. Second, a welcome to the students and teachers from the WELLINGTON, NEW ZEALAND area who are participating in the Welling- ton Young Person's Festival. Welcome to the Cleveland Free-Net. Enjoy and learn!! There is a 60 minute time limit on this connection. ! There is then some news from the administrator which announces local ! "happenings" on the campus. ( Why is it that these Finns have their ! fingers in everything. ED) The Bulletin board is laid out as though it ! were a campus and you can visit different buildings where different ! activities occur. So lets start out at the communications centre ! which is option 14. <<< CLEVELAND FREE-NET DIRECTORY >>> 1 The Administration Building 2 The Post Office 3 Public Square 4 The Courthouse & Government Center 5 The Arts Building 6 Science and Technology Center 7 The Medical Arts Building 8 The Schoolhouse (Academy One) 9 The Community Center & Recreation Area 10 The Business and Industrial Park 11 The Library 12 University Circle 13 The Teleport 14 The Communications Center 15 NPTN/USA TODAY HEADLINE NEWS ------------------------------------------------ h=Help, x=Exit Free-Net, "go help"=extended help Your Choice ==> 14 ! When you choose 14 you then get a new menu and different options. ! OK lets see what the "User services" are like with option 5 ! There might be other options that are of more interest to you, ! so you can choose where you want to go rather than follow this demo. ! As you might imagine it could prove cumbersome to have to wade ! through menus so Free-net also provides you with some short cuts ! for example is a command that would take you quickly to ! the communications centre. <<< THE COMMUNICATIONS CENTER >>> 1 About the Communications Center 2 Chat with other users 3 Directory Services 4 File Transfer Services 5 User Services 6 The Post Office 7 The Teleport ------------------------------------------------ h=Help, x=Exit Free-Net, "go help"=extended help Your Choice ==> 5 ! Here you see that is the quick command to get to the ! User Services... and in here you could tailor your environment ! by constructing a nifty/neat personalized signature for yourself ! once you become a registered user. As you can see there even exists ! the possibility to moderate your own newsgroup if you are a SYSOP ! Don't ask me how you get to be a sysop. But since we are only a visitor ! at the moment then lets look and see how many users are logged ! into the system at the moment by selecting option 10 ! ( There is more than one way to skin a cat... why didn't you just ! do "who"... talk about being long winded. ED). <<< USER SERVICES >>> 1 Help Desk 2 The Free-Net Index 3 Administration Q & A 4 Change your Password 5 Set your System Parameters 6 Edit your signature file. 7 Set access to logon/mail-read times 8 Moderate a newsgroup (Sysops Only) 9 The Sysops Area 10 Who's on the Free-Net? 11 Display the Message of the Day ------------------------------------------------ h=Help, x=Exit Free-Net, "go help"=extended help Your Choice ==> 10 rnf Rochelle N. Fleming am626 Ian Thomson qxz2 Qinghong Zhao aa431 Doug Gillespie fnguest Freenet Guest User sxg12 Sukru Gultop as237 Brian T. Chan fnguest Freenet Guest User ac721 Aron Gamman ag097 Z. Horodysky al342 Becky Bilyk aa540 Jinny Williamson al212 Ken Blasczak ah467 Marlene J. Miller mes10 Mark E. Smith ai989 Darby Dixon III ah007 Frederick O. Jacobson ae264 Patti Braggs ar785 James W. Miller maf7 Michael A. Feldman ah138 Joby Williams af416 Lee Peters an421 Kathleen Richards xx206 The Horror Sig aa666 Dan Krumlauf aa679 Daniel Hernandez aa632 David Gondek 27 users online ! Looks like most of the users are local users and a couple "visitors" ! are coming in over telnet. At the moment we are down in the lower reaches ! of the User Services so to quickly get up to the help desk we can type ! go help. And since "Bulletin Boards" is what the boy from the bitnet ! backwoods would be most interested in, we select option 7 Your choice ==> go help <<< THE HELP DESK >>> 1 About the Help Desk 2 Help Directory (Who to Contact) 3 Hints on using Free-Net 4 Help with Free-Net Version 2.3 5 Help with Editors 6 Help with Mail 7 Help with Bulletin Boards 8 Help with Voting 9 Help with Chat 10 Help with Searching 11 Help with Directory Services 12 Help with File Transfer 13 How to change to your sysop ID 14 Free-Net Bug Reports ------------------------------------------------ h=Help, x=Exit Free-Net, "go help"=extended help Your Choice ==> 7 ! You are then give some instructions on how to behave in the ! Bulletin Board system. It is not rn or nn but it gives the idea ! of how newsgroups function... some of the commands are similar ! to those that you would find on your common or garden newsreader. ! For example the f "followup" r "reply" and n "next" are the same, ! as are many others. The Bulletin Board System When you enter a Bulletin Board you will see the message; "Initializing connection to Bulletin Board Server, please wait..." possibly followed by some numbers. This can take up to 45 seconds for Bulletin Boards that have many articles in them. (Some have several thousand) Once the initialization is complete, you will see the main Bulletin Board menu. Here you can see the titles given to each article and select among them. To read an article you can type the number next to the title or, if you wish, you can read the articles in order by typing `n' (for next article). After you have read an article the system will mark the article with an `R' to show that you have read it. (NOTE: The current article is always marked with a `*' even if you have read it) When you leave the Bulletin Board the system will record which articles you have read so that the next time you read that board you will not have to read the same articles again. When you start up the Bulletin Board System you will begin with the current article set to the first unread article on that board. There are many optional commands that you can use while in the Bulletin Board system. `t' -- Type out the current article. `n' -- Read the next unread article. This will skip any articles that you have already read. `b' -- Read the previous article. (Back up) This will not skip unread articles. `v' -- Read (view) the next article. This will not skip unread articles. `T' -- Type out the current article without stopping for page breaks. This is useful for downloading messages to your PC. `N' -- Read the next unread message without stopping for page breaks. `B' -- Read the previous article without stopping for page breaks. `V' -- Read the next article without stopping for page breaks. `d' -- Delete the current article from the system. This is only allowed if you are the author of the article or you are the Sysop for that board. `h' -- Prints a list of all the possible commands. (Help) `q' (or `x') -- Quit (or exit) the Bulletin Board System. `c' -- Contribute an article. This is how you get an article onto the system. `s' -- Read the next unread article with the same subject. This is a handy way to follow a single thread of discussion within a board. `l' -- List all the titles of all the articles on the board. `u' -- List only the unread articles on the board. `r' -- Send an electronic mail message (reply) to the author of the current article. If you have chosen an editor the article will be included in the edit buffer. `f' -- Post a follow-up to the current article to the board. If you have chosen an editor the article will be included in the edit buffer. `j' -- Jump to a specified article without reading it. This is one way to move around in the message headers window. `e' -- Jump to the end of the message headers window. `+' (or `-') -- moves you forward (or back) one screenful in the message headers window. `/' -- Search the titles for a given pattern. This sets the current article to the next article that contains the pattern in its title. `>' -- Save the current article into a file in your work directory. You will be prompted for a filename. If the file you name already exists, the article will be appended, otherwise the file will be created. `!' -- Mark the current article as still unread. `k' -- Mark all articles up to and including the current article as read. (kill all previous articles) `z' -- Mark all articles with the same title as the current article as read. (zap this subject) `w' -- Write out the current state of the system. This saves the information about what articles you have read. You only need to do this if you don't trust the system to do it for you. h=Help, x=Exit Free-Net, "go help"=extended help ! But lets get back to the main menu by doing a go main just to show ! that you can always jump back to the beginning no matter where you are. ! For there was a Science and technology Center that might be an interesting ! place to look at. We select it with option 6. Your Choice ==> go main <<< CLEVELAND FREE-NET DIRECTORY >>> 1 The Administration Building 2 The Post Office 3 Public Square 4 The Courthouse & Government Center 5 The Arts Building 6 Science and Technology Center 7 The Medical Arts Building 8 The Schoolhouse (Academy One) 9 The Community Center & Recreation Area 10 The Business and Industrial Park 11 The Library 12 University Circle 13 The Teleport 14 The Communications Center 15 NPTN/USA TODAY HEADLINE NEWS ------------------------------------------------ h=Help, x=Exit Free-Net, "go help"=extended help ! The menu changes once again and I find that I have walked my way ! over the electronic Campus to the Science and Technology Centre <<< SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY CENTER >>> 1 About the Science and Technology Ctr. 2 USA TODAY: Science and Technology News 3 The Museum of Natural History 4 NASA Air and Space SIG 5 The Computer Corner 6 The Skeptics SIG 7 IEEE (Institute of Electrical & Electronic Engineers) 8 Solid waste SIG ------------------------------------------------ h=Help, x=Exit Free-Net, "go help"=extended help ! The computer corner looks quite interesting so I go there with option 5 Your Choice ==> 5 <<< THE COMPUTER CORNER >>> 1 About the Computer Corner 2 Cleveland Computer Society 3 Cleveland Area Bulletin Boards 4 Cleveland Area Bulletin Boards, Version 2 5 Computer Special Interest Groups ------------------------------------------------ h=Help, x=Exit Free-Net, "go help"=extended help ! And I look at the special Interest groups option 5 ! (This is getting boring and repetitious... can't you liven it up ! with a few jokes. ED). Patience ED the punch line is coming. ! By giving all these menus it gives a panoramic view of how big the ! system is, and you never now there just might be someone who is ! desperately in need of information about Texas Instruments 99 ! heheheheheheheh... sorry about that. But since we are big boys ! lets go for that cryptic wonder of wonders the UNIX SIG, option 9. Your Choice ==> 5 <<< COMPUTER SPECIAL INTEREST GROUPS >>> 1 The Adam Forum 2 The Apple Core 3 The Atari SIG 4 The Commodore/Amiga SIG 5 The IBM-PC SIG 6 The Tandy SIG 7 Texas Instruments 99/4A/9640 SIG 8 Timex/Sinclair SIG 9 The UNIX SIG ------------------------------------------------ h=Help, x=Exit Free-Net, "go help"=extended help Your Choice ==> 9 ! And since we need to get the FAQ's on unix then option 4 ! ( Sheeeesh.... Go unix would have got you there a whole lot faster ! without all this messing about with menus... get on with it. ED). <<< Unix Sig Menu >>> (go unix) 1 About The Unix Sig 2 Unix Sig General Newsgroup 3 Unix Sig Q&A Newsgroup 4 Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ's) 5 Directory Services ------------------------------------------------ h=Help, x=Exit Free-Net, "go help"=extended help Your Choice ==> 4 ! OK this is the last menu I promise... and the take home pay is just ! about to be delivered. We will go for option 4 since there might be ! something about Xview under Windows V 3.0 ( About time too. ED ) <<< Frequently Asked Questions Menu >>> 1 About FAQ Files 2 Frequently Asked Questions about UNIX 3 Frequently Asked Questions about UNIX on 386 and 486 PC's 4 Frequently Asked Questions about the X Window System 5 Frequently Asked Questions about NeXT Computers 6 Frequently Asked Questions about Minix 7 Minix 1.5 Information Sheet 8 Common UNIX Abbreviations and Acronyms 9 The Hacker's Dictionary (Second Edition) ------------------------------------------------ h=Help, x=Exit Free-Net, "go help"=extended help Your Choice ==> 4 ! There it is the take home pay... a usenet feed. The bulletin boards on ! free-net is syphoning off articles from usenet and making them available ! to people with telnet access. ( But wasn't it a long way down? ED ). ! I suppose it would be an easy job to make a building on the campus ! called the "BioLab" and then feed all of the Bionet newsgroups into it. ! Now that would be a good task for an aspiring bionaut. From usenet.ins.cwru.edu!magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!qt. cs.utexas.edu!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!lta!xug Mon Jul 8 15:28:40 EDT 1991 ˇLast changed: 30 Jun 91¸ This article and three following contain the answers to some Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) often seen in comp.windows.x. It is posted to help reduce volume in this newsgroup and to provide hard-to-find information of general interest. Please redistribute this article! This article includes answers to the following questions, which are loosely grouped into categories. Questions marked with a + indicate questions new to this issue; those with significant changes of content since the last issue are marked by *: 0) TOPIC: BASIC INFORMATION SOURCES AND DEFINITIONS 1) What books and articles on X are good for beginners? 2)* What courses on X and various X toolkits are available? 3)* What conferences on X are coming up? 4) What X-related public mailing lists are available? 5) How do I ask a net-question so as to maximize helpful responses? ! ( You could have said that in the first place. ED ). ! What!!!!! I go to all the trouble of finding out this information... ! log the session to disk... edit the damned thing, putting in comments here ! and there... give a panoramic view... exude enthusiasm from every pore, ! and all you do is bitch. That's it. I've had it. I quit. I'm going to ! find myself another EDITOR. h=Help, x=Exit Free-Net, "go help"=extended help Your Choice ==> x Are you sure you want to exit Freenet? (y/n) y Thank you for using the Free-Net. Bye. Rob "when you have a split personality you can always talk to yourself" Harper