Internet Surfer 2.0/Internet Surfer 2.0 (Wayzata Technology) (1996).iso/pc/text/mac/faqs.544

Text File | 1996-02-12 | 29KB | 587 lines

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQS);faqs.544



                  Be Brief

  Never say in ten words what you can say in fewer.  Say it succinctly and
  it will have a greater impact.  Remember that the longer you make your
  article, the fewer people will bother to read it.

         Your Postings Reflect Upon You -- Be Proud of Them

  Most people on USENET will know you only by what you say and how well you
  say it.  They may someday be your co-workers or friends.  Take some time
  to make sure each posting is something that will not embarrass you later.
  Minimize your spelling errors and make sure that the article is easy to
  read and understand.  Writing is an art and to do it well requires
  practice.  Since much of how people judge you on the net is based on your
  writing, such time is well spent.

               Use Descriptive Titles

  The subject line of an article is there to enable a person with a limited
  amount of time to decide whether or not to read your article.  Tell people
  what the article is about before they read it.  A title like "Car for
  Sale" to rec.autos does not help as much as "66 MG Midget for sale:
  Beaverton OR." Don't expect people to read your article to find out what
  it is about because many of them won't bother.  Some sites truncate the
  length of the subject line to 40 characters so keep your subjects short
  and to the point.

             Think About Your Audience

  When you post an article, think about the people you are trying to
  reach.  Asking UNIX(*) questions on rec.autos will not reach as many
  of the people you want to reach as if you asked them on
  comp.unix.questions or comp.unix.internals.  Try to get the most
  appropriate audience for your message, not the widest.

  It is considered bad form to post both to misc.misc, soc.net-people,
  or misc.wanted and to some other newsgroup.  If it belongs in that
  other newsgroup, it does not belong in misc.misc, soc.net-people,
  or misc.wanted.

  If your message is of interest to a limited geographic area (apartments,
  car sales, meetings, concerts, etc...), restrict the distribution of the
  message to your local area.  Some areas have special newsgroups with
  geographical limitations, and the recent versions of the news software
  allow you to limit the distribution of material sent to world-wide
  newsgroups.  Check with your system administrator to see what newsgroups
  are available and how to use them.

  If you want to try a test of something, do not use a world-wide newsgroup!
  Messages in misc.misc that say "This is a test" are likely to cause
  large numbers of caustic messages to flow into your mailbox.  There are
  newsgroups that are local to your computer or area that should be used.
  Your system administrator can tell you what they are.

  Be familiar with the group you are posting to before you post!  You
  shouldn't post to groups you do not read, or post to groups you've
  only read a few articles from -- you may not be familiar with the on-going
  conventions and themes of the group.  One normally does not join
  a conversation by just walking up and talking.  Instead, you listen
  first and then join in if you have something pertinent to contribute.

             Be Careful with Humor and Sarcasm

  Without the voice inflections and body language of personal
  communications, it is easy for a remark meant to be funny to be
  misinterpreted.  Subtle humor tends to get lost, so take steps to make
  sure that people realize you are trying to be funny.  The net has
  developed a symbol called the smiley face.  It looks like ":-)" and points
  out sections of articles with humorous intent.  No matter how broad the
  humor or satire, it is safer to remind people that you are being funny.

  But also be aware that quite frequently satire is posted without any
  explicit indications.  If an article outrages you strongly, you
  should ask yourself if it just may have been unmarked satire.
  Several self-proclaimed connoisseurs refuse to use smiley faces, so
  take heed or you may make a temporary fool of yourself.

              Only Post a Message Once

  Avoid posting messages to more than one newsgroup unless you are sure
  it is appropriate.  If you do post to multiple newsgroups, do not
  post to each group separately.  Instead, specify all the groups on a
  single copy of the message.  This reduces network overhead and lets
  people who subscribe to more than one of those groups see the message
  once instead of having to wade through each copy.

          Please Rotate Messages With Questionable Content

  Certain newsgroups (such as rec.humor) have messages in them that may
  be offensive to some people.  To make sure that these messages are
  not read unless they are explicitly requested, these messages should
  be encrypted.  The standard encryption method is to rotate each
  letter by thirteen characters so that an "a" becomes an "n".  This is
  known on the network as "rot13" and when you rotate a message the
  word "rot13" should be in the "Subject:" line.  Most of the software
  used to read usenet articles have some way of encrypting and
  decrypting messages.  Your system administrator can tell you how the
  software on your system works, or you can use the Unix command "tr
  [a-z][A-Z] [n-z][a-m][N-Z][A-M]". (Note that some versions of Unix
  don't require the [] in the "tr" command.  In fact, some systems will
  get upset if you use them in an unquoted manner.  The following
  should work for everyone, but may be shortened on some systems:
    tr '[a-m][n-z][A-M][N-Z]' '[n-z][a-m][N-Z][A-M]'
  Don't forget the single quotes!)

            Summarize What You are Following Up

  When you are following up someone's article, please summarize the parts of
  the article to which you are responding.  This allows readers to
  appreciate your comments rather than trying to remember what the original
  article said.  It is also possible for your response to get to some sites
  before the original article.

  Summarization is best done by including appropriate quotes from the
  original article.  Do not include the entire article since it will
  irritate the people who have already seen it.  Even if you are responding
  to the entire article, summarize only the major points you are discussing.

            When Summarizing, Summarize!

  When you request information from the network, it is common courtesy to
  report your findings so that others can benefit as well.  The best way of
  doing this is to take all the responses that you received and edit them
  into a single article that is posted to the places where you originally
  posted your question.  Take the time to strip headers, combine duplicate
  information, and write a short summary.  Try to credit the information to
  the people that sent it to you, where possible.

              Use Mail, Don't Post a Follow-up

  One of the biggest problems we have on the network is that when someone
  asks a question, many people send out identical answers.  When this
  happens, dozens of identical answers pour through the net.  Mail your
  answer to the person and suggest that they summarize to the network.  This
  way the net will only see a single copy of the answers, no matter how many
  people answer the question.

  If you post a question, please remind people to send you the answers by
  mail and at least offer to summarize them to the network.

      Read All Follow-ups and Don't Repeat What Has Already Been Said

  Before you submit a follow-up to a message, read the rest of the messages
  in the newsgroup to see whether someone has already said what you want to
  say.  If someone has, don't repeat it.

            Check the Headers When Following Up

  The news software has provisions to specify that follow-ups to an
  article should go to a specific set of newsgroups -- possibly
  different from the newsgroups to which the original article was
  posted.  Sometimes the groups chosen for follow-ups are totally
  inappropriate, especially as a thread of discussion changes with
  repeated postings.  You should carefully check the groups and
  distributions given in the header and edit them as appropriate.  If
  you change the groups named in the header, or if you direct
  follow-ups to a particular group, say so in the body of the message
  -- not everyone reads the headers of postings.


          Be Careful About Copyrights and Licenses

  Once something is posted onto the network, it is *probably* in the
  public domain unless you own the appropriate rights (most notably,
  if you wrote the thing yourself) and you post it with a valid
  copyright notice; a court would have to decide the specifics and
  there are arguments for both sides of the issue. Now that the US has
  ratified the Berne convention, the issue is even murkier.  For all
  practical purposes, though, assume that you effectively give up the
  copyright if you don't put in a notice.  Of course, the
  *information* becomes public, so you mustn't post trade secrets that
  way.  When posting material to the network, keep in mind that
  material that is UNIX-related may be restricted by the license you
  or your company signed with AT&T and be careful not to violate it.
  You should also be aware that posting movie reviews, song lyrics, or
  anything else published under a copyright could cause you, your
  company, or members of the net community to be held liable for
  damages, so we highly recommend caution in using this material.

            Cite Appropriate References

  If you are using facts to support a cause, state where they came from.
  Don't take someone else's ideas and use them as your own.  You don't want
  someone pretending that your ideas are theirs; show them the same respect.

            Mark or Rotate Answers and Spoilers

  When you post something (like a movie review that discusses a detail of
  the plot) which might spoil a surprise for other people, please mark your
  message with a warning so that they can skip the message.  Another
  alternative would be to use the "rot13" protocol to encrypt the message so
  it cannot be read accidentally.  When you post a message with a spoiler in
  it make sure the word "spoiler" is part of the "Subject:" line.

             Spelling Flames Considered Harmful

  Every few months a plague descends on USENET called the spelling flame.
  It starts out when someone posts an article correcting the spelling or
  grammar in some article.  The immediate result seems to be for everyone on
  the net to turn into a 6th grade English teacher and pick apart each other's
  postings for a few weeks.  This is not productive and tends to cause
  people who used to be friends to get angry with each other.

  It is important to remember that we all make mistakes, and that
  there are many users on the net who use English as a second
  language.  There are also a number of people who suffer from
  dyslexia and who have difficulty noticing their spelling mistakes.
  If you feel that you must make a comment on the quality of a
  posting, please do so by mail, not on the network.

              Don't Overdo Signatures

  Signatures are nice, and many people can have a signature added to
  their postings automatically by placing it in a file called
  "$HOME/.signature".  Don't overdo it.  Signatures can tell the world
  something about you, but keep them short.  A signature that is longer
  than the message itself is considered to be in bad taste.  The main
  purpose of a signature is to help people locate you, not to tell your
  life story.  Every signature should include at least your return
  address relative to a major, known site on the network and a proper
  domain-format address.   Your system administrator can give this to
  you.  Some news posters attempt to enforce a 4 line limit on
  signature files -- an amount that should be more than sufficient to
  provide a return address and attribution.

           Limit Line Length and Avoid Control Characters

  Try to keep your text in a generic format.  Many (if not most) of
  the people reading Usenet do so from 80 column terminals or from
  workstations with 80 column terminal windows.  Try to keep your
  lines of text to less than 80 characters for optimal readability.
  If people quote part of your article in a followup, short lines will
  probably show up better, too.

  Also realize that there are many, many different forms of terminals
  in use.  If you enter special control characters in your message, it
  may result in your message being unreadable on some terminal types;
  a character sequence that causes reverse video on your screen may
  result in a keyboard lock and graphics mode on someone else's
  terminal.  You should also try to avoid the use of tabs, too, since
  they may also be interpreted differently on terminals other than
  your own.


               Summary of Things to Remember


       Never forget that the person on the other side is human
       Don't blame system admins for their users' behavior
       Be careful what you say about others
       Be brief
       Your postings reflect upon you; be proud of them
       Use descriptive titles
       Think about your audience
       Be careful with humor and sarcasm
       Only post a message once
       Please rotate material with questionable content
       Summarize what you are following up
       Use mail, don't post a follow-up
       Read all follow-ups and don't repeat what has already been said
       Double-check follow-up newsgroups and distributions.
       Be careful about copyrights and licenses
       Cite appropriate references
       When summarizing, summarize
       Mark or rotate answers or spoilers
       Spelling flames considered harmful
       Don't overdo signatures
       Limit line length and avoid control characters

(*)UNIX is a registered trademark of AT&T.

-----------
      This document is in the public domain and may be reproduced or
      excerpted by anyone wishing to do so.
--
Gene Spafford
Software Engineering Research Center & Dept. of Computer Sciences
Purdue University, W. Lafayette IN 47907-1398
Internet:  [e-mail]    phone:  [phone]
Xref: bloom-picayune.mit.edu news.admin:25964 news.misc:9010 news.software.readers:2549 news.software.b:12417 news.answers:3576
Path: bloom-picayune.mit.edu!enterpoop.mit.edu!snorkelwacker.mit.edu!think.com!sdd.hp.com!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!darwin.sura.net!gatech!purdue!spaf
From: [e-mail] (Gene Spafford)
Newsgroups: news.admin,news.misc,news.software.readers,news.software.b,news.answers
Subject: Changes to USENET Software: History and Sources
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
Date: 19 Oct 92 05:16:09 GMT
Expires: 18 Dec 92 17:16:08 GMT
Followup-To: news.misc
Organization: Dept. of Computer Sciences, Purdue Univ.
Lines: 155
Approved: [e-mail]
Supersedes: <[e-mail]>

Archive-name: usenet-software/diff1
Original from: spaf@purdue (Gene Spafford)
Last-change: 18 Oct 1992 by spaf@purdue (Gene Spafford)


*** old/software.n    Sat Sep 19 23:18:02 1992
--- ./src/software.n    Sun Oct 18 23:39:15 1992
***************
*** 5,7 ****
  Original from: spaf@purdue (Gene Spafford)
! Last-change: 19 Sep 1992 by [e-mail] (Rich Salz)

--- 5,7 ----
  Original from: spaf@purdue (Gene Spafford)
! Last-change: 18 Oct 1992 by spaf@purdue (Gene Spafford)

***************
*** 59,61 ****
  is specified in RFC 1036 (see below).  B News has been declared "dead"
! by a number of people, including Rich Adams, and is unlikely to be
  upgraded further; most new UUCP sites are using C News (see next
--- 59,61 ----
  is specified in RFC 1036 (see below).  B News has been declared "dead"
! by a number of people, including Rick Adams, and is unlikely to be
  upgraded further; most new UUCP sites are using C News (see next
***************
*** 100,104 ****

! A screen-oriented NEWS client for VMS is also available via ftp from
! ftpvms.ira.uka.de (contact Bernd Onasch <[e-mail]> for
! details).

--- 100,105 ----

! A screen-oriented news client for VMS that works with CMU/tek, EXOS,
! MultiNet, UCX, Wollongong and DECnet is also available via ftp from
! iraun1.ira.uka.de, info.rz.uni-ulm.de, and ftp.spc.edu (contact Bernd
! Onasch <[e-mail]> for details).

***************
*** 250,251 ****
--- 251,262 ----

+ "trumpet" is a NNTP based news reader for DOS which will also run
+ under Windows (although only as a DOS application). There is Lan
+ Workplace version which is also available.  It works using the
+ Clarkson Packet Drivers either over a Novell network or a PC with an
+ 'ordinary' TCP/IP connection. It offers a very intuitive interface
+ with most of the basic facilities required in a newsreader (but
+ without some of the 'bells and whistles found in something like rn).
+ It has facilities for using SMTP to forward/reply etc.  The latest
+ version is 1.05g and is shareware available at most main ftp sites.
+
  At least one IBM VM/SP (CMS) version of the Usenet software is
***************
*** 284,287 ****

! Special note on "notes" and pre-2.11 news
! -----------------------------------------
  Users of these systems may note problems in their interactions with the
--- 295,298 ----

! Special note on "notes" and old versions of news
! ------------------------------------------------
  Users of these systems may note problems in their interactions with the
***************
*** 302,304 ****
  release of "notes" was at the January 1982 Usenix conference.  The
! current release of notes is version 1.7; it is no longer being
  actively maintained.
--- 313,315 ----
  release of "notes" was at the January 1982 Usenix conference.  The
! last release of notes was version 1.7; it is no longer being
  actively maintained.
***************
*** 309,313 ****
  "news.lists", or else they should post from a system running
! up-to-date B news software (i.e., 2.11).  "notes" users may obtain
! some patches from the comp.sources.unix archives which enable recent
! versions of "notes" to interact with moderated groups properly.

--- 320,325 ----
  "news.lists", or else they should post from a system running
! up-to-date news software (i.e., C news or INN).  "notes" users may
! obtain some patches from the comp.sources.unix archives which enable
! the most recent versions of "notes" to interact with moderated groups
! properly.

***************
*** 315,323 ****
  some other current B news features, such as the "checkgroups" message.
! "notes" continues to be a "foreign" system, and B news versions before
! 2.10.2 are considered "obsolete."  The various maintainers of the
! Usenet software have never expressed any commitment to maintain
! backwards compatibility with "foreign" or obsolete news systems and
! are unlikely to do so; it is the responsibility of the users to
! maintain compatibility of such software if they wish to continue to
! interact with the Usenet.

--- 327,335 ----
  some other current B news features, such as the "checkgroups" message.
! "notes" continues to be a "foreign" system and B news versions are
! considered "obsolete."  The various maintainers of the Usenet software
! have never expressed any commitment to maintain backwards
! compatibility with "foreign" or obsolete news systems and are unlikely
! to do so; it is the responsibility of the users to maintain
! compatibility of such software if they wish to continue to interact
! with the Usenet.

***************
*** 326,334 ****
  --------------------------------
! You can obtain the version number of your news software by issuing the
! "v" command in either "vnews" or "readnews."  The "rn" version is
! obtainable by typing the "v" command to the top level prompt.
! Type "V" to see the version number of "nn".

- Current software is obtainable from almost any major Usenet site.
- Source to the 'rn' newsreader program is also widely available.

--- 338,345 ----
  --------------------------------
! You can obtain the version number of your news software by issuing
! some form of "v" command to show the current version -- consult the
! man page for details.  Current software is obtainable from almost any
! major Usenet site as well as the sites noted in the body of the
! article, above.


***************
*** 347,351 ****

! Sources for news 2.11, C News, "rn", and "trn" are also available in
! the comp.sources.unix archives.  European sites should request the
! sources from their nearest Eunet backbone site.

--- 358,363 ----

! Sources for most of the news readers and software, including news
! 2.11, C News, "rn", and "trn" are also available in the
! comp.sources.unix archives.  European sites should request the sources
! from their nearest Eunet backbone site.

***************
*** 385,386 ****
  Steve Bellovin, Ray Essick, Mark Horton, Brian Kantor, Phil Lapsley,
! Bob Page, Tom Truscott, and Larry Wall.  Thanks, folks.
--- 397,398 ----
  Steve Bellovin, Ray Essick, Mark Horton, Brian Kantor, Phil Lapsley,
! Bob Page, Rich Salz, Tom Truscott, and Larry Wall.  Thanks, folks.
--
Gene Spafford
Software Engineering Research Center & Dept. of Computer Sciences
Purdue University, W. Lafayette IN 47907-1398
Internet:  [e-mail]    phone:  [phone]
Xref: bloom-picayune.mit.edu news.admin:25960 news.announce.newusers:918 news.software.readers:2548 news.software.b:12416 news.answers:3562
Path: bloom-picayune.mit.edu!snorkelwacker.mit.edu!spool.mu.edu!darwin.sura.net!gatech!purdue!spaf
From: [e-mail] (Gene Spafford)
Newsgroups: news.admin,news.announce.newusers,news.software.readers,news.software.b,news.answers
Subject: USENET Software: History and Sources
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
Date: 19 Oct 92 05:14:38 GMT
Expires: 18 Dec 92 17:14:37 GMT
Followup-To: news.admin
Organization: Dept. of Computer Sciences, Purdue Univ.
Lines: 400
Approved: [e-mail]
Supersedes: <[e-mail]>

Archive-name: usenet-software/part1
Original from: spaf@purdue (Gene Spafford)
Last-change: 18 Oct 1992 by spaf@purdue (Gene Spafford)


Currently, Usenet readers interact with the news using a number of
software packages and programs.  This article mentions the important
ones and a little of their history, gives pointers where you can look
for more information and ends with some special notes about "foreign"
and "obsolete" software.  At the very end is a list of sites from which
current versions of the Usenet software may be obtained.

Note that the number of software packages available to run news,
especially on PCs, is increasing.  This article lists only a few of
the many news packages available, and the presence or absence of any
particular software package should not be construed as indicating
anything about its suitability usefulness.

History
-------
Usenet came into being in late 1979, shortly after the release of V7
Unix with UUCP.  Two Duke University grad students in North Carolina,
Tom Truscott and Jim Ellis, thought of hooking computers together to
exchange information with the Unix community.  Steve Bellovin, a grad
student at the University of North Carolina, put together the first
version of the news software using shell scripts and installed it on
the first two sites: "unc" and "duke." At the beginning of 1980 the
network consisted of those two sites and "phs" (another machine at
Duke), and was described at the January Usenix conference.  Steve
Bellovin later rewrote the scripts into C programs, but they were never
released beyond "unc" and "duke." Shortly thereafter, Steve Daniel did
another implementation in C for public distribution.  Tom Truscott made
further modifications, and this became the "A" news release.

In 1981 at U. C. Berkeley, grad student Mark Horton and high school
student Matt Glickman rewrote the news software to add functionality
and to cope with the ever increasing volume of news -- "A" News was
intended for only a few articles per group per day.  This rewrite was
the "B" News version.  The first public release was version 2.1 in
1982; the 1.* versions were all beta test.  As the net grew, the news
software was expanded and modified.  The last version maintained and
released primarily by Mark was 2.10.1.

Rick Adams, at the Center for Seismic Studies, took over coordination
of the maintenance and enhancement of the B News software with the
2.10.2 release in 1984.  By this time, the increasing volume of news
was becoming a concern, and the mechanism for moderated groups was
added to the software at 2.10.2.  Moderated groups were inspired by
ARPA mailing lists and experience with other bulletin board systems.
In late 1986, version 2.11 of B News was released, including a number
of changes to support a new naming structure for newsgroups, enhanced
batching and compression, enhanced ihave/sendme control messages, and
other features.

The current release of B News is 2.11, patchlevel 19.  Article format
is specified in RFC 1036 (see below).  B News has been declared "dead"
by a number of people, including Rick Adams, and is unlikely to be
upgraded further; most new UUCP sites are using C News (see next
paragraph).

A new version of news, known as C News, was developed at the
University of Toronto by Geoff Collyer and Henry Spencer.  This
version is a rewrite of the lowest levels of news to increase article
processing speed, decrease article expiration processing and improve
the reliability of the news system through better locking, etc.  The
package was released to the net in the autumn of 1987.  For more
information, see the paper "News Need Not Be Slow," published in The
Winter 1987 Usenix Technical Conference proceedings.  The current
version of C News is labeled 27-Aug-1991.  C News can be obtained from
its official archive site, cs.toronto.edu, using FTP.

Another Usenet system, known as InterNetNews, or INN, was written by
Rich Salz <[e-mail]>.  INN is designed to run on Unix hosts
that have a socket interface.  It is optimized for larger hosts where
most traffic uses NNTP, but it does provide full UUCP support.  INN is
very fast, and since it integrates NNTP many people find it easier to
administer only one package.  The package was publicly released on
August 20, 1992.  For more information, see the paper "InterNetNews:
Usenet Transport for Internet Sites" published in the June 1992 Usenix
Technical Conference Proceedings.  INN can be obtained from many
places; its official archive site is ftp.uu.net in the directory
networking/news/nntp/inn.

ANU-NEWS is news package written by Geoff Huston of Australia for VMS
systems.  ANU-NEWS is complete news system that allows reading,
posting, direct replies, moderated newsgroups, etc.  in a fashion
closely related to regular news.  The implementation includes the RFC
1036 news propagation algorithms and integrated use of the NNTP
protocols (see below) to support remote news servers, implemented as a
VAX/VMS Decnet object.  An RFC 977 server implemented as a Decnet
object is also included.  The ANU-NEWS interface is similar to
standard DEC screen oriented systems.  The license for the software is
free, and there are no restrictions on the re-distribution.  For more
info, contact [e-mail] (Geoff Huston).  ANU-NEWS is
available for FTP from kuhub.cc.ukans.edu.  Contact
[e-mail] for more info.

A screen-oriented news client for VMS that works with CMU/tek, EXOS,
MultiNet, UCX, Wollongong and DECnet is also available via ftp from
iraun1.ira.uka.de, info.rz.uni-ulm.de, and ftp.spc.edu (contact Bernd
Onasch <[e-mail]> for details).

A port of C News for the Commodore Amiga under AmigaDOS (NOT Unix), is
available.  The port was done by Frank J. Edwards <[e-mail]>,
and available from Larry Rosenman <[e-mail]>.  Also,
Matt Dillon <[e-mail]>, has greatly improved the
UUCP clone for AmigaDOS, currently V1.16D, available for ftp from
ftp.uu.net in /systems/amiga/dillon.  The package also includes a
newsreader very loosely like the real rn.  Dillon also has a "vn" port
provided by Eric Lee Green.  This software is also available on Bix,
and for ftp from ab20.larc.nasa.gov.

Several popular screen-oriented news reading interfaces have been
developed in the last few years to replace the traditional "readnews"
interface.  The first of these was "vnews" and it was written by
Kenneth Almquist.  "vnews" provides a "readnews"-like command
interface, but displays articles using direct screen positioning.  It
appears to have been inspired, to some extent, by the "notes" system
(described below).  "vnews" is currently distributed with the standard
2.11 news source.