Accessing and Using the Internet

asdf UNITED NATIONS - UNITED NATIONS POPULATION FUND TSS/CST Workshop on Data Collection, Processing, Dissemination and Utilization

INT/92/PH1/doc. 17/95 19 May 1995

New York, 15-19 May 1995

Original: English

Accessing and Using the Internet 2nd Revised Edition - August 1995

Prepared by: Djamal-Eddine Benzine and Patrick Gerland ([email protected] and [email protected]) United Nations Statistical Division, New York, U.S.A.

ii

2nd Revised Edition - August 1995

Accessing and Using the Internet

([email protected] and [email protected])

TSS/CST Workshop, May 1995

United Nations Statistical Division, New York, USA.


Accessing and Using Internet

iii

Preface This monograph was prepared with consideration of the usefulness it can give to the UNFPA Country Support Teams in the regions of the world as well as other individuals working in the mainstream of information technology who are in the field and at headquarters. The paper introduces Internet, describes its evolution and growth, the wide array of services it provides, and it presents a rich list of important and relevant tools to access it, and several directories of addresses that are helpful in keeping abreast of with what is happening around the globe. Special emphasis has been given to contemporary options for local connectivity available at the national level in most countries, including in Africa, Asia, and Latin America. Most of the background information and reference materials were collected worldwide from the Internet itself. This study would not have been possible without the help of the large community of Internet users who over the years have actively contributed their time, resources and expertise to make the Internet what it is today. This gives an illustration of the wealth of information and resources available in various places around the globe — just waiting to be exploited. In today’s world, computer technology has not only opened up numerous possibilities to obtain information, it has also made the information more affordable. Now that we have all this information within reach through the Internet, let us share its gateways and find the best avenues for educating and reeducating ourselves. Let us remember to share what we have learned with colleagues and counterparts to promote international economic and social development as far reaching as the Internet. While an all-too-large proportion of the world’s estimated 5.6 Billion people still lack access to potable water, electric power, and adequate nutrition — much less computers — the Internet can be a potent tool to ease economic hardship and to promote social welfare.

The authors would like to thank Ms. Dulce Castillo and Mr. Henry Hof for their valuable contributions in helping to finalize this paper. The views expressed in this paper are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect those of the United Nations. Mention of firm names and commercial products does not imply the endorsement of the United Nations. The designations employed do not imply the expression of any opinion whatsoever on the part of the Secretariat of the United Nations concerning the legal status of any country, territory, city or area or of its authorities, or concerning the delineation of its frontiers or boundaries.



United Nations Statistical Division, New York, USA

iv



Contents Part 1

Internet Overview ................................................................................. 1 1. Accessing Today’s World Knowledge using the Virtual College .............................. 3 2. The Internet: Infrastructure for the Information Age........................................... 3 3. Top 10 Things To Know about the Internet ..................................................... 4 4. The 4.1 4.2 4.3 4.4

Internet: a Summary ......................................................................... 4 What is the Internet? ....................................................................... 4 How do computers with different operating systems communicate with each other? .. 6 Who owns the Internet? .................................................................... 6 Who pays for it? ............................................................................ 7

5. What Can Be Done with an Internet Access? .................................................. 7 5.1 Exchanging information quickly and conveniently ...................................... 7 5.2 Accessing experienced and expert individuals ........................................... 7 5.3 Receiving regular updates on interesting topics .......................................... 7 5.4 Gaining wide-area access to data .......................................................... 8 5.5 Building teams and enhancing teamwork across geographic distance .................. 8 5.6 Accessing archived information ........................................................... 8 5.7 Translating and transferring data between machines .................................... 8 5.8 Enjoying recreation and entertainment ................................................... 8

Part 2

Internet Connections ............................................................................. 9 6. Getting Connected: What is Needed to Plug in to the Internet ............................... 11 6.1 What is needed? ........................................................................... 11 6.2 How much will it cost? .................................................................... 13 6.2.a Set-up costs ................................................................................ 13 6.2.b Monthly costs .............................................................................. 13

Part 3

Internet Tools ..................................................................................... 15 7. Tools of the Trade ............................................................................... 17 8. Electronic Mail

..................................................................................

18

9. Electronic Mail, ListServs, and Discussion Groups ........................................... 19 9.1 Sending and receiving E-mail ............................................................ 20 9.2 Anatomy an E-mail message.............................................................. 21 9.3 Cyber-cues ................................................................................. 21 9.4 E-mail gateways on the Internet .......................................................... 22 9.5 When E-mail gets returned ............................................................... 22 10. Using E-mail to Subscribe to ListServs and Discussion Groups .............................. 22 10.1 Mailing Lists and ListServs............................................................... 23 10.1.a Finding a Mailing List ................................................................. 24 10.1.b Internet Mailing Lists .................................................................. 24 10.2 Bulletin Boards (BBSs) ................................................................... 26 10.3 USENET (Users Network) Groups ....................................................... 26





10.3.a 10.3.b 10.3.c 10.3.d

Part 4


v

Usenet by E-mail ...................................................................... News Posting Service via E-mail. .................................................... Another Usenet->E-mail Method! .................................................... Usenet Searches........................................................................

27 28 29 29

11. Internet Access Tools ........................................................................... 11.1 Finger: finding people on the Internet................................................... 11.2 Telnet ...................................................................................... 11.3 FTP (File Transfer Protocol) ............................................................. 11.4 Archie ..................................................................................... 11.5 News readers .............................................................................. 11.6 Gopher..................................................................................... 11.7 Veronica ................................................................................... 11.8 World-Wide Web (WWW) ............................................................... 11.9 Mosaic ..................................................................................... 11.10 Wide-Area Information Servers (WAlSs) ...............................................

29 29 30 30 30 31 31 31 32 32 32

12. Accessing the More Advanced Internet Resources By E-mail ................................ 12.1 How to access Internet services by E-mail .............................................. 12.2 Finding the latest version ................................................................ 12.3 Other translations of this document ..................................................... 12.4 The “rules of the Game” ................................................................. 12.5 Accessing the Internet by E-mail ........................................................ 12.6 New in these parts? ....................................................................... 12.7 How to find a E-mail address (“White Pages”) ......................................... 12.7.a “Directory Assistance” by E-mail .................................................... 12.7.b Address/Name server info by E-mail ................................................. 12.7.c Finger by E-mail ....................................................................... 12.7.d Knowbot Information Service ......................................................... 12.8 FTP by E-mail ............................................................................ 12.9 Archie by E-mail.......................................................................... 12.10 Gopher by E-mail ......................................................................... 12.11 Veronica by E-mail ....................................................................... 12.12 A GopherMail shortcut ................................................................... 12.13 WAIS searches by E-mail ................................................................ 12.14 World-Wide Web by E-mail.............................................................. 12.15 WWW search by E-mail .................................................................. 12.16 Telnet by E-mail ..........................................................................

33 33 33 33 34 34 34 35 35 36 36 36 37 39 41 43 43 43 44 45 45

Internet Resources .............................................................................. 47 13. Directory of Resources .......................................................................... 13.1 Further readings .......................................................................... 13.2 Internet addresses explained ............................................................. 13.3 General references ........................................................................ 13.3.a Internet growth statistics .............................................................. 13.3.b Internet resources ...................................................................... 13.3.c Subject-oriented Internet resources ................................................... 13.4 Selected discussion and mailing lists for population activities ........................ 13.5 Inventory of Internet resources for demographers and population activities .......... 13.5.a WWW Servers of interest to demographers and for population studies ............ 13.5.b WAIS Databases of interest to demographers ........................................ 13.5.c Census & Data Facilities Gopher Servers of interest to demographers ............. 13.5.d Demography & Population Studies Gophers .........................................



49 49 49 50 50 50 51 54 59 59 61 61 62


vi



13.5.e E-mail addresses: staff of population information units ............................. 64 13.6 Inventory of Internet Resources for Statisticians and Data Producers/Users........... 66 13.6.a WEB Services from International Statistical Agencies and Organisations ......... 66 13.6.b WEB Services from National Statistical Agencies ................................... 66 13.6.c Census & Data Facilities WWW Servers ............................................. 68 13.6.d Departments, Divisions and Schools of Statistics .................................... 69 13.6.e Statistical Research Groups, Institutes, and Associations ........................... 69 13.6.f Statistical Archives..................................................................... 70 13.6.g Statistical Software Vendors and Software FAQs .................................... 70 13.6.h Statistical Journals ..................................................................... 70 13.6.i Statistical Mailing Lists ............................................................... 70 13.6.j Statistics Related Newsgroups ......................................................... 70 13.6.k Computer Related Newsgroups ........................................................ 70 13.6.l Other WEB Services ................................................................... 71 13.6.m Statistics Related Gophers ............................................................. 72 13.6.n E-mail addresses: National Statistical Offices ........................................ 72 13.7 Directory of United Nations System electronic mail directories ........................ 72 13.7.a Professional directories ................................................................ 74 13.8 Contact list for working papers and pre-publication series ............................. 75 14. Glossary of Terms, Acronyms, and the language of the Internet ............................. 79

Part 5

Internet Providers ................................................................................ 87 15. Internet Connectivity ............................................................................ 89 15.1 Summary of international connectivity .................................................. 89 15.2 Country codes and connectivity .......................................................... 89 15.3 Comparison of the networks .............................................................. 95 15.4 Updates..................................................................................... 95 16. Deciding the Level of Internet Service Useful ................................................. 95 16.1 Electronic mail ............................................................................ 95 16.2 Network news .............................................................................. 96 16.3 Interactive access to remote computers .................................................. 96 16.4 Network navigation aids .................................................................. 96 16.5 Allowing network users to access your computer........................................ 97 17. Internet Service Providers ....................................................................... 97 17.1 Internet access providers in Africa ...................................................... 99 17.2 Internet access providers in Asia ...................................................... 103 17.3 Internet access providers in Caribbeans, Central and Latin America ............... 107

Part 6

Appendix ......................................................................................... 113 18. Access and Use of E-mail and Internet: Results of an Electronic Survey .................. 115






1

Part 1 Internet Overview




2








3

1. Accessing Today’s World Knowledge using the Virtual College We are now in a world where the possibilities of a “virtual college” is fast becoming a reality. In this virtual place, location and time will not restrict anyone from accessing information located anywhere in the world as well as communicating with peers and colleagues. The willingness of nations, institutions and individuals to cooperate, share expertise and knowledge, and the continued rapid technological progress and affordability are making the so-called virtual college more and more achievable. In this information age, it is more than a mere library; it is a living college with its agora where people of diverse background and expertise share resources, knowledge and experiences. Using the proper technology and communications, anyone regardless of age, sex and qualification can now connect and access a vast repository of information, text, data, articles, catalogs and various types of media at almost any time. We now have a dynamic form of continuous education that enables us to learn new things and revive our knowledge. By stimulating individual capacity building, it allows anyone anywhere in the world to stay up-to-date on a given field, get state-of-the-art information, access existing resources, maintain contact with individuals and institutions, and discover new opportunities. The global village is at our door, and the virtual college offers an electronic forum where individuals from all backgrounds may exchange information officially or privately about any subject matter. The merging paths of the scientific, research and academic community, individuals, citizen networks and NGOs, local, regional and national governments, international authorities, private and public corporations and organizations encompass and transcend anyone’s knowledge of the existing resources, provide an invaluable source of learning and offer a unique way to cross-fertilize and crystallize individual experiences into a collective know-how with the potential to generate new knowledge. The information exchange can be instantaneous, or spanned over a few hours or days. The speed, ease, and the low-cost process make it a viable, cost-effective, and highly reliable alternative to physical meetings that often require considerable travel, time and resources. More and more technical and working meetings are held in cyberspace using “remote conferencing” through simple E-mail exchanges and, very soon, through more advanced telecommunication facilities. This paper is less about the future, more about the present and what today’s technology offers, what is already available worldwide, and is fast becoming more affordable and accessible every day: the Internet.

2. The Internet: Infrastructure for the Information Age Information is valuable. People are in constant need of information. One of the basic problems with information is that it is not always available when and where needed. In an effort to provide answers, librarians have been cataloging information for centuries. With the introduction of computers and the improvement of telecommunication infrastructures, significant progress has been made in providing better packaged and faster delivered information to institutions and individuals with access to these resources. One of the most remarkable products of the association of computer and telecommunication technologies is the Internet. The authors of this paper will explain what is meant by Internet, how it can be accessed and used efficiently to increase our knowledge and productivity. We have taken several considerations into account in presenting the information that is most useful. First, it was necessary to know what information was available. This paper provides an index of the most relevant resources for population activities extracted from the vast amount of network information. Most of the tools and references listed in this paper are pointers to the information, which themselves may be pointers to the real substantive information. Second, it was important to determine the importance and relevance of existing information to our work. Few of us are knowledgeable in more than a specialized area. We need to rely on others to make us aware of the




4



importance of databases and resources in a specific discipline, and here is where librarians can be most useful. They have familiarity with research databases that individuals use for population activities, statistics, demography, health, education, and many others. For information on population matters, POPIN is a good example of such a network of information repositories. Finally, once the existence and importance were known, the information needed to be indexed, a difficult task to accomplish. Information available on the network is always moving, growing, changing, and aging. Computers provide the tools needed to assist us in managing and accessing this ever-changing environment. Millions of people around the world are active users of the Internet. It is not necessary to be a computer expert to use it. All you need is a bit of practice and some patience.

3. Top 10 Things To Know about the Internet

1

Despite the recent media attention on the Internet, most non-users still know very little about the phenomenon’s real features and uses. Unfortunately, the best sources for dispelling the myths — Internet users themselves — often to get tongue-tied in awe of its vast potential. They tend to struggle for a succinct description that is meaningful to a non-user. The following 10-point list captures the essence of what the Internet is and is not: 1. The Internet is a medium for effectively communicating with others. 2. The Internet is a research support and information retrieval mechanism. 3. The Internet is flexible in cost and features. 4. The Internet is at once a local and an international entity, allowing interaction among users separated by an office wall or by an ocean. 5. The Internet isn’t a specific piece of software or hardware. 6. The Internet isn’t a single network, but a group of networks logically (but not physically) arranged in hierarchy. 7. The Internet isn’t owned by any government, corporation, or university. 8. The Internet isn’t the same everywhere (homogeneous), but vastly different (heterogeneous). 9. The Internet isn’t restricted to research only, non commercial, or other appropriate uses, although some networks within it are. 10. The Internet isn’t solely or even mostly, inhabited by computer professionals, engineers, nerds, or techies. It is used daily by people of all backgrounds, interests, personalities and nationalities. Chances are at least one of the preceding points refutes something many of us have heard about the Internet.

4. The Internet: a Summary The remaining part of this paper examines and explains several specific issues about Internet. Before getting into details, here is a broad overview that should quickly answer most of the fundamental questions many users may have about the net.

4.1 What is the Internet? The Internet is a collection of thousands of computer networks, tens of thousands of computers, and more than 10 million users who share a compatible means for interacting with one another to exchange digital data. The

1.

Excerpt from Using the Internet, Special Edition by William A. Tolhurst, Mary Ann Pike, Keith A. Blanton, John R. Harris. Que Corporation. 1994. Pages 7-8.






5

Internet’s phenomenal growth (Figure 1) has made it a virtual household word, whether people know anything specific about it or not.

Figure 1. Internet Hosts, Worldwide (Logarithmic Scale)2

Figure 2. FidoNet, UUCP, BITNET, and Internet (Log. Scale)2

What is now known as Internet started on 2 January 1969 when the United States Government, through the Advanced Research Project Agency, a Department of Defense Organization, launched an experimental project to explore networking technologies. A network — called ARPANET — connecting supercomputers and other radio and satellite networks, was established to mainly support military research. The system was designed in such a way that each computer could communicate with any other computer, even if sections of the network were, for one reason or the other, out of order. The network has evolved considerably since then, as shown in Figure 2, by incorporating other networks such as NSFNET, commissioned by the United States National Science Foundation (NSF), an agency which in the late 1980's was operating five supercomputer centers for scholarly research. The supercomputers composing the NSFNET backbone were communicating via fast (56,000 bit per second) telephone lines. The NSF network, based on ARPANET’s technology, was joined by regional academic university networks, each with a supercomputer center operating as a hub. The incorporation of NSFNET to the Internet was, in many respects, the starting point of its “democratization” in the sense that the NSF promoted universal educational access by funding campus connections only if the campus was willing to provide access to any enrolled student.

2.

Drawn by MIDS, Austin, Texas . Copyright (c) 1995 MIDS.




6



As a consequence of an increased number of nodes, the traffic on the network reached saturation. It was decided to upgrade the network with faster telephone lines and faster computers controlling the traffic. The contract was awarded to Merit Network, in partnership with IBM and MCI.

4.2 How do computers with different operating systems communicate with each other? Communication among computers operating under different systems is ensured by running programs that use the same communication standard called protocol. A set of protocols, known as Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol (TCP/IP)3, was developed under contract from the U.S. Department of Defense as a means to internetwork dissimilar systems. TCP/IP is a de facto UNIX standard, but is supported on almost all systems. Internet can therefore be defined as an electronic network composed of all the networks using IP protocol. In the USA, this includes government networks, campus networks, regional networks and large organizations; and a few networks outside the USA mainly in Canada and western Europe. It has been recently joined, through gateways, by non-IP based networks (also called the outernet) such as Bitnet, Decnet, UUCP and FidoNet4 . The Internet (or simply “the net”) , like the galaxy on which we are a tiny part, is in perpetual expansion. As of 30 April 1995, the number of servers on the Internet and on other affiliated networks reached 4,652,000. There were only 4 on ARPANET in 1970.

4.3 Who owns the Internet? No one does. The Internet is not only the set of supercomputers and computers and the telecommunication infrastructure that links them together, but also the huge information resources and services available to users connected to the network. There is no supreme authority for the Internet as a whole. There is, however, a voluntary membership organization, called the Internet Society (ISOC), whose goal is to promote global information exchange through Internet technology. ISOC appoints a technical body, the Internet Activities Board (IA), whose members are selected among volunteers. The IA is responsible for the technical management and direction of the Internet and reports to ISOC. The IA decides when standards are necessary, sets and announces them via the network. It also keeps tracks of Internet addresses to ensure that two different computers do not have the same 32- bit address (though it does not assign addresses itself). ISOC relies also on another technical body called the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) that is the main working group in charge of the development of new TCP/IP standards for the Internet.

3.

The TCP part of TCP/IP ensures that all of the bytes sent are received correctly at the other end. The routing mechanism is provided by the IP part. Messages transmitted contain the address of the receiver, as well as the destination station. A file transfer capability, called FTP or File Transfer Protocol is included in TCP/IP. Files can therefore be uploaded and downloaded between sites using the TCP/IP protocol.

4.

Fidonet is defined on the Newton's Telecom dictionary as “an electronic bulletin board technology for transfer and receipt of messages. The origins of FidoNet date back to the early 1980s, when the two authors of the BBS software Fido, who lived on opposite coasts, needed an easy way to exchange modifications they made to the source code. They designed a system where, as a nightly event, the board would shut down and run utilities that automatically transferred the changed files between the author's BBSs. The logical next step was to permit the exchange of private mail messages called NetMail, between the sysops. The author found these capabilities so useful that they include them as part of the Fido BBS (Bulletin Board Software) package. It didn't take long for an informal network of Fido nodes to come into existence, all running the Fido software and exchanging various utility and program files and NetMail among sysops. Like other BBSs, the FidoNet BBSs had their own SIGs, or Special Interest Groups, where users with similar interests could exchange messages in a way similar to what on-line services call conferences or forums. By 1986 a Fido sysop had extended the NetMail concept to allow SIGs to share public messages among the BBSs, and EchoMail was born. In the years since, BBS authors and FidoNet users and sysops extended these capabilities to other BBS packages, and FidoNet grew. It currently has over 11,000 nodes covering most of the world. Many of the existing public and private networks go through FidoNet gateways into the Internet Mail system, which carries e-mail over a group of interconnected networks to universities, government agencies, military branches, and corporations. FidoNet technology uses store-and-forward messaging and is based on point-to-point communications between nodes”.






7

4.4 Who pays for it? Part of the Internet is subsidized by the United States Government through agencies such as the National Science Foundation. With the Internet opened to other networks, the general rule is that every constituent network pays for its own part.

5. What Can Be Done with an Internet Access?

5

The short answer is, Almost anything. More specifically, the Internet can be viewed as an information utility, whose benefits can be subdivided into eight major categories: • exchange information quickly and conveniently. • access experienced and expert individuals in thousands of fields. • receive regular updates on topics of interest. • gain wide-area access to our data. • build teams and enhance teamwork across geographic distance. • gain access to archived information. • translate and transfer data between machines. • have fun and be entertained.

5.1 Exchanging information quickly and conveniently By far the most popular application of this vast network is the exchange of electronic mail (E-mail) that lets users send written (actually, typed) messages to one another. Why use this instead of the telephone? Well, for one thing it allows you to compose a message before sending it, thereby making sure everything to be covered is in the message. Also, unlike most telephone answering machines, you can send messages of arbitrary length. It is also possible to include other information within a message, such as executable programs or spreadsheet data. You moreover can have a written record of your communication.

5.2 Accessing experienced and expert individuals There are many computer professionals within the Internet community, and there are also many other active participants such as doctors, artists, musicians, attorneys, businessmen, homemakers, students, office workers, factory workers, clergy, government officials, scientists, and many others. They are from almost every walk of life and most countries on the planet. All are relatively easily accessible and able to interact with anyone to exchange information, opinion, or simply pleasant conversation. A certain gathering place exists on the net to allow users with specific interests to congregate and share tips, viewpoints, and other data on topics of mutual interest. This place is called the USENET, which consists of literally thousands of smaller cells, called newsgroups. Would you like some insight on how well a computer system performs? Some detailed information about a drug or a specific disease? What is the latest news in Namibia? These are all available via USENET. It is easy to join and then resign from newsgroups, and it is easy to modify the character of the newsgroup data we receive (our news feed) as our needs or interests change.

5.3 Receiving regular updates on interesting topics Many interest groups periodically publish newsletter-type documents. By joining one of these groups, or mailing lists in the Internet vernacular, it is possible to receive information automatically as it is placed on the net. Essentially, we can create our own personalized news source dedicated to the topics we are interested in, rather 5.





8



than having to search more general sources for relevant information. Subscribing to a mailing list is as easy as sending an E-mail message saying, “Sign me up!”

5.4 Gaining wide-area access to data Travel and field operations are an integral part of the regional and international assistance programs. To be as productive in a remote location as we are at our home office, we need access to the same information available at headquarters or located elsewhere. When traveling, we have to anticipate everything we need to bring. With the appropriate Internet connection, we do not have to take anything when we go; we can get what we need once we are there. Many service providers use Public Data Networks (PDNs) for local dial up connections in hundreds of cities around the world.

5.5 Building teams and enhancing teamwork across geographic distance Economic forces at work today have led to the downsizing and restructuring of businesses throughout the world. The emphasis is on smaller, more distributed and efficient organizations. This does not mean however that the tasks to be completed have gotten any smaller. It only implies that companies and the employees must distribute the load and work cooperatively to get tasks done that otherwise would not be completed.

5.6 Accessing archived information Archives for many of the USENET newsgroups and mailing lists are readily available, and thousands of computers on the Internet make copies of public domain and shareware programs available to anyone. The programs from a single major host can fill several CD-ROMs.

5.7 Translating and transferring data between machines One often overlooked benefit that the network provides is a means for exchanging data between dissimilar machines. Because the Internet consists of many different types of computing platforms, the problem of transferring data is solved by necessity. There is also no need to worry about finding a common media among the machines, such as floppy disk, tape, or CD-ROM. There are utility programs to convert one data format to another.

5.8 Enjoying recreation and entertainment The Internet is far from a cold, business-only environment. Although most users enjoy browsing information on various topics (alternatively called net surfing or net prospecting), a wealth of educational programs and recreational games is available through the Internet. Some are played on-line (simultaneously in competition with other Internet users); others are meant for downloading and playing directly on our computer.






9

Part 2 Internet Connections




10








11

6. Getting Connected: What is Needed to Plug in to the Internet There are two types of connections to the Internet: a shell account connection and a true Internet connection. Most of the users get connected through their companies or university computers with full time access to the Internet. This category of users has its PC or MAC linked to a UNIX server connected to the closest Internet access point, called the host. The connections from users to the server is made via a modem or through a local area network (LAN) and a communication software. A growing number of on-line service providers also offers subscribers, who want to be members of the club but do not have access to a company or university computer, a shell account on a computer connected to the Internet. A terminal emulation software is used to dial from the computer to the service provider’s computer. Once connected, users get access to some of the Internet’s resources depending on the specific agreement with the provider. The shell account type connections and those obtained through employers’ and universities’ computers are not "true" Internet connections: they provide access to only a limited number of services. To benefit from the complete set of services (to be reviewed later), a TCP/IP connection is required with a Point-to-Point Protocol (PPP) link. PPP is a serial communications protocol for Wide Area Networks (WANs) defined by the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) in 1991. It can run on any full-duplex link from dial-up to high-speed communication lines. It can establish and terminate a session as well as hang up and redial on a low-quality call. With a remote log-in, one cannot use applications that need a graphical display (like Mosaic, discussed later). For that, a PPP connection is necessary. Similarly, electronic mail can be sent and received directly only with a PPP connection. Depending on the user’s needs and the provider, the connection may be free, or it can vary from a nominal fee to thousands of dollars per month. Section 16, Deciding the Level of Internet Service (page 95) defines and explains the differences in the four major levels of service. This information helps figure out the level of service one needs and affordability. Section 14 (page79) provide a review of the Internet Connectivity and Service Providers and lists the local contacts. It is possible to call and shop around for the best deal available in the specific area.

6.1 What is needed? The equipment needed depends on the selected level of service. Here are the essential components to connect to the Internet: •

A personal computer (IBM PC, Macintosh, or other) is sufficient for individual-level services. Unlike other recently popularized areas of computing such as multimedia, the hardware requirements are quite reasonable. The computer can be any size or kind. It should be capable of running a conventional communications program and must have some space to store files. Obviously, more powerful machines that can run Windows, or System 7 for a Macintosh, may provide a more up-to-date user interface and other features, but the baseline capabilities of the net will not be enhanced.

•

A hard drive. A hard drive is essential to store the information files taken off the Internet. Hard drive space is always at a premium. It is likely that the more interesting files on the Internet will be larger and more complex ones. Files containing images or sound can be quite large, so it is wise not to skimp on disk space.

•

A modem. This device converts what is typed on a personal computer into signals that are transmitted across standard telephone wires or data lines. (Modems are usually distinguished by the speed of transmission, known as baud rates. The higher the baud, the faster the transmission.) E-mail activities can be readily handled by modems with low baud rates (2,400). If advanced Internet functions are anticipated, a modem supporting higher transmission speeds is highly recommended (14,400 is common now, and 28,800 or higher are already on the market). The rule of thumb is to purchase a modem with the highest available baud rate.




12



•

A standard, voice-grade telephone line is perfectly acceptable for connecting to the service provider’s host computer. The most advanced levels of service require special hardware, and perhaps special telecommunications lines.

•

A telecommunications program. Communications programs are software programs that permit the computer to send data across a modem. In an increasing number of business and office environments, local area networks are being established through which Internet access is available. If we work from home or from remote field locations, we will need a software program for our home or portable computer to permit it to make a phone connection across telephone lines to another computer connected directly to the Internet. (Frequently, the people who specialize in modems will be able to recommend an appropriate communications software program. They will also be able to answer questions about setup and provide initial troubleshooting.)

•

An electronic account. All Internet users must establish an Internet address. To do this you must obtain an electronic account with one of the services providing Internet access. (A list of these can be found in Section 17: Internet Service Providers, page 97). Electronic accounts can be obtained from universities or research institutions (if the reader happens to be affiliated with one), from some businesses (many companies are already installing or investigating electronic networking), or from the commercial Internet service providers that sells access accounts.

•

An appropriate level of Internet access6. Universities and large corporations have dedicated lines to the Internet. All individual users need a software program to use the Internet Protocols (IP) for communications. IP protocols are enabled by SLIP (Serial Line Internet Protocol), compressed SLIP, or PPP, (Point-to-Point Connections) software applications. Increasingly, these tools come with the major telecommunications programs, or are available as shareware from other users. Table x. Comparison of Internet connections Mailbox and Usenet News only

Online accounts with full Internet functionality

SLIP/PPP

Dedicated Line Connections

Good for individuals and small business

Good for individuals and small business

Accounts Good for individuals, small business and medium businesses

Good for medium and large businesses

Inexpensive

Inexpensive

Inexpensive connect time

High speed connectivity, full time

Easy to use

Many times have obtuse commands for finding information

Full Internet to the desktop

Expensive hardware

No “real” Internet capability

Requires a “doubledownload” for file transfers

Too slow to be fully functional - strains under moderate usage

Best to have local staff for connection support

Many Internet users subscribe to commercial providers who have already installed the necessary connections. Users need only to sign up with one of them and they are ready to follow on-line instructions to gain access to the Internet. It is useful to realize that almost all Internet providers can supply subscribers with a variety of access levels, from simple E-mail to a more comprehensive TCP/IP access. The rates vary based on the level of access. Similarly, it is important to know that some electronic network providers give subscribers access to a set of services that can easily be confused with Internet services. Companies like CompuServe, America Online, and Prodigy in the US, Minitel in France, and other producers in other countries provide some useful electronic services, but they are not the Internet. In many cases they can provide access to Internet E-mail

6.

See also Section 16: Deciding the Level of Internet Service , page 95.






13

addresses through gateways, but many Internet resources requiring FTP, gopher, MOSAIC, or other advanced Internet services are either unavailable, or accessible with additional conditions.

6.2 How much will it cost?

7

The cost for an Internet connection comes from three sources: service provider charges, line connection charges, and set-up costs.

6.2.a Set-up costs Assuming that a user has a personal computer, the needed hardware is a modem. A 2400 bit per second (bps) modem can be easily found and purchased for under $50.8 A communications software is also needed. For the most basic services, it possible to use terminal emulation software that can cost from $50 to over $100. For the more sophisticated service that will support the needs of a small business, it is reasonable to pay about $500 to $2,000 for hardware, plus another $500 or so for software. The software cost of an Internet connection is being alleviated by a move of operating system developers to include Internet-capable software within the OS itself. For some time, UNIX operating systems have been Internet capable, and Microsoft Windows NT also includes the software support necessary to communicate with the network. Many of these same features are also expected in the next release of Windows 95.

6.2.b Monthly costs The service provider calculates the monthly charges based on the level of service and the provider’s price structure. As mentioned earlier, there are conditions for a free connection. If someone uses a fee-based provider, it is common to pay $10-$30 per month for basic service, and $20-$50 for a full-featured individual access. A small business can get sufficient service for $100-$500 per month. Expensive connections are designed generally for larger organizations that often have dedicated staff for arranging and managing the connection. The telephone company charges for the connection time. A popular trend among service providers is to offer local phone numbers, or toll-free numbers for a flat fee. The advantages must be weighed, but it does give an option. Case Study: AfricaLink (USAID)i AfricaLink was initiated in August 1994 by the Africa Bureau’s Office of Productive Sector Growth and Environment (SD/AFR/PSGE). AfricaLink’s immediate goal is to connect over 100 African institutions in 43 countries that collaborate with PSGEii to the Internet. PSGE had asked the World Resources Institute (WRI) to research on how to establish these connections. Only E-mail and ListServ access were required. AfricaLink funding for these connections is due to start in May 1995. The favored approach — the local model — seeks to strengthen the existing capacity of local E-mail Service Providers (ESPs) to connect many in-country spokes. International messages are forwarded to the local ESP, bundled together, and then transmitted at high speed at off-peak hours to an international Internet gateway (via X.25 or dials up [or is dialed up] and files are transferred using UUCP or FidoNet-compatible software). In many African countries a significant electronic networking capacity exists as well as an international communication “backbone” (e.g., ORSTOM’s Reseau Inter-Tropical d’Ordinateurs: RIOiii, national X.25 systems, daily polling from an Internet gateway) that provide reliable international communications. By building incrementally upon this capacity, the local model aims to provide reliable and low cost support.

7.


8.

The costs quoted in this section are applicable to the United States of America.




14



At a relatively modest investment — about $500 per site connection (hardware and software installation, and one day’s on-site start-up training) and about $1,000 per year operating cost — the Africa Bureau can use electronic networking to respond to many of its strategic objectives and, in the process, assist in developing an infrastructure that is crucial to the commercial future of many African countries. The operating cost is based on these estimates: a maximum of $0.40/KB or about $0.50 per message to send or receive E-mail. Local E-mail is usually cheaper and in some cases free. If 40 international E-mail messages are sent or received per week, the operating costs would be about $1,000 per annum. 100% would be subsidized the first year; and 50% the second year ($500 for operating expenses). A multi-page ListServ access would cost correspondingly more. Free technical support is generally available on-line from the local E-mail service provider. On-site technical support also is often available for a fee. As a form of commitment to electronic networking, the collaborating national institutions are responsible for paying all telephone costs between their location and the local ESP. Many other initiatives, both within and outside the USAID Africa Bureau, are underway to support E-mail connectivity in Africa. ODA, GTZ, DANIDA, IDRC, UNITAR and the World Bank have some interests, and are even actively supporting some Internet connectivity in some countries. However, no other donor except IDRC has a policy to support electronic networking in Africa.iv Zambia is an example where the value of electronic networking is a national initiative. The University of Zambia (the local ESP) supports a network of over 300 users. As a result of the demand for greater access to the Internet’s information services, a permanent link with a TCP/IP service provider in South Africa has been established. The cost of the link is shared by the network of users. In Zambia, construction of the electronic “rural roads” was a prerequisite to the design and financing of an “international highway.” i.

Brunner, Jake. AfricaLink - Final Report and Recommendations (Draft, February 1995).World Resources Institute ([email protected]).

ii. Collaborating national institutions affiliated to the Special Program of African Agricultural Research (SPAAR), the Network for Environment and Sustainable Development in Africa (NESDA), the U.S. Climate Change Study Initiative (CCSI). Additional collaborators such as commodity-based E-mail networks and the U.S. Famine Early Warning Systems (FEWS) Project are likely to be forthcoming. In these networks were integrated into AfricaLink, 250 new users would be added. iii. Pascal Renaud (Project RIO Director), ORSTOM. 213 rue La Fayette, 75010 Paris. France. Telephone: +33 1 4803-7609 - Fax: +33 1 4803-0829. E-mail: [email protected] (URL: http://norfolk.orstom.fr/welcome.htm) iv. Capacity Building for Electronic Communication in Africa (CABECA) is a project to promote computer networking throughout Africa, executed by the Pan African Development Information System (PADIS) of the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA). E-mail: [email protected] - Telephone: + 251 1 511167 - Fax: +251 1 514416, or +1(212)963-4957 Technical contact personnel: East Africa: Douglas Rigby ([email protected] (Tanzania, Uganda, Rwanda and Kenya); East Africa: Lishan Adam ([email protected]); West Africa: Bob Barad ([email protected]); Southern Africa: Mike Jensen ([email protected]). International requests and other collaboration with the project should be addressed to PADIS project coordination center. Contact: Nancy Hafkin, OIC, PADIS/UNECA - P.O.Box 3001 Addis Ababa, Ethiopia ([email protected]).






15

Part 3 Internet Tools




16








17

7. Tools of the Trade There are five main services: •

Electronic mail (E-mail)

•

Discussion lists (ListServs) and newsgroups (Usenet) for communications among users

•

Remote connections to other systems with FTP for file transfer, or remote computing using Telnet

•

Query, access and download of text, data files and software using Archie, Veronica and WAIS

•

Interactive navigation across the network using Gopher and World Wide Web

The electronic mail is the most basic level of the Internet that enables anyone to exchange E-mail with users on the Internet and other networks. The next highest level combines discussion lists, newsgroups and electronic mail. The best collection of Internet access includes newsgroups and E-mail, as well as the Internet’s interactive tools — Telnet, FTP, Gopher, and so on. (These tools are called interactive because they enable anyone to connect with other people and computers in real time. E-mail and Usenet groups do not work in real time. For instance, when someone sends an E-mail message to a friend, it is not read at the same time the user types it in. It may sit in a mailbox for minutes or days before it is read by the recipient.).

Figure 3. UUCP and USENET (Logarithmic Scale)9

9.

Figure 4. Internet Resource Discovery Services on NSFNET by Bytes (Logarithmic Scale)9

Drawn by MIDS, Austin, Texas . Copyright (c) 1995 MIDS. Data from /nsfnet/statistics/1993/nsf9301.highlights.




18



Table 1. Comparison of Internet tools

Tool

Purpose

Ftp

File Transfer Protocol

Quantity of Accesible Information Gigabytes

Retrieve Client Software via FTP Positive Features

Great for finding Search & retrieve More than software archives if anonymous FTP 1.6 million files searched you know an exact filename Remote 1000s of Log into 1000s of Telnet interactive databases databases worldwide 100s of Directory service for Hytelnet Hypertext interface to telnet database telnet— particularly to selected sites focused on libraries More than Email or FTP Gopher Hierarchical browser 1,000s sites results to yourself

Mosaic

WAIS

Hypertext interface to Internet resources (links embedded in docs) Internet-based global hypermedia browser Relevance feedback search & retrieval

login as ftp or anonymous, password: email address

Host Sites Demos

Need to know where wuarchive.wustl.edu: Good for moving pick directory for your even large files, lots the files are in computer of software archives advance (archie good)

archie

WWW

Negative Features

Need to know what you are looking for

ftp.sura.net: /pub/archiez

Need to know where the databases are in advance Up dates are needed often to get most current version Overwhelming amount of information SLOW on even fast links

wuarchive.wustl.edu; pick directory for your computer

archie.sura.net, login as archie

access.usak.ca: /pub/hytelnet

access.usask.ca /ca. login as hytelnet

boombox.micro.umn. edu: /pub/gopher

consultant.micro. umn.edu, login as gopher

info.cern.ch: /pub/www

info.cern.ch, no login or passsword

ftp.ncsa.uiuc.edu

www.undp.org

More than 1000s sites

Hypertext links make it easy to jump around on one subject

More than 1000s sites

Encompasses all tools with nice interface

SLOW on slow links Turn off pictures

More than 100s of sites

Grades quality of information retrieved

Need to know which quake.think.com: databases you want /wais to search

quake.think.com , login as wais

8. Electronic Mail Like any tool, the electronic mail has its strengths and weaknesses. On the surface, it appears to be just a faster way of delivering letters. To know when an electronic mail is appropriate, think about how it differs from other communications media. In some ways, E-mail is very similar to the telephone; in other ways, it is similar to traditional postal mail. Table 2 gives a quick comparison. Table 2. Comparison of communication techniques10

10.

Telephone

E-mail

Postal Mail

Speed

High

Moderate

Low

Cost

High

Low

Low

Synchronization

Necessary

Not necessary

Not necessary

Formality

Varies

Moderate

Varies

Accountability

Low

Moderate

High

Excerpt from: The Whole Internet: User’s Guide & Catalog. Ed Krol. O’Reilly & Associates, Inc. April 1994. Pages 101-103.






19

Telephone

E-mail

Postal Mail

Conferencing

Small group only

Unlimited

One-way only

Security

Moderate

Low

High

The use of low-cost electronic networking allows information and expertise to be shared with wider coverage, unlike the conventional telephone and even fax communications. The relative cost-effectiveness of electronic networking is well documented11. In Africa, for example, a one page E-mail costs about $1 to transmit, a one page fax about $10, and a five minute phone call up to $25. Table 3.

Time and cost comparisons between fax message and electronic mail between Addis Ababa (Ethiopia) and London (United Kingdom)12

Media

10K file (4 pages) 60K file (24 pages) 10K file (4 pages) 60K file (24 pages) Time Time Cost in US$ Cost in US$

Fax

8 minutes

48 minutes

14.00

84.00

E-mail no compression 2400bps

2 minutes

5.6 minutes

3.20

9.00

E-mail compression 2400bps

1 minute

3.7 minutes

1.60

6.00

E-mail no compression 9600bps

30 seconds

1.2 minutes

1.60

3.20

E-mail compression 9600bps

20 seconds

40 seconds

1.60

1.60

Electronic networking can help developing countries respond to, and participate more effectively in, a rapidly changing global economy that is increasingly driven by the free flow of information and ideas.

9. Electronic Mail, ListServs, and Discussion Groups Sending an E-mail message is the most used function on the Internet, with the exception of sending and receiving files. The Internet software, through a computer network, delivers the E-mail messages right to the computer. Delivery time and costs are far less than other traditional means. The only main drawback is that the system is not secure. This means mail sent and received are open for others to read. Therefore, to maintain mail privacy and confidentiality, do not send it by E-mail unless you want to invest in a scrambling device for encoding communications. E-mail is used for the same reasons people send postal mail: •

Exchange of correspondence among business associates

•

Exchange of private letters among friends and family

In addition, the E-mail is useful for these purposes: •

Transfer and receive copies of files and documents

•

Subscribe to electronic discussion groups, electronic journals, electronic newsgroups, and so on

•

Obtain free copies of computer software

11 .

Capacity-Buidling in Electronic Communications for Development in Africa. Proposal. U.N. Economic Commission for Africa. 1992. Barad, Bob. Electronic Communications Applications for EDI Learning Programs in Africa. Consultant report Sept. 30, 1994. Brunner, Jake. AfricaLink - Final Report and Recommendations (Draft, February 1995).World Resources Institute ([email protected]). Goodman, Seymour, L.I. Press, S.R. Ruth, and A.M. Rutkowski. The Global Diffusion of the Internet: Patterns and Problems. Communication of the ACM. August 1994. Vol. 37, No. 8, pp. 27-31. Hawkins, Robert. Computer Networking with Mozambique and its relationship to the World Bank’s objectives. Draft. World Bank. Nov. 15, 1994. Nuttall, Christophe. L’Internet en Afrique. Programme UNITAR/UIT pour l’expansion de l’Internet en Afrique au service des différents partenaires du développement durable en Afrique. Draft proposal. UNITAR. Oct. 1994.

12 .

Lishan, Adam. Modern Communications Through Electronic Networking. PADIS, UNECA. Workshop on Statistical Computing, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia 7-11 Nov. 1994. ECA/STAT/SDB.5a(ii)/94/10. Page 8.




20

•



Obtain copies of sounds, graphics, and multimedia through the Internet

9.1 Sending and receiving E-mail To write and receive E-mail messages, an E-mail software program “resident” is required. This software allows the user to see incoming E-mail messages and provides an editor for outgoing messages. According to statistics regularly compiled on network usage, the electronic mail (also known as E-mail or messaging), is the most widely used facility (see Figure 3). Provided someone has a direct PPP connection or has access to a networked computer with E-mail facility, the person may send messages, documents and data files to one or several countrepart users. There are many commercial E-mail programs operating under all platforms (CCmail for DOS and Windows, Microsoft Mail, PINE, ALL-IN-1, DEC MAIL, etc..), and most offer these functions: send and receive mail, forward mail to one or several addresses, reply directly to the sender by proposing a template with the address and subject already filled, attach documents in several formats, store mail in folders, use aliases in lieu of addresses. Internet addresses are built up from left to right, beginning with the most specific piece of information (a user's personal and individual identification) and proceeding to the most general (the “host” name or the highest level domain within which the user can be found). A name consists of several elements or labels, each separated by a delimiter (a @ or . character). The format for addressing a message to an Internet user is: [email protected] For example, the address of one of the authors of this document is [email protected], pronounced “benzine at u.n. dot org”. The "at" sign (@) separates the name from the network address. In another address such as: [email protected], the address also carries the computer name (nywork2) in addition to the domain name (undp) and the top-level domain name (org). Usernames are commonly a first initial followed by the last name (pgerland for patrick gerland) or the reverse ([email protected] for Isabelle Nuttall). Sometimes only the last name is used ([email protected]), or they combined a first and last name separated by an underscore ([email protected]) or a dot ([email protected]). The top-level domain name is a three letter abbreviation of the recipient's affiliation: .com (commercial and business organizations), .edu (education and research institutions), .gov (government agencies), .mil (military sites), .net (gateways or hosts), and .org (international and other organizations). Host names are used when you Telnet, FTP, gopher, and use the “Web.” A host name is structured like this: • • •

ftp.undp.org gopher.undp.org www.undp.org

where org is the top level domain, and undp is the organization name; ftp, gopher, and www are the names of the computers. All Internet addresses are internally converted into a unique, 32-bit identifier (always four numbers - each less than 256 - separated by periods [called dots or dot notation]) for a specific TCP/IP host on a network. The IP (Internet Protocol) address corresponding to the one UNDP WWW server is: 157.150.192.10 Outside the United States, each nation has an assigned domain that corresponds to its two-letter code, as listed in table 6 (page 90). These country codes are based on the International Standards Organization (ISO), number 3166, which defines two-letter, three-letter, and numeric designations for each nation. See Section 15 on the Internet Connectivity (page 89) for the country codes. Information moves across the Internet very much like mail moves through the post offices. A message may be carried in a mail truck or (in the case of the Internet) on a packet switching network. In either case, it may travel along with thousands of other unrelated messages. When it arrives at its destination (say Brazil), our electronic message is reassembled, sorted, and sent out again to its final destination within Brazil.






21

Message delivery to a recipient's mailbox is not instantaneous as the case is, for example, with a faxed or telexed message. It takes from a few minutes to a few days, depending on how it is routed: two messages from a single source to the same destination may take different routes, depending on the traffic in the network. It is the responsibility of the receiver to open and check the mailbox. Mail not delivered is returned with a message indicating the reason for non-delivery.

9.2 Anatomy an E-mail message To send an E-mail message the recipient’s Internet address is necessary. (Refer to the Section 13.2 on Internet addresses explained (page 49) to understand how an Internet address is put together. There are also the Finger and Whois services that are similar to the telephone company’s white/yellow pages.) Most computer systems keep E-mail prompts to a minimum. To start, select or type the command to create a new E-mail message, then type the person's full Internet address, followed by a carriage return. At the next prompt, type the subject of the message, again followed by the enter key on the computer. Once in the message display screen, you can type the message. >mail [email protected] Subject:> E-mail and Internet: access and use Hello, We are doing a small survey on the access and use of E-mail facilities for a paper to be presented at a workshop on data collection, processing, dissemination and utilization. We will appreciate your response to the following questions on the use of E-mail facilities at your location. If you are not an E-mail user - or if you have no time to respond - your acknowledgement is still important for us to test the communication facilities. Thanks, Patrick GERLAND and Djamal-Eddine BENZINE

To send the message, use the command in the menu. There are some E-mail systems where you type a period on a separate line and hit the Return key. The system will send the message, or prompt with cc. This gives the opportunity to copy the message to a third party. If we simply press Enter, the message will immediately be sent.

9.3 Cyber-cues To communicate some emotion in cyberspace a series of smiley-face-like concoctions (commonly called “Emoticons”) have evolved to punctuate your informal network messages. Here are a few of the more common ones: :-) :-( :-) :-) : D

smile frown also a smile wink laughing

8-) :-} :-X :-] :-o

wide-eyed grin close mouthed smirk oh, no!

Short cuts to over-used expressions To save time when typing in informal network messages, the following expressions have been abbreviated to save on wrist and hand strain: •

btw “by the way”

•

fyi “for your information”

•

imho “in my humble [or honest] opinion”

•

wrt “with respect to”




22



9.4 E-mail gateways on the Internet Mail to the Internet is addressed in the form [email protected]. As seen above, an example of an Internet mail address is [email protected]. Many other large public networks have electronic mail gateways between their networks and the Internet. Sometimes, an email address has to be “converted” to Internet format. To help you find the correct formatting for some large networks, we summarize some guidelines from the Internetwork Mail Guide by Scott Yanoff (available via anonymous FTP at csd4.csd.uwm.edu). Network Name

Sample User ID

How to form Internet Email

America Online Applelink AT&T Mail Bitnet BIX Compuserve Connect Easylink Easynet Eastbet Econet Ecuanex Fidonet Genie Geonet Glasnet Greenet MCI Mail Niftyserve Nordnet Peacenet Pegasus Prodigy Pronet Sprint Mail Telecom

user id userid userid userid@site userid 1234,567 userid 1234567 host::userid first last @ org userid userid first last at 1:2/3.4 userid userid at host userid userid first last (123-4567) userid userid userid userid userid userid first last at org userid

[email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] or [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] /G=first/S=last/O=org/ADMD=TELEMAIL/C=US/@sprint.com [email protected]

9.5 When E-mail gets returned When electronic mail cannot be delivered, the user normally gets a message. At this point, you only know the mail did not go through. To know the cause, it is necessary to wade through the returned cryptic message. There are three common reasons for electronic mail to fail: • Unknown hosts: the mail system can’t find the recipient’s machine • Unknown Recipients: the recipient is unknown at that machine •

Mail Can’t Be Delivered: the mail can find the machine but still can’t deliver the message

10. Using E-mail to Subscribe to ListServs and Discussion Groups Since the BBS concept was transferred to the Internet and the software was modified, hundreds of USENET and ListServ discussion groups have operated on the same principles: a topic is stated, and people interested in the topic send and receive messages, and conduct discussions from all around the world. Many programs now archive the discussions so that newcomers can retrieve threads of conversations that have taken place before they join a discussion. Any listing that has a URL beginning with mail:// can be subscribed to via E-mail. Someone simply "writes" to the contact person of the resource, and they "write back" in return. It is all accomplished electronically, just as if the person were sending a letter through the post office.






23

10.1 Mailing Lists and ListServs This is an E-mail feature that allows a single message to be "served" or delivered to many addresses simultaneously. The recipients' E-mail addresses must appear on a distribution "list" to receive these reflected messages. There are currently over 5,600 publicly accessible ListServ-based mailing lists in the world (May 1995). They cover a wide variety of subjects, and the number grows daily. The Listserv system is a mailing list of E-mail addresses which allows members to send messages to a particular mailing list. The mailing list consists of a large number of people interested in the specific topic(s) who receive subject related articles using their normal E-mail software. Mailing lists are generally maintained by the Listserv software but some of them are managed by a human moderator. We have listed useful references in this paper (see below 13.4: Selected discussion and mailing lists for population activities; page 54). Each ListServ is dedicated to a specific topic. Listservs have been traditionally maintained at universities as part of an intercampus network called Bitnet. The Listserv program forwards messages directed to it to all subscribers The host computer receives and sends out Email, keeps files, handles subscriptions and unsubscriptions, and collects monthly logs of all messages sent to the list. It can also provide files of other information. The listserver will send "back issue" logs and other files on request. ListServs are free and provide a very useful and efficient way of coordinating the activities of a large group of people (especially if they are geographically dispersed). Everyone can comment or inform everyone else about their work, questions to be answered, or some organizational matters to be resolved. Since the comments can be read by everyone, it provides a quick and easy way to keep list subscribers involved and informed. The following describes how to use the listserv programs. To subscribe to a ListServ group, send an E-mail message to the URL address. The transaction takes place between software, and there is no human intermediary. Knowing the difference between a list that has a human moderator and one that is controlled by software is useful. We can usually tell this by the URL. If the address contains the information "listserv@”, the resource is handled by a computer; if it contains the information "-requests@", there is a human editor who handles the subscription and information requests, and maintains the distribution list manually. To send or receive an E-mail message, both the sender and the receiver must have electronic mail addresses. (Some services have emerged on the Internet that accept an E-mail message intended for another party who does not have an electronic account. These services will —for a fee— have the message printed and delivered by a fax or by the post office.) Typically, to subscribe to a ListServ list, we send an E-mail message to the software (called, simply, ListServ) that governs the subscription requests and maintains the distribution records for the discussion list in which we are interested. Invariably, the software governing a list will be located on the same computer host on which a particular discussion group is located. The subscription request is sent as a message containing the single line: (Substitute your real first name and your real last name for the phrases "YourFirstName" and "YourLastName" in the preceding syntax.) To unsubscribe is even easier. We send a message containing the single line: In this case, the computer software will be able to determine your first name and your last name from the subscribers’records it maintains. It is, however, important to send these messages from the same account used when the subscription was made; otherwise, the records will not match. To send a message to all subscribers on the list, simply address an E-mail message to the list itself, instead of to the ListServ software. Thus, if we wanted to join a list called "Economy” about Economic Problems in Less




24



Developed Countries located at "acadvm1.uottawa.ca", we would send a subscription request to the following

address: [email protected]

If we intended to send a message to all the subscribers of the list, we would address our message to the following: [email protected]

Note that the computer host, domain, and type (everything following the "@" sign) are identical in both instances as we are merely addressing the software manager (ListServ) in the first case, and the distribution list (“Economy”) in the second. ListServs are free; there is no subscription fee. But a price can be associated with subscribing to too many ListServs (or ones that are very active). Subscribers should be aware that some ListServs generate a lot of interests and heavy mail. If someone subscribes to several ListServs, (s)he should be prepared for a substantial increase in mail. It could be difficult to review, and might also take up disk space on the computer until the person is decided what to do with the individual messages. It is better to keep a record of the lists you have subscribed so as to to easily unsubscribe from a list that inundates you with more messages than you can handle.

10.1.a Finding a Mailing List To find out about mailing lists that are relevant to your interests, send the following command to the same address given above: LIST GLOBAL /keyword (Of course, we must replace “keyword” with an appropriate search word such as Marketing, Education, etc.) Another helpful document with the commands used to subscribe, unsubscribe and search mailing list archives can be obtained by sending this to: [email protected] Include only this command in the body of the note: get mailser cmd nettrain f=mail Search and view the enormous selection of Listserv and Internet mailing lists through this easy-to-use gopher interface which includes a list of recent additions, deletions, and updates: Gopher: Name: Nova Scotia technology Network Internet Resources | Mail Lists

10.1.b Internet Mailing Lists There are several compilations of mailing lists to which one can subscribe and these are indicated below. The same mailing lists may appear in several compilations, as there are overlaps among the sources. Mail: Address: [email protected] or [email protected] Body: send netinfo/interest-groups Usenet: Newsgroup:

news.answers

Anonymous FTP: Address: dartcms1.dartmouth.edu Path: /siglists/internet.lists






25

Address: class.org Path: /class/ kovacs_library_listservers Address: ftp.concert.net or ftp.nisc.sri.com Path: /netinfo/interest-groups.txt Address: ftp.sura.net Path: /pub/nic/interest-groups.txt World Wide Web: URL: http://www.ii.uib.no/~magnus/palm.html http://www.clark.net/pub/listserv/listserv.html Diane K. Kovacs13 maintains for example for each topic listed below a Directory of Scholarly Electronic Conferences. It is possible to obtain them at various sites, including at: ftp://zeus.kent.edu/library/acadlist or gopher://gopher.usask.ca/1/Computing/Internet Information/Directory of Scholarly Electronic Conferences. Each directory contains descriptions of electronic conferences (e-conferences) on topics of interest to scholars. E-conference is the umbrella term that includes discussion lists, Internet interest groups, electronic journals (ejournals), electronic newsletters (e-newsletters), Usenet newsgroups, forums, etc. The e-conferences in this directory are all accessible via Internet services including E-mail, Telnet, Gopher, or WWW. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12. 13. 14. 15. 16. 17. 18. 19. 20. 21. 22. 23. 24. 25. 26. 27. 28. 29.

Agriculture, Veterinary Science and Zoology. Anthropology, Cross Cultural Studies, and Archaeology. Art, Architecture and Urban Design. Astronomy. Botany, Horticulture. Business, Accounting, Finance, and Marketing and Economics. Chemistry, Chemical Engineering and Materials Research. Communication and Journalism. Computer Engineering, Software Engineering. Computer Science Research: AI, Expert Systems, Virtual Reality. Computer Science Research: Computer Standards (Official and De Fac... Computer Science Research: General Academic. Computer Security. Computer Systems: Network Administration. Computer Systems: System Administration. Computer Systems: Training and User Support. Ecology and Environmental Studies. Education: Computer Assisted Instruction, Educational Technology. Education: Educational Research (general), Grants and Funding. Education: Higher, Adult and Continuing Education. Education: Miscellaneous Education, Alumni and Student Groups. Education: Primary, Secondary (K-12), Vocational and Technical. Education: Special Education, Developmental and Physical Disabilit... Engineering and Technology General and Transporation Engineering. Futurology, Future Studies. Genetics, General Biology, Biophysics , Biochemistry. Geography and Miscellaneous Regional and Individual Country Studie... Geology and Paleontology. History.

30. 31. 32. 33. 34. 35. 36. 37. 38. 39. 40. 41. 42. 43. 44. 45. 46. 47. 48. 49. 50. 51. 52. 53. 54. 55. 56. 57. 58. 59. 60. 61. 62.

Human Resources and Industrial Psychology. Humanities (Comparative & Interdisciplinary). Information Retrieval. Information Systems. Internet Tools and Resources. Jobs, Employment, Placement Services and Programs. Languages. Latin American Studies. Law, Criminology, Justice. Library and Information Science. Linguistics and Text Analysis. Literature. Mathematics and Statistics. Medical Practice, Nursing, Personnel, Patients and Medical Science... Miscellaneous Computer-Related. Music. Philosophy and Ethics. Physical Education, Recreation and Dance. Physics. Political Science and Politics. Programming Languages and Programming. Psychology and Psychiatry. Public Domain and Publically Supported Software. Publishing and Related Issues. Religious Studies. Science and Technology (Miscellaneous). Social Activism. Social, Cultural and Political Aspects of Computing. Sociology and Demography. Theater, Film and Television and Popular Culture. Weather and Meteorology. Women's Studies, Gender Studies. Writing.

The directories are grouped in some files such as: 13

Diane K. Kovacs, The Directory Team and Kent State University Libraries ([email protected] and [email protected])




26



ACADLIST README (explanatory notes for the Directory) ACADLIST INDEX (Listname and Keyword Index of the Directory) 96 k ACADLIST FILE1 (Education and Library and Information Science) 120 k ACADLIST FILE2 (Art and Architecture through Linguistics and Text Analysis) 79 k ACADLIST FILE3 (Literature through Writing) 98 k ACADLIST FILE4 (Social Sciences) 141 k ACADLIST FILE5 (Biological Sciences) 63 k ACADLIST FILE6 (Physical Sciences) 77 k ACADLIST FILE7 (Business, Economics, Publishing and News) 38 k ACADLIST FILE8 (Computer Science) 77 k ACADLIST FILE9 (Social, Cultural, and Political Aspects of Computing; and Academic Computing Support) 96 k

A PRINT version is available from the Association for Research Libraries. The print version is combined with the Directory of Electronic Journals and is called -The Directory of Electronic Journals Newsletters and Academic Discussion Lists_Contact Ann Okerson - [email protected] for more information. To 1. 2. 3.

retrieve these files from the [email protected] server: send an E-mail message addressed to LISTSERV@KENTVM or [email protected]; leave the subject and other info lines blank; the message must read: GET Filename Filetype f=mail (e.g., ACADLIST FILE1 or ACADLIST FILE9 or whatever) 4. If you need assistance receiving, etc. contact your local Computer Services colleagues.

10.2 Bulletin Boards (BBSs) BBSs are software tools for providing bulletin board services. BBSs differ only slightly from E-mail ListServs. Any given BBS can provide E-mail, but it also provides access to collections of data and/or documents that can be downloaded. BBSs offer an alternative to ListServs in the sense that we can choose whether we wish to obtain information from a BBS, whereas by subscribing to a ListServ we automatically receive all messages from the ListServ. Users may retrieve "threads" of discussions along topical lines from BBSs by requesting a search of archives of postings and E-mail messages that deal with a particular topic. Non-lnternet BBSs frequently involve an access fee, while most Internet-based BBSs are free.

10.3 USENET (Users Network) Groups USENET refers to a worldwide collection of thousands of computers (not all on the Internet) that host and receive USENET newsgroup information and exchanges. As of May 1995 over 58,000 computers around the world make up this network, exchanging news articles daily. We will find many of these in the references listed in this paper. The main differences between the Newsgroup and the mailing lists (ListServ) are the following: •

USENET is a special interest news distribution scheme that allows individuals with access to Usenet to read and post articles. The system is somewhat like E-mail but involves a network of news 'feeds' that pass the news along, and makes up a worldwide collection of automatically updated electronic bulletin boards or forums.

•

Each message within an individual newsgroup is called a post or an article. Articles within each newsgroup are arranged by topics. Initial queries or informational articles will likely generate several responses. This patchwork of queries and responses form a message thread with a specific topic. The software used to read network news automatically piece together the various queries and responses in logical order. The original article appears first, followed by any available followup (response) articles in the message thread (See below 11.5: News readers; page 31).

•

USENET is divided into newsgroups. Each newsgroup is devoted to a single topic. Each newsgroup article is received and stored on each participating USENET computer. Unlike E-mail (and mailing list based on






27

ListServ), where the messages are actually sent to every computer subscribers and stored on their individual mail account, newsgroup articles are stored on a news server, at the site that services the accounts. Check with the systems administrator(s) at your site to see if you receive USENET news or if a site mail alias has already been set up for the mailing list before subscribing. This can help cutdown on network traffic, and reduce the cost by sharing the same amount of information among all the locally interested subscribers. As of May 1995 there are over 2,500 active newsgroups that function as forums for exchange of questions and answers on a specific topic. Each newsgroup has a distinct identifier that describes the topics discussed in the group. Newsgroups distributed worldwide are divided into seven traditional classifications: comp

Groups that discuss topics of interest to computer professionals and hobbyists. Hardware and software systems are also discussed.

misc

Groups that address themes not easily classified under any other headings, or that incorporate themes from multiple headings.

news

Groups concerned with the news about network and administration topics.

rec

Groups oriented toward the arts, hobbies, and recreational activities.

sci

Groups concerned with discussing practical knowledge, usually related to research in or the application of established sciences.

soc

Groups that primarily address social issues and socializing.

talk

Groups largely debate-oriented and tend to feature long exploratory discussions on individual topics with little resolution.

In addition, there is a rapidly growing category of newsgroups with "alternative" grouped names. These involve subjects or communities that are less formal and less traditional, such as the following: alt

Groups that deal with ephemeral, frivolous, or highly controversial topics.

bionet Groups related to biology. bit

Redistributions of BitNet LISTSERV mailing lists. All sorts of subjects.

biz

Groups for business and commercial topics.

clar

ClariNet newsgroups, from commercial and official sources.

gnu

Groups about the GNU Project of the Free Software Foundation.

hep

HEPnet newsgroups, about high-energy and nuclear physics research sites.

ieee

Groups for discussions related to engineering and electronics.

info

A collection of mailing lists gatewayed into news at the University of Illinois.

k12

Groups for discussions of primary school educational topics (K thru 12th grade education).

relcom Russian-language newsgroups, mainly distributed in the countries of the former Soviet Union. u3b

Groups of interest to AT&T 3B{2,5,15,20,4000} computer users.

vmsnet Groups of interest to VAX/VMS computer users. Each newsgroup is geared to a specific subject. Some newsgroups may literally have thousands of subscribers whereas others may exist with only a dozen or so subscribers.

10.3.a Usenet by E-mail In order to get a proper start and avoid needlesly embarrassing ourselves, we must read the Usenet new users intro. document, which can be obtained by sending E-mail to: [email protected] and include this line in the BODY of the note: send usenet/news.answers/news-newusers-intro




28



To obtain a listing of Usenet newsgroups, add these commands to our note: send usenet/news.answers/active-newsgroups/part1 send usenet/news.answers/active-newsgroups/part2 send usenet/news.answers/alt-hierarchies/part1 send usenet/news.answers/alt-hierarchies/part2 To get the FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions) file(s) for a given newsgroup, try a command like this: index usenet/ (Substitute dots for dashes if they appear in the newsgroup name.) If any FAQ files are available, they will be listed in the returned info, and we can request them with a command like: send usenet// Once we have handled the preliminaries, we need to know how to read and contribute to Usenet newsgroups by E-mail. To read a newsgroup, we can use the GopherMail service covered later in this paper. To obtain a list of recent postings to a particular newsgroup, we need to send the following lines to one of the GopherMail servers mentioned previously; specify “Subject: get all” and include only these lines in the message body. (We must replace “” below with the name of the Usenet newsgroup we wish to access, e.g.: alt.answers, biz.comp.services, news.newusers.questions, etc.) ------- begin gophermail message (do not include this line) Name= Type=1 Port=4324 Path=nntp ls Host=pinchy.micro.umn.EDU ------- end gophermail message (do not include this line) If this does not work, we can try another Host by specifying Port=4320 (instead of Port=4324) and substituting one of the lines below. Host=phantom.bsu.edu Host=teetot.acusd.edu (???) Host=infopub.uqam.ca (no alt.*) Host=gopher.ic.ac.uk (good) Host=info.mcc.ac.uk Note that many of these sites carry only a limited range of newsgroups, so we may have to try several before finding the one with the newsgroup we are looking for. When the newsgroup does not exist, gophermail sends something like “’nntp ls ’: path does not exist”. When a site does not accept outside requests, gophermail sends something like “Sorry, we don’t accept requests outside campus”. If successful, the GopherMail server will send a typical gopher menu on which we may select the individual postings we wish to read. Note: The GopherMail query in this example is the edited result of many previous queries. It was pared down to the bare essentials so it could be tailored and reused.

10.3.b News Posting Service via E-mail. These servers allow you to post to USENET newsgroup even if you are not part of the USENET system. Use dashes in the groupname rather than periods: for example, sci-stat.edu rather than sci.stat.edu. Remember to include the E-mail address in the posting to get replies. If you decide to make your own post, mail the text of the post to:






29

[email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] (For an updated list send E-mail to [email protected]) For example, to post to news.newusers.questions, send the message to either of the two: [email protected] [email protected] An appropriate subject line should be included with your real name and E-mail address at the end of the note.

10.3.c Another Usenet->E-mail Method! See the Section 12.14: World-Wide Web by E-mail (page 44) for an even easier method of retrieving Usenet posts by E-mail! This method is limited to the set of newsgroups carried at the CERN server, but the selection is quite comprehensive.

10.3.d Usenet Searches A service at Stanford University makes it possible to search USENET newsgroups for postings that contain keywords of interest to you. You can even "subscribe" and receive a daily list of newsgroup postings that match your search criteria. Send mail to [email protected] with HELP in the body of note for full details. 14

11. Internet Access Tools

There is a handful of common Internet tools designed for use on each of the more popular personal computers. These tools are software programs that make it easy to reach any of the resources listed in this paper. New tools or improvements to existing ones are announced continuously. There are a number of books that describe these in great detail (see Section 13.1: Further readings, page 49). It will be good to get an easy-to-understand overview of the range of capabilities represented by these different tools to be familiar with the available functions, and understand why each has been developed. We will need to master several tools, one for each different Internet resource type we choose to access (FTP, gopher, talent, MOSAIC, and so on). We can download the software programs from the Internet or use ones made available by our Internet service provider. Listings included in this paper make it convenient to find out where each individual tool is available.

11.1 Finger: finding people on the Internet Finger is the tool that helps locate other people on the Internet. The Finger tool can provide the E-mail addresses, full name, telephone numbers, and other information about a particular user at a specified site. Finger allows us to search for the user logged on a computer connected to the Internet. We could thus find someone's E-mail address provided we know the name of the computer he or she uses. Even if we do not know a person's login name, we can type part of a person's name and Finger will produce a list of possibilities. Service or resource providers on the Internet will often provide help facilities that explain the service or resource. Such is the case with the Internet Finger Database. It is also worth trying an address a few times if at

14.

Excerpt from New Rider’s Official Internet Yellow Pages by Christine Maxwell and Czeslaw Jan Grycz. New Riders Publishing. 1994. Pages 10-13.




30



first you do not succeed. You can also experiment with the possibility of reaching a resource using other Internet tools if the first tool does not work. Finger also allows access other kinds of information contained in text files. For instance, to reach NASA's Headline News type: finger://[email protected] To find the Top 40 on the pop music charts type: finger://[email protected]

11.2 Telnet Telnet is among the earliest Internet command structures. Telnet is a software tool used to log in to a remote computer and to use its applications. Most computers are protected by passwords (or their important files are protected by some measure of security). Some allow temporary or restricted access when a user submits his/her computer account as a password. Given the appropriate password, or if a computer is available to the public, Telnet lets us work on the remote computer as if we actually owned it. This means that if the computer to which we are connected is more powerful than the one than we own, we receive the benefits of its increased performance even though we are distant from it (perhaps even in a different state or country!). Most communications software packages support Telnet communications protocols, because the command protocols are by now quite ubiquitous on the Internet. The Internet Telnet software is a tool of enormous benefit to scientific and engineering research and development. It makes it possible for people to work together and share resources as, for example, to avail themselves of powerful and expensive supercomputers. Telnet is a useful command structure, letting us interact with computers on the Internet. Telnet is useful because it has existed for a long time, and many commercial programs now incorporate basic Telnet programming structures, making it possible to use this facility from a variety of telecommunications software programs.

11.3 FTP (File Transfer Protocol) FTP is another specialized Internet tool. Its special function is limited to retrieving files from remote computers or placing them there. Text files, application programs, binary code, software updates, various utilities, and many helpful computing aids can be retrieved using FTP. Numerous Anonymous FTP sites permit anyone on the Internet to retrieve files that have been placed on a computer as a public service. In a recent transaction, files of substantial size were posted onto a computer by one user and picked up by another for correction. When the corrections were finished, they again were posted to a computer and retrieved by another individual. In the case of this example, one of the persons was in New York, U.S.A, and the other in Algiers, Algeria! It would have been very time-consuming to have transferred these files by postal service. It might also have been impractical to send large files via E-mail. FTP permits the exchange of files in this manner very easily.

11.4 Archie Archie is a searching tool that has a specific function on the Internet. It queries Anonymous FTP sites on the Internet in a standardized manner and creates an index of the files located on these sites. Because there are thousands of Anonymous FTP sites, it could be difficult to find a specific file. Archie solves the problem by its single comprehensive index. We can easily search for a file name, and then log in to the appropriate FTP site listed in the index.






31

Archie is a software tool that — on an ongoing basis — scans Anonymous FTP sites and builds an index of Table of Contents of those sites, making it easier to find specific items.

11.5 News readers Newsreader programs have been created specifically to give people easy ways of reading postings made to specific USENET newsgroups, a specific variety of electronic discussion group. USENET is a kind of loosely organized network, stemming from the period in the Internet's development when programmers designed software for their own use. The programs created make it easy to keep in touch with one another on a variety of topics; thus newsgroups have become very popular and proliferated. News reader software was created subsequently, when the number of newsgroups grew to unmanageable proportions. There now exist literally thousands of newsgroups on the Internet, with discussions on every conceivable topic. News readers are programs that permit specification of selected newsgroups. Having been configured in this manner, the program then collects information only from these specified sources, making it a burden-less process to keep abreast of one or several discussions at a time. Routine postings on USENET lists contain information on how to subscribe. There are also comprehensive and frequently updated lists of currently active newsgroups. These form a dynamic and active portion of the Internet. Changes are frequent, with some newsgroup topics emerging while others close for lack of sustained interest. USENET is not centrally organized, so there is no control over who gets a particular news feed or how individual articles are sent out. But the bottom line is that whatever our interest may be, there is bound to be a discussion group dedicated to that very subject.

11.6 Gopher Gopher is an extremely popular Internet tool, developed at the University of Minnesota. Gopher permits us to access data without requiring that we know beforehand its location or even details of what it is we are looking for. Gophers are popular because they permit the user to browse and discover things on the Internet with little difficulty. Most people also find Gophers very friendly and easy to use. Gophers provide a simple, menu driven, tree-structured interface to the data/files available on the various Internet servers. Even though they are easy, some people have improved on Gopher even further, and have made that improved software available to the Internet community. Most of the Internet tools can be retrieved from FTP sites. These kinds of tools are often also carried on local sites, so we might check with our local administrator to find out if a copy is already available to us through our home or office account provider.

11.7 Veronica Veronica is a gopher service dedicated to locating resources existing within "gopher space." Veronica is an augmentation of gopher. It provides keyword searches of the titles of gopher items. This is a major help to finding out where a given file or program can be found and retrieved from among the various gopher Internet sites. The Veronica service maintains an index of titles of gopher items, and the result of a Veronica search is a gopher-like menu of files or directories. We can often get to Veronica by going through a normal gopher client, either our own or one supplied by our Internet service provider if we do not have our own.




32



11.8 World-Wide Web (WWW) Another characteristic of the Internet is the ability to link documents at one location with files at another. This kind of network linking is known as hypertext, and a special tool has been developed to pursue hypertextual links among disparate files. World-Wide Web (WWW) is an Internet software tool for network navigation similar to gopher. It is also menu-driven. Unlike gopher, WWW follows hypertext links between related sources rather than files related to one another by server identification. WWW allows us to pursue the "strands" of a web of information distributed across the network. Using WWW we might locate an interesting document, notice a citation in it, and use WWW to look up the source document. This popular Internet navigation software can be obtained from a site in Europe. Though a relative newcomer, WWW holds great promise for navigating the Internet electronically, and is contributing to making Internet even more accessible to novice users.

11.9 Mosaic Mosaic was developed by the National Center for Supercomputing Applications at the University of Chicago at Urbana-Champaign, Illinois. Mosaic is among the most popular of the recently available Internet searching tools. It comes in many flavors for various computing platforms. Be sure to download the version of Mosaic that matches your computer. Mosaic understands the protocols of many of the most-used graphical user interfaces. It unifies the searching capacities of many Internet retrieval tools and adds the ability to display images in a variety of graphical formats. This means that Mosaic can retrieve a variety of image files and show them on the computer even if we do not own the original graphics program from which the images have been generated. Of course, the computer must be able to display graphics (that is, it must have a windowing capability of some sort). Mosaic is popular for its flexibility and comprehensiveness as an Internet navigator and retriever of a wide variety of file formats. A text-based version called Lynx is able to run on most computer platforms and can also provide most of the basic navigation features offered by Mosaic using the hypertext links available in the World Wide Web. As with many such specialized tools, finding out what is available for retrieval by Mosaic was a problem. A recent tool called the World-Wide Web Worm WWW(W) is accomplishing a function similar to that of Veronica. It scoured the Internet locating WWW sites and indexing their contents so that people could more easily find information they were seeking.

11.10 Wide-Area Information Servers (WAlSs) WAIS is an Internet tool that lets us access specially designed server databases in a useful manner. Rather than using a conventional searching strategy, WAIS incorporates the capability of using natural language queries. The system interprets a query in a useful form for its server databases, and looks through the database(s) for documents containing specific terms or phrases. When it finds them, it ranks the results and delivers a list of likely information in the order of relevance. The document that best matches a search is scored 1,000, and the rest are given a lower figure according to the rank of relevance. An even greater enhancement is that we can use the results of the search to modify our original search even further. Thus, if the fourth-ranked file is closer to what we want than the first-ranked file, we can add it to our query parameters, saying, in effect, "get me more like this" but including this topic. WAIS is an example of a tool that provides an enhanced retrieval mechanism through ranking of items according to their relevance to a constructed query. It is a powerful Internet tool, and many servers exist on the Internet with WAlS-compliant databases. We can find some of these listed in the pages of this directory.






33

12. Accessing the More Advanced Internet Resources By E-mail

15

12.1 How to access Internet services by E-mail About half of the 160 countries with Internet connections have only E-mail access to this worldwide network of networks. You can access almost any Internet resource using E-mail. Maybe you have heard of FTP, Gopher, Archie, Veronica, Finger, Usenet, Whois, Netfind, WAIS, and the World-Wide Web but thought that these were out of reach because you lack a direct connection. This is not the case. You can use simple E-mail commands to do all of these and much more on the Internet. And even if you do have full Internet access, using E-mail services can save you time and money. If you can send a note to an Internet address, you are in the game. It is better to first read this entire document before trying the techniques that are covered. This way, it is possible to gain a broad perspective of the information resources available, an introduction to the tools you can work with, and the best methods for finding the information you want.

12.2 Finding the latest version This document is now available from several automated mail servers. To get the latest edition, send E-mail to one of the addresses below. To:

[email protected] (for US/Canada/etc.) Enter only this line in the BODY of the note: GET INTERNET BY-EMAIL NETTRAIN F=MAIL

To:

[email protected] (for Eastern US) Enter only this line in the BODY of the note: send usenet/news.answers/internet-services/access-via-email

To:

[email protected] (for UK/Europe/etc.) Enter only this line in the BODY of the note: send lis-iis e-access-inet.txt

You can also get the file by anonymous FTP at one of these sites: Site:

ubvm.cc.buffalo.edu get NETTRAIN/INTERNET.BY-EMAIL

Site:

rtfm.mit.edu get pub/usenet/news.answers/internet-services/access-via-E-mail

Site:

mailbase.ac.uk get pub/lists/lis-iis/files/e-access-inet.txt

12.3 Other translations of this document Several readers volunteered to translate this text into languages other than English. The list below shows the status of the translation work. You can obtain any of the completed texts by sending E-mail with: Subject:

15.

send accmail.xx (where “xx” is as shown below)

Excerpts from: Doctor Bob’s Guide to Offline Internet Access - 4th Edition -July 1995. Copyright © 1994-95, “Doctor Bob” Rankin. All rights reserved. Permission is granted to make and distribute verbatim copies of this document provided the copyright notice and this permission notice are preserved on all copies. Feel free to upload to your favorite BBS or Internet server!




34

To:



[email protected]

Chinese (In progress) Croatian (In progress) Czech (Complete - 4th Edition) Danish (Complete - 4th Edition) Dutch (Complete - 3rd Edition) French (Complete 4th Edition) German (Complete - 3rd Edition) Hebrew (Complete 4th Edition) Hungarian (In progress) Indonesian (Complete 4th Edition) Italian (Complete 4th Edition)

Filename: accmail.tw Filename: accmail.hr Filename: accmail.cz Filename: accmail.dk Filename: accmail.nl Filename: accmail.fr Filename: accmail.de Filename: accmail.he Filename: accmail.hu Filename: accmail.id Filename: accmail.it

Japanese (In progress) Norwegian (Complete - 4th edition) Persian (In progress) Portuguese (Complete - 2nd Edition) Romanian (Complete - 4th Edition) Russian (Complete - 4th Edition) Serbian (In progress) Spanish (In progress) Swedish (In progress) Ukranian (In progress)

Filename: accmail.jp Filename: accmail.no Filename: accmail.ir Filename: accmail.pt Filename: accmail.ro Filename: accmail.su Filename: accmail.sb Filename: accmail.sp Filename: accmail.se Filename: accmail.ur

Please contact the author if you wish to assist in translating this document into another language.

12.4 The “rules of the Game” This document is meant to be both tutorial and practical, so there are various actual commands and Internet addresses listed herein. Everyone will notice that when these are included in the text, they are indented by several spaces for clarity. It is not necessary to include the leading spaces when trying these commands. There are also things like “” or “” appearing in this document. You can think of these as place holders or variables that must be replaced with an appropriate value. The quotes or brackets in the value should NOT be included unless specifically directed to do so. Most E-mail servers understand only a small set of commands and will not accept any other. So it is necessary to include ONLY the specified commands in the Subject or body of the note, avoiding any extraneous lines such as a signature, etc. It is also better to ensure that there is at least one blank line between the note headers and the body of your note, and to pay attention to upper/lower case in directory and file names when using E-mail servers. It’s almost always important.

12.5 Accessing the Internet by E-mail Learn how to use FTP, Gopher, Archie, Veronica, WAIS, the Web, and Usenet, using mail as the only tool. Mail: Address: [email protected] Body: send lis-iis e-access-inet.txt For further information about Mailbase, or to report any problems, please contact [email protected] Address: [email protected] Body: get internet by-E-mail nettrain f=mail Telnet: Address: lynx.mailbase.ac.uk When prompted for a login simply reply with: lynx When asked for the terminal type you normally reply with the type: vt100 Then just use the arrow keys and the Enter key to move around the server. World Wide Web: URL: http://www.mailbase.ac.uk

12.6 New in these parts? Newcomers to the Internet are advised to subscribe to the HELP-NET list where the person is likely to find answers to most questions. Send the command:






35

SUBSCRIBE HELP-NET in the BODY of a note to [email protected], then E-mail the questions to the list address: [email protected]

12.7 How to find a E-mail address (“White Pages”) 12.7.a “Directory Assistance” by E-mail To find someone’s mail address when you only know the userid or real name, try this service. A subject is not needed. In the body of the message, put the word whois, followed by the person’s last name, a comma, a space, and their first name or initial. For example, whois gates, bill. For help, send a message that contains only the single word help. Mail: Address: [email protected] Body: whois lastname, first name Address: [email protected] Body: whois lastname, first name Address: [email protected] Body: send usenet-addresses/name “WHOIS” is a service that queries a database of Internet names and addresses. If you are looking for someone or you want to know where a particular Internet site is located, you can send an E-mail with Body: To:

whois [email protected]

Try substituting “mit.edu” or the last name of someone you know in place of “” and see what comes back. Another alternative name looker-upper is a database at MIT that keeps tabs on everyone who has posted a message on Usenet. Send E-mail to “[email protected]” and include this command ONLY in the BODY: send usenet-addresses/ Specify as much information as possible about the person (lastname, firstname, userid, site, etc.) to limit the amount of information that is returned to you. Here’s a sample query to find the address of someone you think may be at Harvard University: send usenet-addresses/Jane Doe Harvard NETFIND is another more powerful search engine that uses a person’s name and keywords describing a physical location to return information about the person (or persons) who fits the description. Let’s say you want to find someone named Hardy at the University of Colorado in Boulder. Your Netfind query will be addressed to [email protected] and will contain the only line: gopher://ds.internic.net:4320/7netfind%20dblookup?hardy+boulder+colorado Netfind works in two phases. First it displays a list of internet domains that matches your keywords; then it looks for the person in the domain you select. Netfind by E-mail is very similar, in that you will receive a listing of matching domains from which you must make one or more selections. Each selection is numbered and there are corresponding “gopher://” commands at the bottom of the listing. Let us select cs.colorado.edu computer science dept., University of Colorado boulder which means that your next command to [email protected] will be: gopher://ds.internic.net:4320/0netfind%20netfind%20hardy%20cs.colorado.edu




36



If all goes well, you will receive a list similar to this: full_name: HARDY, JOE (not a real person) E-mail: [email protected] phone: (303) 492-1234 address: Campus Box 777 department: COMPUTER SCIENCE

Note that if you already know the person’s domain name, you can immediately start with the query like the latter one above. You can also try the “Four11 Online User Directory”, a free directory of users and their E-mail addresses. Send E-mail to [email protected] for details on how to search the Four11 directory. To obtain the latest list of all the known whois-style white pages servers on the Internet, and related information: Mail: Address: [email protected] Anonymous FTP: Address: rtfm.mit.edu Path: /pub/whois

12.7.b Address/Name server info by E-mail The Mail Name Server ([email protected]) offers some useful services by E-mail. Some of the commands you can send in the BODY of your note are: help ip host.foo.bar name ip# ns host.foo.bar

(full details) (get host’s addresses) (get host name from address) (get host’s name servers)

12.7.c Finger by E-mail “Finger” is a utility that returns information about another user, like last logon. Sometimes people enter fun or useful information in their finger replies. To try out finger, send E-mail with: Subject: To:

FINGER [email protected]. [email protected]

You will receive some current sports standings. (The general form is FINGER user@site.) Just for practice, try finger using a combination of gopher and WWW. Send the command: send gopher://:79/0 to the WWWmail server mentioned earlier.

12.7.d Knowbot Information Service Knowbot is a “white pages” service that will search for a name through a large number of Internet databases. It is a great way to look up friends and acquaintances. It is not yet as convenient as it might be, but Knowbots are among the newest and most advanced services on the Internet and is worth knowing. Telnet: Address: info.cnri.reston.va.us 185 Enter: E-mail address Documentation describing the philosophy and use of the Knowbot Information white pages service (ASCII or Postscript format) can be obtained using anonymous FTP at: nri.reston.va.us in the /rdroms directory.






37

12.8 FTP by E-mail FTP stands for “file transfer protocol” and is a means of accessing files that are stored on remote computer systems. In Internet these remote computers are called “sites”. Files at FTP sites are typically stored in a tree-like set of directories (or nested folders for Mac fans) and each pertains to a different subject. When visiting an FTP site using a “live” Internet connection, specify the name of the site, login with a userid & password, navigate to the desired directory and select one or more files to be transferred back to their local system. Using FTP by E-mail is similar, except that the desired site is reached through a special “ftpmail server” which logs in to the remote site and returns the requested files to you in response to a set of commands in an E-mail message. FTP by E-mail is good even for those with full Internet access, because some popular FTP sites are heavily loaded and interactive response can be sluggish. So it is practical not to waste time and connect charges in these cases. To use FTP by E-mail, you first need a list of FTP “sites” which are the addresses of the remote computer systems that allow you to retrieve files anonymously (without having a userid and password on that system). We will list some popular sites listed in this guide, but you can get a comprehensive list of anonymous FTP sites by sending an E-mail message to the internet address: [email protected] and include these lines in the BODY of the note: send usenet/news.answers/ftp-list/sitelist/part1 send usenet/news.answers/ftp-list/sitelist/part2 ... (lines omitted for brevity) ... send usenet/news.answers/ftp-list/sitelist/part18 You will then receive (by E-mail) 20 files which comprise the “FTP Site List”. Note that each of these files is about 60K, so the whole lot will total around a megabyte. Therefore, first make sure you check and see if the list is already available locally, or consider requesting just the first few as a sampler before getting the rest. Another file you might want to get is “FTP Frequently Asked Questions” that contains information on using FTP services, so add this line to your note as well: send usenet/news.answers/ftp-list/faq After you receive the site list, you will see dozens of entries like this that tell you the site name, location and the kind of files that are stored. Site: Country: Organ : System : Comment: Files :

oak.oakland.edu USA Oakland University, Rochester, Michigan Unix Primary Simtel Software Repository mirror BBS lists; ham radio; TCP/IP; Mac; modem protocol info; MS-DOS; MS-Windows; PC Blue; PostScript; Simtel-20; Unix

If you find an interesting FTP site in the list, send an E-mail to one of these ftpmail servers: [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected]


(USA) (USA) (USA) * (France) (France for French-speaking Africa) (Germany) (Sweden) (UK) (Australia) (USA)



38


[email protected] [email protected] [email protected] mail-server@ nluug.nl


(Germany) (Ireland) (Poland) (Netherlands)

Your selection does not matter, but a server that is close may respond quicker. In the body of the note, include these lines: open dir quit

* use "connect " for dec.com sites

This will return to you a list of the files stored in the root directory at that site. See the figure below for an example output of “oak.oakland.edu” for the site name. +---------------------------------------------------------------------+ | | | -r—r—r-1 w8sdz OAK 1255 Nov 9 16:32 README | | drwxr-xr-x 3 w8sdz OAK 8192 Feb 25 05:17 SimTel | | d—x—x—x 3 root system 8192 Jan 19 20:26 bin | | d—x—x—x 5 root system 8192 Dec 30 05:15 etc | | drwxrwx--2 incoming OAK 8192 Feb 25 11:05 incoming | | drwxr-xr-x 3 w8sdz OAK 8192 Jan 30 17:37 pub | | drwxr-xr-x 2 jeff OAK 8192 Apr 17 1994 siteinfo | | | +---------------------------------------------------------------------+

In your next E-mail message you can navigate to other directories by inserting (for example) chdir pub before the “dir” command. (The “chdir” means “change directory” and “pub” is a common directory name, usually a good place to start.) Once you determine filename you want to retrieve, use: get in the following note instead of the “dir” command. If the file you will retrieve is plain text, this will suffice. If it is a binary file (an executable program, compressed file, etc.) you will need to insert the command: binary in your note before the “get” command. Tip: Many directories at FTP sites contain a file called 00-index.txt, README, or something similarly named that gives a description of the files found there. If you are just exploring and your “dir” reveals one of these filenames, do a “get” on the file to save time. To get the text of The Magna Carta, send this to [email protected] (or another ftpmail server): open ftp.spies.com chdir Gov/World get magna.txt quit

(The name of the FTP site) (The directory where the file lives) (Sign here please, John) (Bring it on home)

Here are the commands you would send to get the latest McAfee Scan Antivirus program from the McAfee server. First you need to check what are the various files available. open ftp.mcafee.com chdir /pub/antivirus dir quit

(The name of the FTP site) (The directory where the file lives) (Get a listing of the all files in the directory) (Leave the server)

Once you have the listing with all the files available, send a new message with the commands to download the interesting file(s).





open ftp.mcafee.com chdir /pub/antivirus binary get scn-221e.zip quit


39

(The name of the FTP site) (The directory where the file lives) (Because you are getting a ZIP file) (Download the latest Scan file) (Leave the server)

Some other interesting FTP sites you may want to “visit” are listed below. (Use these site names on the “open” command and the suggested directory name on your “chdir” command, as in the previous examples.) ocf.berkeley.edu rtfm.mit.edu oak.oakland.edu ftp.sura.net quartz.rutgers.edu gatekeeper.dec.com

Try: Try: Try: Try: Try: Try:

pub/Library for documents, Bible, lyrics, etc. pub/usenet/news.answers for USENET info SimTel/msdos for a huge DOS software library pub/nic for Internet how-to documents pub/humor for lots of humor files pub/recipes for a cooking & recipe archive

Remember that you cannot just send an E-mail to ftpmail@; instead send the “open ” command to one of the known ftpmail servers. You should note that ftpmail servers tend to be quite busy so the response might take several minutes, hours, or days, depending on when and where you send your request. Also, some large files may be split into smaller pieces and returned to you as multiple messages. If the file that is returned is something like what you see below, (the word “begin” with a number and the filename on one line, followed by a bunch of 61-character lines), it is most likely a binary file that has been “uuencoded” by the sender. (This is required in order to reliably transmit binary files on the Internet.) begin 666 answer2.zip M4$L#!`H`!@`.`/6H?18.$-Z$F@P```@?```,````5$5,25@S,34N5%A480I[ M!P8;!KL,2P,)!PL).PD’%@.(!@4.!P8%[email protected]%PL*!@@*.P4.%00.%P4*.`4.

You will need to scrounge up a version of the “uudecode” program for your operating system (DOS, OS/2, Unix, Mac, etc.) in order to reconstruct the file. Most likely you will find a copy already at your site or in your service provider’s download library. If not, use the instructions in the next section on how to search FTP sites for a copy (page 37). One final point to consider... If your on-line service charges you to store E-mail files that are sent to you and you plan to receive some large files via FTP, it would be wise to handle your “inbasket” expeditiously to avoid storage costs.

12.9 Archie by E-mail Let us say you know the name of a file, but have no idea at which FTP site it might be located. Or maybe you are curious to know if files matching a certain criteria are available via FTP. Archie is the tool you can use to find out. Archie servers can be thought of as a database of all the anonymous FTP sites in the world, allowing you to find the site and/or name of a file to be retrieved. And using Archie by E-mail can be convenient because some Archie searches take a LONG time to complete. To use Archie by E-mail, simply send an E-mail message to one of the following addresses: Asia [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected]


(Japan) (Japan) (Japan) (Korea, Rep. of) (Korea, Rep. of) (Taiwan, Prov. of China)

Europe and Middle East [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected]


(Austria) (Austria) (Finland) (Germany) (Italy) (Israel) (Portugal) (Spain) (Sweden)


40


[email protected] [email protected] North America [email protected] [email protected] [email protected]

(Switzerland) (UK) (Canada) (USA, NY) (USA, NJ)


[email protected] [email protected] [email protected] Oceania [email protected] [email protected]

(USA, NJ) (USA, MD) (USA, NE) (Australia) (New Zealand)

To obtain detailed help for using Archie by mail, put the word help in the subject of the note. You will receive an E-mail explaining how to use Archie services. If you are the “just do it” type, then enter the command: find where “” is the name of the file to search for, in the BODY (not the subject) of the note. This will search for files that accurately match your criteria. If you want to find files that contain your search criteria anywhere in their name, insert the line set search sub before the “find” command. Some other useful Archie commands you might want to use are: set maxhits 20 set match_domain usa set output_format terse

(limit output, default is 100 files) (restrict output to FTP sites in USA) (return output in condensed form)

When you get the results from your Archie query, it will contain the names of various sites where the desired file is located. Use one of these site names and the directory/filename listed for your next FTP file retrieval request. Now we can locate that uudecode utility mentioned in the last section. Let’s send an E-mail to [email protected], and include the following lines in the message: set match_domain usa set search sub find uudecode

(restrict output to FTP sites in USA) (looking for a substring match...) (must contain this string...)

Note: You will be looking for the uudecode source code, not the executable version, that would be a binary file and would arrive uuencoded - a Catch 22! The output of your Archie query will contain lots of information like this: Host ftp.clarkson.edu (128.153.4.2) Last updated 06:31 9 Oct 1994 Location: /pub/simtel20-cdrom/msdos/starter FILE -r-xr-xr-x 5572 bytes 21:00 11 Mar 1991

uudecode.bas

Location: /pub/simtel20-cdrom/msdos/starter FILE -r-xr-xr-x 5349 bytes 20:00 17 Apr 1991

uudecode.c

Now you can use an ftpmail server to request “uudecode.bas” (if you have BASIC available) or “uudecode.c” (if you have a C compiler) from the ftp.clarkson.edu site. It should be noted that the latest version of uudecode can be found at the SimTel repository. Send E-mail to [email protected], including any or all of these commands in the BODY of the note, and the requested files will be returned to you by E-mail. get uudecode.bas get uudecode.c get uudecode.doc






41

12.10 Gopher by E-mail Gopher is an excellent tool for exploring the Internet and is the best way to find a resource if you know what you want, but not where to find it. Gopher systems are menu-based, and provide a user-friendly front end to Internet resources, searches and information retrieval. Gopher knows where things are, thanks to the many volunteers who spend time creating pointers to useful collections of ‘Net resources. And Gopher takes the rough edges off of the Internet by automating remote logins, hiding the sometimes-cryptic command sequences, and offers powerful search capabilities as well. When visiting a Gopher site using a “live” Internet connection, one would specify the name of the site, navigate through a series of hierarchical menus to a desired resource, and then either read or transfer the information back to their home system. Using Gopher by E-mail is very similar, except that the desired site is reached through a special “gophermail server” which gophers to the remote site on your behalf and returns the requested menu, submenu or file to your in response to a set of commands in an E-mail message. Although not every item on every menu will be accessible by “gophermail”, you will still find many interesting things using this technique. Let us send an E-mail to one of these addresses: [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected]

(USA) USA Sweden Japan Brazil Czech Republic *OUT OF SERVICE* Israel Japan Japan Japan Japan

You have the option to specify the address of a known gopher site on the Subject line to get the main menu for that site instead. Here are some interesting gopher sites you may like to explore at your leisure. cwis.usc.edu gopher.micro.umn.edu english-server.hss.cmu.edu Let’s be bold and skip the HELP stuff for now. Send a note to one of the gophermail servers and specify Subject: cwis.usc.edu You will get a message back from the server that looks something like the text in the figure below: +--------------------------------------------------------------------+ | | | Mail this file back to gopher with an X before the items you want. | | | | 1. About USCgopher/ | | 2. How To Find Things on Gopher/ | | 3. University Information/ | | 4. Campus Life/ | | 5. Computing Information/ | | 6. Library and Research Information/ | | 7. Health Sciences/ | | 8. Research and Technology Centers/ | | 9. Other Gophers & Info Resources/ | | | | You may edit the following numbers to set the maximum sizes after | | which GopherMail should send output as multiple E-mail messages: |




42



| | | Split=27K bytes/message

Accessing and Using the Internet

Accessing and Using the Internet

Suggest Documents

Accessing and Using the Internet

Accessing Security Incident information on the Internet

Internet skill-related problems in accessing online

Accessing Physician Information on the Internet - The Commonwealth ...

Accessing Security Incident information on the Internet

Accessing Security Incident information on the Internet

The Internet in Three Finnish Cities: Accessing Global Networks

Accessing Security Incident information on the Internet - Edith Cowan ...

"Accessing The Internet By E-Mail" Doctor Bob's ...

Consumer Perspectives on Barriers to Accessing the Open Internet:

Consumer Perspectives on Barriers to Accessing the Open Internet:

Chapter 2, “Accessing and Using the SMASH CLP”

Using the Internet and Virtual Instrumentation to

Accessing Abaqus Database Using Python Scripting

Accessing Faith-Based Organizations Using Public ...

Semantically Accessing Documents Using Conceptual ... - CiteSeerX

Accessing protein conformational ensembles using room-temperature ...

The Ruby UCSC API: accessing the UCSC genome database using ...

Accessing and Using Climate Data and Information in Fragile, Data ...

Semantically Accessing Documents Using Conceptual ... - CiteSeerX

Accessing Portal Iviews using PCD API

Accessing Ubiquitous Services Using Smart Phones - Rutgers ...

Accessing Automated Teller Machine without using ...

Accessing Portal Iviews using PCD API - SCN