FidoNews · Vol 3, No 3 · 20 January 1986
Volume 3, Number 3 20 January 1986
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| _ |
| / \ |
| - Fidonews - /|oo \ |
| (_| /_) |
| Fido and FidoNet _`@/_ \ _ |
| Users Group | | \ \\ |
| Newsletter | (*) | \ )) |
| ______ |__U__| / \// |
| / FIDO \ _//|| _\ / |
| (________) (_/(_|(____/ |
| (jm) |
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Publisher: Fido 1/1
Editor in Chief: Thom Henderson
Review Editor: Allen Miller
Chief Procrastinator Emeritus: Tom Jennings
Fidonews is published weekly by SEAboard, Fido 1/1. You are
encouraged to submit articles for publication in Fidonews.
Article submission standards are contained in the file
FIDONEWS.DOC, available from Fido 1/1.
Disclaimer or don't-blame-us:
The contents of the articles contained here are not our
responsibility, nor do we necessarily agree with them;
everything here is subject to debate. We publish EVERYTHING
received.
Table of Contents
1. EDITORIAL
FidoNet Administration
2. NEWS
Modified copies of Fido documentation
Fido 108/62 afflicted with FidoRot
Things That Need to be Said
Running a "Non-Technical" Fido
ProComm support board back on-line!
Some more thoughts on shareware
3. COLUMNS
Printer Tips
A Critique of PC Pursuit
Rainbow Corner
4. WANTED
Rainbow hard disk controller needed
Space Coast Fido is looking for people
5. NOTICES
All About ARC version 4.52
The Interrupt Stack
Special notice to Jim Filgo
============================================================
EDITORIAL
============================================================
This week's guest editorial is by Ken Kaplan, the National
FidoNet Coordinator.
FidoNet Administration
FidoNet has been growing by leaps and bounds. It's not only
growing in this country, but in other countries as well.
Administering the net has grown to be an enormous task.
So far we've been able to keep up, but it looks like that
will be harder and harder as time goes by. The time has
come when we need someone full time to keep up with it all.
The cost of phone calls alone has gotten large enough to
make my company complain, not to mention the sheer amount of
time I spend daily on FidoNet administration.
I don't intend to make anyone do anything they don't want to
do. FidoNet is and always has been a voluntary thing; I
don't propose to change that. But there is so much that I
can do, and should do, that I am not at present able to do,
that would make FidoNet better for all of us. I simply
don't have the time to do the things I'd like! There are so
many services that I could provide, if only I had the time
to do them. We should be advertising FidoNet to
unsophisticated users. We should be providing more support
to the beginning sysop. We should be compiling a stack of
ready answers to common questions. We should be compiling a
list of services that FidoNet sysops can provide to
commercial users (for a price, of course!) We should be
getting involved in legislation that affects sysops.
There are so many things that we should be doing, but nobody
has the time! It is all I can do just to maintain the
national net, and I see so much more that I could do, if
only I could spend the time on it. I'm an amateur, same as
you. I've been doing this in my spare time, same as you.
But I've just about reached the limit of what I can do
without offending my company.
I'd like to be able to spend all my time on making FidoNet
better for all of us, but I need your help. What I have in
mind is something like freeware. If you can see your way
clear to send some money to help out, I'll greatly
appreciate it. At the very least, it'll help to pay for my
phone bills. If we're lucky, enough people will help out
enough so that I can spend all my time working on improving
FidoNet. If enough money comes in, then I can think of
several solid, worthwhile services I can provide that you'll
really appreciate.
Fidonews Page 2 20 Jan 1986
I promise that I'll be the national coordinator as long as I
can afford to, but please send whatever you can to:
FidoNet(tm) Administrators
PO Box 41143
St. Louis, MO. 63141
Thanks,
Ken Kaplan and Ben Baker
------------------------------------------------------------
Fidonews Page 3 20 Jan 1986
============================================================
NEWS
============================================================
Rob Elliott
Fido's #115/100 and #115/500
I have heard many complaints from sysops concerning the dis-
tributed documentation for Fido Version 11. The problem
does not lie in the huge size of the file, but in the over-
printing used to produce bold and underlined characters. It
can take hours to print, if your printer can even handle it.
(A surprisingly high number cannot) So, I have created two
modified versions of the documentation that do not use this
tedious overprinting process, and put them in archive format
for distribution as follows:
FIDODOC1.ARC is the original documentation with overprinting
via backspacing. It is about 300Kb long when un-ARC'ed.
FIDODOC2.ARC is a modified version that uses escape codes
for bold and underline, as used by DEC LA50/LA100 type
printers. It is about 250Kb long when un-ARC'ed.
FIDODOC3.ARC contains no bold or underlining by any means.
It is about 246Kb long when un-ARC'ed.
These files are available on Sit-Ubu_Sit Fido #115/500 and
at Illini Data RB Fido #115/100 (the latter requires good
VT100 emulation). Possibly elsewhere by the time you read
this.
------------------------------------------------------------
Fidonews Page 4 20 Jan 1986
Tim Sullivan
PC Techniques
108/62
My board seems to have an affliction that can best be
described as 'Fidorot' or 'Fido dulldrums'. It seemed like
an excellent idea to bring up a Fido system of my own. My
company was willing to provide the resources and I had the
time and interest to undertake SYSOP duties. There were
only a few Fido nodes in my area and it seemed as if it was
getting harder to gain access to them. I even came up with
what I thought was a unique idea for a theme. But after
less than three months in operation, my board seems to have
stagnated!
There haven't been any new ideas lately. The frequency of
calls is dwindling. Nothing new has been uploaded. There
hasn't been any Fido mail for days. I NEED HELP!
Please help this board to survive! I'll listen to ideas,
comments, suggestions or any kind of help. Please take the
time to Fido mail your favorite freeware program, new SYSOP
utilities, an article that you read last week, games, or
anything of interest or controversy to keep this board
alive.
This board needs a quick injection of activity. If you like
phoning Fidos in other places, how about trying PC
Techniques! We're online from 6pm - 6am Weekdays and 24hrs
Weekends at (513) 891-1947.
------------------------------------------------------------
Fidonews Page 5 20 Jan 1986
Miscellaneous Things That Need to be Said
Well once again I've somehow managed to find the time to
write another one of my amazing articles for FidoNews. My
main problem is that I've found this amazing institution
called Private High School, and for some reason they feel
I'm a Senior and that they should be able to take all of my
time. By the way, this institution is called Allen Academy,
and if any Alumni is out there send money or it won't be
around any longer. Anyway I'm glad that someone created the
index, it was just what Fnews needed.
I believe that I own the world's oldest IBM Pc. The mother
board came with 48k (in 16k chips). Of course we upgraded,
but our BIOS is so old it won't except the 640k we put in.
In fact we can't install a hard disk of any measurable size.
I have a complaint! The last time I looked at the nodelist
Bill Smith was the Sysop of Elite Software! Well, I hate to
say this but Bill doesn't sysop the board, I do. Would
someone fix this please?
I don't know how many people out there use Volkswriter but
if you don't use it you should. It spells now and is real
nice.
Oh, yeah. Every one that reads this is invited to my 19th
birthday which is on the 23rd of May. And if you want you
can stick around and go to Commencement ball (24th) and on
the 25th you can stick around and see if I actually graduate
this year.
Mike Ringer
Sysop of Elite Software
117/1262
3/12
------------------------------------------------------------
Fidonews Page 6 20 Jan 1986
Brad Hicks
Fido 100/523
+-------------------------------------------------+
: SOME THOUGHTS ON RUNNING A "NON-TECHNICAL" FIDO :
+-------------------------------------------------+
I've been running WeirdBase since March of 1984, and in
those scant few months, it has grown into the one of the
most-popular BBS in St. Louis. Along the way, I've
learned a few things that I think are worth passing along.
Most of these come under the heading of, "I wish somebody
had told ME that!"
LESSON NUMBER ONE: THERE ARE PEOPLE OUT THERE WHOSE
COMPUTERS DON'T RUN MS-DOS.
And furthermore, a lot of them have something to
contribute! What does this mean? To start with, it means
that you should lose your copy of SQ.EXE, and only use ARC
and LU to open things up, not box them in. Hundreds of
Apple //, Macintosh, CP/M, TI, and Atari users will thank
you. Put yourself in their shoes for a minute - would you
call back to a BBS where roughly half of the text was
restricted to people with a different computer?
LESSON NUMBER TWO: THE FIDO GENERIC ON-LINE HELP SUCKS.
Maybe it's adequate for technical users and as a quick
reference, but otherwise it's just blatantly useless.
Nowhere in the on-line help does it tell a new user what a
Message Area IS, or what the difference is between an
upload and a download, or what the difference is between
the E)ditorial and the B)ulletin, or what he can change
with the C)hange menu, or any of the myriad topics that a
newcomer to Fido needs to know. Technical users will, of
course, download the Fido Users Guide from some system,
memorize it, and never look back. Non-technical users
can't or won't DO it that way. The '?' command is a good
place to put a few screens'-worth of good on-line help.
Tip: make it specific to your board! When you describe the
A)rea-change command, tell them what the other A)reas are
used for, and so forth.
LESSON NUMBER THREE: KEEP THE MESSAGE AREAS SMALL.
There are several good reasons for this one, and not
the least of them is that each message takes up 4 kb. At
that rate, once you hit a thousand messages, you're
starting to hurt for disk space.
But the most important reason is that nobody wants to
read more than about 60 messages before jumping into the
conversation. When you consider how many 300 baud modems
are still out there, and what some people pay in long-
Fidonews Page 7 20 Jan 1986
distance costs, you can see why.
But what can you do for people who don't call in very
often? See my next tip ...
LESSON NUMBER FOUR: DON'T THROW ANYTHING AWAY.
I have a long-standing complaint about bulletin boards.
While they are a great way to collect a lot of written
material in a hurry, a very convenient means of
correspondence, they are completely without history.
Outside of CompuServe, where you can occasionally find a
file 'something.THD', old messages go to the same place
where your lap goes when you stand up.
On WeirdBase, I have a sloppily-hacked-together IBM PC
BASIC utility to print out messages, which I use in
conjunction with PC-Write 2.4 to maintain The Message
Archive. The Message Archive is a collection of
conversation files, from all of the areas on WeirdBase,
separated by topic, each with around ten to thirty
messages. For example (excuse the truncated subjects) ...
FILENAME BYTES FROM TO MSGS AREA SUBJECT
---------- ----- ----- ----- ---- ---- ----------------
ALERT 21019 10/15 11/22 19 4 Pagan Action Ale
ASTRO 21029 10/14 11/03 25 1 Astronomy, Comet
BBSLAW 8192 09/16 10/26 9 1 Congress vs. BBS
DRWHO2 15436 09/24 11/03 26 3 Dr. Who, fandom
EVIL!D&D 36668 09/16 11/21 37 5 The Evils of D&D
FANMISC1 11168 08/31 10/25 30 2 S.F. Books and M
JOKES2 3967 10/16 11/22 15 1 More Attempted H
SEX 10596 12/28 12/31 10 1 Sex & Contracept
Any new user, or anyone who's been gone for awhile, can
go to Files Area 1 and with the F)iles and T)ype command
locate and read ONLY the messages in which he is
interested, then switch to the Message Area indicated (in
my FILES.BBS comments I show the range of dates, number of
messages, and the message area for your replies) to catch
up on this week's contributions and reply.
LESSON NUMBER FIVE: STICK TO SUBJECTS THAT YOU KNOW
Look - no matter how fanatical your users are, expect
that (especially if you're just getting started) somewhere
between 20% to 50% of the messages on your board are going
to have to be written by the sysop. Users (quite rightly,
I think) expect the sysop to reply to their comments, and
to lead off new conversations.
I've been in science fiction fandom since I was a small
child, I'm a Neopagan Witch, I'm a gamer, I'm into
political philosophy and Libertarianism. Wanna guess what
the first couple of message areas on WeirdBase are? That's
right, after #1 (general), science fiction books and fandom
Fidonews Page 8 20 Jan 1986
is in #2, science fiction TV and movies in #3 (I got so
many Dr. Who fans that they needed their own area),
Neopagan Witchcraft in #4, gaming in #5, and civil rights
in #6. That's what I know, so that's what conversations I
started. Fortunately, these aren't uncommon interests in
the St. Louis modem community.
But I've tried several times to get conversations going
on subjects I knew less well but was interested in -
BadFilms, Punk Rock, and so forth - and each time it
fizzled. SOMEBODY has to take charge of a message area and
keep it moving, or it fades away.
LESSON NUMBER SIX: ... BUT KEEP IT LEGAL!
This almost shouldn't have to be said. For one thing,
you won't last long on the FidoNet if you're heavily into
illegal activities - I doubt if many Pirate Boards will
ever even see this article.
Here's the list of things that I've been avoiding like
the plague: phone numbers of Pirate Boards or any other
information on hacking, phreaking, pirating, or crashing;
any advice or suggestions on criminal activities; anything
to would be classed as "pornography" by St. Louis community
standards (for example, ASCII nudes).
By cracking down hard on people who do such things, and
by having a very supportive cast of regulars, I've been
able to get away with running a completely open board, no
validation whatsoever (knock on wood!). The people who are
into those activities leave VERY quickly for more
hospitable boards.
By the way, I decided a long time ago that I wasn't
going to have much of any software to download. There were
three reasons, and I still stand by them. First, they
discourage people with other machines. Second, they really
aren't that appropriate to a non-technical, conversation-
oriented BBS. Third, I didn't want the hassle of having to
figure out what really was and wasn't public domain. You
might want to think about these reasons, too. Remember,
there are lots of other boards from which people can
download software.
LESSON SEVEN: BE FLEXIBLE!
If a message area isn't getting any new messages, don't
let it just sit there and rot - clean it out, archive the
mess (see Lesson Four), and start something new! In fact,
an empty message area probably looks better than one that
is stagnant. And if worse comes to worse, you can always
raise it to Sysop privilege, so it doesn't even show up on
the A)rea list, until you're ready to unveil it.
On my board, I reserved area 9 for FidoNet, so I've got
Fidonews Page 9 20 Jan 1986
two areas just for experimentation. At the moment we're
using Area 7 in a group-writing project, and storing
personal autobiographical messages in Area 8 - but that's
very subject to change. In fact, that's why a few months
ago I re-built the whole board so that my message areas
were M!AREA1 through M!AREA9, and my file areas were
F!AREA1 through F!AREA9. It encourages me to think about
them in different ways.
Star Tzard (normally on 125/433, lately on 100/22 and
100/523) tells me that his favorite metaphor for BBSing is
the Electronic Cocktail Party, but I prefer to think of
WeirdBase as the Electronic Science Fiction Convention -
with nine different function rooms, and an ever-rotating
schedule, and everything caught on "videotape" so that you
can review it later ... What more could anyone want?
===========================================================
Personal footnote: I'm trying to compile a list of Pagan
BBS's and boards with message/file areas dedicated to
Paganism and/or Witchcraft. If any of you know of any,
send FidoMail to Brad Hicks, 100/523. Thank you!
------------------------------------------------------------
Fidonews Page 10 20 Jan 1986
Tom Smith
Fido 14/619
PIL Software Systems is back on-line!
The ProComm Support BBS, formerly Fido #10/619, is now up
and running as Fido #14/619 out of Columbia, MO.
Hours: 7pm-7am CST, M-F (except for national mail time)
Plus any other time the machine's not in use. 23
hour/day service coming soon.
Number: (314) 449-9401
Focus: We're here primarily to distribute and support
ProComm, our user-supported communications
program.
Currently featuring ProComm version 2.1. 2.2 is in the works
and will feature Telink, YMODEM and MODEM7 file transfers,
among other new features.
Give us a call and download ProComm, ask a question or make
a suggestion. We want to hear from you!
------------------------------------------------------------
Fidonews Page 11 20 Jan 1986
Some more thoughts on shareware
A thought on shareware. After reading several articles in
FIDONEWS on the topic, I can't help but get my two cents in.
Our office uses several shareware programs. Among them, the
PC Write, File, Calc series, Pibterm, and AUTOMENU v 3.01.
Several utilities such as ARC are used, too.
I guess what caught my attention was mention in an article
about the personal check for Fido from an employee at MCI
who had set a Fido up for use in PC Pursuit advertising.
Many shareware authors make it easy for institutions to pay
for their products by including a formal invoice or order
form. Others, perhaps out of a desire not to appear pushy,
do not. It is impossible for my institution, under state
law, to send a check to a vendor without an invoice.
I guess the bottom line of this is -- Authors, please
include an invoice with your documentation or in the ASCII
that appears on screen when your program is called without
parameters, i.e. ARC. This will make it possible for those
of us who wish to compensate you for your work to do so.
I hope this hasn't been offensive; it is just not possible
for some institutional users to pay for items without an
invoice.
Bill Allbritten, sysop, 11/301
------------------------------------------------------------
Fidonews Page 12 20 Jan 1986
============================================================
COLUMNS
============================================================
PRINTER CARE
Carol Bluestein
Most people read their printer manual, plug in the printer
and never think anything more about it. I did, until
trouble developed. It is a very helpless feeling to realize
that something is going wrong and the trouble is electronic.
Most of my work is on my disks and I need that information
printed out. Oh well. The printer needed attention so I
took it in for service.
My printer was not printing a line of dots. I now know that
this means that one of the pins was inoperable. The print
head was replaced and everything was okay until the line
feed action was not consistent. Lines were being skipped or
printed at 8 lines per inch instead of 6 lines per inch, all
without my explicit direction, and a different pin was out
of commission. I took it back to be fixed. I wound up with
a new printer board and a second new print head.
Everything seemed to be okay, until another pin went. I
found this all very frustrating. I had had this printer for
10 months with no problems, and now it couldn't seem to
operate for two months straight.
This time the service people couldn't find anything wrong
with the electronics. It turned out to be something fairly
simple. The pin had gotten clogged with ink.
There is a way to fix this problem, and you can do it at
home. First remove the print head. Take out the ribbon,
and look down at the print head. There is a metal lever
that swings out and unlocks the print head. Lift the head
out. When the head is free, you will notice that it is
still attached to the printer board by a plastic cable which
has a clear plastic tab just underneath it. Never pull the
cable itself; always use the tab. Pull it horizontally, and
the print head and cable will pull free of the printer
board. Now, look at the print head and find the pins (the
part that is up against the ribbon).
Take some WD-40, and either spray it directly on the pin
heads or on a tooth brush, and then carefully brush the pin
head to clear out the clogging ink. If you want, you can
then place some lubricating oil behind the pin heads, where
you can see their shafts. To replace the print head, just
reverse the procedure, remembering to handle the cable only
by the clear tab.
And one more item. Be careful when you use multi-forms and
textured or heavy paper in your dot matrix printer.
Printing occurs when the pins strike the ribbon, which in
Fidonews Page 13 20 Jan 1986
turn strikes the paper. If you don't make the adjustment on
the position of the print head in relation to the paper, and
you are too close, the thickness of the paper(s) can snag
the pins. There is a lever which adjusts the pin head
distance from the platen. If you are using thick paper or
multi-forms, make the adjustment.
I sincerely hope that this saves you time and money.
------------------------------------------------------------
Fidonews Page 14 20 Jan 1986
C R I T I Q U E : P C P U R S U I T
This article is a short critique of GTE's long distance
communications service called PC Pursuit. I have attempted
to provide a maximum amount of information in a minimum
amount of space. This document was written on 25 Oct 85.
What is PC Pursuit?
===================
It is a data only communications service provided by GTE.
It is available only during evenings and on weekends,
corresponding to the times when reduced long distance voice
phone charges are in effect. It is available only in 12
major cities. The service allows a subscriber to make an
unlimited number of calls to any of the twelve cities. Each
call is supposedly limited to one hour in length; I have
made a few calls longer than one hour and have not been cut
off. You can call at 300 or 1200 baud. Voice is not
supported.
How much does it cost?
======================
$25 to sign up and $25/mo. The first month's charges are
prorated based on the day of the month you subscribe. There
is no (zero) charge for connect time, number of calls, or
for using 1200 Baud. $25/mo is all GTE charges for ,as they
say, "all you can eat." GTE will bill your Visa or Master
Card, or send you invoices monthly. Depending on what your
local call telephone charges are, your local phone company
may charge you for each connection -- see next section.
How does it work?
=================
It works quite well, subject to the "problems" described
below. Each of the 12 cities has a local PC Pursuit access
number. You call this number, and a modem answers. (In my
case, this "local" number is a Zone 2 call and costs me $.07
on weekday evenings, $.04 on weekends.) The network answers
and asks you what city you want to call. (I have never
received a busy signal from the local number.) You answer
with one of the twelve city names. It asks you what the
local number is you want to call (in the requested city).
You provide the number. It asks you if you want to proceed,
or respecify city/phone number. Your specify proceed. It
asks you to hang up and wait for a call back. It hangs up.
Within about 30 seconds it calls you back. You must have a
modem capable of answering; when your modem answers you get
a series of messages stating (1) your request is on the GTE
network, (2) your call is being made, (3) your connection is
complete, or busy, or no answer. If complete, you are
automatically connected to the other number, just as if you
Fidonews Page 15 20 Jan 1986
called using normal long distance. Otherwise the network
hangs up, and you can start again.
What are the problems?
======================
The biggest one is that a 1200 baud connection has an
effective data rate of about 600 baud. This is caused by
the extra computer processing done by the PC Pursuit
network. I have not tried 300 baud. Occasionally I have
gotten a message to the effect that there are no circuits
open to the requested city; when this happens the network
hangs up after saying "Please try again later." Also, on a
very few occasions I have gotten a very noisy connection,
and also lost the connection during an upload/download
operation. In general, except for the slow data rate, I
feel the service is at least as good as normal long
distance.
What are the upcoming improvements?
===================================
They will support 2400 baud sometime during 1986. In the
last few weeks the network has occasionally redialed busy
numbers 10 times. They will implement auto redial "real
soon now"; I suspect they are trying it out on a few lines
first.
How do I get more information &/or sign up?
===========================================
Call the PC Pursuit information number, 1-800-835-3001.
It's busy a lot. When you get on you'll have 10 minutes on
a stripped down Fido system. The Files section has files
giving the 12 cities, access numbers, availability times,
etc. You can download all of this data. You can also sign
up online; that's what I did.
I hope this answers more questions than it raises. I've
been using PC Pursuit since early September and, except for
the slow data rate, I really like it.
------------------------------------------------------------
Fidonews Page 16 20 Jan 1986
Rainbow Corner
by Theodore Needleman
Finally, a chance to catch up a bit on Reader mail. This
week's seems to fall into two categories. More positive
comments and encouragement on Project Transport, and
questions which, surprisingly enough, are all pretty much
about the same topic.
Project Transport looks more and more likely. I'm currently
giving some thought about how to identify those software
packages to be tested, and will probably use some software
guides, such as QUE Book's as a start. Several of you have
already reported some IBM packages which will run on the
Rainbow, and I will be listing these in a couple of weeks.
I still haven't received the IBM emulator package I
mentioned last week. If it does show up, (and if it works),
I'll not only report to you on it, but try to make it part
of the project.
This week's questions all seem to be about the feasibility
of using IBM peripherals (RAM memory, hard disks,
multifunction boards, etc.) with the Rainbow. There are two
factors to be considered when discussing this possibility,
neither of which offer much encouragement. The first of
these is hardware incompatibility. IBM peripherals are
designed for a bus environment. All of the IBM's expansion
slots lie on this bus, allowing any card to be placed into
any slot. The Rainbow does not use a bus structure (strange
when you consider DEC invented the bus concept). Instead,
there are areas on the Rainbow motherboard where specific
expansion boards can be plugged in. The connectors in these
areas contain just the particular signals that are used with
the specific board that belongs in that area. Even if you
could fit a disk controller board in the area reserved for
the graphics expansion, it wouldn't work. Add to this the
fact that IBM type cards connect through fingers on the
card, while DEC cards use a plug and socket scheme. So you
can't just "plug in" an IBM type card. Beside the hardware
incompatibilities, there are also quite a few software
problems. Because IBM peripherals are used on a bus, they
must contain some method of decoding when the signals on the
bus are destined for them, rather than some other card.
Complicating things even further, the organization of the
memory (memory map) is different from the Rainbow, as are
the screen addressing and graphics, and the BIOS (Basic
Input Output System).
As you can see, it is no easy job to use an IBM type board
with a Rainbow, though, at least in theory, it can be done.
What is needed is an interface. This would plug into the
various Rainbow connectors, and the IBM type boards would
plug into the interface. Once this was accomplished, the
"BOX" would convert Rainbow signals into something the IBM
peripherals could understand, and vice-a-versa. There is a
similar type of equipment (at least in concept) used in
communications called a PROTOCOL CONVERTER. In fact, I
Fidonews Page 17 20 Jan 1986
recently came across a rumor that DEC has commissioned such
a device from a third party OEM. I wouldn't hold your
breath though, I hear lots of rumors, most of which are
wishful thinking. Even if this one turns out to be true,
with DEC's marketing track record, it will probably cost
more to buy than a fully configured IBM-PC! If anyone could
bring out a device like this for between $500 and $750, they
would make a lot of money in very little time.
Last week I promised to spend more time on the FIDONET
system. FIDO is a public access bulletin board system (BBS)
that was written several years ago by Tom Jennings. Tom
lives in San Francisco, and though I've never met him (or
even talked to him) I have a lot of admiration for him and
his work. He put FIDO into the public domain, and it has
become the most used micro-based BBS in the world. The FIDO
BBS is an extremely user-friendly system to the dial-in
caller and most have a similar structure. There are two main
areas - a Message Area, and a File Area. Each area usually
has several (or many) sub areas. On most FIDO boards, for
example, the Message Area has sub areas for FIDONET Mail
(more on this in a moment), answers to questions to the
SYSOP (System Operator) a "general" message area where you
can leave messages for other users of the board, and several
specialized message areas that depend on the orientation of
the board and/or inclination of the SYSOP.
So far, the FIDO "system" sounds (and is) great. But I
haven't discussed the most remarkable thing about it.
Almost every FIDO BBS is networked with the others (that's
why it's called FIDONET). Each individual BBS is a node in
the network. and, as of this writing, there are 306 nodes!
This means that you can send mail, in the form of messages
or programs, to (and from) any node in the network. The way
this works is that the message is left in a special area of
the board (the FIDOMAIL area mentioned before) along with
routing instructions. Sometime during the early morning
(from 2AM to 5AM), with each board having its own assigned
time, FIDO collects all messages to a single node into a
packet, dials up those boards where a message or packet is
destined, and delivers (transmits) the FIDOMAIL. It's
really quite remarkable when you think of it. Every night,
while most of us are sleeping, all of these messages are
zipping around the country (and world). There is generally
a charge for using FIDOMAIL, albeit a very reasonable one to
help cover the phone bill. If you are interested in using
this feature of FIDONET, check with the SYSOP of the board
you use.
Next week, I'll discuss the process of up and downloading
software, review some public domain software, and give some
more DEC-oriented FIDO board numbers. See you then!
(c)opyright 1985 by Ted Needleman-all rights reserved
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Fidonews Page 18 20 Jan 1986
============================================================
WANTED
============================================================
Rob Elliott
Fido 115/100
I am in desperate need of a DEC Rainbow hard disk controller
board and a Winchester hard disk mounting plate. If you
have any of these for sale, or know of a place they are
available immediately, please reply to me at Fido 115/100.
------------------------------------------------------------
Fidonews Page 19 20 Jan 1986
Hello, EG&G Space Systems is collecting resumes of people
with Technological backgrounds. This is the format we would
like to see them in:
Your Name
Education
Summary of schools you have attended. These include
training in the armed forces, for work, etc. For colleges
and universities they can just be the degree you have
from them.
Professional Summary
Short summary of your work experience. Any managerial
posts, technical positions, etc.
Professional Experience
Your work experience, from latest to earliest by company.
Preferably short description of what you have accomp-
lished, but we don't mind if you get long winded, some
people get too terse.
Publications and Papers
Any documents that you have authored. Include everything.
We will edit the list to your best advantage in any
proposals that we submit.
Professional Organizations and Honors
Not all of us graduate Summa Cum Laude (gee did I spell
that right?) or be a Phi Beta Kappa, but we can belong to
some very interesting organizations and have honors from
some very interesting places.
Basically we are generating proposals for NASA and KSC in
the advanced technology area. For more information, contact
us:
EG&G Space Systems
219 Indian River Avenue, Suite 200
P.O. Box 6505
Titusville, Fl 32782-6505
(305)-267-8028
David W. Heron
Computer Hardware/Operating Systems Specialist
Sysop Fido 145/1
Network Coordinator Net 145
Space Coast Net
Titusville & Kennedy Space Ctr.
Brevard Co. Florida
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Fidonews Page 20 20 Jan 1986
============================================================
NOTICES
============================================================
Thom Henderson, 107/8
System Enhancement Associates
Relax!
ARC 4.52 Is Ours
There's a great deal of confusion out there about what
version of ARC is the "correct" one. Is it 4.52, or 4.50?
Since this all started because of a mistake I made, then I
should explain.
The "official" current version of ARC is 4.50. That's what
we have on our board, and that's the one we support.
However, we're still working on it, as we have been all
along. (After all, four major versions in less than a year!)
At one point, not all that long ago, I logged onto a board
and saw that the sysop had version 4.3, or some such. I
thought he would appreciate the latest version, so I
uploaded it. By mistake I uploaded an internal development
version, numbered 4.52. Needless to say, I'll try not to do
that again!
At this point, I'm no longer sure just how 4.52 differs from
4.50, except that you'd have to look long and hard to find
it. It also shouldn't do any harm for you to use 4.52,
except insofar as it's creating headaches for us.
I'm amazed, and deeply gratified, at the storm of messages
we've received from concerned sysops and users. Our thanks
to you all, and I apologize for all the confusion.
------------------------------------------------------------
The Interrupt Stack
24 Jan 1986
Voyager 2 passes Uranus.
9 Feb 1986
Halley's Comet reaches perihelion.
9 Feb 1986
Diana Overholt (109/74) has another birthday.
11 Apr 1986
Halley's Comet reaches perigee.
19 May 1986
Steve Lemke's next birthday.
Fidonews Page 21 20 Jan 1986
24 Aug 1989
Voyager 2 passes Neptune.
If you have something which you would like to see on this
calendar, please send a message to Fido 1/1.
------------------------------------------------------------
Will Jim Filgo, node 131/445, please call node 1/1 to pick
up his mail?
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