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PACKET08.LOZ
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1990-09-26
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INTRODUCTION TO PACKET RADIO - PART 8 - by Larry Kenney, WB9LOZ
This part of the series discusses, in detail, the various parts of the
packet message. The following is an example of what you see when listing
messages on a BBS. On some systems the information is displayed in a
different order, but the same information is given.
MSG# STAT SIZE TO FROM @ BBS DATE/TIME SUBJECT
4723 P 1084 WD5TLQ WA6XYZ N5SLE 0604/1240 Software working great!
4721 BI 771 PACKET WB9LOZ ALLUSW 0604/1154 INTRODUCTION TO PACKET
4717 BF 2387 EXAMS W6NLG ALLCAN 0604/1020 FCC Exams: June - Dec.
4715 T 275 94114 W1AAR 0604/0959 QTC San Francisco 415-821
4712 BF 918 ALL N6ZYX ALLCAN 0604/0845 9600 BAUD DEMONSTRATION
The MESSAGE NUMBER is assigned by the BBS program when the message is
received and it cannot be changed. The numbers are assigned sequentially.
The STATUS of the message includes several different bits of information.
The first letter of the STATUS indicates the TYPE of message: B for
Bulletin, P for Personal, or T for Traffic for the National Traffic System.
Bulletins are messages of general interest to all users, and are available
to be read by everyone using the system. Personal messages are listed only
for the sender and the addressee, and they're the only ones that can read
them. (Anyone in monitor mode could see a personal message as it's being
sent over the air, of course.) The list above would have to have been
requested by WA6XYZ since it lists an outgoing personal message. Traffic
messages, type T, are messages used for handling traffic on the National
Traffic System. (Refer to part 12 of this series for information on NTS.)
STATUS also shows if the message has been read, has already been forwarded
to all designated stations, is in the process of being forwarded, or is an
"old" message. You might see one of these letters: Y - yes, it has been
read, F - it has been forwarded, I - it's in the process of being
forwarded right now on another port, or O - the message has been on the BBS
long enough to become an "old" message. "Old" can be anywhere from 2 days
for an NTS message to 3 weeks for bulletins. The time frame for each
message type is specified by the local sysop. The "O" is mainly used to
catch the attention of the sysop.
The SIZE indicates the combined total of characters, including punctuation
in the message.
TO is who the message is addressed to or it can be a message category. The
call of the addressee is entered for a personal message, and for bulletins
it could be ALL, EBARC, USERS, etc. TO is also used to categorize bulletins
by particular topics. You might find a message addressed TO AMSAT, TO
PACKET or TO SALE, when it is actually a message about AMSAT, about PACKET
or about equipment for SALE. For NTS messages TO is the zip code of the
addressee.
FROM shows the callsign of the station originating the message.
@ BBS is used if you want a message to be forwarded to someone at another
BBS or for general distribution using a forwarding designator. In the list
shown above, the personal message would automatically be forwarded to
WD5TLQ at the N5SLE BBS. By entering a special designator, such as ALLCAN,
in the "@ BBS" column a message can be forwarded to specific areas. (See
Part 6 and 7 of this series for details on addressing messages and using
forwarding designators.)
Next is the DATE and TIME when the message was received at the BBS you're
using. (If the message was originated at another BBS, the date and time
when the message was originally entered will be shown in the forwarding
headers, as explained below, and at the top of the message when you read
it.) Keep in mind that the date and time indicated can be either local
time or GMT (Zulu time) depending on the time used by the BBS.
The SUBJECT (or TITLE) is a short line telling what the message is all
about. It should be brief, but informative. For bulletin type messages,
this is the information that determines whether or not a person is going to
read your message when he sees it in the message list.
The parts of the message mentioned so far are all included in the header of
the message, and are seen when listing messages. The hierarchical address
and the message ID are not shown in the normal listing. On some systems,
such as those using W0RLI software, entering a semicolon after the list
command will give you this information. (Example: LL 15 ;)
If a message has been forwarded from another BBS, forwarding headers are
added at the top of the actual message text. This is information added by
each BBS that was used to get the message from its origination point to the
destination. Each BBS adds one line showing the time the message was
received by that particular BBS, its call sign, and usually the QTH, zip
code, and message number. Other information is often added, at the
discretion of the sysop there. If you use the RH command, rather than just
R, when reading a message, such as RH 7823, you'll receive complete
headers. With just the R, headers are reduced to a list of the BBS
callsigns. Complete headers are useful if you want details on the path the
message took to reach you or how long it took to be forwarded from system
to system from the source to destination.
The TEXT of the message contains the information you want to convey to the
reader. It can be of any length. When entering a message into a BBS, use
carriage returns at the ends of your lines, as if you were using a
typewriter. The normal screen width is 80 characters, so you should enter
a carriage return prior to the 80th character on each line. Don't allow
the automatic wrapping of lines to occur. A message entered without
carriage returns is very difficult to read, as words are cut at improper
points, lines vary drastically in length, and blank lines are often
inserted.
You should include your name, call and packet address at the end of the
text so that the person reading your message will be able to send a return
message to you if he or she wishes to do so.
You complete the text with either a Control-Z or these three characters:
the "slash" (/) plus the letters "EX". These characters must be on a line
by themselves. On some systems only the Control-Z will work. This tells
the system that you've finished entering the message.
Messages that are going to be forwarded to several BBSs or across a long
distance should be limited in size. Extremely long messages can tie up the
forwarding system unnecessarily, so users are advised to break up long
messages into parts, keeping them to a length of 2 - 3 K each.
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