NetNews Usenet Archive 1992 #30

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Text File | 1992-12-15 | 21.8 KB | 629 lines

Comments: Gated by NETNEWS@AUVM.AMERICAN.EDU Path: sparky!uunet!paladin.american.edu!auvm!UCSBUXA.BITNET!LB05GATE Message-ID: <9212160139.AA27587@ucsbuxa.ucsb.edu> Newsgroups: bit.listserv.cwis-l Date: Tue, 15 Dec 1992 17:39:35 PST Sender: "Campus-Wide Information Systems" <CWIS-L@WUVMD.BITNET> From: "Rick Gates" <LB05GATE@UCSBUXA.BITNET> Subject: December Hunt Results Comments: To: cwis-l@wuvmd.bitnet Lines: 617 ********************************************************** * * * December Internet Hunt * * * * RESULTS * * * * (Watch out! 617 lines in this message) * ********************************************************** The results are in. The winner is: Calvin Boyer Library University of California, Irvine Calvin scored a total of 41 points out of a maximum of 42 in an entry dated Tue, 01 Dec 92 19:52:40 -0800. One of the distinguishing features of Calvin's effort was his almost total reliance on a single gopher server. Here is his own words: >As an experiment to see how far I could go using only one of >the more robust gopher servers (University of California - >Santa Cruz InfoSlug), I limited my first round assistance to >INFOSLUG. The number of answers with the InfoSlug tag is most >illustrative. > >and it takes longer to type the answers than to find! Congratulations Calvin, on a job well done! STATISTICS ---------- The number of players was down this month, partly (I suspect), due to the usually frantic end-of-the-term activities occurring in academic centers around the world. Number of players: 11 Number of comments: 32 COMMENTS ABOUT THIS HUNT ------------------------ As our winner has already pointed out, the InfoSlug Gopher at UC Santa Cruz provides a good starting point for network searches. As expected Veronica is already becoming a vital tool. Roughly half of all gopher solutions sent by this month's players used Veronica. THE USUAL --------- If any player would like a copy of their individual results, please feel free to send me a message. ASIDE ----- In response to the proliferation of Network tools named after cartoon characters (Archie, Veronica), I propose that we come up with a new maxim for Cybernauts: "Just Use Gopher Heavily, Especially After Dark" Well, now for something completely different: GOPHER/ALIAS HINT (3 or 4 screens of info) ----------------- I thought that maybe people would be interested in a how I've been using aliases with the gopher command. I'm on a Unix system here, and I can can use the alias command to cut down on keystrokes. For instance when I type the letter 'm' and hit return, I get put into my emacs mailer. That's because I have the following line in my .login file: alias m emacs -f rmail In other words, 'm' becomes an alias (substitute, synonym) for the command 'emacs -f rmail'. This sort of facility is availble on other, non-Unix platforms as well. The way I use this feature with Gopher revolves around the fact that you can always find out what address and directory you are connected to with Gopher. For instance from the following menu on my local Gopher server: Other Gopher and Information Servers 1. Univ of Minnesota Gopher Server/ 2. Other Gopher and Information Servers/ 3. Apple Computer Higher Education Gopher Server/ 4. UCB Berkeley Gopher Server/ 5. University of California - Irvine/ --> 6. Veronica (search menu items in most of GopherSpace)/ ...if I press '=', I will get a screen that looks like this: Name=Veronica (search menu items in most of GopherSpace) Type=1 Port=70 Path=1/Veronica Host=futique.scs.unr.edu This gives us the name of the menu choice, the type (1 is a directory), the port, the directory path, and the address of the remote host. Here's how I can use this info. My Gopher client, and I suspect many others, allows for the specification of path, address and port on the command line. So if I type the following command: gopher -p 1/Veronica futique.scs.unr.edu 70 ...then after a short pause I will see the following screen Root gopher server: futique.scs.unr.edu --> 1. About Veronica. 2. Search many (300) Internet gopher menus by _SINGLE_ keyword <?> 3. About the reduced-redundancy search. 4. Proposals for Veronica Development. As I frequently do Veronica searches, it's useful for me to create an alias for this command. Thus a line in my .login file reads: alias ver "gopher -p 1/Veronica futique.scs.unr.edu 70" Now, rather than having to traverse a number of Gopher menus to get to the Veronica search screen, I simply type 'ver' and I am there! This can be a real time saver for any set of Gopher resources that you need to visit regularly. For instance, rather than having to choose: Other gophers North America U.S.A page down several times Choose UC Santa Cruz InfoSlug system I simply type 'slug' from my system prompt, and I am there because of the following line in my .login file: alias slug "gopher scilibx.ucsc.edu 70" How did I get the information for my gopher command? I simply pressed '=' from the following menu: USA 109. Texas A&M/ 110. UCCSN System Computing Services Gopher (Las Vegas, Nevada)/ 111. University Corporation for Atmospheric Research (UCAR)/ 112. University System of Georgia Information Service/ 113. University of California - Berkeley, Open Computing Facility/ 114. University of California - Berkeley, Workstation Support Services/ 115. University of California - Irvine/ 116. University of California - Irvine, Information & Computer Science/ 117. University of California - San Francisco, UCSFYI Experimental Gop/ 118. University of California - Santa Barbara/ --> 119. University of California - Santa Cruz, InfoSlug System/ 120. University of Chicago (under construction)/ 121. University of Colorado, Boulder/ 122. University of Delaware gopher server/ 123. University of Florida (experimental)/ 124. University of Georgia (test gopher)/ 125. University of Houston Protein Information Resource gopher/ 126. University of Houston, Texas/ Press ? for Help, q to Quit, u to go up a menu Page: 7/10 ...and got this information: Name=University of California - Santa Cruz, InfoSlug System Type=1 Port=70 Path= Host=scilibx.ucsc.edu (Note that there is no path needed here, or in my .login alias.) I hope that this information proves useful. I'm fairly certain that much of it is available on other platforms as well. To those anxious for the Hunt answers, I will now release you from captivity. Hopefully before long, I will find a Gopher/FTP site for the Hunt, and I'll be able to place information of this sort in a hints or tips file there. Without further delay... THE HUNT ANSWERS ---------------- 1. (3) What is the atomic weight of boron? (Question contributed by Jim Olivetti.) Winner's Answer --------------- U of C - Santa Cruz InfoSlug System <select> The Library/ <select> Electronic Reference Books/ <select> Periodic Table of Elements/ <select> Boron answer: 10.811 Other Answers ------------- gopher at University of Minnesota All the Gophers in the World/ University of Colorado, Boulder/ Online Library Catalogues, Electronic Books and Reference Databases/ Reference Works/ Periodic Table of Elements/ boron The atomic weight of boron is 10.811. 2. (6) Seems like a funny question to ask from so far away, but I'm trying to find a new book on the Internet by an author named Krol. Are there any local bookstores that might carry this? I live in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Winner's Answer --------------- <telnet> Gopher.Ora.Com <log in> Gopher <select> Ordering Information/ <select> List of Bookstores Carrying O'Reilly Books/ <select> New Mexico answer: Page One; Holman's 3. (4) Early last month, U.S. president-elect Bill Clinton proposed a new technology policy. Where can I find the text of this proposed policy? Winner's Answer --------------- University of California - Santa Cruz InfoSlug System <select> The World/ <select> US Presidential Campaign '92 Documents/ <select> Search Democratic Files <?> "technology" <select> /Democratic/Statements/tech-policy. answer: document is available for reading from screen, for mailing, for saving as a file, or for printing. Other Answers ------------- EFFector Online November 4, 1992 Issue 3.08 A Publication of the Ele Frontier Foundation ISSN 1062-9424 A TECHNOLOGY POLICY FOR AMERICA Six Broad Initiatives by Bill Clinton (September, 1992) ----- telnet to quake.think.com (WAIS) select [sunsite.unc.edu] clinton-speechess (sic!) search for "technology policy" (found 40 items) select "TECHNOLOGY: Position Paper - 9/16/92" (score 1000) 4. (5) I'm going to be in Denver, Colorado on the nights of Jan 22-25. Will the Denver Nuggets basketball team be playing at home on any of those nights? (Idea for question contributed by Nancy Pope, LSU Library.) Winner's Answer --------------- University of California - Santa Cruz InfoSlug System <select> The Community/ <select> Professional Sports Schedules/ <select> National Basketball Association Schedule (92 - 93) Season <TEL> once connected <type> denver 1/22 1/23 1/24 1/25 answer: Saturday, 1/23 Cleveland at Denver (7:00 pm) Monday, 1/25 Minnesota at Denver (7:00 pm) [Rick: I showed a provincial nature on this one by forgetting to point out that the Denver Nuggets was a *professional* basketball team. A few players found schedules for the University of Colorado, who's team will be out of town on those nights.] 5. (5) What was the total amount of sales in liquor stores in the United States in September of this year? Was this more than last year? Winner's Answer --------------- University of California - Santa Cruz InfoSlug System <select> The Library/ <select> Electronic Reference Books/ <select> Economic Bulletin Board/ <select> Business Statistics for the last 4 Calendar Years/ <select> Select Domestic Trade. <scroll to> DM0540 Retail sales, liquor stores answer: September, 1991 1733 September, 1992 ?* * Since data for August 1992 had not yet been posted, either I have the second best source, i.e., not the correct one, or, .... Try this one again in a few days/weeks? [Rick: This was a tough question as it had to be answered using 2 of the files available via the Economic Bulletin Board. The figures for September 1991 can be found either through the resource mentioned above or the Revised Monthly Retail Sales. For September 92 data, one needs to choose: Economic Bulletin Board/ Economic Indicators/ Advance Retail Sales. ...where you will find projected, preliminary, and final data for the last three months. Under the section "Not Adjusted for Seasonal, Holiday, and Trading Day Differences" you will find that sales for September 92 were 1.959 billion dollars, thus sales for September of this year exceeded last year by 226 million dollars.] 6. (6) I'm volunteering some time for a local hiking association. I'd like to know if anything's been written on the development of trails for the handicapped? Winner's Answer --------------- University of California - Santa Cruz InforSlug System <select> The World/ <select> Other Internet Gopher Servers/ <select> Search many (250) Internet gopher menus by SINGLE keyword <?> "trails" <scroll to> Whole Access, 1987. Accessibility and California recreational trails. Redwood City, CA, Whole Access. [14] pp. 09 TRAILS FOR THE HANDICAPPED answer: this must be it.... [Rick: Yes, the Gopher server at the Univ. of Minnesota College of Natural Resources maintains a large database of citations to literature on trails. The section on trails for the handicapped would give someone a good starting place.] 7. (4) What's the name of the FidoNet system that Nik Ellwood of Melbourne Australia runs? Winner's Answer --------------- University of Minnesota Gopher Server <select> Other Gopher and Information Servers/ <select> WAIS Based Information/ <select> Everything/ <select> 136. fidonet - nodelist.src. <?> "ellwood" answer: DirtBags 8. (3) I'm going to London next February. Is there a place that I can ask about some of the different pubs that might help take the chill away? Winner's Answer --------------- an answer: Since London is a big place, were I faced with this situation, I would post a specific query giving location of my stay on the news group "rec.crafts.brewing." You can find similar "threads" posted there by: (For particulars on how to post to news group, see Krol pp.146-148--another reminder as to why no one should be without Krol.) University of Minnesota Gopher Server <select> Other Gopher and Information Servers/ <select> WAIS Based Information/ <select> Everything/ <select> homebrew.src. <?> "london" <browse among hits> .... Re: London-area pubs; ...Re: Pubs near London; etc. But above all buy your own personal copy of the CAMRA Good Pub Guide-- it is indespensible! Other Answers ------------- WAIS source -- homebrew.src search on keyword london pubs a number of articles found Re: London pubs.txt one from tony@spss.com mentions a list of pubs from Michael Jackson's Pocket Guide... another place to post a question would be rec.travel or soc.cultural.british [Rick: Another good place with lots of advice about where to get good beer is the Usenet group alt.beer.] 9. (3) Where is the ACM's SIGGRAPH '93 Conference being held next August? Winner's Answer --------------- University of California - Santa Cruz InfoSlug System <select> The World/ <select> Other Internet Gopher Servers <select> Search many (250) Internet gopher menus by SINGLE keyword "siggraph" <select> SGRAPH93; ACM SIGGRAPH'93 Conference Proceedings answer: Anaheim, CA August 1 -6, 1993 Other Answers ------------- gopher at University of Minnesota All the Gophers in the World/ ACM SIGGRAPH/ conferences/ Siggraph93/ READ_ME Anaheim, California 10. (3) I've heard it said that traffic on the Internet is growing at an astronomical rate! Where can I find some statistics that would verify this? Winner's Answer --------------- <select> Search FTP sites (Archie)/ <select> Exact search of archive sites on the internet <?> "statistics" <select> nis.nsf.net:nsfnet/statistics// <select> history.packets.* illustrative answer: traffic in millions of packets has increased from 357 million packets in October 1988 to 22.498 billion packets in October 1992. Other Answers ------------- Panda -- panda.uiowa.edu 4. Online Information Services... 2. Anonymous FTP - nic.merit.edu... 10. Merit Internet Information (a must for new Internet users).. 2. Anonymous FTP - nic.merit.edu... 13. nsfnet... 13. statistics.. statistic data on internet usage and growth is available via ftp at NIC.MERIT.EDU. This site contains some of the following data: pnets Traffic broken down by network, measured in packets, which traversed the specified NSFNET backbone during the one-month reporting period. country Traffic broken down by country, measured in both packets and bytes, which traversed the specified NSFNET backbone during the one-month reporting period. history.netcount Growth as reflected in the number of domestic and foreign networks having announcement to the NSFNET infrastructures. ----- The Domain Survey attempts to discover every host on the Internet by doing a complete search of the Domain Name System. The latest results gathered during late October 1992 are listed. For more information see RFC 1296; for detailed data see the pub/zone directory on ftp.nisc.sri.com. N.1 Number of Internet Hosts The chart below shows the number of IP hosts on the Internet. These are hosts with at least one IP address assigned. Data was collected by ZONE except where noted. The following two sections are graphs of the data in this chart. Date Hosts 08/81 213 Host table #152 05/82 235 Host table #166 08/83 562 Host table #300 10/84 1,024 Host table #392 10/85 1,961 Host table #485 02/86 2,308 Host table #515 11/86 5,089 12/87 28,174 07/88 33,000 10/88 56,000 01/89 80,000 07/89 130,000 10/89 159,000 10/90 313,000 01/91 376,000 07/91 535,000 10/91 617,000 01/92 727,000 800| 780| 760| 740| * 720| 700| 680| . 660| 640| 620| 600| T * 580| h 560| o 540| u 520| s * 500| a 480| n . 460| d 440| s 420| . 400| o 380| f 360| * 340| H . 320| o 300| s * 280| t 260| s . 240| . 220| . 200| . 180| . 160| 140| * 120| * 100| .. 80| * 60| . 40| * 20| ..*...* 0|...*....*......*......*.....*.*....*... ------------------------------------------------------------------- 8 8 8 8 8 8 8 8 8 9 9 9 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 Date "*" = data point, "." = estimate This graph is a linear plot of the number of Internet hosts. [Rick: Astounding information on the growth of hosts. ] Extra Credit Question --------------------- <select> The University of California - Santa Barbara/ <select> UCSB Electronic Address Server <CSO> <insert> 1 <insert> gates answer: choose from among lb05gate@ucsbuxa.bitnet lb05gate@ucsbuxa.ucsb.edu lb13goph@ucsbuxa.ucsb.bitnet lb13goph@ucsbuxa.ucsb.edu ----- Well, at least I can find your email address; two sigs at the bottom of the article helps! And since I read it on News, it's Internet info, right? ----- It better be lb05gate%ucsbuxa@hub.ucsb.EDU, or he won't get this! ----- Whois also produces...... whois Gates Gates, Rick (RG120) lb05gate@UCSBUXA.UCSB.EDU (805) 893-7225 Mystery Question ---------------- Here is another idea which exploits the real reason people would find on-line info easier to use than library data - you can process data without retyping it. I want to create a spreadsheet which adjusts my monthly investment account balances for inflation as measured by the Consumer Price Index. Where can I get the monthly CPI values for the last decade on-line? I know CENDATA carries this (e.g. on Compu$erve), but I'm not sure where it is on the internet. Must be there - I'll search for it if you don't know where.... (Question contributed by Neal McBurnett, AT&T Bell Labs, Denver) Okay, I'm sure that there are several ways to access CompuServe Information Service over the Internet, however, the best way that I've found to access CIS is by telnet'ing to hermes.mit.edu, which is a SprintNet gateway. From there you can connect to CompuServe's computers in Dayton over an x.25 line (this effectively runs at 9600bps, thus your account will be billed at that rate, plus a small surcharge of around 6 cents/minute for use of SprintNet, if memory serves). Once you've connected to the CIS host, login and and type "GO CENDATA" to get to Census Data Forum. ----- FTP to info.umd.edu has ecnomic data see info/EconData/Data/USNational/Price/cpi.zip [Rick: I haven't had the time to download this very large file. Here's the listing: -rw-rw-r-- 1 503 503 1713984 Jun 24 18:14 cpi.zip ]