Crawly Crypt Collection 1/crawlyvol1.bin/bbs/amail20/amailusr.txt

Text File | 1993-03-30 | 7KB | 186 lines

                       A User's Guide to AMail & QWK
                                    by
                               Keith Jackson
                  (Sub-Edited, and updated by Andy Styles)

What is an Off-line reader?

When I started in comms, I'd just bought myself a modem, used some
software from a cover-disk and a list of BBS numbers from a magazine. I
went ringing round as many as I could, trying to find one that suited me.
I could suddenly read, reply to and send messages all over the place but
my first phone bill gave me six kinds of fit!

All of the BBS's I tried allowed users to do all of this while connected
to the BBS, ie on-line. This is OK for dropping a quick note to the sysop
or another local user but to do much more than this (unless you're a heck
of a typist) is difficult, not to mention expensive. Enter the off-line
reader. This species of program alows you to do all your messaging at your
own convenience and with much less strain on your expenses! There are
several standards around for the types of message packet they use but the
one used by AMail is also the commonest, QuickMail.

What do I need?

If you can log onto a BBS you are at least half-way there. You need a
terminal emulator, a transfer program (if not included in the terminal),
at least one archiver for ARC, LHARC or ZIP and a QWK reader program.
Whatever type of computer you're using you should be able to get a working
set-up like this. Details vary, even for a single computer so you are best
speaking to your sysop for advice.

How do I get started?

Let's assume that you have managed to log onto the Bulletin Board. Go to
the AMail menu and select it. Wait a few moments for the program to be
loaded and you should see the top menu, with options from A to E plus Help
and Quit.

First things first. Select A to choose the areas (conferences) you want to
read. Now you have a new menu with a number of message areas displayed,
each with its own number. Between the number and the name of the area may
be a symbol. # means that you can read but not write, + means that it is
the default area and may not be deleted, while * means an area you have
chosen to receive.

Chosing an area is easy - just type its number and press Return. You can
select all of them by pressing A (not recommended yet!) or delete them all
by pressing N. There may be more than one page of areas. To check, press
Return on an empty line. You may also enter a range of areas, by separating
the area numbers with a hyphen, like this:

10-24

This would toggle areas 10-24, either on, or off, depending what each one is
already set to.

Remember that some of these areas carry a lot of messages per day, Common
Room being one of the biggest. Take areas bit by bit or you're likely to
be buried in messages! Do be careful if you have only a floppy-disk system
as a crash during a download can lock up the BBS. I know, it's happened to
mine.

Happy? Right, enter 0 and let's get on.

Next press C, Change Options. You shouldn't need to do this very often but
getting it right will make life a lot smoother.

A - Personal Index

Intended to allow easier access to messages addressed to you, I haven't
found an ST reader which supports this. I'd leave it OFF unless you're
sure you can use it.

B - Archive Type

AMail supports three common archivers: ARC, LZH and ZIP. Select one to
match your archiver.

C - Archive Compresion

Unless you have both a hard drive and a modem with MNP5 or V42bis leave
this ON.

D - Line length

Some readers need a carriage return character at the end of each line of
text. Experiment with this until it looks right on your screen.

E - Own Messages

If you have a slow modem, turning this OFF will save you a few pennies at
the expense of knowing whether your messages are being imported properly.
I'd leave it ON.

F - Maximum Messages

This should prevent you from getting too many messages at once. Once the
number you set has been reached, AMail will pack them ready to send, even
though not all of your areas will have been scanned.

G - New Files

Many BBS receive files over the network, just like the messages. This
option keeps you up to date without having to download the complete
filelist.

H - Help

The Help screen

I - Bulletins

Some BBS have news bulletins. Ask the sysop.

J - Batch Pack

This option takes AMail one step beyond any other QWK program I know.
Normally you have to wait for your messages to be packed and archived
on-line. Now you can have it done automatically so that the QWK file is
all ready each time you log on. As this could take up a lot of space on
his hard-drive, you need to ask your sysop for this facility.

K - Default Protocol

You can use any file transfer protocol with AMail, depending on what your
sysop has set up. This option stops the extra menu each time you make a
transfer.

Now you can Quit to the top menu again and put AMail to work.

Select B for the messages to be prepared for you and then D when this has
been completed. Only when the transfer has been successful should you Quit
AMail. This is because the messages in the packet will be noted as read
and you won't be able to reclaim them.

Now I've got the QWK file, what do I do with it?

Start your off-line reader. It will probably demand to know where
everything is and then you can unpack the QWK file, read your messages and
then produce a reply file (.REP) to go back to the BBS. A quick point: all
BBS's are different and you cannot upload a REP file for on BBS onto
another. To remind you the first part of the file is named after the BBS,
Mine are named KEITHPT as my board is known as Keith's Point.

Next time you log onto the BBS and go into AMail, start by uloading your
REP file (option E) and you should see a report of the messages found at
the bottom of the screen. Now all you have to do is press B and the cycle
begins again. Happy AMailing!

Keith Jackson, 30/11/92
Andy Styles,   30/03/93

                                  Appendix 1
                               Atari ST Programs

This is not an exhaustive list for the ST and I have little knowledge of
other systems. All I'll say is that these are my personal opinions, based
on my reactions when I used them. Perhaps users of other computers might
like to send additional information to Andy Styles, author of AMail, at
2:257/403.0, 90:102/103.0, or 51:502/4.0.

Terminal Emulators

Vanterm - a good old faithful. Easy to use but a bit limited.

Freeze Dried - Slightly crippled, shareware program. Very effective and
               with built-in ANSI graphics support for use with PC boards.

KMTERM - Also has ANSI emulation built-in. Not as easy to use as Freeze
         Dried and needs a separate transfer program.

Transfer program

There's only one you need to have for the ST: XYZ.TTP or it's more recent,
GEMmed brother. Superb.

QWK Readers

MT_QWK - This is the one I use most. Easy to use and regularly updated.

C_QWK - Captain's Quick. Works OK but not one of my favourites.

IMHO - Tricky to set up but very fast. Needs a minimum of 1Mbytes of RAM
       and the more the better but well worth the trouble.