home
***
CD-ROM
|
disk
|
FTP
|
other
***
search
/
The Atari Compendium
/
The Atari Compendium (Toad Computers) (1994).iso
/
files
/
umich
/
network
/
mailint.txt
< prev
next >
Wrap
Text File
|
1994-10-23
|
21KB
|
561 lines
Accessing The Internet By E-Mail
A Special "Doctor Bob" Report
Copyright (c) 1994, "Doctor Bob" Rankin
All rights reserved. Permission is granted to repost this
document in complete and unaltered form only.
How to Access Internet Services by E-mail
-----------------------------------------
If your only access to the Internet is via e-mail, you don't have to miss
out
on all the fun! Maybe you've heard of FTP, Gopher, Archie, Veronica, and
WAIS, but thought they were out of your reach because your online service
does not provide those tools. Not so! And even if you do have full
Internet access, using E-mail servers can save you time and money.
This special report will show you how to retrieve files from FTP sites,
explore the Internet via Gopher, search for information with Archie or
Veronica and query hundreds of WAIS databases using E-MAIL AS YOUR ONLY
TOOL.
If you can send a note to an Internet address, you're in the game! This
is
great news for users of popular online services such as CompuServe,
Prodigy
and America Online where there is partial or no direct Internet access.
I encourage you to read this entire report first and then go back and try
out
the techniques that are covered. This way, you will gain a broader
perspective of the information resources that are available, an
introduction
to the tools you can work with, and the best methods for finding the
information you want.
A Short Aside... "What is the Internet?"
----------------------------------------
Many introductory texts on the Internet go into excruciating detail on the
history, composition and protocol of the Internet. If you were looking
for
that you won't find it here, because this is a "how to" lesson, not a
history book.
When you buy a new car, they don't make you read "The Life and Times of
Henry
Ford" before you can turn the top down and squeal off the lot. And when
you
get a new computer, nobody forces you to read a text on logic design
before
you fire up Leisure Suit Larry or WordPerfect.
So if you're the type that wants to short-circuit the preliminaries and
just
dig in, you've come to the right place. I'm not going to bore you with
the
gory details. Instead, I'll just offer up my Reader's Digest condensed
definition of the Internet, and encourage you to read more about the
Internet in one of the many fine Internet books & guides listed in the
Appendix. Some of them are even free, and accessible directly from the
Internet!
Internet (noun) - A sprawling collection of computer networks that spans
the
globe, connecting government, military, educational & commercial
institutions, as well as private citizens to a wide range of computer
services, resources, and information. A set of network conventions and
common tools are employed to give the appearance of a single large
network,
even though the computers that are linked together use many different
hardware and software platforms.
FTP By E-Mail
-------------
FTP stands for "file transfer protocol", and is a means of accessing
files
that are stored on remote computer systems. Files are stored in a
hierarchical "tree" of directories, each of which pertains to a different
subject. Using FTP by e-mail can be nice even for those with full
Internet
access, because some FTP servers are heavily loaded and interactive
response
can be very sluggish. So it makes sense not to waste time and connect
charges in these cases.
To access 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 (with having a userid and password on that system). To get
this
list, send an e-mail note to:
mail-server@rtfm.mit.edu
without a subject 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
send usenet/news.answers/ftp-list/sitelist/part3
send usenet/news.answers/ftp-list/sitelist/part4
send usenet/news.answers/ftp-list/sitelist/part5
send usenet/news.answers/ftp-list/sitelist/part6
send usenet/news.answers/ftp-list/sitelist/part7
send usenet/news.answers/ftp-list/sitelist/part8
You will then receive (by e-mail) 8 files which comprise the "FTP Site
List".
Print them out or store them in a place where you can reference the list
handily. Another file you might want to retrieve is "FTP Frequently Asked
Questions", so add this line to your note as well. This file contains
lots
more info on using FTP services.
send usenet/news.answers/ftp-list/faq
If you find an interesting FTP site in the list, send e-mail to one of
these
addresses (in order of preference):
bitftp@pucc.princeton.edu
ftpmail@sunsite.unc.edu
ftpmail@decwrl.dec.com
And in the body of the note, include these lines:
open <name of site>
dir
quit
This will return to you a list of the files stored in the root directory
at
that site. In your next mail message you can navigate to other
directories
by inserting (for example)
cd pub
before the dir command. ("pub" is a common directory name, and usually a
good place to start.) Once you determine the name of a file you want to
retrieve, use
get <name of file>
in your note instead of the dir command. If the file you want to retrieve
is
plain text, this will suffice. If it's a binary file (a program, etc.)
you'll need to insert the binary command in your note before the get
command.
So to summarize, here's the e-mail message you would send to the address
"bitftp@pucc.princeton.edu" in order to retrieve the text of The
Declaration
of Independence from a remote FTP site:
open ftp.eff.org
cd pub/CAF/civics
get dec_of_ind
quit
Some other interesting FTP sites you may want to "visit" are listed below:
ocf.berkeley.edu try: pub/Library for documents, bible, lyrics, etc.
rtfm.mit.edu try: pub/usenet/news.answers for USENET FAQs &
archives
oak.oakland.edu try: pub/msdos for a huge DOS software library
ftp.sura.net try: pub/nic for Internet how-to documents
quartz.rutgers.edu try: pub/humor for lots of humor files
You should note that FTP mail servers tend to be quite busy so your reply
may
not arrive for 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 to you ends up looking 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 has been uuencoded by the
sender. You'll need to scrounge up a version of the uudecode program for
your operating system (UNIX, DOS, OS/2, VM, etc.) in order to unscramble
the
file. Most likely you'll find a copy in your service provider's download
library.
begin 001 sample.zip
M4$L#!`H`!@`&`/6H?18<$-Z$F@P```@?```,````5$5,25@S,34N5%A480I[
M!P8;!KL,2P,)!PL)"PD'%@<(!@4&!P8%-@<6%PL*!@@*"P4&%00&%P4*"`4&
M%08*)08(!Q@*!PH("P<+!"4$)00*!@0%%`4)-`<&%PD:*_S\_/O[^PP++`LL
Another point to consider... If your online 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!
Archie By E-Mail
----------------
Let's say you know the name of a file, but you have no idea at which what
FTP
site it might be lurking. Or maybe you're curious to know if a file
matching a certain naming criteria is 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 while to complete, leaving you to tap your toes in
the meantime.
To use Archie by e-mail, simply send an e-mail message to one of the
following ad