FidoNews is the official newsletter of the International FidoNet
Association, and is published weekly by SEAdog Leader, node 1/1.
You are encouraged to submit articles for publication in
FidoNews. Article submission standards are contained in the file
ARTSPEC.DOC, available from node 1/1.
Copyright (C) 1986, by the International FidoNet Association.
All rights reserved. Duplication and/or distribution permitted
for noncommercial purposes only. For use in other circumstances,
please contact IFNA.
The contents of the articles contained here are not our
responsibility, nor do we necessarily agree with them.
Everything here is subject to debate.
Table of Contents
1. ARTICLES
MAILCOST--some comments from a user
Quit Belly-aching
Fido Utilities from 130/3
Artificial Intelligence Conference
International Fido Conference - notes by Allen Miller
Problem with the date format in FIDOmail
Help Out Loek!
More coals on the fire, or IFNA in 500 words or less
IFNA/Conference Remote Reaction
2. FOR SALE
Public Domain Software Library Sale!!
3. NOTICES
The Interrupt Stack
CARTOON: Generic George, by Bruce White
New Net in Southern California - #166
I will attempt something I have never done before.....
I will "try" to write a review of a program I found on a
board in Arizona called appropriately "MAILCOST"
I have used this program for accounting mail in our net now
for about a month and find that although it is well written and
certainly does check and account for ALL out-of-town mail, it
does it in a manner that is inconsistent with the way Fido
accounts the actual costs to the user. Fido subtracts the listed
cost of a message from the users account regardless of whether
there are other messages going to the same node or host. This is
I believe the way that MOST hosts try to keep up with the mail
costs for a net. While "MAILCOST" does certainly keep a record of
the mail from each node, it does it by taking ALL messages to a
certain host and lumping the cost together. It then divides the
cost of the call (supplied by the host) between the nodes who had
mail for that node/host. While this is certainly cheaper it
places an additional load on the host & the sysop of the system
to update the users account to reflect the savings (not an easy
task I assure you) each time the mail is accounted. This results
in confusion of the users as to actually "how much" the messages
cost. Fido tells them that a message to node xxx/xx costs $.25
each and then when they send the message and the host gets say 2
or three in for that host then the actual cost is lowered. There
is no way the host can ACCURATELY specify to the user what the
ACTUAL cost will be until after the mail is sent. It is much like
an estimate from a repair shop, sometimes accurate but often
wrong.
I have a few suggestions for the author of the program. I
don't want to sound like I am jumping his case (which I
definitely AM NOT) but I think that by looking at it from the
AVERAGE hosts point of view he will come up with a vastly
improved version that could account the mail in two ways, either
being specified by the host using the program.
Suggestion #1: Set the program up to ADD up the total cost
of the mail from each NODE separately BY USER NAME. This way each
message sent will be counted as a separate call (although not
always the case) and logged appropriately. Thus the host can
inform the node each accounting period of the Fido-based cost of
his nodes mail. I suggest a log format as follows:
NODE # USER NAME # msgs Total COST
-----------------------------------------------------
Fidonews Page 3 8 Sep 1986
123/1 Jim Brown 2 $0.50
123/1 Sysop 4 $1.00
123/5 Sysop 7 $1.75
123/6 Sysop 20 $5.00
( I send a LOT of mail out for myself)
This way the host knows how much Fido ACTUALLY charged the
user and since most hosts collect BEFORE they allow the user to
send mail then they can deduct this from the account of the user
regardless of what node the user is on. Any savings realized by
the host due to multiple messages to the same node/host could
either be passed back to the user or used to help cover the costs
of bringing in such filesas FidoNews and the NodeDiff.a* each
week. I am sure that most hosts try to do as much as they can
afford, let's face it no matter what, calls for the news and
nodediff costs the host money and since there is no one for him
to try to pass the costs on to he ends up eating about $15 a
month over the cost of operation of the system.
By making the program capable of working either like the
format it now has or by the format I have proposed (selectable by
the sysop/host), I am sure the author would realize that the
accounting method he uses now, while good, is based on paying for
mail after the fact which would mean letting anyone in the net
send mail at any time without having to put up a cent. This could
run the host a bundle and I don't think this was the authors
intention. Also if the host did do it this way he could stand to
lose a lot of money from people not paying him what they owe for
mail.
Again I am not on anyones case this is simply constructive
criticism and I hope it is taken that way.
After reading FidoNews issue 332 I get the distinct
impression that some of you fortunate enough to be able to attend
the conference in Colorado went there for one reason, to belly-
ache!
Come off it people, I mean Thom Henderson, Ben Baker, Ken
Kaplan, and TOM JENNINGS have busted their butts to keep this
network going. They have forged ahead despite the adversities
with something they believed in. They sure didn't do it for the
profit potential, I mean lets face it the profit potential is
simply non-existent.
I read where tempers flared over the nomination of the board
members of INFA, I read where people were miffed that they
couldn't cast proxy votes, etc. I will say this one thing to all
of you out there and then I will shut up.
Tom Jennings didn't HAVE to release Fido the way he did. He could
have made it a commercial package and gotten a LOT of money for
it.
Ben Baker didn't HAVE to work so long and hard on the nodelist
setup. He could have left it where you had to edit the damn 137k
long file by hand each week. He could have simply not done
anything in which case there would be no network.
Ken Kaplan didn't HAVE to work so hard to organize the network
into regions, net, and nodes. He could have left it as was and
let you figure out how to send the mail to the west coast to one
particular board and one board only.
Thom Henderson didn't HAVE to volunteer for newsletter publisher.
He could have gone his merry way and we would have no means of
finding out what the Fidos outside our local area were doing
without having to call all over the world.
I say this to the person that said the hell with these
people, he already had a network if Ken and Ben and Tom Jennings
and Thom Henderson didn't like it. If you think you have a
network just STOP and THINK what you would have if these people
had done NOTHING. You would have just that......NOT A DAMN
THING!!!!!!!!!!
Quit your damn belly-aching and let these people do their
job. You concern yourself with running your little piece of the
machine (this could apply to everyone) and TOGETHER we can make
this network WORK for the good of us ALL.
The response to my MSGCRYPT program has been so positive that
I've decided to announce some of my other programs I've written.
Any program I've written can be either file requested by SEAdog
or for Fidos, send me a message and I'll hold a file attach for
you (no trouble at all). Either Poll me or Pickup me with a
message to me the next day. Here are some of them:
CALLERS.ARC: Modify the caller count. Show, add to, subtract
from, and set the caller count. (Not for caller count stuffing!
Use when converting BBS software or after a crash.)
SYSEDIT.ARC: (no docs) Full screen fancy system file editor.
Arrow-key editing, change caller count, sort files by priv,
exchange files, insert in the middle or delete from the middle,
rotate all files.
DARC.ARC: Archive utility. Scans an archive for filenames and
deletes those filenames from the current dir. For use when
you've dearchived a large archive and decide you don't like it;
instead of individually finding which files were in there are
deleting them, run DARC and it will automatically delete them!
ARCDIV.ARC: Archive utility. Remove certain files from an archive
to a separate archive without unpacking and repacking them.
LASTUSER.ARC: Read LASTUSER.BBS and display stats.
CHECKCD.COM: (12 bytes) Return errorlevel 1 on no CD.
MOVEULS.ARC: Aid in moving uploads from u/l dir to file areas.
ALTPAGE.ARC: Separates odd and even pages of docs so you can
print on both sides of the paper
SKIPPAGE.ARC: Extract pages from the middle of large docs
Can a computer become intelligent? This is a question that a
select group of scientists have been asking for over 30 years.
All will agree that the answer is yes, but not in their life
time, or their childrens lifetime. But when the computer does
become intelligent, what will be its implications on the world?
How will the intelligent computer effect the world in which we
live in, and that of our great great grandchildren?
Artificial Intelligence (AI) hs been called a half breed of
academic research in psychology, philosophy, linguistics, and
computer science. Because of this, most AI researchers are
frowned upon by their colleagues in other fields of science.
They feel that AI is something that should be left alone, that
computers are not here to be intelligent, but to help intelligent
people. Joseph Weizenbaum, a noted computer scientist at M.I.T.,
has gone as far as to describe "...AI as the province of madmen
and psycopaths."
The AI Conference will try to answer these questions about the
future of intelligent computers, as well as inform you of the
latest findings in the AI field. Short tutorials on various
areas of AI will also be included periodically. It is a place
where your questions about AI can be answered. Languages such as
LISP and Prolog will be supported. AI programming techniques
will be discussed if there is interest.
What is AI all about? What exactly does AI mean? For answers to
these, take a look at the AI Conference.
Current locations are:
New York City Area:
-------------------
Gateway NRA BillBoard
Brooklyn, NY New York, NY
1-718-338-3501 1-212-333-3285
Baud:300/1200 baud:300/1200/2400
Net/Node:107/222 Net/Node:107/102
Time:6pm to 8am weekday
New Jersey Area: New England Area:
---------------- -----------------
Helix 1 The Mindset Fido
Atlantic City, NJ Burlington, VT
1-609-266-0517 1-802-658-2494
Baud:300/1200/2400 Baud:300/1200
Net/Node:107/404 Net/Node:16/635
West Coast Area:
----------------
Mindset BBS
Sunnyvale, CA
1-408-737-3362
Baud:300/1200
Fidonews Page 8 8 Sep 1986
Net/Node:143/20
SYSOPS: If you would like to have this conference on your board,
please contact Richard Clark at Gateway NRA (107/222) whom is the
co-ordinator of the conference.
International Fido Conference
August 14-17, 1986
per Allen Miller, 108/0
The conference was hosted by the Colorado Springs User Group
and they did a fine job. There were somewhere around 100 Fido
Sysops (some with wives). The Sysops came from all over the
United States; there were also Sysops from Canada, Great Britain
and Holland. It was a great experience to meet face-to-face with
the people I had been writing e-mail to for the last two years.
I overheard a conversation between Thom Henderson and Donovan
Kuhn where Thom told Donovan that he looked just like he had
pictured him. That guy must be clairvoyant.
I arrived too late for the Thursday evening session which
featured Ezra Shapiro of Byte Magazine. Ezra didn't make it
either as he was bailing water out of his house. Seems they have
the same kind of plumbing problems in S.F. that the rest of us
experience from time to time. Over the weekend we got to hear a
good bit from Ezra who proved to be the stabilizing force that
was needed for some of our 'discussions'.
I will skip to the topic that I think most of my local
Sysops are interested in and will get back to the rest of the
conference in some fashion.
VERSION 12
==========
Tom Jennings is working on it. However, it seems like it
will be much more involved than I had imagined. The network has
been growing at geometric paces.
* Dates for availability ranged from September to January *.
Fido's current internal nodelist table has room for 1,200
nodes. If the nodelist has more than 1,200 nodes, Fido will just
skip the ones beyond. Until v12 is out, Fido Administrators can
help by eliminating inactive Fido's when they send in their
nodelist updates. Also, if you have entries indicated as DOWN,
just put a semicolon before them to change to a comment. This
will also help.
If you remember the time before Nets, when there were only
Nodes, then you will be able to appreciate this. In May, 1984,
there were about 10 Fido's; in June, 1985 there were about 160
Fido's and the Net concept was introduced; at September, 1986
there are now almost 1,200 Fido's and the Zone is the new step.
A Zone will be a group of Nets. Initially, Zones might line up
with countries. Down the road a Zone might even be a subset of a
country.
Just imagine it. If nothing else in Fido changed other than
the Zone concept, jillions of Fido utilities would have to change
to accommodate the new structure of Zone/Net/Node replacing the
Fidonews Page 10 8 Sep 1986
current Net/Node. Fido v12 can't just be haphazardly introduced
into the bbs world without a lot of work/time to at least have
compatible versions of the most important utilities like listgen,
editnl, xlatlist, and robot.
There will be several months between the distribution of v12
and the introduction of new Zone numbers. This will give
everyone a chance to get familiar with the new software and
hopefully keep the confusion during the changeover to a minimum.
Some other areas of change.
1. Fido's internal version of the nodelist will be a disk file
instead of loaded to memory. The list is just getting too
big. Tom Jennings said he rewrote the search code so when
Fido needs to check an address against the nodelist, it will
be real fast.
2. To make international mail more efficient, a 'gate' concept
for outgoing mail of one country to be funneled to the gate
who would process and send mail destined for a second country.
3. Because of the size of the nodelist and the other related Fido
structures, Fido will not be a system that will run well on a
floppy based system. Fido will want a hard disk for storage
capacity.
4. Fido will have no more command line switches other than
perhaps the /T test mode. Tom's comment was that there just
weren't enough letters available for additional controls. All
these type controls will be handled from a text file, as will
be the event schedule.
5. The version 11 manual was over 300k bytes. The version 12
manual will not be downloadable. It will be professionally
printed and available for purchase for some reasonable number
of clams.
6. There will be new handling of system security in v12. Our
names (Twit, Normal, etc.) will go by the wayside and be
replaced with numbers. Security will work on a 'mask' concept
which will let you have much more control of access by user,
area, and function.
7. To conform to the current times regarding security of e-mail
and disclosure.... Normal level users will be given a message
that the 'Sysop can read Private mail'.
I am sure that there are more new features and goodies of
v12 than I have covered here. However, that is all that I had in
my notes or that I could remember from Tom Jennings' conference
session. Anyway, knowing Tom a little, I expect there will be
some minor things that he wouldn't have thought to discuss in the
meeting. We'll just have to wait and see.
International Fido Net Association
Fidonews Page 11 8 Sep 1986
==================================
IFNA (pronounced "if-nuh") is the International Fido Net
Association. It is a nonprofit organization created to be a
vehicle to raise tax deductible money to support the ongoing
needs of this large organization. The Board of Directors was
approved to be Ken Kaplan, Ben Baker and Thom Henderson. The
Articles of Incorporation (or some kind of legal b...s... to use
a term of George Wing) were voted on and approved at the meeting.
Preparing Bylaws is a step that remains to be done.
There was a lot of energy invested to get this group
organized (lets hear some applause). At the conference there was
a lot of energy expended on some less productive discussion of
the so-called issues. Suffice it to say (good old hindsight)
that more communication on the agenda of incorporation might have
made people more happy. However, I say that there are probably
some people in the world that you can never please. Since all of
us donate our time for this effort, I wouldn't loose too much
sleep over the small minority. If you weren't there, you missed
some interesting interpersonal interaction.
Randy Bush, along with his committee, has done a fabulous
job on what will be the most meaningful contribution to the world
of telecommunications that I could have imagined. Randy has been
developing the FidoNet standards document.
The FidoNet Standards Document will be a thorough and
complete documentation of how to send mail between computers via
communications links. Can you believe it, this will contain the
first complete documentation of XMODEM protocol. This document
will be used by authors of other systems to incorporate FidoNet
compatibility.
A 64k microcomputer (commodore, volkswagen, etc.) could not
load the entire Fido program and could not possibly participate
in the network. With this document, programmers will have the
tools to adapt their communications software to the FidoNet
requirements. Voila, worldwide mail network brought to you by
FidoNet.
Some enterprising Fido Sysops have already worked out links
to other networks, Usenet and Bitnet, to name two. Imagine it,
other non-micro based nets could spring up that use the FidoNet
Standards and thereby be directly compatible with any Fido
system. It's just incredible.
Rest of the Meeting
===================
There were interesting sessions on SEAdog, Thom Henderson;
Fido with Multilink, Allen Miller (cough, cough); USRobotics,
Welch and Smith (I think); Echomail, Jeff Rush; Routing, Ben
Fidonews Page 12 8 Sep 1986
Baker; ARC, Andy Foray; FidoNet International, Henk Wevers &
Frank Thornley; Unix Gateway, Bob Hartman; and NAPLS, Dave
Hughes.
In addition to the formal presentations, there were many,
many impromptu sessions in the hallways, bar and nice hospitality
suite that SEA provided.
We went to the Flying W Ranch Saturday night for some cowboy
food and music. The Flying W Ranch is number two in the United
States for consumption of red beans, next to Wendy's. We had a
great meal and got to hear some good picking and strumming. The
clouds in the sky were forgiving and we had a lot of fun. The
food lines served 1,400 people in 25 minutes. That's what I call
a chuck wagon.
Sunday morning we got to ride the Manitou and Pikes Peak
Railway Cog Wheel Train up to the top of Pikes Peak. We rode
from 6,000' to 14,110' in about one hour. The views were
glorious. It really makes you glad to be alive.
The End
=======
Much thanks to our hosts, the Colorado Springs User Group
and Dick Bertrand, George Wing, Chuck Sanders, Woody Wood, Jim
Cannell who all worked hard to make our meeting a great success.
The utility FU have just been released, and I noticed that this
program writes the the creation date different from FIDO. The
problem is that Fido cannot recognice which date this mail was
created so "Delete messages by age" do not work in FIDO. I have a
suggestion that the syntax for the date will be set so everybody
which write utilities can use the same expression. From Kermit
protocoll I got following:
Creation Date, expressed as "[yy]yymmdd[ hh:mm[:ss]]" (ISO
standard julian format), e.g. 831009 23:59. The time is
optional; if given, it should be in 24-hour format, and the
seconds may be omitted, and a single space should separate
the time from the date.
Therefore I suggest that the format for FIDOmail creation date is
YYMMDD HH:MM which only occupies 13 bytes and because of that it
will be 7 bytes for future things.
This is only the structure in the messages. I think that FIDO
would write out the date in the same manner as today. Maybe it
could be changed so it is ok all over the world by using the
Country Dependent Information (MSDOS SYSTEM CALL 38H).
Regards from Europe and Sweden
Lennart Svensson
FIDO 501/4602
To author of FU: I hope you recognize the problem with your date
format.
The message which appeared in Dutch on p 14 of Fido328.Nws is
here translated by Jeanine Fegan. Mrs. Fegan has consented to
translate into Dutch any reply you wish to send Loek Jansen. Send
your reply through Kurt Kurosawa at 19/201 (Texarkana Region/
Fido's Domain, 318-869-1258, Sysop: Nevin Nobles).
--[ English Translation ]----------------------------------
Hello, everybody! There are some problems with Commodores using
Fido:
1st - Upload. This doesn't work with the Teletron 1200 or
Multimodem 64.
2nd - Download. This doesn't work with these modems, either. A
few users asked me several times what we can do about this.
Does someone have a solution or know of a modem that doesn't have
these problems? [ Note: It would help if you knew of one which is
sold in Holland, or could send PD or Freeware programs that would
enable the use of these modems --KK ]
There are two new programs from Commodore users that I'd like to
post for downloading IF they're in the public domain. They were
written for the Micro-Master tournament. If you know something
about these programs, please let me know.
More coals on the fire
or
IFNA in 500 words or less
For those who think IFNA came out of a hat. Its formation
was discussed in Fido Newsletter # 325.
There can be no doubt but that the initial formation of IFNA
and it's implementation were handled poorly. However, I have a
very real problem in suddenly deciding that the folks who have
kept it organized and running for the past two years, have
written many of the utilities and compiled and shipped the
newsletter, have given freely of their time and money, are
suddenly to be viewed as untrustworthy money grubbing assholes. I
don't really believe we are witnessing the beginning of an evil
empire.
The issue that only those in attendance who were paid up
members of IFNA would have the right to vote was stupid and was
dropped at the actual business meeting.
The question of proxy votes was never discussed by anyone at
the business meeting though it was mentioned in the newsletter.
Tom Jennings and Fido Software are a separate issue from
IFNA. Tom is on IFNA the board of directors, but Fido Software
is NOT part of IFNA.
(I personally think that Tom should be compensated for Fido.
Many of us use Fido as both a hobby and to promote our
businesses. I own a computer store, I hope to gain sales, but I
don't force anyone to buy from me in order to use the board. I
also don't run a non-profit business. There is no rational reason
to believe that Tom Jennings should continue to provide us with
free entertainment. He is a programmer and that's how he makes
his living; the Fido code belongs to him, not us.
An aside in an aside: the FidoNet standard is going to be,
has been, made public and will allow any one who wants to to
write a truly "free" bbs system that incorporates the FidoNet
protocol.
Besides which, it is not really clear to me that TJ is going
to charge for version 12. What is clear is that the Version 12
reference manual will cost money. It is being written by a
professional writer, it is being bound in book form, and both of
these items cost money; writers and publishers don't work for
nothing.
If there is a charge for the new version you have some
choices. If you don't want to buy it, don't. As I understand it,
there is no real compelling reason to upgrade unless you are
involved to international mail. If you don't think Tom Jennings
should be paid for the work he has done, and, until now anyway,
Fidonews Page 16 8 Sep 1986
the fun and enjoyment he has brought you, well then, don't pay
him. Another choice, of course, is to buy one copy of version 12
and spread it all over the Net; not a very nice solution, but it
would certainly stifle Tom's attempt to make some money off his
software and probably kill Fido in the process.)
Back to IFNA: what the hell can IFNA really do without our
cooperation?
IFNA is only a name with no real power until we give it, and
can't, at least at this time, be mandatory; how are they going to
make you join if you don't want to? The immediate advantage of
being a member of IFNA is that you will, at least, I hope you
will, have a say about the by-laws and how IFNA will be run and
what it's direction will be. If you are not a member you will
have no input, and it will be harder to change, or implement,
anything after the initial structure is in place. The long range
advantages range from potential tax deductions to a political
power base.
However, and this is a big however, without us IFNA is
nothing more that a name registered on a few pieces of paper in
the state of Missouri. IFNA, at least at this point, does not own
the rights to much of anything. The FidoNet utilities are already
written, the structure is in place. Everything needed to function
is already available. So, if IFNA becomes a closed society,
requires mandatory attendance at meetings in Missouri on the 14
of each month when the moon, or is it the sun, is in Aquarius,
bites your dog, pisses in the pool, etc.; well then fork'em,
start an alternate Network.
And here folks is what we're talking about in real money: 48
cents a week, less than the cost of a soft-drink, less than a
beer, certainly less than a pack of cigarettes.
The past week or so has been a big one for FidoNet. There was
the Fido Conference, and a Fido made national news by being the
largest pirate board yet uncovered.
In some ways, I think these two events are related by more than
the time of their occurrence.
Perceptions of the Net
I read with interest the newsletter articles on the Fido
Conference, and the great forment regarding the formalization of
IFNA.
It reminded me of some of the discussions I had with some of the
principals years ago. Their conclusion was that FidoNet is not a
democracy, but a bunch of small fiefdoms unified by a common
technology.
Another way of putting this is that FidoNet is what its sysops
perceive it to be, with the caveat that the sysops did not
control the technology - Tom Jennings and St. Louis control the
technology.
Why we run a Fido
Before we can understand why FidoNet exists, each of the
individual sysops has to understand why their individual Fido's
exist.
In our case, we run a BBS to allow us to collect and distribute
public domain software among local users, mail among local users,
and communications among the developers and beta testers of our
company. We run Fido in particular because of the wide variety
of file transfer protocols it supports. (This is a particular
thorn in our side, as we shall discuss later.) The network is
strictly a side benefit, one that costs more monetarily than it
returns in any sense.
Far be it from me to agree with Mikey
Mike Hamilton and I certainly have had our disagreements. I have
also had my disagreements with both Mr. Jennings and the St.
Louis crowd.
However, from what I read, Mike (Mikey as he is derisively
referred to by everyone - and Lord Mikey by myself in the past)
seems to be under attack because he is asking questions -
questions that seem to be valid. When I was there, despite my
Fidonews Page 18 8 Sep 1986
problems with him, and despite reservations I had with the
technical solutions he implemented as the local host, Mike did
one hell of a job. I find it difficult to believe that Mike is
Fidonews Page 19 8 Sep 1986
whining about the money per se, which is the implication of many
of the authors in the past newsletter.
I already pay for about everything
In running our Fido, we already pay for just about everything
ourselves. We have to pick up our own newsletters and nodelists.
We get very little net mail, and a good bit of that is file
attached, and therefore not routed through any hosts.
Our node takes NO money from our operations
There is a very simple reason for this, one that I will hammer
home again and again: If I take money for running my system, I am
obligated to provide something. (That something would have to be
well defined, which is one of the reasons we don't.)
How this all relates to the Pirate Fido
How does all this relate to the Pirate Fido? Well, until just
recently, the informal political structure of Fido was presented
in a document called Policy1 or Policy2. In these documents,
there were essentially three rules stated: Be a NetNode during
the national window, don't hassle another sysop, and don't put up
pirate software. The rest of the document goes to great lengths
to describe how the various levels of sysops or netops or
whatever you want to call them are supposed to (for want of a
better word) enforce these rules, and what the appeal process for
this enforcement is.
Now that Fido was NOT shut down through this process - it was
shut down from the outside. While I hope Mr. Miller is correct
in the statements he made in his letter to InfoWorld about most
Fido's being honest, I am dissillusioned that, for some reason,
this gaucherie was allowed to continue despite the formal
policies. I find it quite difficult to believe that a pirate
board of that magnitude (and apparent openness) was not known at
least to the local net, which would seem to imply that at least
the local net failed to meet its responsibilities as outlined in
the aforementioned documents.
The formalization of IFNA can only lead to more rules - I am not
saying this is good or bad per se. But I have to ask myself what
will happen in the future when there are more rules, and more
formal mechanisms for their enforcement, when we cannot abide by
the simplest of rules now? Given that the money IFNA wants to
take in will not be used for salaries, how will more time be
budgeted to these problems?
Understandings, Misunderstandings, and Questions
IFNA Membership will not be required to be on the nodelist
Fidonews Page 20 8 Sep 1986
This was the most re-assuring statement I read in the whole
newsletter. It will be interesting to see how many pay the
membership, and at what juncture.
Fidonews Page 21 8 Sep 1986
Railroading and expediency
There was a lot of discussion about railroading - that IFNA had
basically determined what they were going to do and tried to just
force it on the body of the meeting.
I believe there are valid arguments on both sides of the
discussion. On the one hand, if the initial articles of
incorporation allow sufficient input, they are certainly not cast
in concrete (it is just a lot of "legal stuff" in that sense.) It
also makes sense that a well defined outline of the structure,
and perhaps one or two alternatives are best prepared in small
groups, and then presented to the body as a whole for discussion
and affirmation.
However, as tight as time is for everyone involved, I believe the
IFNA officers dropped the ball by not giving the body as a whole
a much better idea, in writing, of what was going to happen, what
the structure will be, and what the alternatives are. This
should have been in the hands of anyone coming to the meeting
before they even left for it. It should have been in the hands
of those of us who could not attend, with enough time for
discussion across the net.
There is an important question this raises. The monies IFNA
takes in are NOT supposed to be allocated to salaries. (That is
my understanding of the facts, not necessarily a statement of my
feelings on the wisdom of the decision ... an important
distinction.) Given this, the IFNA officers should not have
significantly more time to dedicate to politics and organization
in the future than they have in the past - in fact, as FidoNet
grows, they will have to spend more time tending to the
technology. Given all of this, what reason is there to expect
IFNA to do a better job in the future than they have in the past?
Rates of Growth
An important point that seems to have been ignored in the
discussions in the newsletter is the rate of growth. FidoNet has
been growing at about 100% per year - doubling in size every
year. If we assume that the $25 is contributed by every node,
this means we are talking about a $100K budget in two years.
While I have no reason to assume that everyone will kick in $25,
I have a feeling that if IFNA does emerge alive from this
quagmire, it will be close to 100%. I certainly have no reason
to assume the rate of growth will subside - it would seem to me
the national density of Fido population should approach what it
is now in metropolitan areas - in other words, 10's of thousands
of them.
One statement that really bothered me was attributed to Ken
Kaplan - that the $25 IFNA fee might be enforced for all nodes to
LIMIT the growth of the net. I had always been under the
impression the goal was to EXPAND the net - was I simply mistaken
in this, or have the goals changed?
Fidonews Page 22 8 Sep 1986
"They have been running it for 2.5 years and can keep running it"
This is not a direct quote, but an attribution to TJ in the past
newsletter. I cannot comment on the veracity of the attribution.
However, the statement itself reveals a basic flaw in FidoNet.
FidoNet is no longer Tom Jennings' or Ken Kaplan's or whoever's
baby. It is ours, the sysops, as a whole.
When I pay for something, I expect something for it
As I mentioned before, I have this peculiar New England trait -
when I pay for something, I expect something in return. One of
the things I expect is a product that works. Fido does, largely,
but in one or two areas, it does not. Particularly, Kermit and
the limited range of modem support.
It is extremely bothersome that TJ insists the Kermit problems
are on the Columbia tape itself. For a number of technical
reasons (the limited character set you can pump through a packet
switched network) I HAVE to use Kermit of all the protocols
offered by Fido. And despite Mr. Jenning's protestations, his
doesn't work, and all the versions I have taken off the Columbia
tape (about 6 in regular use, including Unix) do.
Conversely, I don't generally pay for a pig in a poke
From what I have read, this is exactly what was asked of the
attendees at the Fido conference.
A bottomless pit
The $25 IFNA fee would probably not kill most Fido sysops.
However, it does not stop there, and that is what scares a lot of
us.
TJ is talking $40 (effectively) for Fido itself. At that price,
I assume that is for a single version, and the next one (and the
next one) will cost close to the same. You can't run a Fido
without ARC ($35-$50 depending on how you go about it.) You need
a nodelist editor of some sort (another $25 or so). You probably
need communications software - $50?
So all the sudden, the relatively minimal cost becomes much much
greater. More importantly, the rules are changed, in a very
insidious way. We were all brought into the net under one set of
assumptions - that we could get on board for nothing, get the
latest and greatest software and documentation for nothing. and
communicate cheaply. All the sudden, this seems to be changing -
after 1000 sysops and god knows how many users have come to count
on the network.
Fidonews Page 23 8 Sep 1986
My Five Cents
Version 12 should not be mandated until alternatives are
sanctioned
Fidonews Page 24 8 Sep 1986
One or two of the articles in the newsletter referenced Fido
alternatives, and the documentation of the Fido protocols. I
believe one of the most important steps to be taken is the
separation of the technology from the politics.
Tom Jennings has, without doubt or reservation, accomplished a
masterful feat in Fido. But even the best of artists can have
feet of clay.
Feel free to jump all over me if I'm wrong (you will anyway) but
one has to at least question the timing and motives of the
changes of v12. It comes at a time when the existing standards
are to be documented to the point of allowing the existance of
clones. Will it be compatible with previous versions (and
clones), and if not, how major will the changes be, and how
forthcoming will TJ be with the specifications of those changes?
It might be wise for IFNA not to make this transition until
clones are available and sanctioned, if for no other reason than
to eliminate possible conflict of interest charges. (It appears
to me that you virtually MUST pay for V12, and FidoSoft is a
profit making corporation (at least in the legal sense as I
understand it) and that FidoSoft will therefore directly benefit
from a decision by IFNA, a non-profit organization, to upgrade
the network to v12.)
DECUS parallels
A lot of the structure outlined seems to reflect the roots of the
St. Louis crowd - DECUS. This is not necessarily bad - DECUS
does a great job at what it does. But there are crucial
differences - most of them related to money.
A DECUS member understands that membership is basically a ticket
to spend more money, and comes from an environment where that
spending can be afforded. A DECUS member understands the value
of intangible things like conferences.
I am not sure the same is true of your typical Fido sysop. The
$25 annual membership to IFNA is not an expense charged to the
company in most cases - it's a couple of pizzas not bought, a
couple of movies not seen, or what have you. The sysop is going
to want to see something tangible for that $25 - and I have not
seen anyone say what more they will get than what they already
have. (I am not saying I AGREE this is right, merely that I
understand the perception.)
There is another major difference between IFNA and DECUS. DECUS
members have a much wider choice of vendors than potential IFNA
members. Sure, you have to have a DEC processor to be a DECUS
member - but last time I looked, an 11/23 cost around $500, with
all the other components obtainable from vendors other than DEC.
From what was presented in the newsletter, IFNA will not be
sanctioning Fidoclones until after v12 is released. In other
words, the traditional "friendly adversary" relationship between
Fidonews Page 25 8 Sep 1986
DECUS and DEC will not exist between IFNA and FidoSoft. This is
not necessarily bad per se, but it will continue to raise
questions at every phase of IFNA/FidoNet development.
Fidonews Page 26 8 Sep 1986
Source Code for Fido - Fido From IFNA, not FidoSoft
IFNA should consider sanctioning and distributing a source level
Fido clone. (This is not to say that all IFNA sanctioned Fido
clones should be distributed in source -just the first ones.)
I would much rather see IFNA charge more and be the sole source
(or primary source) for Fido Software than the incestous
relationship between IFNA and FidoSoft currently proposed.
If TJ is not willing to contract to do this work, I believe IFNA
should freeze FidoNet at v11 levels until a sanctioned, source
version is available.
There are arguments both for and against source code
availability. The notable argument against is that it makes it
simple to intentionally or unintentionally screw up the net.
However, the political structure of the network in theory should
keep these problems in check.
On the other side, we currently have all our eggs in one basket,
and from my point of view, the basket leaks. Beyond this, there
are things the users want that TJ/IFNA say are not possible, or
that TJ does not have the time or inclination to do. I maintain
that very little is not possible, but by forcing others to start
from total scratch, they make it nearly so. I have also heard
arguments (that I do not believe) that there are trapdoors in
Fido itself. I would feel better in any case if I could look at
the source to determine this for myself.
IFNA better become more realistic about other uses of the net
I believe that many Fido sysops percieve FidoNet as an
alternative to large, charged systems, with limitations. The
original goals of the founders of the network did not exactly
jibe with this. In particular, the main stated goal of the net
is to allow for cheap, point to point messaging. The explosion
of echomail on the network, and the desire for both broadcast,
and truly private forms of messaging indicate that point to point
messaging is only ONE of the percieved goals.
I believe it will be difficult to resolve the political issues
while maintaining the limited, point to point orientation of the
net.
In fact, while it may be simpler from TJ's point of view, I am
not really clear on why Fido and FidoNet are two different things
- it would seem a better design to simply allow for either at any
time with sysop control - and it is my understanding this is what
SEADog in fact does.
For the formation, only a node number should be required to vote
I agree that once IFNA is going and in place, that dues should be
Fidonews Page 27 8 Sep 1986
paid. However, until that time, it seems reasonable to me that a
node number, and only a node number should be required to vote on
Fidonews Page 28 8 Sep 1986
the initial bylaws.
The problem is not money - it is time
One basic gap in the logic of all the articles on the
conference/IFNA formation is the arguments about money. Money is
not really the problem - Time is. A number of people said that
the phone costs for distributing nodelists was not the major cost
of running IFNA - it was the costs of hand-holding and question
answering. If this is true (which seems very reasonable to me),
then those costs are minimal compared to the cost of Ken Kaplan's
time doing same, or whoever is IFNA.
To reject out of hand the use of IFNA funds for salaries seems
like a foolish place to begin.
I am NOT questioning the motives of IFNA, TJ, or anyone
I believe that everyone involved is trying to do their best by
FidoNet. However, we started out with statements about FidoNet
being what its sysops percieve it to be - and while the motives
behind the actions of IFNA are probably above board, they have
not done a good job in keeping the perception of same on the part
of the sysops. IFNA must understand that the symbiotic balance
between TJ and IFNA and the body of sysops as a whole has
changed. In the past, the network operators could basically
dictate the operation of the net as they pleased. But the
success of the net, while due to their decisions, depends on the
body of sysops. And at this time, the body of sysops are in a
position to survive without IFNA. I am NOT advocating this - I
believe it would be tragic. But it scares me that people pointed
this out to IFNA in very blunt terms in the newsletter. IFNA
must choose its path carefully, and perhaps more importantly,
publicly.
A CRY FOR SUPPORT!
DEDICATED TO
V I E T N A M V E T E R A N S
Their Wives, Lovers, and Friends
Dedicated to those of us who know the true cost of war
And have paid the cost!
A unique concept in the electronic bulletin board communic-
ations medium has come to being in the San Francisco South Bay
city of San Jose, California. Its overwhelming success during
its first 30 days of existence has made quite evident the fact
that such a public service was needed. Many call seeking solace
and support in it's message bases, others simply to rekindle the
friendships born in that conflict.
The sysops, Todd and Nancy, are more than qualified to host
such a public service, as they are both Vietnam veterans. Todd
served as a Medical Field Surgeon attached to the United States
Army's 101st Airborne, having survived the horrors of being a
Prisoner of War in a Laotian prison camp. Nancy, his wife,
fought her war years after Todd returned from the steamy jungles
of Southeast Asia. Together they fought to keep alive a rela-
tionship that was everything to them, and succeeded only after a
bitter struggle where everything was nearly lost.
Both of them feel a certain obligation to share themselves
with the countless men and women who are still fighting their
war, with the hopes that somehow through their empathetic inter-
vention, they might help some of them find an end to that war.
It is also their hope to enlighten those who were not a part of
this `war' in such a way as historians will never succeed in
doing.
Now, Don Kulha, sysop of the Survival Communication Forum
125/7, another Fido bulletin board north of the San Francisco Bay
in Santa Rosa, California has joined in Todd and Nancy's efforts
to provide a place where not only veterans of the Vietnam `war'
can meet to share their thoughts and feelings, but where those
who love and care for them can find solice as well. Something
good is happening in California!
What Todd, Nancy, and Don need now is your support in making
a good thing even better! The time has come to begin a national
Echo-mail Vietnam Veteran's Conference where we can bring other
concerned persons together all across this United States of
America!
As the largest amateur network in the world, we can make
this a grand success! If you would be interested in joining with
us in this service, let us know by sending us a message. Echo-
mail is rather a mystery to both the LooneyBin and the Survival
Communications BBS's, so even if you don't feel the call to be-
come part of what w are doing by joining in the national con-
ference, you can still support us with advice regarding the in-
tricacies involved in setting such a medium up. Any support you
can offer will be greatly appreciated.
Fidonews Page 30 8 Sep 1986
We're looking forward to "hearing" from you soon!
Sincerely Yours,
Todd and Nancy Looney Don Kulha
The LooneyBin 143/27 Survival Comm. Forum 125/7
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Fidonews Page 31 8 Sep 1986
=================================================================
FOR SALE
=================================================================
Now available from Micro Consulting Associates!!
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software and other goodies, and that's "archived" size!
When unpacked, you get approximately 28 megabytes worth of
all kinds of software, from text editors to games to
unprotection schemes to communications programs, compilers,
interpreters, etc... Over 66 DS/DD diskettes!! This
collection is the result of more than 15 months of intensive
downloads from just about 150 or more BBS's and other
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archived for your convenience. Starting a Bulletin Board
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spending thousands of dollars? This is the answer!!!
To order the library, send $100 (personal or company check,
postal money order or company purchase order) to:
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Post Office Box 4296
200-1/2 E. Balboa Boulevard
Balboa, Ca. 92661-4296
Please allow 3 weeks for delivery of your order.
Note: No profit is made from the sale of the Public Domain
software in this collection. The price is applied entirely
to the cost of downloading the software over the phone
lines, running a BBS to receive file submissions, and
inspecting, cataloguing, archiving and maintaining the
files. Obtaining this software yourself through the use of a
computer with a modem using commercial phone access would
cost you much more than what we charge for the service...
The following format choices are available:
- IBM PC-DOS Backup utility
- Zenith MS-DOS 2.11 Backup Utility
- DSBackup
- Fastback
- ACS INTRCPT 720k format (Requires a 1.2m floppy
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- Plain ol' files (add $50)
Add $30 if you want the library on 1.2 meg AT disks (more
expensive disks). There are no shipping or handling
charges. California residents add 6% tax.
For each sale, $10 will go to the FidoNet Administrators.
A new net has been created in Southern California, net 166. This
net consists of members of net 103 that have split off to form
our own net due to disagreements about net management procedures
with the 103 host. If you are in Southern California and would
like to join us, send us a mail message to 166/1. The nodelist
will show the new net starting with NODELIST.248.
Node 103/511 (DataFlex Fido) is now the host of net 166.
