FidoNews is published weekly by the International FidoNet
Association as its official newsletter. You are encouraged to
submit articles for publication in FidoNews. Article submission
standards are contained in the file ARTSPEC.DOC, available from
node 1:1/1.
Copyright 1988 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 at (314) 576-4067. IFNA may also be contacted
at PO Box 41143, St. Louis, MO 63141.
Fido and FidoNet are registered trademarks of Tom Jennings of
Fido Software, 164 Shipley Avenue, San Francisco, CA 94107 and
are used with permission.
The contents of the articles contained here are not our
responsibility, nor do we necessarily agree with them.
Everything here is subject to debate. We publish EVERYTHING
received.
Table of Contents
1. ARTICLES ................................................. 1
Elvis Lives .............................................. 1
HAYES Technical Support Echo Announcement ................ 2
New Message Editor ....................................... 4
2. COLUMNS .................................................. 5
Let's YACK about The Negative Side ....................... 5
3. NOTICES .................................................. 6
The Interrupt Stack ...................................... 6
Latest Software Versions ................................. 6
FidoNews 5-43 Page 1 24 Oct 1988
Noel Crow
FidoNet 170/200
ELVIS
A Generic Echomail Statistics Utility
ELVIS was designed to maintain a history of Echomail traffic for
your system. It reports counts of incoming messages, in each
echo area, and from each network node sending to you. Since
Elvis derives its data directly from incoming packets, and
requires no system-specific control files other than its own,
it's compatible with just about any MS-DOS system that receives
FidoNet-compatible echomail. It is useful for identifying dead
echos, broken links, and dupe sources, especially for echomail
hubs handling a large number of echo areas or nodes.
Elvis consists of two executable files; ELVIS.EXE, which scans
incoming mail and stores message counts in monthly data files.
ELVISRPT.EXE is used to generate ASCII reports from the data
files written by ELVIS.EXE. Any date range (that you have data
for) may be specified. Command line switches may be used to
report only the message counts in certain echo areas or from
certain nodes.
File Request ELVIS100.ARC from FidoNet 170/200. Size is 39K,
about 3 minutes at 2400 baud.
Mike Ratledge
SysOp of East Bay X-Change TCommNet BBS
372/555, 372/666, 372/777 and 372/888
I am pleased to announce that I have received permission to
create a HAYES technical support conference for owners of Hayes
Microcomputer Products modems.
I will host this new EchoMail area (tag is "HAYES") and the
folks at Hayes technical support department will check in daily
to answer any new questions.
The following is the unedited text of a letter I received
electronically from John Aitken, the head of Hayes SysOp support
in Atlanta:
Hayes Microcomputer Products, Inc
705 Westech Drive
Norcross,GA.30092
TO: Mike Ratledge, Sysop - East Bay X-Change BBS
FROM: John Aitken, Hayes - Sysop Support Coordinator
SUBJECT: Hayes Technical Support Forum
Date: 16 September, 1988
Mike, We at Hayes are actively committed to supporting our
Customers, and are always seeking new ways to provide that
support. Towards that end I accept your invitation to
participate in your Hayes Support Message Area within the Fido
- Networking System.
Once your Message Area is up and running we will actively
participate by signing-on daily, answering questions and
providing technical support to all callers within the network.
Additionally, I have provided you with full access to the Hayes
Sysop Support Conference, where you will have access to all
technical files, bulletins, and configuration notes - contained
within our Technical Library.
Please feel free to utilize any of the technical information
that you may find within our file directories and be sure to let
me know how we can provide additional help or information.
FidoNet callers are invited to submit their questions,
suggestions, and comments - within the message area, and we will
monitor and reply on a daily basis.
If there is anything that we can do for you or your FidoNet
callers - please don't hesitate to ask.
FidoNews 5-43 Page 3 24 Oct 1988
Best regards and good wishes for your Network!
John Aitken
Hayes Sysop Support Coordinator
Training and Customer Services
If you would like to recieve this echomail area on your system,
please get in touch with me at 372/888 and we'll setup your link
according to the volume of requests I receive. I imagine that
this echo area will warrant being carried on the "backbone" in a
short time! NOTE: 372/555 is a Hayes V96 unit - it's online at
5:30PM each weekday (until 8AM) and all weekend, too. If you
wish to sign on locally, you should call 372/666 or 372/888 and
register. Be sure to ask for access to the V96 unit. I will
have a second V9600 online by the time this article is printed.
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FidoNews 5-43 Page 4 24 Oct 1988
jim nutt
'the computer handyman'
1:114/15.11
Announcing version 1.87 of msged, the only Fidonet mail editor
with complete c source code. Features include:
Message body text searching
Integrated full screen editor
Uses existing config files (binkley.cfg and areas.bbs)
Easy to Use
Easy to Install
Full Zone:Net/Node.Point>Domain addressing
Intelligent Point remapping
Support for Netmail, Echomail and Local Areas
Uses All 80 columns of the screen
Quoting (of course!)
Message Forwarding
Carbon Copies
Address Lookup
Text file import/export
Abort/Delete Confirm (optional)
Support for large displays
Optional Tear and Origin lines
Direct Screen Video (video fossil and bios support soon)
Source compatible with Quick C, Zortech C and Turbo C
Creates a confmail echomail export log
Large message handling (big version only)
All versions will run in under 128k of memory
Fast! (100 messages in under 20s 8mhz AT and Desqview)
Free! No charge for non-commercial use
Coming features include:
Message selection list
Editor block commands
UUCP addressing
You Tell Me what you want!
Msged is available from 1:114/18 or 1:114/15 for file request
as MSGED and a msged support echo is being formed. For more
information contact me (jim nutt) at 1:114/15.11.
"IF THIS REALLY WAS A GOOD HOBBY NETWORK YOU'D TALK ABOUT D&D".
This was a message to me from a user about my board. I don't
happen to have any message areas that cover D&D. Funny that
should be the case, since my advertised specialty areas are
EagleTech Software and the national AVIATION EchoMail conference.
I politely responded, explaining that "Amateur Hobby Network"
means that *I* have a hobby in playing with computers and
networking them together. It does not necessarily follow that I
support all hobbies. Even though I happen to like D&D and other
adventure, role-playing and war games.
Then I get this guy who calls in with a name whose validity I
question. So I left him a message AND a custom welcome, asking
him to verify the name, with address and phone number. Seven
times he logged in, saw the custom welcome, and hit all the file
areas and logged off. I dropped him to DISGRACE status, left a
more clearly worded custom welcome; still he called in about four
more times, tried to hit the file areas (the only one allowed at
DISGRACE level is the FidoNews Area), and logged off. So I
TWITted him. Why didn't he just leave me a message? I even told
him how to do it on the custom welcome.
And the classic - "Hacker calling". Oh, that's TWIT level
immediately.
Why is it so hard for people to say who they really are on BBSs?
I don't recall ever having that difficulty when *I* was a mere
user. And if ever there was a strange person, I definitely
qualify. But *I* never had any problems using my real name.
Handles are kind of nice, when they apply, but this doesn't cut
well in EchoMail. Too many people out there.
Oh, well, even FidoNet can't be all blessings and charm, I
suppose. I've been blessed, even in my troubles with users, in
that I haven't had any vicious hackers trying to crash my board
or slam my communication links. I've heard of such, but (knock
on wood) haven't seen any.
I guess I'll just overlook the negative side and enjoy my hobby.
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FidoNews 5-43 Page 6 24 Oct 1988
Utility authors: Please help keep this list up to date by
reporting new versions to 1:1/1. It is not our intent to list
all utilities here, only those which verge on necessity.
Hal DuPrie 1:101/106 Chairman of the Board
Bob Rudolph 1:261/628 President
Matt Whelan 3:3/1 Vice President
Ray Gwinn 1:109/639 Vice President - Technical Coordinator
David Garrett 1:103/501 Secretary
Steve Bonine 1:115/777 Treasurer
IFNA BOARD OF DIRECTORS
DIVISION AT-LARGE
10 Courtney Harris 1:102/732? Don Daniels 1:107/210
11 Bill Allbritten 1:11/301 Hal DuPrie 1:101/106
12 Bill Bolton 3:54/61 Mark Grennan 1:147/1
13 Rick Siegel 1:107/27 Steve Bonine 1:115/777
14 Ken Kaplan 1:100/22 Ted Polczyinski 1:154/5
15 Larry Kayser 1:104/739? Matt Whelan 3:3/1
16 Vince Perriello 1:141/491 Robert Rudolph 1:261/628
17 Rob Barker 1:138/34 Steve Jordan 1:102/2871
18 Christopher Baker 1:135/14 Bob Swift 1:140/24
19 David Drexler 1:19/1 Larry Wall 1:15/18
2 Henk Wevers 2:500/1 David Melnik 1:107/233
Membership for the International FidoNet Association
Membership in IFNA is open to any individual or organization that
pays a specified annual membership fee. IFNA serves the
international FidoNet-compatible electronic mail community to
increase worldwide communications.
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Address _________________________________________________________
City ____________________________________________________________
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Home Phone (Voice) ______________________________________________
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Zone:Net/Node Number ____________________________________________
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Your Special Interests __________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________
In what areas would you be willing to help in FidoNet? __________
_________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________
Send this membership form and a check or money order for $25 in
US Funds to:
International FidoNet Association
PO Box 41143
St Louis, Missouri 63141
USA
Thank you for your membership! Your participation will help to
insure the future of FidoNet.
Please NOTE that IFNA is a general not-for-profit organization
and Articles of Association and By-Laws were adopted by the
membership in January 1987. The second elected Board of Directors
was filled in August 1988. The IFNA Echomail Conference has been
established on FidoNet to assist the Board. We welcome your
input to this Conference.
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FidoNews 5-43 Page 9 24 Oct 1988
INTERNATIONAL FIDONET ASSOCIATION
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