F I D O N E W S -- Volume 13, Number 44 28 October 1996 +----------------------------+-----------------------------------------+ | The newsletter of the | ISSN 1198-4589 Published by: | | FidoNet community | "FidoNews" | | _ | 1-904-409-7040 [1:1/23] | | / \ | | | /|oo \ | | | (_| /_) | | | _`@/_ \ _ | | | | | \ \\ | Editor: | | | (*) | \ )) | Christopher Baker 1:18/14 | | |__U__| / \// | | | _//|| _\ / | | | (_/(_|(____/ | | | (jm) | Newspapers should have no friends. | | | -- JOSEPH PULITZER | +----------------------------+-----------------------------------------+ | Submission address: FidoNews Editor 1:1/23 | +----------------------------------------------------------------------+ | MORE addresses: | | | | submissions=> cbaker84@digital.net | +----------------------------------------------------------------------+ | For information, copyrights, article submissions, | | obtaining copies of FidoNews or the internet gateway FAQ | | please refer to the end of this file. | +----------------------------------------------------------------------+ SPECIAL HALLOWEEN ISSUE? Table of Contents 1. EDITORIAL ................................................ 1 Submissions are picking up ............................... 1 2. ARTICLES ................................................. 2 ARTSPEC has been updated! ................................ 2 A Short *.MSG Programming Tutorial [II] .................. 7 Speaking of music echoes ................................. 14 Rules, rules, rules ...................................... 15 3. FIDONET HISTORY .......................................... 18 When TBBS became Echomail capable ........................ 18 4. COORDINATORS CORNER ...................................... 19 Nodelist-statistics as seen from Zone-2 for day 299 ...... 19 5. NET HUMOR ................................................ 20 Cybersaga song ........................................... 20 FTSC Jokes ............................................... 20 Do Geeks rule the Net? ................................... 23 Are you an Internet addict? .............................. 26 Are you addicted to the Net? ............................. 29 6. COMIX IN ASCII ........................................... 31 Hail hail the gangs all here? ............................ 31 Comix from Chattanooga ................................... 31 Come out come out wherever you are? ...................... 33 Just in time for goblins? ................................ 34 7. QUESTION OF THE WEEK ..................................... 36 Would you send in a headline given the chance? ........... 36 And more! FIDONEWS 13-44 Page 1 28 Oct 1996 ================================================================= EDITORIAL ================================================================= We got a lot of .JOK and .CMX files this week. We also got a good response to last week's Question of the Week. Those responses have initiated the creation of a new section called Answers of the Week which appears in this Issue for the first time. Keep 'em coming! [grin] I have also updated ARTSPEC.DOC to include this new section FILENAME.TYP [.ANS] as well as adding an instruction to the message submission detail and correcting a couple other minor points. The update is included in this issue as the first article. It was also hatched out into SDS area SOFTDIST as ARTSPEC.ZIP and into the FIDONEWS file Echo as ARTSPEC.DOC along with this Issue of FidoNews. As always, it is also available on the FidoNews Webpage and by file-request to 1:1/23 [1:18/14] by filename or magicname of ARTSPEC. See the Masthead information at the end for addresses. Next week, I will begin publishing the FidoNet Technical Standards on a space-available basis. FTS-0001 is 65K so it will be most of next week's Issue. The others are much shorter and may appear in bunches. After all the FTSs have been published, the FSCs [standards proposals] will appear regularly. Another new section will be created for these publications to set them apart. Developers are welcome to submit their proposals for FidoNews publication using the filename extension of: .FTC . I'm still looking for some .BIO submissions from all you lurkers. You don't have to be famous or infamous to tell on yourself. Don't be shy. There aren't any ghost stories here to make this a Halloween Issue but we do have a Jack-o-Lantern courtesy of Dave Aronson. [grin] Boo! C.B. ----------------------------------------------------------------- FIDONEWS 13-44 Page 2 28 Oct 1996 ================================================================= ARTICLES ================================================================= [A few minor changes and adjustments and the addition of a new FILENAME.TYP] Ed. FidoNews Article Submission Guidelines FidoNet address 1:1/23 Updated 27 Oct 1996 by Christopher Baker Updated 29 May 1991 by Tom Jennings Based on the original work by Thom Henderson | denotes a change since the last update |. "Fido" and "FidoNet" are registered trademarks of Tom Jennings, Box | 410923 |, San Francisco CA | 94141 |, USA and are used with permission. -------- SYNOPSIS: FidoNews is the newsletter of the FidoNet computer network, its Sysops and users. It is passed to its readers electronically via the FidoNet and other computer networks and to non-network readers as well. This document intends to tell you how to write and submit articles for publication in FidoNews. Much of it describes the technical specifications which an article must meet in order to be included in the newsletter, as well as broad (very) guidelines on content. (Of course you realize articles can be submitted only electronically.) Please read it carefully. The article you save might be your own. ------------ INTRODUCTION: FidoNews was originally founded in early 1984 to include all parts of the lives of its member Sysops and users, which of course means not just technical matters. We do not have fixed goals of maximum distribution or maximum readership (i.e. lowest common denominator) but only to meet the needs of our individual network members. The success of this venture has always been contentious at best (ahem). In any case the grand experiment continues. Twelve years later (at this writing) and over 30,000 Nodes in the network, the editorial policy, or lack of one, of FidoNews has shown to best fit our ever-changing and unpredictable needs. FIDONEWS 13-44 Page 3 28 Oct 1996 -------------- SUBJECT MATTER: Articles on any subject of interest to FidoNet members and users are welcome and encouraged, not necessarily of a technical nature, though priority may be, but not necessarily, given to articles of importance to the FidoNet, its technology and its uses; other networks such as uucp and the Internet; social aspects of communications; ethical issues; other related matters. -------------- ARTICLE LENGTH: Try to keep articles short. The longer it is, the less likely people are to read it. Consider splitting long articles (more than five pages) into smaller articles to be run serially. Exceptions will be made at the whim of the editors. For practical reasons, we will attempt to keep FidoNews to a "reasonable size", which is of course a highly subjective and variable thing. As of May 1991, the goal is under 100,000 bytes. Decisions regarding content may be made based upon this, though in general it shouldn't be an issue. ------------------ WRITING GUIDELINES: We are not all professional writers, nor is that even a goal for the FidoNews -- we want real communication to and from real people; even at the expense of so-called "good writing", which is frequently a tool to exclude. There are a few minimum requirements though for any successful writing, even for the lowly FidoNews: * The subject discussed must be clear to people other than the author! Don't assume that people will pick up the context from your writing. Tell them explicitly. * Why are you writing this? It may seem obvious -- "Review of the new Acme 75-baud Modem" -- but it's not. Are you the manufacturer? An irate customer? Let us know your point of view. * Who are you? A good question! Anonymity is acceptable, though most people want to take credit for their work. Include full contact information including electronic mail addresses. * Articles submitted via Netmail or email must contain all the technically required lines and delimiters in the BODY of the message. This includes the *[title] line and the 70 character width requirement. | To indicate the filename type for one of these message submissions, place the FILENAME.TYP in the Subj: line of your email, Netmail, or Echomail |. Those that require extra editing may be delayed from appearing in FidoNews. FIDONEWS 13-44 Page 4 28 Oct 1996 * Articles will appear when space becomes available, not necessarily the "next" issue. If your article is of a time- critical nature, please say so when you submit it; the editor still has final say. * The editor reserves the right to request changes from an author to meet these "standards", which you have to admit are pretty loose. It is not the intent for this to be a mechanism to refuse articles the editor does not like, but simply to keep the contents intelligible. * If we have a backlog of articles, we may get fussier about things. Historically, this has not been a serious problem. --------------------- SUBMITTING AN ARTICLE TECHNICAL REQUIREMENTS: If all that hasn't scared you away, the next step is to create a text file which contains the text of your article. The resulting file should be sent or uploaded to | "Editor" |, FidoNet address 1:1/23. The "physical" location (and phone number) of FidoNews varies, and hence must be found elsewhere, such as within a recent copy of FidoNews itself. Filenames must follow the MSDOS standard: FILENAME.TYP a 1 to 8 character file name (A - Z, 0 - 9) a period, a 0 to 3 character file type (A - Z, 0 - 9) File types are used to distinguish types of submissions, as follows: .ART An article, commentary, open letter, or general news item. .GUE Want to write a Guest Editorial? [*Name & Node on line 1] .RET Need to make a Retraction of a previous article or notice? .COL Want to become a regular contributor with your own column? | .ANS Answers to the Question of the Week. | .BIO FidoNet biographies - tell us your story. .HIS FidoNet history - got an anecdote to share? .REV Reviews of related product, services, or programs. .JOK Net humor in print. .CMX Comics in ASCII. [watch those lines at 70 columns!] .PRF Want to Proofread? Get a cookie for spotting errors. .AD Advertising FREE services or events. .SAL "For Sale" .WAN "Wanted" .NOT A notice for the back of the issue. Keep them short. FIDONEWS 13-44 Page 5 28 Oct 1996 If your file doesn't have one of the above extensions, then it will lay around taking up disk space until someone takes a look at it and realizes what it is. Maybe. The name of the file is up to you, though you should use a name which is not likely to be "stepped on" by someone else -- the system will not guarantee file names are unique. For example, FNEWS.ART is probably not a good name for an article. -------------- CHARACTER SETS: The character by character contents of the file itself must meet the following standards or it cannot be published in FidoNews. The FidoNews staff WILL NOT be responsible for making file contents conform to these standards. * FLUSH LEFT MARGIN: Please do not put a "left margin" on your articles. Have the text start at the very first column. * RIGHT MARGIN AT COLUMN 70 OR LESS: Less is tolerable, more is definitely not. If your cursor is resting at column 71 when your line is ended, you're okay. One character past that even with trailing spaces and MAKENEWS will barf on your submission. If your submission is physically rejected, the Editor will have to fix it manually or send it back for reformatting. * RAGGED-RIGHT TEXT: Word-Star style "justification" (inserting spaces into sentences so that a paragraph is perfectly rec- tangular) is extremely hard to read, and consumes needless space. Please don't use it! * NO FUNNY CHARACTERS: This includes formfeeds, returns without linefeeds, linefeeds without returns, tabs and other oddities. The only control codes (character codes 0 through 31 decimal) allowed are carriage return (CR) and linefeed (LF). The only exception is: Control-Z "end of file" terminator characters are tolerated. Not required. * NO GRAPHICS CHARACTERS: Believe it or not, not everyone in the world has an IBM PC. Please restrict yourself to printable ASCII characters in the range 20 hex to 7E hex (space to tilde). * LINES TERMINATED: Each line in the article should be terminated with a 'newline' -- either the MSDOS standard (CR/LF) or the unix standard (LF only). ----------------- SUBMISSION FORMAT: Below is a sample article properly formatted. Features of it are discussed further below. FIDONEWS 13-44 Page 6 28 Oct 1996 --article file example begins below this line-- *A Sample Article [this is in LINE 1 starting at COLUMN 1] This is My Title by Joe Schmoe, [Netmail/email address] And here is my article. Note that it is flush left (zero indent).