F I D O N E W S -- Volume 14, Number 2 13 January 1997 +----------------------------+-----------------------------------------+ | 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. | +----------------------------------------------------------------------+ YOUR MESSAGE HERE! Table of Contents 1. EDITORIAL ................................................ 1 FidoNet on the Internet? ................................. 1 2. CORRECTIONS .............................................. 2 Oops in 1351 corrected ................................... 2 3. ARTICLES ................................................. 3 FidoNet WebRing on the Internet .......................... 3 Peace on Earth, etc ...................................... 4 4. GETTING TECHNICAL ........................................ 6 FSC-0014 - Binary message bundles ........................ 6 FSC-0015 - Fundamentals of FOSSIL implementation ......... 14 FSC-0016 - FidoNet mail session startup .................. 27 FSC-0017 - Archive Philosophy and Document Naming ........ 29 5. COORDINATORS CORNER ...................................... 31 Backbone Echo Changes [Nov-Dec] .......................... 31 Nodelist-statistics as seen from Zone-2 for day 010 ...... 32 6. NET HUMOR ................................................ 33 A Poem for our times? .................................... 33 7. COMIX IN ASCII ........................................... 35 Name this castle! ........................................ 35 8. NOTICES .................................................. 36 Future History ........................................... 36 9. FIDONET SOFTWARE LISTING ................................. 37 Latest Greatest Software Versions ........................ 37 10. FIDONEWS PUBLIC-KEY ..................................... 44 And more! FIDONEWS 14-02 Page 1 13 Jan 1997 ================================================================= EDITORIAL ================================================================= Some folks are resisting this but an Internet presence for FidoNet already exists and it's going to keep building. For one thing, it's often cheaper for Sysops to get their files via Internet links where connect time is virtually unlimited and filesize irrelevant. Just look at the current ELRUL701.ZIP file for example. It's 1.3Megs and a lot of files that size add up at normal phone rates on BBS connections that aren't local. The Internet also provides real-time links like IRC [Internet Relay Chat] and nearly instant email turnaround without waiting for routing schedules. It's also visual and just plain fun. [grin] I've started YAILTF [Yet Another Internet Link To FidoNet] in the form of what is known as a WebRing for FidoNet [see article below]. It now has 3 pages listed. You can be next! This doesn't mean FidoNet is being taken over by the Internet. But folks who like to communicate and experiment started FidoNet and many of them also have an Internet presence. Even Tom Jennings has a webpage [www.wps.com] while he no longer has a Node number. FidoNet will still be an amateur BBS network [even though you don't need a BBS to be a FidoNet Sysop] and will still fill a niche no other group does but we're also all over the Web and growing there faster than here. Ironic, isn't it? Well, the Jacksonville Jaguars [football for non-U.S. types] are still down by 7 in the AFC Championship game but they love to come from behind and this Issue is ready for bed. Enjoy! And SEND me some .BIOs and ASCII art!! Or I'll write longer editorials. [snicker] C.B. ----------------------------------------------------------------- FIDONEWS 14-02 Page 2 13 Jan 1997 ================================================================= CORRECTIONS ================================================================= In the Editorial of FidoNews 1351 [16 Dec 96], I misquoted the Possum Oath of Red Green as it might be applied to FidoNet ops of late. The correct Latin is: Quando Omni Flunkus Moritati and not Moratatus as previously indicated. Something about subjunctive superlatives of gerundives twice removed. [grin] The meaning stated was correct: "When all else fails, play dead." Sorry about that. Ed. ----------------------------------------------------------------- FIDONEWS 14-02 Page 3 13 Jan 1997 ================================================================= ARTICLES ================================================================= FidoNet Internet sites go circular? Christopher Baker Rights On!, 1:18/14 (cbaker84@digital.net) There are a number of FidoNet-related websites and pages out there on the Internet. Many of them are listed in FidoNews by Internet section at the end of each Issue. They are not connected in any sense other than being available on the World Wide Web [WWW] and if you want to visit them you need to enter each site's address into your browser one after the other. You can then bookmark them for your personal list if you wish. Primitive. I've discovered out there in webland a site called WebRing [http://www.webring.org] that has figured out a new way to make it easier than ever to find sites of like content and then wander amongst them in a virtual circle in cyberspace. It's a free service offered by WebRing to all who apply for unique ringnames. A WebRing is sort of like a FidoNet website Echo. There isn't any direct interaction [outside of signing onto the ring] between the sites but all the sites are in a common list a websurfer can scoot around in until s/he comes full circle. I have started the FidoNet World Wide WebRing on the WebRing server. They provide all the cgi effects and all you have to do is follow the instructions on the FidoNet WWWRing page at: http://ddi.digital.net/~cbaker84/fnetring.html and pick up the two graphics and the code blurb for your site's page. You do have to know something about HTML programming but the code blurb has all you need to get started. The sign-up page also contains entry areas for your page URL and email address. Once you've signed up you need to put the code on your page and then send email to the RingMaster [me]. You will receive email from WebRing as well with info on further steps required. It's not as complicated as it sounds on paper. Once the server tells me your page is in the queue for addition to the Ring, I go check it for continuity and then advise on corrections or add your page to the Ring for others to find. FidoNews is Site 1 and already on the Ring. I invite you to add your page[s] to the FidoNews World Wide Web Ring today! QOFM. Chris FIDONEWS 14-02 Page 4 13 Jan 1997 ----------------------------------------------------------------- Peace on Earth, etc. by Troy H. Cheek (1:362/708.4) Another Christmas has passed. This year, I got mostly clothes. I take it as a sign of old age that this is actually what I wanted. In the first FIDONEWS issue of this New Year, Michael Wilson suggests, among other things, that Fidonet should be easier to access. Now, I agree that the archaic practice refusing to offer programs or technical assistance to new users until they've got their system set up well enough to send you netmail is, well, archaic. Unfortunately, it was still in place locally when I set up as a point not too many years ago. :-( Obviously, we need to be more helpful to people who want to join in on the fun. However, some kind of central access to Fidonet with some kind of standardized program and a single phone number to call is taking things a bit too far in the other direction, IMHO. For example, I just suffered through another yearly episode of a drama some people like to call Modem-mas. Or maybe it's a sit-com. On or around Christmas (this year, it hit early) technically-illiterate newbies get their first computer and/or modem. In spite of the fact that we moan how people can't find Fidonet, these people do. (A similar effect can be noted at the start and end of each school year, as students relocate.) It's bad enough, and understandable enough, to have to explain echomail conferences, moderators, netmail, and echolag to BBS users who stumble into an echo and begin treating it like the local chat message base. It's downright bizarre to have to explain the same to someone who signs his messages "Sysop of the [Whatever] BBS." Give Fidonet a quick and easy access point, and you can multiply this problem by a few hundred. Forget for a moment the question of why people are leaving Fidonet. Consider for a moment the question of why people are _staying_ with Fidonet. One of the reasons I've heard over and over again is that Fidonet has a better signal/noise ratio than any other network. Make access _too_ easy and that goes out the window. Speaking of Windows, a new slick front-end for Fidonet also has problems. One of the other reasons why people stay with Fidonet is that you don't constantly need to buy the latest, fastest, and most expensive hardware to access it. You don't even need any particular computer platform. In other words, I feel that if we change Fidonet to try to attract people who are already being better served by other Nets, we will simply alienate those who are sticking with Fidonet because it already serves their needs. These people, I think, are what makes Fidonet FIDONEWS 14-02 Page 5 13 Jan 1997 what it is to begin with. -- |Fidonet: Troy H. Cheek 1:362/708.4 |Internet: 362-708-4!Troy.H..Cheek@river.chattanooga.net | | Standard disclaimer: The views of this user are strictly his own. | River Canyon Rd. BBS <=> Chattanooga OnLine! Gateway to the World. ----------------------------------------------------------------- FIDONEWS 14-02 Page 6 13 Jan 1997 ================================================================= GETTING TECHNICAL ================================================================= [This is part of the continuing series of FidoNet Technical proposals being presented here in numerical order. They have been reformatted to the 70 column limit where required. They also represent our continuing series of FidoNet History presentations.] Ed. FSC-0014 A Bundle Proposal Wynn Wagner III January, 1988 UPFRONT ------- What follows is a proposal for a new structure of message bundles that are transmitted between Fidonet systems. Currently we deal with "packet version 2." This is a proposed format for packet version three. The version number should be recognizable by TYPE-2 programs, but the older programs will not be able to do anything more than report an error. In other words, there is no direct upwards compatibility except for the offset in the _BundleHeader (see below) of the TYPE-3 signal. Because of this, any conversion should be slow... possibly a year or more. Interim systems would have to be able to pack and unpack both kinds of bundles. It would be required for the packer to know whether its target system knows about TYPE-3 bundles or not... either by some node list flag or by using a control file. I think it is important that a new structure be seriously considered, but it is also vital that we approach such a change with a mind to keeping it an evolutionary process rather than an overnight revolution. It is important that TYPE-2 systems be retired using attrition instead of compulsion. This proposal is described in detail... possibly too much detail. The design looks scarier than it really is. Code to process this kind of a bundle is almost trivial. One design feature is that putting a message bundle together is somewhat more involved than taking one apart. The theory is that we will be getting more and more tiny installations operating as points. Collecting and unpacking such things as echomail will be easier even on small/slow computers. Heavy volume traffic with lots of packing and unpacking is usually carried on by computers more capable of heavy work. Please note that the added work on the shoulders of the packer is almost microscopic, but it exists. This uneven distribution of the FIDONEWS 14-02 Page 7 13 Jan 1997 work is intentional. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- PRELIMARIES: METHODS -------------------- Messages are transmitted in "bundles." A bundle is a sequence of "packets." Every bundle has at least two packets: a header and a footer. This document describes the layout and use of those packets as well as the general format