Everybody's Guide to the Internet

217 Pages·1994·8.1 MB·English

by  Adam Gaffin

Everybody's Guide to
the Internet
Everybody's Guide to
the Internet
Adam Gaffin
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• EVERYBODYSGUIDE
Affiliated East-West Press Pvt Ltd
New Delhi Madras Hyderabad Bangalore
Everybody'sGuide to the Internetby Adam Gaffin
Originaledition published by The MIT Press, SSHaywardStreet,
Cambridge, MA, U.S.A.
CopyrightC 1994 Electronic Frontier Foundation
All rightsreserved. No partofthis book may be reproduced inany form by
any electronicor mechanical means(includingphotocopying, recording,or
information storageand retrieval) withoutpermission in writing from the
publishers and copyright holders.
First East-West Press Edition 1996
Printed at Rajkamal Electric Press, Delhi 110033
Published by Affiliated East-West Press Private Limited
104Nirmal Tower,26 BarakhambaRoad,New Delhi 110001
ISBN 81-8S938-7S-X
Not for sale or shipmentoutside India, Bangladesh,Burma,Cambodia,
Laos, Nepal, Sri Lankaand Vietnam
Contents
Foreword by Mitchell Kapor ix
Preface xi
1 Setting Up and Jacking In 1
1.1 Ready Set . .. 1
1.2 Go! 4
1.3 Public-Access Internet Providers 5
1.4 IfYour Town Has No Direct Access 15
1.5 Net Origins 16
1.6 How It Works 18
1.7 When Things Go Wrong 20
1.8 FYI 21
2 E-Mail 23
2.1 The Basics 23
2.2 Elm-A Better Way 31
2.3 Pine-An Even Better Way 33
2.4 Smileys 34
2.5 Sending E-Mail to Other Networks 34
2.6 Seven Unix Commands YouCan't Live Without 38
2.7 When Things Go Wrong 41
3 Usenet I 43
3.1 The Global Watering Hole 43
3.2 Navigating Usenet with nn 45
3.3 nn Commands 50
3.4 Using rn 52
3.5 rn Commands 55
3.6 Essential Newsgroups 58
Contents vi
3.7 Speaking Up 58
3.8 Cross-Posting 62
4 Usenet II 65
4.1 Flame, Blather, and Spew 65
4.2 Killfiles, the Cure for What Ails You 67
4.3 Some Usenet Hints 71
4.4 The Brain Tumor Boy,the Modem Tax, and the
Chain Letter 71
4.5 BigSig 72
4.6 The First Amendment As Local Ordinance 75
4.7 Usenet History 75
4.8 When Things Go Wrong 76
4.9 FYI i7
5 Mailing Lists and Bitnet 79
5.1 Internet MaHing Lists 79
5.2 Bitnet 80
6 Telnet 83
6.1 Mining the Net 83
6.2 Library Catalogs 86
6.3 Some Interesting Telnet Sites 90
6,4 Telnet Bulletin Board Systems 101
6.5 Putting the Finger on Someone 103
6.6 Finding Someone on the Net 104
6.7 When Things Go Wrong 106
6.8 FYI 106
7 FTP 107
7.1 Tons of Files 107
7.2 Your Friend Archie 108
7.3 Getting the Files 110
7.4 Odd Letters-Decoding File Endings 114
7.5 The Keyboard Cabal 115
7.6 Some Interesting FTPSites 116
7.7 ncftp-Now YouTellMe! 125
7.8 Project Gutenberg-Electronic Books 126
7.9 When Things Go Wrong 127
7.10 FYI 127
Contents
8 Gophers, WAISs, and the World·Wide Web 129
8.1 Gophers 129
8.2 Burrowing Deeper 131
8.3 Gopher Commands 134
8.4 Some Interesting Gophers 135
8.5 Wide-Area Information Servers 140
8.6 The World-Wide Web 143
8.7 Clients, or How to Snare More on the Web 144
8.8 When Things Go Wrong 145
8.9 FYI 146
9 Advanced E-Mail 147
9.1 The File's in the Mail 147
9.2 Receiving Files 148
9.3 Sending Files to Non-Internet Sites 149
9.4 Getting FIP Files via E-Mail 150
9.5 The All-Knowing Oracle 154
10 News of the World 155
10.1 Clarinet: AP,Dave Barry, and Dilbert 155
10.2 Reuters 156
10.3 USA Today 156
10.4 National Public Radio 157
10.5 The World Today, from Belarus to Brazil 157
10.6 E-Mailing News Organizations 158
10.7 FYI 158
11 IRe, MUDs, and Other Things That Are More Fun Than They
Sound 161
11.1 Talk 161
11.2 Internet Relay Chat 162
11.3 IRC Commands 164
11.4 IRC in Times of Crisis 167
11.5 MUDs 168
11.6 Go, Go, Go (and Chess, Too)! 172
11.7 The Other Side of the Coin 172
11.8 FYI 173
Contents viii
12 Education and the Net 175
12.1 The Net in the Classroom 175
12.2 Some Specific Resources for Students and Teachers 175
12.3 Usenet and Bitnet in the Classroom 179
13 Business on the Net 181
13.1 Setting Up Shop 181
13.2 FYI 184
14 Conclusion: The End? 185
Appendix A The Lingo 189
Appendix B Electronic Frontier Foundation Information 199
Index 203
Foreword
Welcome to the world of the Internet.
The ElectronicFrontier Foundation(EFF)isproud tohavesponsored
the production of Everybody's Guide to theInternet, EFF is a nonprofit
organization based in Washington, D,C., dedicated to ensuring that
everyone has access to the newly emerging communications technolo
gies vital to active participation in the events of our world, As more
and more information is available online, new doors open up for those
who have access to that information, Unfortunately, unless access is
broadly encouraged, individuals can be disenfranchised and doorscan
close, as well. Everybody's GHide totheInternetwas written to help open
some doors to the vast amounts of information available on the
world's largest network, the Internet.
The spark for Everybody's Guide to the Internet, and its companion
electronic version, EFF's Guide to the Internet, was ignited in a few
informal conversations that included myselfand Steve Cisler of Apple
Computer, Inc., inJune of 1991.With the support of Apple Computer,
EFFengaged Adam Caffin to write the book and actually took on the
project in September of 1991. The guide was originally published
electronically in July of 1993as the BigDummy'sGuide to theInternet,
The idea was to write a guide to the Internet for people who had
little or no experience with network communications. Weintended to
post this guide tothe netin ASCIIand HyperCard formats and togive
it away on disk, as well as have a print edition available, We have
more than realized our goal. Individuals from as geographically far
away as Germany, Italy, Canada, South Africa, Japan, Scotland, Nor
way, and Antarctica have all sent electronic mail to say that they
downloaded the guide. Everybody's Guideto theInternet is now avail
able in a wide array of formats, including ASCII text, HyperCard,
Foreword x
World-Wide Web, PostScript, and AmigaGuide. And the guide is
final!y available in a printed format, as well.
You can find the electronic version of Everybody's Guide to the
Internet by using anonymous ftp to ftp.eff.org and accessing
pub/NeUnfo/Guidebooks/EFF_Net_Guide/netguide.eff. Or send an
e-mail message to [email protected]. The electronic version is entitled EFF's
Guide totheInternet and is updated on a regular basis.
EFFwould like to thank author Adam Gaffin for doing a terrific job
of explaining the Net in such a nonthreatening way. We'd also like to
thank the folks at Apple, especially Steve Cisler of the Apple Library,
for their support of our efforts to bring this guide to you. Finally, we'd
like to thank our publishers at MIT Press, especially Bob Prior, for
working out an arrangement with us where we can continue to dis
tribute the text in electronic format and forego our royalties in order
to keep the price of the book low.
We invite you to join with EFFin our fight to ensure that equal
access to the networks and free speech are protected in newly emerg
ing technologies. We are a membership organization, and through
donations like yours, we can continue to sponsor important projects
tomakecommunications easier. Informationabout the Electronic Fron
tier Foundationand some of the work that we do can be found at the
end of this book.
We hope that Everybody's GuidetotheInternethelps you learn about
whole new worlds, where new friends and experiences are sure to be
yours. Enjoy!
Mitchel! Kapor
Chairman of the Board
Electronic Frontier Foundation
[email protected]
For comments, questions, or requests regarding EFF or Everybody's
Guide totheInternet,send a note to [email protected].
Preface
Welcome to the Internet! You're about to start a journey through a
unique land without frontiers, a place that is everywhere at once-
even though it exists physically only as a series of electrical impulses.
You'll be joining a growing community of millions of people around
the world who use this global resource on a daily basis.
With this book, you will be able to use the Internet to
• stay in touch with friends, relatives, and colleagues around the
world, at a fraction of the cost of phone calls or even air mail;
• discuss everything from archaeology to zoology with people in sev
eral different languages;
• tap into thousands of information databases and libraries world
wide;
• retrieve any of thousands of documents, journals, books, and com
puter programs;
• stay up-to-date with wire-service news and sports and with official
weather reports;
• play live, "real-time" games with dozens of other people at once.
Connecting to "the Net" today takes somethingofa senseofadven
ture, a willingness to learn, and an ability to take a deep breath every
once in a while. Visiting the Net is a lot like journeying to a foreign
country. There are so many things to see and do, but everything at
first will seem so, well, foreign.
When you first arrive, you won't be able to read the street signs.
You'll get lost. If you're unlucky, you may even run into some locals
who'd just as soon you went back to where you came from. As ifthis
weren't enough, the entire country is constantly under construction;
every day, it seems like there's something new for you to figure out.