KEN ABOUT .......... EMAIL, FAX, AND TALKING
by Ken Ross: petlibrary@bigfoot.com

Web Site: http://members.tripod.com/~petlibrary

ARE THEY TALKING ABOUT US?

On July 22nd the New York Times ran an article about fellow Commodore types in ''Living the 8-Bit Dream in a 32-Bit World'', in which a reporter looked at the world of the C64 user nowadays. (Hey! - didn't Saturday Night Fever start out the same way?? ) The article can be found at:

http://www.nytimes.com/library/tech/99/07/circuits/articles/222bitt.html

You have to register (for free) first to get access to the library but it's a handy reference site so
it's worth it.
[It can also be got if you ask somebody who's got a zipped version to attach it to a reply ...;-) ]

On my website there's a new page about CBM mail lists:

http://members.tripod.com/~petlibrary/cbmlist.htm

This is a list that can be subscribed to from a chap in Australia. Details are on the page.

Down in Devon a chap by the name of Mark Thurston is setting up a C64 e-zine. See:

http://www.userport.cjb.net
or email him at thurstonet@eclipse.co.uk (does his ISP only work when the moons is in the right position?)

FTP ICL RSN!!

At the moment 'Project Upload' is underway. This involves getting files uploaded to the main Commodore software website at ftp.funet.fi/pub/cbm from the CBM/PET library. The files are in LNX format compressed in either zip or gz format. To create them I use a C64/1541 combo. Then using the A500+ I get them onto PC 720K disks for dealing with on my Mac. I will also be putting the CBM/PET library onto my website, which has just the catalogue on it at present

EUDORA (more on and about)

After Eudora has filtered incoming things into their various mailboxes there are some that need to be printed out. Transferring these into a mailbox named 'printout' I can then select all from the edit menu before printing them out all in one go. Some longer items are saved as text so that Simpletext can read them out to me while I multi task (toast, etc).

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You can get web pages delivered to your e-mail box - well at least the HTML sections - from the e-mail address:

webmail@www.ucc.ie (no subject) and the command to use is GO <URL>

It may be best to send a help command to the server first to check out the full range of commands and other info. The machine does have other things to do so your request will have to sit in a queue of jobs - so be prepared for a wait ;-)

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This is info about sending faxes for free by e-mail pulled from the website:

http://www.tpc.int

Send a FAX by e-mail. An experiment, started in June 1993, now makes it possible to send a FAX, (for free), to many different parts of the world by using Internet e-mail. Any e-mail software can be used to send a text message. Before you begin use the 'Check Coverage' page to verify the area you wish to send a fax to is covered by the TPC Project. To send your fax via e-mail start your mail software and compose a new e-mail message. The Address Format is:

remote-printer.recipient_name@fax_number.iddd.tpc.int

Notes on recipient_name and fax_number

Use the name of the recipient you wish to have on the coversheet.
The character '_' is converted to a space.
The character '/' is converted to start a new line.
Strip out punctuation characters.
Do not use long distance and international access codes.
Begin with country code (1=USA, 44=UK, etc).
Maximum number of digits is 15

An e-mail message will be sent back to you confirming the fax was sent, or information about any problems.

If you need assistance with international country codes the website has a complete country code list.
Tip: this type of e-mail to fax will generate pages approximately 80 characters wide using 11-point courier font. ASCII graphics and special characters may or may not look correct when faxed. Keep your text simple. Each fax server operator is allowed to select their own cover page and may include their own banners or format it to their liking. Some sites may rotate multiple banner ads into the cover page. In the UK the fax server operator is Demon Internet Limited. Processing time, (in a test), was 2 mins. Demon is currently configured to allow a maximum of 15 fax(es) per hour, 25 fax(es) per week

RECHARGE OF THE LIGHT BRIGADE

In the Tandy's bargain bins rechargeable battery packs for presumably discontinued cordless (?) phones lurk a very good bargain. Pulling apart a 95p item revealed 5*AA ni-cads, which at the best price of a quid each in the blister packs was quite a good buy. Just snipping the thin connections apart was all that was needed before labelling them (D1-D5) before charging up and putting into service. (So now I can watch the BBC go off air (?) at the stroke of midnight Dec 31st 1999! - as a couple of recent events have made me have some doubts about things running smoothly when the digits flip over ;-) )

NEWS & IMPROVED

For those of you who have been following things will know that for various reasons I can't use an off line news reader program in my Mac. I've been using Deja com to deliver a digest of headers by email that I can open up in Wannabe, a text only browser. This is fine except I've got to download the HTML for the advert jpegs etc. I was in the midst of going to download a promising OLR program when I accidentally clicked on a link to news:comp.sys.cbm while using IE2.0b3 (pure 68k Mac version). It seems the book that I derived my info from was wrong in using news://(group) - the thing that worked was news:(group). To my surprise up it popped and replying/posting facilities were there as well. When trying the same thing in IE3.01 it gives a dialog box saying that it wants OLR. So, in this case 'they', (Uncle Bill), took a feature out when ''improving'' things.
(Ed: Hey! If they left everything in all the time you would be complaining of bloatware!)
I've got to be online to use it but in Eudora/Wannabe combination downloading timing there's little in it, and as I write this deja.com hasn't sent me a digest in 2 weeks.

IS IT ART OR REAL (?)

Recently I encountered the corporate world as satirised in Dilbert (check out http://www.dilbert.com).

'Friday is a casual day', quote he. 'You people are stuck in an office where nobody can see you answering the phone'. Why should any day be different to another was my thought. I was also asked if I'd heard of a certain large technological multi-national firm. It turned out I knew a lot (more than I'd realised when I started talking!!). It took me a moment to realise that in the midst of my flow the speaker thought that I owned a Fokker turboprop with personalised registration, (yes folks - he'd not been listening). It gave me an insight into the world of telephone helplines - they can only (be allowed to?) follow prepared scripts. Some places it seems have rules (customs?) that are bizarre to say the least .......

15 MINS OF FAME FOLLOW UP

Well, I recently looked at the W.H. Smith's Internet Pack. When I was filmed with it the price was 50p. Now they're trying to give them away. Was it something I did?