Your Usernames and What They Mean Your Usernames and What They Mean This page explains the different types of usernames assigned to you and how you should use them. When your account is set up, you are assigned three separate usernames, one for each type of connection: SLIP, PPP, and shell. The username you provide when you log in tells Interlog which type of connection you want. Your primary username is the one you selected when you applied for your account. This is the username by which you'll be known to others on the Internet. For example, if your name is Joe Newbie, you might have chosen jnewbie as your username. Your SLIP username is identical to your primary username, except an 'S' is added to the beginning, giving Sjnewbie. PPP works the same way, with a 'P' at the beginning, giving Pjnewbie. If you are logging in to the shell, use your primary username (for example, jnewbie). Use the SLIP version when you want to start a SLIP session. Likewise, use the PPP version for a PPP session. Regardless of which of the three usernames you use, your password will be the same. Except for logging in, forget about your SLIP and PPP usernames. Any other time that your username is required, use the primary username you selected yourself. This is regardless of how you logged in. If you telnet into your account (even from a SLIP session) use your primary username. Eugene Mallay Professional Business Writing & Communications Consultation Services Author of The Business of Shareware -- Email for Details. emallay@interlog.com Copyright 1996. All rights reserved. ---------- Letting Others Access Your Files Through the WWW Letting Others Access Your Files Through the WWW This page explains how to make your files accessible to anyone on the WWW. While Interlog does not permit you to allow others to access your directory by anonymous ftp, you can allow access to your files by the web. Simply copy the files to your public_html directory and add appropriate links to your web pages. How the files are handled by the user depends on the configuration of the browser. For example, most web browsers are smart enough to realize they are getting a binary file is the extension is .exe. Likewise most browsers handle .zip correctly. However, some extensions might cause the browser to try to process your file. For example, putting a link to a .gif file will probably cause the browser to simply display the .gif, not download it to disk. The safest approach is to compress all your files before adding links to them. ---------- Web Development Web Development This page offers tips and suggestions on how to establish your own presence on the WWW. The following topics are available: * Creating your own home page * Adding a link to your page from Interlog's Users page * Scanning Interlog's access logs for the number of hits on your page * Adding Access Counters to your WWW pages * Learning CGI * Free CGI Scripts to add to your WWW pages * Adding your own search engine to your WWW pages. * Letting others have access to your files * Image Maps * Misc. CGI Notes * Learning Perl * Organizing Your WWW Files ---------- Using the World Wide Web Using The World Wide Web This page offers tips and suggestions on using the WWW. The following topics are available: * Searching the WWW * Downloading Files - HTTP vs. FTP * Recommended Shareware Archives ---------- Using the Shell Using The Shell This page provides information on working in the shell. The UNIX shell isn't for everyone. Compared to DOS or Windows, it is very unforgiving. Most new users find it difficult to learn. You'll probably be mostly working through SLIP or PPP, so you won't have to learn much about the shell. When you're ready to be adventurous, though, jump right in. It's a very powerful operating system, once you know what you're doing. Here is what's available about using the UNIX shell: * An Introduction to UNIX commands * Working With UNIX Archive Files * Learning Perl ---------- Using FTP Using FTP This page offers tips and suggestions on transferring files with FTP. FTP stands for File Transfer Protocal. It's a method of transferring files between two points on the Internet. The following FTP-related topics are available: * Transferring files to/from your Interlog directory * Tranferring Files To Another Individual * Downloading Files - HTTP vs. FTP * Recommended Shareware Archives ---------- Using Electronic Mail Using Electronic Mail This page contains tips on how to use electronic mail. This information is not meant to replace the manuals or documentation that come with your software. Instead, it is meant to fill in the gaps or highlight key points. Electronic mail is the lowest common denominator on the Internet. Almost everyone has an email account and can send and receive electronic messages. The following topics are available to help you use your electronic mail to its fullest: * Eudora vs. Pegasus * Mailing lists for Pegasus Users * Specifying POP and SMTP * Signatures * Forwarding mail * Getting a list of available mailing lists ---------- UNIX Commands An Introduction To UNIX Commands This page lists the most important unix commands available from the shell. See the 'man' command below for a way to get help on other commands. Here are the most important UNIX commands to know: cd -- Change Directory UNIX uses the forward slash to separate directories, not the DOS backslash. Type cd $HOME to change to your home directory from anywhere. Type cd http://www.interlog.com/~emallay to go to the parent directory (note: in UNIX the space is required before the destination). cp -- Copy File Type cp filename1 filename2 mv -- Move File. Type mv filename1 filename2 to effectively rename a file. Type mv filename1 dirname to move a file to a directory. Type mv filename1 $HOME to move a file from anywhere to your personal directory. rm -- Remove (delete) File. Type rm filename1 to delete the file. Type rm * to delete all files in the current directory. Warning: UNIX has no undelete capability. Once you delete it, it's gone. ls -- Display Directory Info. Type ls to get a listing of all files in the current directory. Type ls -l to list all files with full directory information. Type ls | more to show only a screen at a time. mkdir -- Make Directory. Type mkdir dirname to create a directory with dirname. rmdir -- Remove Directory. Type rmdir dirname to delete a directory. sz -- Send File Type sz filename1 filename2 to transfer the listed file(s) by the z-modem protocol. Type sz * to transfer all files in the current directory. trn, tin, nn -- News Readers Very powerful newsreaders. Far more flexible than anything currently available for winsock. High learning curve, though. elm, pine -- Mail Readers Easy to use (for UNIX) mail readers. man -- Manual Pages Displays a terse manual page showing options and usage for the indicated program. Type man ls to get the manual page for ls. Type man sz to get the page for sz. If you don't know the exact name of a command, use the -k option, plus a keyword. For example, type 'man -k copy' for a listing of all the commands containing copy in the name or description. ---------- Working With UNIX Archive Files Working With UNIX Archive Files This page explains how work with UNIX archive files within the UNIX shell. For MS Windows users looking to uncompress archives on their own system (rather than in the shell), use WinZip, an excellent shareware application available from most shareware archives. .tar Files Files ending in .tar can be uncompressed using the following command, typed at the command line: tar xvf ...replacing with the full filename of the archive. For example, to uncompress an archive called KoolProgram.tar, you'd type 'tar xvf KoolProgram.tar'. The contents of the archive would be uncompressed and subdirectories created beneath your current directory, as needed. .gz Files Files ending in .gz are gnu zip files. To uncompress them, type the following at the command line: gunzip ...replacing with the full filename. For example, to uncompress a file called KoolProgram.gz, you would type 'gunzip KoolProgram.gz'. The file would be unzipped and the .gz version removed. .Z Files Files ending in .Z are uncompressed using the uncompress command. Type the following at the command line: uncompress ...replacing with the actual filename. For example, to uncompress KoolProgram.Z, type 'uncompress KoolProgram.Z'. Combinations You'll often find files compressed in more than one way. For example, you might have a file named KoolProgram.tar.Z or KoolProgram.tar.gz. To handle these, simply uncompress the file as indicated by each method, starting from the right. Thus, for KoolProgram.tar.gz, you would first type 'gunzip KoolProgram.tar.gz', which will give you the file 'KoolProgram.tar'. Now you just need to type 'tar xvf KoolProgram.tar'. That makes the files in the archive ready for use. ---------- About Your Account About Your Account This page provides information about your account, including the different types of usernames you have, your password, disk space quotas, how your account is charged, checking your balance, and so on. Currently available topics include: * Your usernames and what they mean * How the accounting system works * Checking your account balance and online time usage * Keeping your account paid up * Choosing a secure password * Changing your password * Disk space quota * Interlog newsgroups ---------- Transferring Files Transferring Files To Another Individual This page discusses how to transfer files to another individual. Transferring files from yourself to another person is something that should be a trivial task, but which regrettably is not. There is no simple FTP-like tool available to you. This page explains the options you have, listed in order of convenience and reliability (additions to this list would be appreciated). * Send the file(s) as an email attachment. In Pegasus Mail for Windows, you only need to click on the "Attachments" button and fill in the resulting dialog box. Use the MIME encoding format if you know your intended recipient can support the format. Otherwise, use uuencode -- most mailers can handle uuencoded messages. Note: if you're sending a large file (over 30k), make sure your recipient's account can handle the size. Some ISPs don't accept large message or forbid their users to receive binary attachments. * Use IRC DCC transfer (I haven't used this myself, so I can't offer any details). * Put a link on one of your Web pages pointing to the file(s). This approach is extremely easy to set up and use, so long as your intended recipient has WWW access. However, anyone else who visits your Web page will also be able to grab a copy. If the files are confidential, you obviously can't use this approach. * Set up a password-protected web page. Use a cgi script to limit access to a page to those knowing the password. If you have a bit of programming skill, this is an ideal approach since it is a trivial task to set up additional pages/passwords. * Modem to modem transfer (not requiring the Internet at all). * Give your intended recipient the password to your account and allow him/her to FTP directly from your account. Warning: giving out your password should only be done with extreme caution. There's nothing to stop your recipient from logging in to your account via telnet, reading your email, changing your password (so you can't get in to your own account), sending death threats to our glorious leaders under your name... - you get the idea. Note: I expect you'll see ISP's offering a service to meet needs such as this in the near future. It is simply too fundamental a need to be left unaddressed for much longer. Businesspeople in particular will be demanding a solution. ---------- Telnet Telnet This page discusses how you can connect to other computers using the telnet protocol. Telnet is a method of logging on to other computers over the Internet as if you were sitting at a terminal at their location. Many sites accessible by telnet require you to create an account with both a username and a password. You can use your Interlog username if you wish (as long as it meets the site's naming restrictions), but don't use the same password. The password file at the site may not be secure or the site's administrator may be lacking in ethics. Use a different password for every site you are on. Remember, you're responsible for your own account. ---------- Sorting Newsgroups Sorting Newsgroups This page is simply a reminder that you can sort your newsgroups list in News Xpress. When you download the list of newsgroups in News Xpress, they're only partially sorted. Many of the more recently added newsgroups will be at the end of the list. To sort the list, choose View from the main menu, then Sort. ---------- Signatures Signatures This page contains suggestions on creating signatures for your email messages and newsgroup postings. A signature is a descriptive blurb added to the end of every message you send. Most mail programs (and newsreaders) will append your signature file automatically. Keep your signature to a maximum of four to five lines - shorter if possible. Any longer and you'll antagonize many users. You can put almost anything in your signature, as long as it is pure ASCII. Most people treat their signature like a business card. In fact, your signature is one of the best opportunities to market yourself over the Internet, since advertising in signatures is common and accepted in almost every newsgroup and mailing list. At a minimum, your signature should contain your full name and email address. Other things it can contain include some or all of the following: * Telephone and fax numbers. * Surface mail address. * Company name. * Brief description of products/services. * Professional affiliations. * Favourite sayings or a pithy quotation. Tips * You aren't limited to a single signature. Create several and alternate them. Use different signatures for different mailing lists and newsgroups. In Pegasus, use the glossary feature to manage as many different signatures as you'd like, appending them to your message manually using a hotkey (don't forget to turn off the automatic signature feature or you'll end up with multiple signatures on each message!). * If you're promoting your business through your signature, list phone numbers as well as your email address. Many people prefer to call, despite the convenience and cost-effectiveness of email. * If you're including a toll free "800" number, don't forget that users outside of North America won't be able to use it - include a regular phone number as well. ---------- Recommended Shareware Archives Recommended Shareware Archives This page lists a few good places to look for shareware applications. You can find the excellent Virtual Software Library search engine at http://www.acs.oakland.edu/cgi-bin/vsl-front. This site allows you to search most of the major archives by keyword. If you want to browse on your own, here are some recommended shareware archives: * Simtel Archives - contains a massive collection of MS-DOS, Win3.1, and Win95 software applications. No games. * WinSite (formerly CICA) - A great collection of Windows (Win3.1 and Win95) shareware. * Windows95.com 32-bit Shareware Collection -- The best source for Win95-specific software. ---------- Searching the World Wide Web Searching the World Wide Web This page provides tips on how to locate specific information available on the web. There are lots of excellent web search tools available to you. I'm not even going to try to cover them all here. Instead, I'll provide pointers to a few of the most useful and/or unusual ones, along with tips on how to take advantage of them. That should be more than enough to get you started. If you have suggestions on other sites, let me know using the feedback form below. Alta Vista My favorite web search tool is Alta Vista. Available at http://altavista.digital.com/, Alta Vista allows you to search both WWW sites and newsgroups. Alta Vista claims to have the largest index of the WWW available anywhere and I don't doubt their claim. Alta Vista is searchable by one or more keywords. The entire text of every page known to the search engine is indexed, so a search for "Toronto Maple Leafs" will bring up every page that has those three words on it. Alta Vista is most useful when you are looking for something specific. The more detailed the search, the better your results. The reason for this is that a search for "marketing" will bring up every web page with the word 'marketing' anywhere on it, when what you really wanted was web pages about marketing. On the other hand, if you're looking for pages that link to your own, or for references to your company's product, or for pages with several keywords, Alta Vista is unbeatable. For subject-related searches, use Yahoo instead (see below). Highly recommended. Yahoo Yahoo is one of the most well-known reference sites on the web. While Yahoo doesn't seem to be as comprehensive as Alta Vista, it has one advantage: it's better categorized. For example, at Yahoo, you could search for "marketing" and get a listing of marketing-related sites. The same search at Alta Vista would simply list all pages with the keyword "marketing" somewhere on the page. Yahoo can be reached at http://www.yahoo.com . General Tips * Keep both Alta Vista and Yahoo in your bookmark list, using whichever is appropriate for a given search. * If you want to see who's linking to your web pages, search Alta Vista for your base web address. For example, if your username is jnewbie, search Alta Vista for "http://www.interlog.com/~jnewbie/". This would find references to any of your WWW pages (not just your home page). ---------- Scanning Interlog's Access Logs Scanning Interlog's Access Logs This page explains how you can examine Interlog's access logs. Interlog's httpd server records information about each hit on a user's page. You can examine this log if you wish. However, it is a big file. Also, the server no longer tracks as much information as it once did - for example, it no longer shows the domain from which the visitor originated. Also, it appears that the file only maintains the current day's information. Finally, with the Harvest Cache system now being used by Interlog, not all hits are recorded. Nevertheless, the information may be of use. You can determine the number of times your home page has been accessed by typing the following at the UNIX shell prompt: grep username/home.html /usr/httpd/logs/access_log | wc -l > hits.html Replace 'username' with your own username. The number in the hits.html file will be the number of times that page was accessed. This doesn't tell you how many different people visited your page. It only indicates how many times the page was accessed. It's possible -even probably- that the page will be accessed several times in one session by the same person. If you want to extract all hits to any of your pages and place it into a file you can use for additional analysis, run this command: grep username /usr/httpd/logs/access_log > hits.log Replace 'username' with your own username. The hits.log file will contain all the information from the access log for any page with your username. ---------- Ring. Ring. Ring. (ring-throughs) Ring. Ring. Ring. This page discusses ring-throughs and what you can do about them. Sometimes you'll hear a line ringing, but no modem answers. This can be very frustrating since it stops you from being able to reach a line that isn't busy. Since Interlog's phone system thinks you've found an open line, it doesn't pass you on to the next available free line, as it would with a busy signal. Despite what you may have heard, ring-throughs are not an insidious plot to raise your blood pressure. No secret organizations are involved. Matt Harrop is not an agent of the devil. It's just a malfuntion in a modem. Repeat after me: it's just a malfunction. It's just a malfunction. There are two solutions to ring-through (and death threats to Interlog's staff ain't one of them...). One is to call Interlog using a different phone line (such as a voice line) just to tie up the bad modem. Then, call Interlog with your modem and you'll be passed by the bad modem to the first available line. The other alternative is to call another number lower down in the hunt group, one which is hopefully past the bad modem. Try the following numbers: * 515-1431 * 515-0729 * 515-9133 * 515-1487 None of the above-listed numbers are alternative ways of connecting to Interlog. There's normally no advantage in calling them since they reduce your chances of finding an available line. Use them only when bypassing a bad modem. ---------- Posting News Posting News: The Difference Between Follow Up, Reply, and Mail This page explains the difference between Follow Up, Reply, and Mail. Follow Up allows you to continue a thread. In other words, to send an article to the newsgroup with the same subject line, plus "re:" before it. If you wish, you can also include quoted portions of the text from the message to which you are replying. Reply is the same as Follow Up, except your message gets sent by email to the person who posted the message to which you are replying, and not to the newsgroup itself. Mail simply allows you to send regular mail from within the newsreader. This allows you to read an interesting article and send off comments to a third person without starting up your mail program. ---------- Reading Usenet News Reading Usenet News This page provides tips and suggestions on accessing the thousands of Usenet Newsgroups available to you. It is not meant to replace the manuals or documentation that come with your newsreader's software. Instead, it is meant to fill in the gaps or highlight key points. The following topics are available: * Interlog newsgroups * How news gets propagated * Expiration of news * Crossposting of articles * Reading Usenet News Offline * Kill Files * The Difference Between Follow Up, Reply, and Mail * News Express * Authentication Errors * Automatic newsgroup retrieval * Sorting Newsgroups * Downloading Files from Usenet newsgroups * Signatures ---------- Specifying POP and SMTP Specifiying POP and SMTP This page provides configuration information regarding your POP and SMTP settings in your mail reader. When you fill in the settings for your mail reader, you need to identify your POP mail account and your SMTP server. The POP account handles mail being sent to you. The SMTP server is used for mail you are sending to others. Normally, your POP account should be username@interlog.com, where username is your login username. Your SMTP server should be mail.interlog.com. If you have problems sending mail, try setting your SMTP server to smtp.interlog.com. If you can't receive mail, set your POP account to username@mail.interlog.com, where username is your login username. Don't make these changes unless you're having problems. If these don't work, contact Interlog support. ---------- Ping Ping This page discusses the ping utility and how your life will never be complete without it. Ping is a simple utility that tests whether or not a site is active and how fast the connection is between you and that site. It does this by sending a series of test packets to the site, which in turn sends them back to you. You won't normally have much need for ping. It's most useful when you're testing whether a site is temporarily down. It's exciting stuff. Really. ---------- Mailing List For Pegasus Users Mailing List For Pegasus Users This page contains information about PM-News, a mailing list for users of Pegasus Mail. Pegasus has an extremely active and helpful support mailing list called PM-News that should be able to resolve just about any problem you run into. This list receives anywhere from 30-100 messages per day. If you have a problem, post a message to this list. You'll almost always get a solution within 24 hours. To subscribe to the list send an email message to listserv@ua1vm.ua.edu, with 'subscribe PM-NEWS firstname lastname' in the body of the message. Of course, put your name in the message, not 'firstname'... ---------- Organizing Your WWW Files Organizing Your WWW Files This page offers some tips and suggestions on organizing your html files on your WWW site. You don't have to keep all of your html files in a single directory. You can create as many subdirectories as you want beneath public_html. For example, all pages of The Unofficial Guide are stored in the Interlog directory beneath public_html. The URL is http://www.interlog.com/~emallay/Interlog/Interlog.html Organizing your files in subdirectories improves their manageability, especially if you have a large number of pages. It also makes it easier when adding tools such as search engines. The search engine for this guide, for example, only searches pages within the Interlog directory beneath my public_html directory. Likewise, I have a number of reports and articles I've written on various business topics. By putting them in different directories, I've been able to set up search engines for only those reports, as well as one for my entire business site (but which excludes those pages in The Unofficial Guide). You have to take your directory structure into consideration when storing files in directories beneath public_html. For example, this page is called OrganizingWWWFiles.html. It is located in a subdirectory called Interlog, which is directly beneath my public_html directory. I have another page in my public_html directory called AboutAdvent.html. If I want to add a link in OrganizingWWWFiles.html to refer to AboutAdvent.html, I can't simply write as I usually would. Instead, I need to refer to this page as . This makes it clear that the file being referred to is one directory above the current one. Another approach is to use absolute URLs. That means providing the complete URL for each reference. Continuing our example, the reference would be: . Likewise, to add a link in AboutAdvent.html to OrganizingWWWFiles.html, the reference would be . Using absolute URLs, the reference would be . ---------- Reading Usenet News Offline Reading Usenet News Offline This page discusses how to read news while not connected to the Internet. If you want, you can read news offline using the Free Agent software program. Available from Interlog's ftp site, this program allows you to download articles from selected newsgroups, compose replies while offline, then post the replies once you reconnect. The program is very popular among many users. Personally, I find it easier (and often faster) to work online. If you scan a lot of messages per day, only reading selected ones (as I do), you actually use up more connect time using Free Agent since many messages that you'd never read are still fully downloaded. My approach is to read online -- often just looking at the subject line for many messages. For articles requiring a lengthy response, I copy the message to a temporary file, mark the message as unread (so it will still be listed when I reconnect), finish reading other articles, log off, compose my responses to all saved messages, log back on, and post my replies. This may sound like a more convoluted approach, but in practice it is very simple, convenient, and economical. It allows me to use my newsreader to its full power while still minimizing my connect time. ---------- Reading The Unofficial Guide Offline Reading The Unofficial Guide Offline This page explains how to read The Unofficial Guide offline. Almost all pages of The Unofficial Guide are now available in a single zipped file you can download for offline reading. To read The Unofficial Guide offline, do the following: * Use the link below to download the zipped file. If you are using Netscape, hold down the key, then click on the link. * Unzip the archive file into a directory of your choice. * Launch your browser. * Load individual html files, as desired. If you are using Netscape for Windows, just drag and drop files from File Manager/Explorer. You may find some of the links don't work properly when accessed offline since they are called using a CGI script. A few files aren't included in the zipped archive -such as the search and feedback functions- since they're completely useless if not processed by the CGI script. Download the zipped archive. ---------- Netiquette Netiquette This page provides guidelines for behaviour on the Internet. The Internet has its own distinct culture. As with any culture, standards of behaviour have developed that newcomers would be wise to follow. These rules are called netiquette. Most of the rules of netiquette you can follow or not follow as you choose, though failure to follow them will usually mark you as an outsider and give you a bad reputation. Other rules must be followed for the good of all. Breaking the more serious rules could lead to the suspension or revocation of your account. The Internet is a collection of otherwise independent networks that graciously allow traffic from other networks to pass through them. Use of these networks is a privilege, not a right. The Internet works because networks cooperate with each other. Not surprisingly, anything that risks Interlog's relationship with other networks will not be tolerated. Likewise, any actions on your part that hinders the ability of other users to make use of the Internet will not be tolerated. Basically, if you use your common sense and show consideration towards others you'll have no problems. Unacceptable behaviours include: * Spamming the Internet. Spamming is sending inappropriate messages to many newsgroups and/or mailing lists. * Inappropriate advertising. When in doubt, don't advertise. * Flagrant disregard for the charters of newsgroups and mailing lists, or the policies of FTP and telnet sites. * Abusive and/or threatening actions against other users. * Attempting to bypass or defeat system security on Interlog or any other site. * Placing unreasonable demands upon Interlog's system resources and/or bandwidth. If you're unsure whether something you have in mind would cause an unreasonable demand, check with Interlog in advance. * Any illegal activity. By following voluntary but recommended rules of netiquette, you'll find you get more out of the Internet. Many people, probably due to the relative anonymity provided by the keyboard, seem to take on an entirely new and out-of-character personality when they get on the Internet. They become belligerent, arrogant, and impatient. Showing basic courtesy and consideration will go a long way towards enhancing your reputation and helping you build lasting on-line relationships. Keep the following suggestions in mind: * Avoid flame wars. Flame wars are exchanges of nasty messages that attack the person rather than the content. People who'd never make such comments face-to-face routinely make them on the Internet. Ignore those who try to provoke you - some people simply have nothing better to do. * Keep messages short and to the point. * Limit your signature to four or five lines. Anything longer than this antagonizes many users. * Keep your messages to the same level of quality that you'd put into your written correspondence. Check spelling. Read it before sending. Think before writing. * Don't send a message in anger. E-mail makes it too easy to say something you'll regret later. * Don't use all-capitals in a message. On the Internet, capitalization suggests shouting. To emphasize a word, surround it with asterisks. * Treat personal mail as confidential. Don't disclose it to others without the author's permission. In particular, don't forward it to newsgroups or mailing lists. * When quoting others, only quote the relevant portions. Delete everything else. Never quote a long message and then simply add 'I agree" to the bottom. * Check your e-mail daily and respond promptly. * Read a newsgroup or mailing list for a week or two before posting. This gives you time to learn the local culture. Read the Usenet newsgroup news.announce.newusers for regular postings of guidelines and policies. ---------- This and That This and That This page provides links to topics that don't fit particularly well anywhere else. Here's what is currently available from this page: * Finding Usenet FAQs -- http://www.cis.ohio-state.edu/hypertext/faq/usenet/ FAQ-List.html * Searching For Shareware * List of Country Codes -- Wondering what country somebody@isp.bw is from? (BW is Botswana - now you know...) * Tranferring Files To Another Individual ---------- Logging On to Interlog Logging On to Interlog This page discusses how to log on to Interlog. There are three ways to connect to Interlog: * SLIP * PPP * through the shell via either dial-in or telnet SLIP and PPP are two different ways of accomplishing the same thing. Both allow you to connect to the Internet using software on your own computer. SLIP is the most commonly used protocol, and Interlog's Starter Kit assumes that is what you're using. To start a SLIP session, run your winsock. For Windows users, this will probably be TCPMan. Select the DIALLER menu and choose LOGIN. Your login script will then be run, connecting you to Interlog. If the line is busy or other problems occur, you'll receive a message to that effect. Try again. To log in via the shell, dial Interlog using any communications program. Once the connection has been made, type your username at the prompt, pressing when done. Your username is the name you chose when applying for your account. You'll then be prompted for your password. Type it in and press . That's all there is to it. To log into the shell while a SLIP or PPP session is running, telnet in using a winsock-based telnet program. ---------- Getting a List of Mailing Lists Getting a List of Mailing Lists This page contains information on how to get a listing of all mailing lists. You can find a well-maintained and very comprehensive list of available mailing lists at ftp://rtfm.mit.edu/pub/usenet-by-group/news.answers/mail/ mailing-lists/ This list is also available on the WWW at http://www.NeoSoft.com:80/internet/paml/. The WWW version is searchable. This list contains descriptions and subscription information for thousands of publicly available mailing lists. Be prepared for a lot of reading, though. This list is huge. ---------- Learning Perl Learning Perl This page contains links to some sources of information on learning to program in Perl. From these links you should be able to find plenty of others. * Book Review By Eugene Mallay: Teach Yourself Perl in 21 Days (David Till, Sams Publishing, 1995) * The Perl FAQ * Perl Guide with searchable index -- consists of the UNIX man pages for perl, coverted to html * Perl newsgroup (Usenet) - comp.lang.perl.misc * University of Florida Perl Archive -- Highly recommended site ---------- Learning CGI Learning CGI This page contains links to some sources of information on CGI programming. From these links you should be able to find plenty of others. * The Web Developer's Virtual Libary * The Web Development Cyberbase - CGI * The Common Gateway Interface ---------- Kill Files Kill Files This page explains what kill files are and how they are used. One thing you can always be certain of on the Internet is that you'll run across people who really get on your nerves. They post silly messages. They're abrasive and argumentative. They don't understand netiquette. Or they just keep going on and on about what a great guy Eugene Mallay really is. Whatever the reason, there's a way you can avoid seeing anything posted by these people to Usenet or to mailing lists you are on. It's called a kill file. A kill file is a listing of criteria used to filter your articles. If you're tired of those poorly written, totally inappropriate posts coming from emallay@interlog.com, add that address to your kill file. How about those pervasive Make.Money.Fast articles? Add 'Make.Money.Fast' to your kill file. The result is that you won't even know there are articles by emallay. And you'll never see 'Make.Money.Fast' again. How you create a kill file depends on what software you're using. The following example applies only to News Xpress. Select Group from the menu, then Kill/AutoSelecthttp://www.interlog.com/~emallay. from the submenu. A dialog box will appear, allowing you to indicate what you want added to the kill file. Your kill file can filter articles according to text in either the 'Subject' line or the 'From' line. You can specify that the filter applies only to a specific newsgroup or to all newsgroups. To make the filter apply to all newsgroups, enter a '*' in the newsgroups field. In both the 'Subject' and 'From' fields, you can enter text that will filter out an article if the text appears anywhere in the field. To add emallay@interlog.com to your kill file, put that text in your 'From' field. If you'd be perfectly happy to never read another message from anyone on America Online, type .aol in the 'From' field. Warning: You can often get unexpected results from a kill file. If you specify '.aol' in the 'From' field, and some other host out there has an extension of .aolo, you'll never see anything from their users either - and you might never realize the problem. Use your kill file with care. Not only will you often get unexpected results, you'll find the newsreader operates much slower as well, since it must do much more processing before it can show you your articles. ---------- Keeping Your Account Paid Up Keeping Your Account Paid Up This page explains how you can make payments on your Interlog account. Interlog will notify you when your account balance falls to $5.00. This should give you plenty of time to send in a payment to keep your account active. You may send in any amount you wish. Payment may be made by cash, cheque, or credit card. Sorry, Monopoly money is no longer accepted. Clearly mark your username directly on the cheque to ensure your account gets credited. For payment by cash, drop by the office. Sending cash by surface mail is not recommended. If your account falls into arrears it may be suspended until you've brought it up to date. While suspended, your account will still receive any email sent to you, though you won't be able to access it. Accounts which remain in arrears for unreasonable lengths of time will be terminated. However, despite what you may have heard, there is absolutely no truth to the rumours that users with overdue accounts are being visited by guys with baseball bats. Really. ---------- Internet Relay Chat (IRC) Internet Relay Chat (IRC) This page provides tips and suggestions on the use of IRC. Internet Relay Chat, or IRC, is a method for communicating with others over the Internet in real time. While in IRC, everything you type is immediately sent to all others currently in the same channel. A channel is like a newsgroup, except that messages are transmitted immediately and are not stored or archived. For best results, try connecting to the following IRC servers, listed according to typical speed and responsiveness: * irc.io.org * irc.ais.net * irc.primenet.com * irc.portal.com * irc.escape.com * copper.ucs.indiana.edu * irc.gate.net * irc.colorado.edu All standard IRC servers use port 6667. To find out more about IRC, subscribe to the following newsgroups: * alt.irc * alt.irc.questions * alt.irc.announce ---------- Introduction Introduction To: The Unofficial Guide Welcome to The Unofficial Guide to Interlog Internet Services. This on-line handbook is designed to help Interlog users get up and running on the Internet as quickly, conveniently, and productively as possible. It is meant to be a supplement to other materials, not a comprehensive stand-alone reference. There are plenty of excellent introductory materials available on the Internet, many of which I'll point you towards. While I've tried to provide balanced coverage of the various issues and topics, you'll quickly notice my own personal bias. Things that interest me tend to get better coverage. You'll also notice I'm not too shy about offering my opinion. Sorry. I'll try to restrain my personal enthusiasms... This handbook is not authorized by Interlog Internet Services. If there are errors or omissions (and I'm sure there are) blame me, not them. ---------- Internet Tools Internet Tools This page covers Internet tools other than email, WWW, newsreading, and FTP. The following topics are available: * Telnet * Archie * Finger * Internet Relay Chat (IRC) * Ping ---------- Interlog Newsgroups Interlog Newsgroups This page outlines the Interlog newsgroups, explaining the purpose of each. To help you get the most out of the Internet, and to keep you up to date on what's happening at Interlog, five Usenet newsgroups have been created just for Interlog users. They are: * interlog.announce * interlog.general * interlog.support * interlog.www * interlog.test interlog.announce interlog.announce is where you'll find announcements regarding service changes, new policies, added phone lines, etc. at Interlog. This newsgroup is moderated, meaning that only messages approved by the moderator get posted. Traffic is kept to a minimum and only important information is posted. You should read this newsgroup daily. (I don't, but you should. Do as I say, not as I do!) interlog.general interlog.general is the place to talk about whatever it is you want to talk about. Anything at all. It doesn't have to relate to Interlog, though the conversation often does. If you're looking for something on the Internet, this is a good place to ask - Interlog's users are a knowledgeable and helpful bunch. interlog.support interlog.support is an open forum for the discussion of anything to do with Interlog, though the focus is on getting problems solved. If you're having problems getting things done, this is the place to ask. If you know the answer to someone else's question, feel free to jump right in. Many of the questions are in areas not officially supported by Interlog, so your answers will probably be as good as -or better- than theirs. Don't be shy! Keep in mind that interlog.support is a public forum. Your question or comment can be read by everyone. That means you shouldn't post personal information (like your password) when giving an example of your problem. If you need to discuss something privately, send e-mail to support@interlog.com or call the office. Don't send your password in e-mail either. interlog.www interlog.www is the place to go for help in setting up your WWW pages, getting scripts to work, or locating sites of interest. Keep in mind that Interlog's support staff doesn't officially offer support on website development or on any problems associated with maintaining a site (though Andrew Silliker often answers questions anyway). Your help will normally come from other users who've already covered the same ground you've just started exploring. interlog.test interlog.test is where you can post test messages when trying to verify that your software is operating correctly. ---------- Interlog's Home Page Interlog's Home Page This page discusses Interlog's home page and how you can arrange a link from it to your own page. Interlog's home page is available at http://www.interlog.com. Interlog also has a Users page which contains links to the home pages of Interlog users. The URL for the Users page is http://www.interlog.com/users.html To add a link to your own home page, there's a form you can fill out attached to Interlog's home page. To use this you'll need a web browser such as Netscape that is capable of handling forms. You can also send email to Andy Silliker (silliker@interlog.com) with the information. ---------- Home Page The Unofficial Guide To Interlog Internet Services Welcome to The Unofficial Guide To Interlog Internet Services. If you haven't visited The Unofficial Guide in a while, you'll notice a lot of changes. I've updated most of the pages, added a search engine, included a change log page (allowing you to check for changes without having to browse all the pages), and more. It isn't finished, of course. I've still got one heck of a pile of notes to add - but I'll enter them as quickly as time permits. Expect to see changes every week. If you spot any errors, even minor ones, please let me know. You may want to check this page periodically for information relating to The Unofficial Guide. Enjoy. ---------- Image Maps Image Maps This page discusses image maps and how you can use them on your WWW pages. An image map is a graphic you display on your web page that allows users to activate a link depending on where on the image they click. Interlog supports their usage. Feel free to add them to your own pages. While image maps are a nifty feature, keep in mind that users with slow Internet connections -and when loading image maps 14.4k is slow- will be waiting awhile as your graphic loads. Make sure you provide an alternative navigation method so that users can turn off graphics if they wish. Don't forget that a large percentage of the Internet doesn't even have access to graphics. They surf the web entirely in text mode - Yes, yes, hard to believe, but true nevertheless. I thought everyone liked to sit around and daydream while waiting for their computer to redraw the screen. A utility program to assist in the creating image maps is available in Interlog's pub/windows/www directory, called MAPEDIT.ZIP. It's 78k. A Windows help file has been included. You can also get this utility using the web with the following URL: ftp://ftp.interlog.com/pub/windows/www/mapedit.zip ---------- The Hunt Group The Hunt Group This page explains Interlog's hunt groups. To make it as easy as possible to connect to Interlog, all of Interlog's phone lines are linked together in a single hunt group. When you call the primary number in the hunt group, 515-1414, all of Interlog's phone lines are available to you. The system will take you through the hunt group from top to bottom, looking for an available phone line. This means you don't have to manually try different numbers when looking for a connection. ---------- Downloading Files - HTTP vs. FTP Downloading Files - HTTP vs. FTP This page discusses the efficiency of downloading files over the WWW (HTTP) compared with downloading them using FTP. Most of the major archives on the Internet allow you to obtain files either over the WWW or via FTP. Most people find the WWW more convenient for seeking files, and usually download with their browser once they've found what they are looking for. However, file transfers are faster and usually more reliable when done using FTP. For small files, it probably doesn't make any difference which method you use. For larger files, especially those a megabyte or larger, you'll get better results by firing up your FTP program and grabbing the file using it. Even accounting for the time needed to start up your FTP program and connect to the desired FTP site, the FTP program will probably complete the download quicker than would your WWW browser. ---------- How News Gets Propogated How News Gets Propagated This page explains how postings to newsgroups get sent around the world. News travels around the world at an exponential rate. The system is based on the idea of sites voluntarily trading articles with other sites. When you post an article it is given an ID number which distinguishes it from other articles. Your article is immediately available to others on Interlog. Periodically during the day, Interlog connects with several other sites and compares article ID numbers. Any articles that aren't already available at both sites are transmitted, bringing each site up to date with the other. Most sites have several such feeds that ensures they obtain articles in a timely manner. The sites that Interlog connects with then contacts several other sites -their feeds- each of which contact several more, and so on. Within one to three days, your article has spread around the world. ---------- How It All Works How It All Works This page describes how your system connects to the rest of the Internet. You don't really need to know this information, though it will help put what you are doing in context. Packets Internet communication is based upon the concept of packets , small blocks of transmittable information. When a friend at another site sends you a message, or you download a file, or run a gopher session, you're just transmitting a long series of packets. Each packet contains enough administrative information about its purpose to allow it to be moved along from site to site, and for your software to be able to figure out what to do with it when it arrives at your site. Winsock When you're running a SLIP session, all communications between your computer and Interlog is done through a special program called a winsock. This program manages the flow of packets to and from your computer. All of your Internet tools, such as your mail program, newsreader, FTP client, Archie program, etc., use the winsock to handle the details of the connection. For most Windows users, your winsock will be TCPMan. Your programs talk to TCPMan, which in turn talks to the Internet. You can have numerous SLIP applications running at once if you wish. TCPMan will ensure that the right packets get to the right application. This means that you could be downloading a large file via FTP, reading your mail, and keeping a WWW session active all at the same time. Bandwidth Bandwidth is the capacity of your connection. Most Interlog users will be limited to 14.4k bps. This represents the primary limitation on your activities. With a 14.4k bps modem you might find it tolerable to download a file and read news at the same time. However, if you tried to explore the world wide web as well (or run three or four simultaneous FTP sessions) you'd find it unbearably slow. There would simply be too many packets trying to squeeze through your limited bandwidth. Of course, if you're using a modem slower than 14.4k bps, the slowdown will seem even greater. While your own bandwidth, represented by your modem's speed, will typically be the biggest bottleneck, sometimes various parts of the Internet get bogged down as well. Interlog currently has two T1 connections to the Internet, providing plenty of bandwidth for most needs. However, it can still be heavily taxed during peak hours. At such times there are so many users transmitting and receiving so many packets that the Internet appears to have slowed down. Basically, a traffic jam occurs. For maximum responsiveness, try to schedule your activities, especially FTP sessions, for off-peak hours. Transfer rates can vary widely from one site to another. Again, the problem is usually bandwidth. Some sites have slow connections. Others have a fast but overtaxed connection. Many sites also limit the amount of their bandwidth they will allow you to use. For example, some sites restrict the bandwidth allotted to FTP sessions. That means that your file transfer might be slow even though the connection itself is extremely good. The bottom line is that if you have only limited bandwidth at a site, the responsiveness will be slow regardless of the speed of your personal connection. Interlog Time Outs Interlog's modems are set for a 30 minute time-out. This means that if the modem detects no activity for 30 minutes it will assume you are done and terminate the connection. The time-out is in place for two reasons. First, it protects your time if you've forgotten to log out or had problems with the connection. Second, it frees up an idle telephone line for other users. While the time-out shouldn't normally cause you any inconvenience, keep it in mind if you are connected by SLIP or PPP and you are writing a long news article or reading a large number of e-mail messages. In such cases, all of your activity takes place exclusively on your computer without any activity over the phone line. You could find that you get disconnected unexpectedly. To be safe, periodically do something that uses the modem. For example, switch away briefly from your newsreader and ping Interlog or have your mail reader re-check for new mail. If you are connected directly to the shell, time-outs should never be a problem since every keystroke is immediately transmitted to Interlog, thus there's almost always modem activity. ---------- Home Page Search Engines Home Page Search Engines This page provides pointers to search engines you can add to your WWW site. If you are serious about your WWW site, you probably already know that content is one of the keys to success. The easier you make it for your visitors to find the specific content that interests them, the more likely they are to return regularly. One way to do this is to provide a search engine for your site. A search engine allows visitors to specify keywords of interest to them. The search engine then locates all WWW pages on your site that matches the visitor's criteria, creates a new WWW page that contains links to those pages, and sends the page to the visitor. With most search engines, you can indicate which files and/or directories are searchable. Available search engines run from the simple to the complex. The problem for you, as an Interlog user, is that most of the good ones require installation by someone with root acceess - and odds are, our fearless leader, Matt Harrop, isn't going to give you root access. Thus, you need to find engines that can be installed by individual users in their own cgi-bin directories. Luckily, you have some options. A good, simple choice is Matt Wright's search engine available at http://www.worldwidemart.com/scripts/. There's nothing fancy in this search engine, but it is very easy to install and works flawlessly on Interlog. It's only suitable for reasonably small sites, though, since it uses a brute force search method - it simply searches every page for the specified keywords. This means that the more pages you have, and the larger they are, they slower the search. If you want more flexibility, or faster, index-based searches, try using the combination of SWISH and WWWWAIS . SWISH is an excellent database/indexing program that builds a compact index of all pages and directories specified by you. WWWWAIS provides a WWW interface to the search engine, allowing the visitor to specify which (if you have more than one) of your indexes to search and what to search for. These packages work closely together and are a nice tandem. However, while I have used these packages on other sites, I haven't tried them on Interlog yet. They should work from your local cgi-bin directory, though I haven't verified it. If you get it installed successfully, let me know. To get more information on SWISH and WWWWAIS, visit http://www.eit.com/software/swish/swish.html. If you know of any other publicly available search engines that will work on Interlog, please let me know and I'll add a reference to them once I've checked them out. ---------- Free CGI Scripts Free CGI Scripts This page describes freely available CGI scripts that you might want to use with your WWW page. Unless otherwise noted, all of these scripts have been tested on Interlog, though subsequent changes by the script's author or system changes by Interlog's staff may have changed that. To the best of my knowledge, these scripts work as advertised. However, use them at your own risk. PHP/FI 2.0 PHP stands for Personal Home Page Construction Kit. It's a cgi program written by Rasmus Lerdorf that allows you to add programming to your html files. The language is very straightforward, though surprisingly powerful. With it, you can create sophisticated forms, interactive surveys, dynamic ("on the fly") pages, and so on. It also includes logging and access control features, though I haven't been able to get them to work on Interlog, as yet. I've had no problem getting them to work on other servers, however. If anyone manages to get logging working on Interlog, please let me know. I use PHP for a number of my pages, including almost every one of The Unofficial Guide's pages. While it isn't for people completely new to UNIX, it isn't hard to install or learn. There are many excellent examples for you to customize for you own use and an active, helpful newsgroup. Best of all, the author seems to update the package almost weekly and is very responsive to suggestions. Visit the PHP home page at: http://www.vex.net/php/ Highly recommended. Matt Wright's Guestbook A guestbook is a chronological (or reverse-chronological) listing of comments made by people visiting your WWW site. Each entry is added to the guestbook html file, allowing other visitors to see the comments made by earlier visitors. It's a handy way to receive feedback while building a sense of community among your visitors. Matt Wright's guestbook script is quite nice. It is full-featured, easy to install, and well supported. Each entry in the guestbook consists of the name and email address of the visitor, the date and time of the visit, and the comments made by the visitor. Optionally, you can allow visitors to create a link back to their own WWW page. The notification features are especially handy. You can set up the guestbook to send you a notification message whenever anyone signs your guestbook. You can also have a message sent to the visitor. For example, you might send a message saying "Thank you for visiting my WWW site. Please visit again." Setting up the script is easy. A fairly thorough README file explains each of the options available to you. Examples are shown for each option. However, novices might have a small problem customizing the notification features since doing so requires editing subroutines within the script. The changes are easy to make -they don't even require that you understand PERL- but they can be daunting nevertheless to a novice. I've set up this guestbook on the Table of Contents page of the Unofficial Guide. Check it out to see how it works (and don't forget to sign it, of course!). To obtain this script (and browse Matt's many other excellent scripts), visit Matt Wright's Script Archive at: http://worldwidemart.com/scripts/ ---------- Forwarding Mail Forwarding Mail This page contains instructions on how to automatically forward your email from your Interlog address to some other mailing address. To forward your mail to another email address, simply create a file in your Interlog user directory called .forward (note the period at the beginning of 'forward' - it's necessary). This is a plain ASCII file. Inside it, place the full email address where you want your electronic mail sent. Once this file is created, all your email will automatically be forwarded to the provided address. If you're new to UNIX, here's step by step instructions for creating the file: * You need to be in the UNIX shell to create this file. Telnet to your shell account or dial-in directly to it. * Once in your user directory, type pico .forward to run the pico text editor. * Type the full address you want your mail sent to. * Press ctrl-x. This tells pico you're done editing. * Type 'y' to save the changes. * Press to accept the default filename of .forward . That's it. Don't forget to delete this file when you no longer want your email forwarded. ---------- Finger Finger This page discusses how to use the finger utility. When someone on the Internet gives you the finger, they aren't necessarily being rude. Finger is a simple tool that allows you to check the status of an individual or host on the Internet. When you run finger, you provide an address and finger will retrieve basic information such as the date and time the person was last logged in, the full name of the user/site, and the associated '.plan' file. A '.plan' file is an ASCII file stored on the UNIX host that contains any information the user or host chooses to provide. Many people use this as a method of transferring information. For example, you could have a company overview stored in your .plan file, and anyone interested could simply finger you to get the information. Many sites disable or limit the workings of finger in order to protect the privacy of their users. In particular, many sites disable the time and date the user was last logged on. The finger utility is available from the UNIX shell or as a winsock application. ---------- Expiration of News Expiration Of News This page explains how long Usenet newsgroup articles are maintained on Interlog. Once a news article shows up on Interlog, it has only a limited life before it will be deleted. All articles in binary groups (such as alt.binaries.pictures) are expired after two days. Other articles expire after four days. Fairly rapid expiration of articles is necessary to avoid causing Interlog's hard drive from being overloaded. As it is, news takes up hundreds of megabytes of space, with the amount used increasing with every additional newsgroup created. Less than two years ago, there were only about 4,000 newsgroups. Today, there are over 14,000. As much as a hundred newsgroups are created each week and each newsgroup could have hundreds of articles per day. ---------- Eudora vs. Pegasus Eudora vs. Pegasus This page discusses the advantages (in my opinion) of Pegasus Mail over Eudora. The two best mail readers available for MS Windows are Eudora and Pegasus. I use Pegasus and strongly prefer it over Eudora. Pegasus allows me to maintain my own distribution lists, filter messages into suitable folders, automatically reply to messages based on customizable criteria, etc. Unlike Eudora, Pegasus is being actively developed by its author, so you can count on problems being fixed and enhancements routinely added. It's available for MS Windows, MS DOS, and the Mac. And it's absolutely free, too. On the negative side, Pegasus is a little harder to set up than Eudora, partly because it has far more features and options than Eudora and partly because it is also designed to serve as a Novell network mail system. The documentation isn't great, either, though it's okay. However, once set up it is very easy to use. There are some minor quirks with the program, but it is still lightyears ahead of the alternatives, free or otherwise. ---------- Downloading Files From Newsgroups Downloading Files From Newsgroups This page explains how to download files from Usenet newsgroups using the News Xpress newsreader. To download a multi-part file, simply right-click on each file in the order you want them downloaded. In most cases they'll be listed in the proper order, but sometimes part three might show up before part two, or another file might be in-between parts of the file you want. NX numbers each file as you right-click on it, so you can use that as a guide to the download/decode order. When you're ready to decode, press F9 or select DECODE from the article menu. To deselect files, just right-click on them again. If you wish, you can select more than one file at the same time before choosing decode. As long as each file's parts are in order, NX will figure out where one ends and the next begins. If you are selecting a lot of consecutive files, you don't have to click on each one individually. Right-click on the first one in the list, keep holding the button down, and drag the cursor to the last continuous file you want, then release the button. If there were one or two undesired files in the middle of the selected block, you can still right-click on them to deselect them. NX will renumber the remaining files. ---------- Disk Space Quota Disk Space Quota This page explains how Interlog's disk space quota works. The maximum amount of Interlog's hard disk space you can be using at any given time is ten megabytes. Software on Interlog checks to ensure that you haven't exceeded this limit. If you do, you will be forced to clear files until you are below ten megabytes. This shouldn't be a problem for most users since those using SLIP or PPP usually transfer files directly to their own computer without using Interlog as an intermediary. You may run into problems, though, if you have extremely large world wide web pages or if you're working in the UNIX shell. The quota does not apply to email waiting for you on Interlog. ---------- Crossposting of Articles Crossposting Of Articles This page explains how to post a single article to more than one Usenet newsgroup at a time. Sometimes you'll write an article that needs to be posted to more than one newsgroup. Perhaps your article is of interest to both interlog.general and alt.barney.die.die.die (well, it could happenhttp://www.interlog.com/~emallay.). Instead of posting the same article twice, once to each newsgroup, crosspost it. Crossposting means that an individual reader will only see your message once, regardless of how many newsgroups to which it is posted. Once it has been read in one newsgroup, it won't show up in other newsgroups for that person. If you post separate messages to each newsgroup, you'll irritate a lot of people by forcing them to read your message each time. Crossposting also reduces the overhead on the Internet. To cross post, simply list all the desired newsgroups on the newsgroups line, separated by commas. There should be no spaces between the names, only commas. ---------- Creating Your Own Home Page Creating Your Own Home Page This page outlines how to set up your own WWW pages on Interlog. Creating basic web pages is very easy. You don't need to be a programmer or have specialized knowledge. While there are plenty of people you can hire to do it for you (including me), it's not at all difficult. The hardest part of creating a web site isn't the html coding, it's designing it to meet your objectives. Individuals should be able to design personal sites on their own. Businesses may be better off hiring an expert. To learn how to create web pages, you need to learn the Hypertext Mark-up Language (HTML). HTML is extremely easy to learn and there are plenty of good references and tutorials available. Here's a couple you might want to check out: * Composing Good HTML. * Beginner's Guide to HTML * Running A WWW Service There are also a number of Usenet newsgroups covering html. Try comp.infosystems.www.authoring.html, for example. The best way to learn html is to simply study what others have done. When you find a page on the web that appeals to you, examine its source. You can do this through your web browser. With Netscape, you click on 'View', then 'Source' to see the source for the currently loaded page. However, viewing the source code can be misleading. While the source code will always contain all the information necessary to create the web page, it may not reflect the overall work done by the site from which you obtained the page. The html file that shows up at your browser may not be the same file as was on the server you obtained it from. For example, many of the pages on my site contain built-in scripts that process the page before sending it to you. Take a look at the feedback form attached to each page of The Unofficial Guide to see this in action. My feedback pages adjust themselves dynamically depending on what, if anything, you entered into the form. To see what my feedback page looks like before processing, load the form into your browser using this URL (use the "Back" button/command on your browser to return to this page when done): http://www.interlog.com/~emallay/Interlog/feedback.html As you can see, it's quite a mess. Now look at the processed form, as it is usually viewed (go ahead and send me feedback so you can see how the script works - note that one html file handles the entire feedback process, though it looks like three separate pages to the user): http://www.interlog.com/~emallay/cgi-bin/php.cgi/~emallay/ Interlog/feedback.html Once you've created your web pages, you need to do the following: * Login to the UNIX shell. * Type mkdir public_html. * Type chmod 755 public_html. * If your web files are on your computer, transfer them to the public_html directory. You can do this using ftp if you're connected by telnet. * Rename your home page home.html. This allows you to provide your URL as simply http://www.interlog.com/~username, where username is your username. Note that the '~' is necessary. It's not a typo. There are no specific restrictions on what you can put on your web page. Essentially, you can put anything you want so long as it isn't illegal and doesn't put too much demand on Interlog's resources. For example, if you put your collection of adult GIFs on your web page, the resulting high level of traffic to your web page would cause major congestion on Interlog's system and network connection. If you're uncertain about a planned usage for your web page, check with Interlog support first. ---------- Country Codes Country Codes This page discusses country codes and how to interpret them. A link is provided to a complete listing of country codes. Every country has been assigned a unique code for internet addresses of sites within that country. The country code is the last part of the Internet address. For example, if you receive email from jsmith@downunder.au, you can determine that the sender is from Australia ('au' is the country code for Australia). However, not all addresses use the country designation. Sites located within the United States and, to a lesser extent, Canada rarely use it -- prefering 'com' or 'edu' or 'net' instead. In general, if an address ends in one of these exceptions, it's probably located in the United States or Canada. Keep in mind that the country code doesn't tell you where the user is actually located. It only tells you where the address itself is. For example, I have several other Internet accounts, including ones that would put me in the United States, Germany, New Brunswick, and Mexico (no, I'm not Internet-crazy -- all except the New Brunswick account are client-related...). For a complete list of country codes, visit http://www.quicknet.net/ctrycode.htm. ---------- Table of Contents Table of Contents This page of The Unofficial Guide To Interlog Internet Services provides a general breakdown of all topics covered within The Unofficial Guide. Choosing one topic will usually lead you to others. You can also read The Unofficial Guide offline, if you wish. If you're looking for something specific, try using the search engine. It'll provide you with a listing of all pages containing the keywords you specify. When you get a moment, please sign my guestbook. * Introduction to the Unofficial Guide * About Your Account * Connecting to Interlog * How It All Works (brief tutorial on how your 'net connection works) * Using the World Wide Web * Web Development -- Putting yourself on the WWW * Reading Usenet News * Using Electronic Mail * Using the UNIX Shell * Using FTP * Other Internet Tools * Netiquette * This and That Return to The Unofficial Guide's Home Page ---------- Connecting To Interlog Connecting To Interlog This page discusses issues affecting your connection to Interlog. Topics covered include: * The hunt group * Logging on * Busy signals * Ring. Ring. Ring. (ring-throughs) ---------- Choosing A Secure Password Choosing A Secure Password This page explains how to choose a secure Interlog password. When choosing a new password it's important to make it non-intuitive to strangers. There are lots of people out there who'd like nothing better than to learn your password and wreck havoc on your account. To protect yourself, put some thought into your choice. Use the following guidelines: * Make it at least five characters long, preferably seven or more. For example, my password is Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious. * Don't use any word or term obviously associated with you, such as any part of your name, your birth date, your spouse's name, your kid's name, your occupation, etc. * Upper and lower case are treated differently, so mix them up in unusual ways. Try gOlEAFSgO, for example. * Include numbers. Change your password frequently, at least every three months. Keep it secure and never give it to anyone. If you've written it down, don't leave it next to your computer or in some obvious location. Just like your telephone, you are responsible for your own account. There's usually no reason for anyone, including staff at Interlog, to know your password. If Interlog's staff does require your password, provide it to them over the phone, not by email. ---------- Checking Your Account Balance & Online Time Usage Checking Your Account Balance & Online Time Usage This page explains how to check the balance of your Interlog account and determine how much online time you've logged during the current accounting month. The easiest way to check the status of your account is using the query form on Interlog's WWW home page. You can directly reach the account status form by going to http://www.interlog.com/account.html. Enter your primary username (without the preceeding 'P' or 'S') in the space provided and click on the 'OK' button. Details on your account status will be sent to you by email (the information isn't displayed on your web browser for security/privacy reasons). Your account status will tell you what service plan number you're using, how long you've been online during the current accounting month, when your accounting month begins, and your current account balance. If you have any questions regarding your account, send email to accounting@interlog.com. ---------- Changing Your Password Changing Your Password This page explains how to change your Interlog password. When your account is created you are provided with a temporary password. It's highly recommended that you change it immediately. To change your password, you must be in the UNIX shell. If you're logged in via SLIP, telnet to interlog.com and log in. Then type passwd and press . You'll be asked for your old password. Type it in and press . Then enter your new password (see below for guidelines). When asked to confirm your new password, retype it exactly as before. The system will then rebuild its database, which may take as much as 10 minutes (it only seems like 10 hours). Be patient. Don't attempt to break the connection with Interlog during this process. The world as you know it will end if you do. Once the database rebuilding process is complete, make sure you change the password in each of your winsock applications that require it, including your winsock 'login.cmd' script. ---------- Change Log Change Log This page lists all recent changes to The Unofficial Guide. April 1, 1996 * Updated: Free CGI scripts - Added profile of Matt Wright's guestbook script March 27, 1996 Added a Guestbook -- please sign! March 23, 1996 * Updated: Access Counters - Added link to the Interlog page explaining how to use the system-wide counter script March 16, 1996 * New Page: Reading The Unofficial Guide Offline March 14, 1996 * New Page: Transferring Files To Another Individual * Updated: Misc. CGI Notes & Tips -- Added link to Mike Diamond's Using CGI on Interlog FAQ March 10, 1996 * New Page: Country Codes - Information about country codes and a link to a complete listing * Updated: Scanning Interlog's Access Log -- Updated the information. It was out of date. * Updated: UNIX Commands -- Added reference to the '-k' option using the man utility * New Page: Learning Perl * Updated: Shareware Archives -- Added additional links to major shareware archives * New Page: This and That -- For links and comments that don't fit anywhere else * Updated: Various pages -- minor corrections such as spelling errors, slight errors of fact, etc. Thanks to everyone who pointed out problems! March 2, 1996 * Updated: Creating Your Own Home Page -- Added link to another good tutorial * New Page: Organizing Your WWW Files * New Page: Reading Usenet News Offline * Updated: IRC -- Listed the standard port number and added links to irc-related newsgroups. * New Page: Posting News: The Difference Between Follow Up, Reply, and Mail * New Page: Web Development - Putting Yourself On The WWW * New Page: Working With UNIX Archive Files * Updated: Using The UNIX Shell -- Is now a directory page with links to other pages. * New Page: An Introduction To Basic UNIX Commands -- The same material that used to be on the Using The Unix Shell page. * New Page: Learning CGI February 27, 1996 * Updated: Interlog Newsgroups (added links directly to the newsgroups) * New Page: Free CGI scripts ---------- Misc. CGI Notes & Tips Misc. CGI Notes & Tips This page contains notes and tips on CGI that don't fit anywhere else as yet. Mike Diamond's Using CGI on Interlog FAQ Mike Diamond, one of Interlog's staff, is writing a FAQ on using CGI on Interlog. It can be found at: http://www.interlog.com/~diamond/cgifaq.html Interlog's WWW Server Interlog is running the NCSA httpd server. Where To Put CGI Scripts Okay, you've finally written a nifty CGI script. Now, what do you do with it? Interlog's server configuration allows cgi scripts to be run from anywhere within your personal public_html directory (and subdirectories). However, all scripts must have a .cgi extension. If your script is called MyKillerApp.pl (a perl script), rename it MyKillerApp.cgi (it will still work will perl...). While you can place cgi scripts anywhere within or under your public_html directory, I recommend creating a directory called cgi-bin beneath public_html and storing all cgi scripts there. Don't forget to set appropriate permissions on your scripts. Languages Used For CGI Programming You can use any language you want for CGI programming. The most common language is probably perl, mainly because it handles text parsing extremely well. C is also used frequently. A perl interpreter is installed on Interlog, as is a C compiler. Windows/DOS Users... If you're writing your scripts in Windows or DOS, then transfering them to Interlog, be sure to set your FTP program to transfer as ASCII. This automatically translates the files to UNIX format. If you don't, the files may not work as expected. ---------- Busy Signals Busy Signals This page discusses everyone's favorite sound - the busy signal. "Hey! Last night I got busy signals at 2:15AM. Don't you people have a life? I mean, I know I don't, but don't any of you?" - Heard on the Internet Nobody wants to hear the dreaded busy signal. Regrettably, you will hear it, unless you arrange for a dedicated line for yourself. Simply keep dialling. Your login script should have a re-dial capability built in, so it will keep trying until it gets a connection. Usually you can get on within ten to fifteen attempts, even at the busiest of times. You can make it easier, though, by being selective about when you call. The system is busiest from 4:00PM to 1:00AM, and especially from 8:00PM to 11:00PM. You'll rarely have problems during the daytime or in the very early morning. If you find it particularly difficult to get on, let the staff at Interlog know. In nothing else, they can tell you when the next batch of phone lines will be installed. Swearing repeatedly at your modem doesn't help. I've tried. ---------- Automatic Newsgroup Retrieval Automatic Newsgroup Retrieval This page explains how to stop News Xpress from automatically downloading the entire newsgroups list every time you start it up. If you find that News Xpress is downloading the entire newsgroup list from Interlog every single time you log on, go to the preferences screen (available from the Options menu) and turn the 'feature' off. There's no reason to download the entire list every time. You'll still be notified of new newsgroups. You only need to download the entire list if you feel the current list has become corrupted. ---------- Authentication Errors Authentication Errors This page explains how to solve Authentication Errors in the News Xpress newsreader. If you receive an Authentication Error when News Xpress tries to connect to Interlog, you've entered incorrect information in News Xpress's set-up screen. Actually, you've provided too much information. When filling in the set-up screen of News Xpress, leave the ID and password fields blank. Interlog does not require that information for your newsreader to access the newsgroups. If you do fill it in, you'll receive the Authentication Error message. ---------- Archie Archie This page discusses the archie search tool. Archie allows you to search the Internet for a particular file. To use Archie you must know at least part of the file's name. Archie sites routinely poll major archives, compiling a listing of all files available there for ftp. When you run an Archie query, it checks its database, providing you with a listing of the sites matching your request. For MS Windows users, I recommend ws_archie, available from any major winsock archive. Versions are available for both Windows 3.1 and Windows 95. ---------- How The Accounting System Works How The Accounting System Works This page explains how Interlog's accounting system tracks and accounts for your online time usage. Whichever service option you choose (bronze, silver, gold, or platinum - call Interlog for details and pricing), your account will be charged an appropriate amount on a daily basis. The amount deducted each day is simply the monthly cost of the plan divided by 30. If you exceed the number of free hours of usage for that plan during the month, the daily charge will increase to include the hourly rate plus the base amount. Once your month is complete, the system will revert to deducting only the standard daily rate. For accounting purposes, your month begins on the day of the month your service was activated. For example, if your account was activated on January 15th, your month begins each 15th. That's the date to watch if you're concerned about exceeding your total free hours. On each 15th, your usage meter will be reset to zero. Any unused hours from the previous month are lost when each accounting month commences. In other words, use 'em or lose 'em. Free hours cannot be carried over from one month to the next. If you maintain multiple logins (such as having a SLIP session running and then telnet-ing into your shell account) the system will not double charge you. You are only charged for the time you are on the system. What you're doing has no effect on how you will be billed. Interlog tracks time in one second intervals, then rounds it to the nearest minute when you log off. The accounting software will detect it when a connection is lost. Nevertheless, if you're using shell access you should get in the habit of properly exiting the system (by typing 'exit'), since Interlog makes no guarantees that it will detect the disconnection. ---------- Access Counters Access Counters This page explains how you can set up access counters to track how often your pages have been 'hit'. While Interlog maintains a central access log file showing all hits on any pages on Interlog's WWW server, searching it for your own hits is a cumbersome, inconvenient process. It's also taxing on Interlog's resources. A better approach is to track hits on your pages on your own. There are plenty of access counters available. An excellent, highly configurable one that works on Interlog is Count 2.2. Available at http://www.semcor.com/~muquit/Count.html, Count provides all kinds of flexibility, including tracking hits without actually displaying the count to your visitors. Highly recommended. Interlog also has an access counter script installed for system-wide use. I haven't used it and can't say how well it works or how reliable it is. Interlog has a support page explaining how to use it. Check there for details. ---------- Transferring Files To/From Your Interlog Directory Transferring Files To/From Your Interlog Directory This page explains how to transfer files back and forth between your personal computer and your user directory on Interlog. Use ftp to transfer files between your own computer and your user directory on Interlog. To do this, set the ID to your standard username (not the SLIP or PPP version) and your password as your real password. This isn't anonymous ftp, so don't use your email address as the password. For example, if your username is jsmith, here's how you would connect using ws_ftp: * Run ws_ftp. * Click on Connect. * Click on New. * Fill out the fields as follows: * Host Name: interlog.com * Host Type: auto select * User ID: jsmith * Password: ********** * Leave the other fields blank. * Click on the Save Password check box. * Click on Save. That's it. Now you can use your home directory just like any ftp site. This only works for you, though. You can't use this method to allow others to access your directory since you'd have to give them your password. Once they have your password, they have complete control of your account, including the ability to change your password and lock you out! They're not just limited to ftp. Interlog does not currently provide any means for you to allow others to obtain files from you via ftp. Eugene Mallay Professional Business Writing & Communications Consultation Services Author of The Business of Shareware -- Email for Details. emallay@interlog.com Copyright 1996. All rights reserved. ---------- End of Document