response 26 of 43:

May 19 19:17 UTC 1998

re #24, I cannot telnet from anywhere to grex, I can only telnet from grex
to somewhere else, as I have no other ISP besides grex.  I will be very upset
if I cannot continue to dial in to grex (by phone) and access websites.  I
have accessed a lot of websites in connection with the bbs conferences.  I
If I could only access websites via grex by telnetting, I would have to pay
for some way to telnet to grex rather than using this money to donate to grex
(I have let my M-net account lapse and given the extra money to grex instead).
Please do no assume that everyone can telnet to grex, or use backtalk.

response 28 of 43:

May 19 22:21 UTC 1998

Thanks, I will stop worrying about it and keep supporting grex.  (Just don't
assume that everyone telnets to grex, the phrasing worried me.)

response 30 of 43:

May 20 03:46 UTC 1998

Keesan, if grex were to set up ppp on the dial in lines, you would still
have the choice of connecting the way you do now as has been pointed out. 

You would also be able to configure your computer to initiate a PPP
connection to grex's terminal server and then telnet from your PC to grex.
No other ISP would be needed.  Just some software on your PC including
TCP/IP stack, PPP dialer and telnet client.  All of those come with
Windows 95 and are available for older versions of Windows but probably
not for DOS)

response 32 of 43:

May 20 19:27 UTC 1998

Something that ought to be pointed out regarding mail on m-net, is that
m-net has had a number of serious bungle-ups with their mail software.
(I seem to remember at *least* one 3-month outage, of internet mail.)
That means many people who might otherwise be using m-net for mail, have
gone elsewhere.  One of the comments we've consistently gotten from
people who use grex, is that they use and like grex because mail is
particularly reliable for them here.  Most of those users are non-m-net
folk, so that means grex is enjoying the positive side of a reputation
and m-net the negative side.  That, in turn, means comparing mail
experience between m-net & grex is something like comparing apples and
peas.  They may both be sweet fruits, but that's about where the
similarities end.

Someone could spam the internet today by using newuser to create an
anonymous account, then running "mail" from a shell script a few
thousand times.  If this became a problem, then we'd have to get
caller-ID, and perhaps deal with the FBI or other law enforcement
bodies.  Fortunately, internet spammers work differently - and grex is
not a particularly attractive vehicle for most spammers to use when
there are so many more attractive bases of operation.  One of the
thoughts we did have regarding making "ppp" not so attractive for
spammers, was to require the use of passwords when using "ppp".

So far as a "proxy server" goes, the proxy server would be bound by the
same internet access rights that the person would normally have from
grex.  If they're not a member, the proxy server wouldn't be able to
make smtp connections elsewhere.  If they are, then the proxy server
could indeed be used to access elsewhere on the the internet - just as
the person could have done before by running that application directly
on grex.  I could be wrong, but I just somehow doubt many members would
care to do this.

response 34 of 43:

May 21 13:24 UTC 1998

I'd like to point out that M-Net _does_ have pop3 - as Grey installed 
the Pop3 patch I wrote, (and caught a teeny logic-bug ;-).

It's working fine and has SERIOUSLY cleared up the trouble we were 
having: users checking for mail _far_ too often; and, users that are
both forwarding AND using pop3..

The patch has a #define for a time-limit (currently at 15 minutes).

What it does is:

    1) Look at the users homedir for a .forward - summary abort if
       found (disallow pop3 if user also forwards);
    2) Look at the pop3-file - summary abort if it's YOUNGER than the
       programmed time "window".

That's it.. In one day, we cleared a megaload of pop3 mail, and the 
total of pop3 mail now hovers around 74 blocks at any given time.

Ask Grey for more mail-info - I just wrote a logical patch.

response 36 of 43:

May 21 22:23 UTC 1998

I haven't put this subject on the board agenda.  I felt that it needs
more discussion before the board tries to make a call on it.

response 38 of 43:

May 24 15:40 UTC 1998

The whole idea makes me nervous, but I think at this point if staff felt it
could be controlled to keep us from becoming a "hotmail/juno" clone, I'd vote
for a trial period.

It would be convenient...

response 40 of 43:

Jun 4 18:15 UTC 1998

I am strongly in favor of trying out local PPP services as an 
experiment. I don't expect us to be overrun with local users, but I 
think it could increase telephone line usage somewhat.

I would very much like to see POP supported over that service. It would 
be best if it were done from a machine dedicated to serving POP and 
perhaps other mail-related functions. 

I am fence-sitting on the internet-wide POP issue. I don't really 
believe in the doomsday scenario, and it does have certain advantages 
over what we are doing now. I wouldn't hear of it, even as an 
experiment, until mail processing were done on a separate box. Once 
we're in that state, I am still a bit uncertain, but lean towards trying 
it.

response 42 of 43:

Jun 6 13:47 UTC 1998

This has been something staff has been talking about for a year or so.