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Grex > Coop13 > #241: Ack! Ypsilanti is a long distance call! | |
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aruba
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Ack! Ypsilanti is a long distance call!
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Feb 10 21:04 UTC 2005 |
When Grex's modems moved to Ypsilanti, Grex suddenly became a long-distance
call for a number of people who live to the west of Ann Arbor.
Speaking for myself, it just never occurred to me that that was going to
happen when we moved the phones. It should have, but it didn't.
I don't think disenfranchising those users is OK. I think we need to find
a way to maintain a modem presence in Ann Arbor.
This item is for discussing options.
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| 59 responses total. |
remmers
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response 1 of 59:
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Feb 10 21:21 UTC 2005 |
Option 1: A terminal server located in Ann Arbor. Getting a machine
to run it on should be easy; space to house it might be a
little trickier.
Option 2: (Possibly) Our new host, provide.net, has a local telephone
presence through much of Michigan, I presume including the
disenfranchised areas. I wonder if we could make an arrangement
with provide.net to piggyback on that -- i.e. user would call
and connect to provide.net, then telnet to whatever our ip
is within their LAN.
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albaugh
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response 2 of 59:
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Feb 10 21:23 UTC 2005 |
"It's a long way to Ypsilanti, a long way to go..."
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tod
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response 3 of 59:
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Feb 10 22:24 UTC 2005 |
Are you quoting Lucifuge by Danzig?
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aruba
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response 4 of 59:
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Feb 10 22:37 UTC 2005 |
Re #1: If we have a terminal server in Ann Arbor, can it automatically
telnet right to Grex, just like the old terminal server did?
If so, that just means we need someone with a dedicated internet connection
to house it.
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mary
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response 5 of 59:
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Feb 10 22:44 UTC 2005 |
And a phone line paid for by Grex.
If we went this route could we cancel one of the phone lines at
Provide and instead pay for a line for the terminal server? Do we
know, approximately, how many people are now left out of the local
area?
Anyone know how much it would cost for Grex to get an 800 number, on
one line?
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mary
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response 6 of 59:
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Feb 10 22:50 UTC 2005 |
Er, that should be, "Do we know, approximately, how many of our
dialin users are now unable to connect as a local call to Provide?"
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remmers
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response 7 of 59:
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Feb 10 23:13 UTC 2005 |
Re #4: Yes, a terminal server in Ann Arbor could be set to telnet directly
to Grex.
I think that option 2 listed above is worth exploring. It might not be
available, but if it is and the price is reasonable, it could mean that
our phone coverage is the same as provide.net's, and we wouldn't need
to house and maintain our own modems or terminal server.
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tod
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response 8 of 59:
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Feb 10 23:53 UTC 2005 |
How many dialin users are there total?
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cross
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response 9 of 59:
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Feb 11 01:23 UTC 2005 |
Why not just get the phone company to add permanent call forwarding from
the old Ann Arbor number to the new number?
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naftee
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response 10 of 59:
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Feb 11 01:49 UTC 2005 |
Let's move GreX to Canada.
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scholar
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response 11 of 59:
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Feb 11 14:58 UTC 2005 |
http://www.grexforcanada.org/
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remmers
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response 12 of 59:
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Feb 11 18:06 UTC 2005 |
That'd be the simplest way to take care of it, if the phone company here
does that sort of thing and the price is reasonable.
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scholar
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response 13 of 59:
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Feb 11 18:11 UTC 2005 |
UNLUC<KY
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naftee
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response 14 of 59:
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Feb 11 19:57 UTC 2005 |
SIMpole
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scholar
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response 15 of 59:
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Feb 11 21:51 UTC 2005 |
AHAHA< MOER LIKE BIGPOLE
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tod
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response 16 of 59:
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Feb 11 23:08 UTC 2005 |
re #9
Don't be so logical!
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richard
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response 17 of 59:
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Feb 13 04:44 UTC 2005 |
grex should have a long term goal of phasing out dialins. The numbers of
people who have no other internet service and actually need to dial in are
not proportionate to the costs of having dial in lines anymore. Hasn't mnet
eliminated dialin lines altogether? I think grex need not spend any extra
money do what is suggested. aruba are you saying it is too much trouble for
you to telnet in from your isp instead of dialing in? Are you not simply just
used to old habits>?
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scholar
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response 18 of 59:
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Feb 13 04:49 UTC 2005 |
Grequez should have a short term goal of phasing out richard.
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aruba
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response 19 of 59:
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Feb 13 05:52 UTC 2005 |
I don't dial in anymore, Richard. Part of Grex's charitable mission is to
provide minimal internet service for people in the Ann Arbor area who
otherwise couldn't afford it. Our dialin lines are a public service.
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richard
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response 20 of 59:
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Feb 13 09:25 UTC 2005 |
that was grex's charitable mission thirteen years ago. Don't you
think its logical that with the passage of time, and given how grex
itself has changed, that the definition of grex's charitable mission
would and should change? Grex isn't what it was all those years ago.
I would argue that Grex lacks the funds and the facilities to continue
being a free dial in-isp for the entire ann arbor/ypsi area and there
is not the same need for it to be anymore. There are doubtless many
many more internet options for citizens of the a2 area than there were
years ago.
Here's what you can do. Study the dialin stats for the last year.
See how many people actually dialed in from Ypsi who can no longer
dial in now. Subtract from that list yourself and others who
admittedly primarly telnet in. Then look at the total numbers. It is
not fair to assume the need for a public service. Substantiate the
need. Prove it exists.
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keesan
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response 21 of 59:
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Feb 13 15:18 UTC 2005 |
I have a choice of dialin (when it is working) or telnet and I almost always
choose dialin. My telnet connections often have a lot of lag (not right now).
Everything will freeze up for 30 sec at a time every few seconds, on bad days.
(To grex or my other shell account - it is not due to grex). I therefore dial
grex and then telnet to sdf (where I can get larger mails and where I have
a larger website). Two friends that we set up with grex dialin are now
forced to use telnet and they don't like it. One says her Windows telnet
program has little scrawny text (I explained how to make it bigger) and prints
white on black (she prints out most of her email to save it). The latter is
a paying grex member but might stop being so if she has to keep telnetting
to read her mail. I know of at least two other grexers (I think both paying
members) who do not have ISP service at home. That is four of us paying for
one phone line already and there are probably others.
As long as the phone lines are being used, this shows there is a desire if
not an absolute need for them. If grex eliminated phone lines, I might
conceivably decide to pay sdf $7/month for 56K access via dialins.
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twenex
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response 22 of 59:
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Feb 13 18:32 UTC 2005 |
For telnet, I recommend PuTTY.
Do you still have lag on telnet since the co-lo move? I very rarely have
problems now.
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aruba
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response 23 of 59:
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Feb 13 22:08 UTC 2005 |
Richard - I don't have time to accumulate those statistics. THe data is
publicly available, though, so feel free to collect it yourself.
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keesan
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response 24 of 59:
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Feb 14 00:29 UTC 2005 |
Yes I often have bad telnet connections (or ssh). Type three lines and
suddenly one of them appears onscreen. It is nearly impossible to correct
typos. The freezes also affect browsing, where I can see that I alternate
between 0 and 700 bytes/sec downloads, and are common around 11 am or 4 pm
when WCC internet access is crowded. It is 'free' to students. $208 for a
course gets you a year of included internet access. I now have 10 hours/mo
free ISP for times like this.
I have PuTTY but these two friends have not the foggiest idea of what a file
is or how to download, unzip and install it and use the program. I tried to
explain how to change the font and the colors (maybe white on black will print
black on white?).
My ISP usually works okay on weekends.
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