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danr
Books on the Internet Mark Unseen   Jan 24 20:56 UTC 1993

This month's PC magazine reviews two new books about the
Internet.  Both are written for persons who are just beginning to
use the Internet. Since this topic is near and dear to our
hearts, I thought I'd summarize the reviews.
 
The first book, _The Whole Internet User's Guide and Catalog_
($24.95, ISBN 1-56592-025-2) is published by O'Reilly and
Associates, publishers of the Nutshell series of UNIX books.  The
second is _The Internet Companion ($10.95, ISBN 0-201-62224-6).
It is published by Addison Wesley.
 
_The Whole Internet..._ gets the better review of the two.
According to the reviewers, it covers not only the services
available on the Internet, it also gives instructions on how to
access them.  Topics covered include the basics such as e-mail
and news (which we have here on Grex) and more advanced topics
such as ftp, telnet and the wais and archie services (which are
not yet available here :(  ).
 
Despite its higher cost, _The Whole Internet User's Guide and
Catalog_ looks like the book to get to get started with the
Internet.
42 responses total.
mcnally
response 1 of 42: Mark Unseen   Jan 24 22:11 UTC 1993

  "The Whole Internet" seems to be very interesting, from what I've read
of it.  I have mostly skimmed through co-worker's copy.  I'd have to say
that I found most of the material on various services far too basic to
be of much use to me but probably well suited to a beginning user.  The
part of the book that I found very interesting, however, is an appendix
that has a sort of catalog of free information services available over
the Internet.  While the listing is by no means comprehensive, there're
still some very interesting things listed.  Based on what I've seen I'd
recommend the book to someone not already familiar with resources on the
net though I'd point out that without network access of at least some
sort it won't be as useful or interesting.  
tnt
response 2 of 42: Mark Unseen   Jan 25 07:41 UTC 1993

 I bought both on 2 JAN 93, but haven't had a chance to read either.  Any
non-smoking, heterosexual vegetarian is welcome to borrow either.
remmers
response 3 of 42: Mark Unseen   Jan 25 14:14 UTC 1993

Would you settle for two out of three?  :)

Actually, "The Whole Internet..." has been sitting on my book shelf
for a few weeks, browsed but not yet read.  Covers quite a range of
topics, from recreational uses to some implementation details.
Almost anyone should be able to get *something* new out of it,
regardless of background.

A glance through the computer section at Borders reveals that
non-techncical, user-oriented books on the Internet has become a
hot publishing area.  Evidently the market must be there,
indicating that the Internet has Arrived.
tsty
response 4 of 42: Mark Unseen   Jan 25 21:36 UTC 1993

I've loaned my copy to steve for his persual adn comment, which
probably will appear here now that the book(s) have their own
item.
  
I thought _The Whole ..._ was a pretty good effort which, as mcnally
noted, eventually provides something for everyone.
mju
response 5 of 42: Mark Unseen   Jan 25 23:07 UTC 1993

(That is, if STeve reads them within the next year...)
jeffk
response 6 of 42: Mark Unseen   Jan 26 04:58 UTC 1993

Another good Internet tutorial is :

Zen and the Art of Internet by Brendan P. Kehoe.  Ed Vielmetti does the
forward.  I bought it for $8 at LIttle Prof, but I've heard that Border's
charges $25.  Good book though.
alan
response 7 of 42: Mark Unseen   Jan 28 12:09 UTC 1993

How can I contact someone at the Boston Computer Society via Internet?


tsty
response 8 of 42: Mark Unseen   Jan 28 20:07 UTC 1993

Do you have direct Internet access?  (not from here, we don't).
  
Here are three domains to which you could email   root@xxxx and
see if someone kknows:
  
        root@bbc.com
                        Bosston Business Computing, Inc.
  
        root@bsw.com    Boston Software works, Inc  (the above is "Ltd")
  
        root@bostech.com    Boston Technology, Ind.
  
 or     root@bu.edu      Boston University
  
It may be more politic to email    postmast@ xxx.yyy, or staff@xx.yy
but that's my nickle's worth.
  
I'm not sure if there is a  "standard" (defacto, anyway) postmaster
userid, but  postmast@xxx.yyy   _seems_ to fit most often ...
steve
response 9 of 42: Mark Unseen   Jan 29 02:30 UTC 1993

   It makes a lot more sense to use postmaster, rather than root.  Too
many messages to root are of the computer error-generated type, such
that root messages may not be read often.
mju
response 10 of 42: Mark Unseen   Jan 29 04:04 UTC 1993

RFC-822 (the Internet e-mail standards document) says that you *must*
have a "postmaster" mailbox, and that it must go to a real human, not
a machine or /dev/null.
terru
response 11 of 42: Mark Unseen   Jan 29 04:36 UTC 1993

True, and I've found all the postmasters I've sent blind messages to
to be very helpful.

tsty
response 12 of 42: Mark Unseen   Jan 29 14:46 UTC 1993

mju, does that standards doc also call for the 8-char postmast as
the standard, or postmaster (9-char) or post (4 char) or what
for the defacto default loginid?
mju
response 13 of 42: Mark Unseen   Jan 30 06:30 UTC 1993

Nope.  On most machines the 8-character login-id limit doesn't affect
anything, since just because you have a "postmaster" mailbox doesn't
mean you have to have a "postmaster" login-id; it could just be
aliased to a human's mailbox.  If you do have such limits, it's
the responsibility of the mail transfer software on that host to
deal with it.  RFC-822 also says, BTW, that any case permutation of
"postmaster" has to work, including "Postmaster" and "POSTMASTER".
sensei
response 14 of 42: Mark Unseen   Feb 1 04:39 UTC 1993

Email jabr@bcs.org or jabr@cs.umb.edu for information about emailing
a Boston Computer Society member.  
mcnally
response 15 of 42: Mark Unseen   Feb 1 07:22 UTC 1993

Next time you have a similar problem you might try using "whois"
or looking in X.500 if you can access the net..

re #13:  My machines also have a "Potsmaster"..
popcorn
response 16 of 42: Mark Unseen   Feb 21 18:18 UTC 1993

This response has been erased.

kentn
response 17 of 42: Mark Unseen   Feb 21 19:01 UTC 1993

Which Host? um-x500    should get you there, too
popcorn
response 18 of 42: Mark Unseen   Feb 22 03:50 UTC 1993

This response has been erased.

tsty
response 19 of 42: Mark Unseen   Feb 23 05:26 UTC 1993

kentn is correct.
popcorn
response 20 of 42: Mark Unseen   Mar 19 03:51 UTC 1993

This response has been erased.

kaplan
response 21 of 42: Mark Unseen   Feb 3 16:54 UTC 1994

info 27 linked to internet 21
rcurl
response 22 of 42: Mark Unseen   Feb 3 17:13 UTC 1994

I have actually *used* _The Whole Internet..._  (in contrast to "on
the back burner", "sitting on my shelf", etc), and it worked. I decided
the time had come to run archie, so I just followed the instructions,
and sure enough, I was on a remote archie host. *However*, it informed
me to get a client, as "interactive use may be limited". So, things
are changing, and I am sure that parts of _The Whole Internet..._ are
already obsolete. 
popcorn
response 23 of 42: Mark Unseen   Feb 3 23:47 UTC 1994

This response has been erased.

scg
response 24 of 42: Mark Unseen   Feb 4 00:42 UTC 1994

We could mail one of these people and ask them.
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