FIDONEWS -- 06 May 85 00:00:48 Page 1 Volume 2, Number 12 6 May 1985 +----------------------------------------------------------+ | _ | | / \ | | - FidoNews - /|oo \ | | (_| /_) | | Fido and FidoNet _`@/_ \ _ | | Users Group | | \ \\ | | Newsletter | (*) | \ )) | | ______ |__U__| / \// | | / FIDO \ _//|| _\ / | | (________) (_/(_|(____/ | | (jm) | +----------------------------------------------------------+ Publisher: Fido #375 Chief Procrastinator: Thom Henderson Fidonews is published weekly by SEAboard, Fido 107/375. You are encouraged to submit articles for publication in Fidonews. Article submission standards are contained in the file FIDONEWS.DOC, available from Fido 107/375. Disclaimer or don't-blame-us: The contents of the articles contained here are not our responsibility, nor do we necessarily agree with them; everything here is subject to debate. We publish EVERYTHING received. Any Day Now The hot question on Fidonet these days is "When do I get 10h?" We now have the definitive answer; you don't. It seems that there have been several versions of 10h (?), so it's going to be called 10i when it is officially released, in order to ensure that everyone has the same version. So when do we get our hands on 10i? The word I got last Wednesday was that it would be released no later than last Friday. So what happened? Well, it seems that Tom Jennings thought of another feature to add at the last minute, so release has been delayed until the new (newer?) version is fully tested. The new feature is a goodie, and should make many peoples' lives much easier, so it's worth the wait. It's the ability to have one Fido be two different net/node numbers (such as being, say, 1230/1 on a private net, while still being 107/375 on the public net). In the new scheme of things, we will be node 375 in net 107 (Metro NY), but I plan on setting 1/375 as my alternate net/node for awhile until I'm pretty sure everyone has the new stuff working. What you FIDONEWS -- 06 May 85 00:00:51 Page 2 will do, I have no idea. One option you DON'T have is to leave things alone. They're serious about this, guys. The official rumor I hear is that anyone who doesn't convert to the new setup within a month or two is going to get dropped from the national list. The guys in St. Louis have been doing a bang-up job, but it's just gotten too big for mere mortals to cope with. NODELIST and ROUTEGEN will also have to change, but there's a bit of a hitch there. It seems John Warren (the guy who wrote them) is in the hospital. I'm told he's been bugging his wife to bring in his computer (a sentiment I can well understand), but I wouldn't count on anything for awhile. Let's just leave the guy in peace, to get well at his own pace. Good luck to you, John! So when do we get 10i? Any Day Now. In fact, this editorial is in severe danger of being rendered obsolete even as I write it (Saturday night). It's to be released just as soon as Tom Jennings feels secure about it. From what I've seen, that won't be too long. I've test-run a copy of 10h, and I can testify that it looks pretty good. If it has any bugs, I didn't find them. There IS one small thing I found, though. This is just a little unofficial advice from me to you. Don't bring up 10i while you still have pending outgoing messages. In my case, I had a whole bunch of mail waiting to go out when I brought up 10h and told it I was 107/375. That night, at mail hour, it saw a bunch of mail from some other node (375 in net 1) and marked them all as orphans. Then, since it had no instructions to forward mail for 1/375, it left them sitting there. I suppose I could have set my ROUTE.BBS to accept mail for forwarding from 1/375, but I didn't get around to trying it. My advice is to just sit tight and wait for your mail to go out, and then bring 10i up before entering any new messages. FIDONEWS -- 06 May 85 00:00:52 Page 3 ============================================================ NEWS ============================================================ ********************************************************** Sensible Piracy Protection ********************************************************** 4/21/85 13:00 Just this morning, I was thumbing back through my latest version of PC Magazine and came across a very unusual ad. It is put out by Peter Norton. In this ad, he extols his product, the Norton Utils. Version 3.0, which if you have ever used these fine utilities will agree with me that they are a very handy little item to have in your toolbox of goodies. These, like many other fine programs of its ilk, are not copy-protected. So far, so good. We at least have a step in the right direction. But it wasn't so much the fact that he changed his ad that caught my eye, but rather, it was the little blurb at the bottom about upgrades. To wit: Got an old version? Upgrade to Version 3 for $25. Got a pirated copy? Go legitimate. Get the new version and your own manual for the upgrade price. Just send a check and your old disk. A new twist in the ever-increasing heated battle against software piracy? YOU BET. I applaud Mr. Norton for his for- ward-thinking attitude about the problem, and a rational, thought-out approach to the problem versus that of Mr. Mitch Kapor who is hellbent on snagging every last pirated copy of Lotus and Symphony on the market today, and I can assure you that that number is quite large. Mr. Norton doesn't employ stupid copy-protection garbage like Lotus. You are free to make as many copies of the programs as you desire. Instead of punishing the pirate, he is giving them a chance to "go legitimate". I might point out that the current version of the programs goes for the tidy little sum of $99.95. So all in all, what we have here is a very good approach to the problem, instead of a knee-jerk reaction the oft-inflated over-blown problem of software piracy. Ultimately, the software industry will have to change. Users with super XT systems packed with megabytes of storage will no longer tolerate the inexcusable approach of only one copy on your hard-disk per floppy. There exists only one form of copyprotection that can not be broken (yet) and that is through the use of ROM-based software. And if the software publishers and authors think for two nanoseconds that I'm gonna sit still for that (and this applies to you, too, gentle reader) they have another thought coming. I, for one, will take my business elsewhere. Copy-protection is ultimately a means of defeating the purpose of software, and any kid with two bits worth of knowledge on a computer FIDONEWS -- 06 May 85 00:00:55 Page 4 can crack just about every scheme on the market today. Granted, there is one drawback to this problem and that is one relating to the legitimate users who actually pur- chased the software. I fully understand the objections to offering pirates the same benefits as a legitimate user, but nonetheless, I still believe this is a positive step in the right direction. Perhaps this is a trend of things to come. I don't know that for certain, but it certainly is an encouraging sign. Per- haps the software authors of the world will eventually learn. That remains to be seen. Vic Bachulis, Sysop Washco Fidonet Node 59 ********************************************************** Please direct all flames to /DEV/USR/NUL and all rational thoughts and comments to Sysop, Fido 59, 1-503-643-2284 ********************************************************** ------------------------------------------------------------ FIDONEWS -- 06 May 85 00:00:56 Page 5 Freeware David Kaplan, Fido #387 The mainstay of bulletin boards is freeware. However, those of us that use public domain software at work have a problem many private users are not aware of. Corporations are extremely sensitive to the source of their software to ensure that any proprietary programs are legitimately licensed. If freeware comes with a ".doc" file indicating this fact, or the application itself displays such a message there is no problem. The problems arise when there is no indication that a piece of software is actually in the public domain. Ideally, the freeware message and the author's name and address would be desired to indicate this fact. This could appear in any of 3 places: 1) Part of a ".DOC" file, or more preferably, 2) Part of the application's screen display, or 3) As a 'display' message that can be seen if the .EXE or .COM file is typed. Without this information, many companies are quite hesitant to use and perhaps enhance public domain software. Many utilities that we have at home are unavailable to us at work. It is an impossible task to track down existing freeware authors, but if we start following this concept for all new software, the authors will get the recognition they deserve. ------------------------------------------------------------ FIDONEWS -- 06 May 85 00:00:57 Page 6 ======================================================== **** Reply to Fido 464 and all IBM BBS Fido sysops **** ======================================================== In reply to Node 464's request for swapping software via routing boxes of disks around the country, I'm in full support of the idea. I currently have around 12 - 13 MB of IBM-only software collected from around the country which cost me in the neighborhood of around $800 to $900 to download, and while it does represent a very nice bit of stuff, I find I'm running out of new stuff at an alar ming rate. If there are any takers out there who are in- terested, please let me know. Just about everything I now have has been tested for basic soundness and useful- ness and has withstood the test of time by hundreds of users in my area (Fido 59 is basically the only IBM sys- tem in this neck of the woods). If any of you wish to do some swapping, by all means let me know. I always can use new stuff! There are a lot of top-quality programs that I have that are begging to be spread around the US. While I'm on the topic, I need to have Fido 464 contact me via the net because I can't find a very current node- list....464, consider yourself paged! Please respond and direct all inquiries to: Sysop Fido 59, Washington County Fidonet, Node 59 Beaverton, ORegon 1-503-643-2284 Thanks much. Vic Bachulis, Sysop. ======================================================== ------------------------------------------------------------ FIDONEWS -- 06 May 85 00:00:58 Page 7 MODULA-2 We are looking for Modula-2 programs or users running Modlua-2 for the purpose of public domain program exchange. Comments on impressions of present compilers and systems are welcome at Fido node #418. We are interested in finding out anything relating to this new language. We would also like to hear from anyone who might know any news or have comments on the "Revisions and Amendments to Modula-2" by N. Wirth published in the "Journal of Pascal, ADA & Modula-2", 85 Jan/Feb, Vol 4 No 1 issue. We have Logitech Modula-2/86 source available for M2MDM, a XMODEM - MODEM7 package for the Sanyo MBC-55x running under MS-DOS 2.11. It supports up to 4800 bps and is an example of interrupt processing using Modula-2 co-routines. It lacks, at present, phone book and dialing features. So dialing is manual from the keyboard if your modem supports it. Full CRC error checking and batch transfers compatible with Fido are included. Also available is SYMDUMP for examining the contents of compiled ".sym" files. SymDump is quite portable and is especially useful if the ".def" source is not available! Lloyd Miller and Rick Keppler Calgary_Fido, node #418 ------------------------------------------------------------ FIDONEWS -- 06 May 85 00:00:59 Page 8 PC-Rockland, located in scenic South Nyack, New York is one of the many RBBS systems around. However, few if any can claim all the features we found when we called into the system. The Sysop currently is running 3 nodes simultaneously, with the capacity for 1 more node immediately available when needed. The system currently supports 2400 baud, as well as the usual 1200 and 300 baud connections. As of last night the total storage space on the system exceeds 250 megabytes, all of which is on-line, available storage. The Sysop has networked an IBM AT using PC-NET along with 3 IBM PC's to form the nucleus of his system. The AT has a 60 megabyte internal hard drive, and an external 'tower' drive with tape backup. He happens to be a BETA test site for RBBS so you will ALWAYS find at least the most current version of RRBS running, and usually an advanced version, not yet released. At last count there were over 40 directories of software for downloading, with literally thousands of programs available, so every caller can find something he likes there. If you are interested in calling this unique system it is running 24 hours a day at (914) 353-2176, and all callers are welcome to call on that number. Once on the system the other numbers and associated information is displayed for you. ------------------------------------------------------------ FIDONEWS -- 06 May 85 00:01:00 Page 9 RUNNING FIDO ON THE SANYO 550 WAYNE CONRAD FIDO #452 Having just set up FIDO to run on my SANYO 555 with the Anchor Mark XII Modem, I found it to be quite an experience... I had problems with the DOS, problems with the serial interface and problems with the modem. With some fiddling around and a lot of help from the Sysops of the other SANYO BBS's around the country, I finally did get FIDO to work correctly with this configuration. I figure maybe this article will help anyone else who wants to try it. What the heck, maybe my instructions will even be correct! COMMAND-LINE SWITCHES The first thing I had trouble figuring out was the /V switch which is used in the command line to tell FIDO which bit of the serial port's status byte is used as the carrier detect. With the SANYO it is bit 7, and the mask for bit 7 is 2^7 which is 128, so your /V switch will be like this: SYO_FIDO 128/V Of course you will need to include other switches in the command line for things like download limits and so forth. We're using bit 7 as the carrier detect because it's the only status bit presented by the 8251A which controls the serial port. The 8251A simply accepts this signal and reflects it's status in that bit, nothing more. If you have the SANYO serial card, then the signal presented to the 8251A is the DTR (Data Terminal Ready), not the Carrier Detect. You can tell if you have this problem because FIDO will either never answer an incoming call, or it will answer calls that don't exist. If this is your problem, then read on; I'll present some solutions that should work. SANYO SERIAL CARD PROBLEMS In the SANYO serial card, the signal represented by bit 7 is DSR (data set ready), not CD (carrier detect) as FIDO expects. This will either cause FIDO to never answer the phone, or to always answer even when there`s no connection. What you need to do is to present CD to the serial card instead of DTR. There are a few ways to do this that I can think of: o Modify the modem cable o Use a Null Modem or other adapter o Get a serial card that allows you to select CD or DSR by using jumpers FIDONEWS -- 06 May 85 00:01:02 Page 10 o Modify the serial card you have MODIFY THE MODEM CABLE On the computer end of the modem cable there are two signals we are concerned with here: Pin 6 -- DSR (Data Set Ready) Pin 8 -- CD (Carrier Detect) Oh by the way, you need to have your modem set up to present a "true carrier" on the CD Line. I don't know how this works, since the Anchor always presents a "true carrier," but I guess that with your modem set for "true carrier," the CD line goes active only after the two modems have connected and have good carriers on the line. Probably with a "false carrier" (?) the CD goes active when the phone rings or something like that. In any case, some modems have a switch for this; make sure it is set for "true carrier." What we want to do is to present the CD line to pin 6 rather than the DSR line. If your modem cable has a solder-on end, then you can probably do the job with a soldering iron in just a few minutes. Just Unsolder the DSR line from pin 6 of the connecter (remember this is the connecter on the COMPUTER END of the cable). Put a little electricians tape or silicon jel on the now freed DSR line to prevent it causing a short. Unsolder the CD line from pin 8 and resolder it to pin 6. Be careful of course to check for solder bridges and the like; Modems (and computers) get quite upset about shorts and may punish you with DOWNTIME and REPAIR BILLS. If your cable is ribbon cable with the press on ends, you will need to remove the end. This is a bit tricky, but it can be done without destroying the connector, if you're VERY VERY careful and if the connector cooperates with you. You need to use a screwdriver or something to lift up the locking parts of the connecter until it comes apart. You might want to have a spare handy just in case; I've destroyed more than one cable end this way. Before you remove the ends, carefully identify which line goes to pin 6 and which line goes to pin 8 and mark them with a felt tip pen or something. THEN remove the connector. Now you need to split the cable to separate lines 6 and 8 from the others. Take line 6 and 8 and exchange their places. You might use some tape or something to keep all this stuff in place (your cable is now split into about 5 different parts). Then carefully align the cable on the disassembled connector, put the connector top on, and press them together. There is a big expensive press used for this, but you can probably make do with a vise and a few small pieces of wood or whatever else you can think up of. Make sure you get the connector on the right way. Get it on the wrong side of the cable or turned 180 degrees and nothing will FIDONEWS -- 06 May 85 00:01:05 Page 11 work. Actually, this is such a pain, and so prone to error, that I probably wouldn't attempt it unless there was absolutely NO other option available. NULL MODEMS and OTHER ADAPTERS You can make an adapter by getting one female and one male DB-25 connector and some wire. You can do it with ribbon cable by using press-on connectors, pressing the male connector on one end, then splitting the cable on the other end and doing the funny stuff above to it before pressing on the female end. Again, it's probably better to use solder- on connectors and shielded cable. Connect these pins straight-across: 7 Signal Ground 2 Transmit 3 Receive 20 Data Terminal Ready 4 Request To Send 5 Clear to Send Then you will connect pin 8 on the male (modem end) connector to pin 6 of the female (computer end) connector. Also, make sure the shield is connected to both of the connector cases. Pin 1 of the rs-232 "standard" is used for protective ground; however I'm not sure whether this should be connected with the shield or not. It's been a while since I've make RS-232 cables. And I hope a long while more. There are also these nice (and usually expensive) little boxes called NULL MODEMS, which are basically a switchbox with a male connector on one end and a female connector on the other, so you can configure it any way you like. If you are lucky enough to have one of these, set it up like I just described above. GET A BETTER SERIAL CARD Not a bad idea at all. The better serial cards have jumpers on them which allow you to decide which lines are used. All you have to do to get the serial card to recognize CD instead of DSR is move a jumper or two... We should all be so lucky! MODIFY THE SANYO SERIAL CARD This is what I chose to do. The modem cable is build into my Anchor, and I didn't want do tear up that ribbon cable anyhow. And I wanted it done NOW, not after going to the FIDONEWS -- 06 May 85 00:01:07 Page 12 store for parts to make an adapter and so on. This modification takes an exacto knife, a soldering iron, solder, and a small piece (two inches or so) of wire--I prefer wire-wrap wire. Take your serial card out of the computer. Now look at the end of the card where the connecter is soldered to it. On the connecter all the holes that the pins fit into are numbered. Look for number 6 and number 8. Follow these onto the card and see where they connect to it. On the top of the board you will see a trace coming from pin 6. Cut this trace with the knife. Now take a look at where the trace goes to. Holding the card with the connecter away from you and the components on top, the trace goes to the NEAR-RIGHT pin (pin 1) of the IC at the FAR-LEFT of the card. Turn the board over and solder one end of the wire to that pin. Solder the other end to the pad where pin-8 of the connector comes onto the card and you`re done. This might not seem too clear, but just be careful with following the pins onto the board and so on so you get the right ones. DISCLAIMER Please note that I wrote these instructions AFTER THE FACT, so I cannot guarantee their accuracy. Also, as far as I know all SANYO serial cards are the same, but there may be look-alike-but-cost-less cards out there that have their board laid out differently. So please be aware. THE DTR PATCH You will also need a patch for your DOS. both MS-DOS and DS-DOS fool around with the DTR line during disk accesses, this is a no-no since it causes many modems to hang up. There is a patch you can get to fix this. There is one patch for MS-DOS 2.11 and another patch for DS-DOS 2.11. This patch only needs to be run once each time you boot, so you can put it in your AUTOEXEC file. it goes by various names but the ones I've seen are DTRPATCH.COM and SYOPATCH.COM. You can get the patch from FIDO #1 or many of the SANYO bulletin boards across the country. If you can't find it anywhere else let me know and I'll send it to the Nearest Fido in Your Area via netmail. It's pretty small anyhow; I think 3k for both the MS-DOS and the DS-DOS version with a small doc' file. BATCH FILES FOR FIDO This is how I set up my RUNBBS.BAT file: :LOOP FIDO_SYO 128/V FIDONEWS -- 06 May 85 00:01:09 Page 13 IF ERRORLEVEL 1 GOTO EXIT GOTO LOOP :EXIT And the AUTOEXEC.BAT file is something like this: DATE TIME DTRPATCH I also have a LOCAL.BAT which I use to bring up fido in the local mode: FIDO_SYO /T THE ANCHOR MODEM'S DTR PROBLEM Most modems use DTR to hang up the phone. The Anchor Mark XII ignores DTR. This is a problem because FIDO expects the modem to hang up when DTR is dropped. Now, there is a fix (requiring a transistor, a resister, and a few minutes) to cause the Anchor to use DTR normally. I haven't done it yet, but I might. What happens when FIDO is sending netmail and files is that it tries to hang up the phone when it is done by using DTR. If it can't, or if it even suspects that it can't, it will start beeping like crazy for you to wake up at 2am and fix it. What a pain, but it does save you from horrid phone bills should something happen to prevent a proper disconnect. What I've noticed is that sometimes the disconnect will occur but FIDO will wake me up anyhow, while other times the disconnect will occur just fine and FIDO won't fuss at all. I don't know why this happens, but I'm going to modify my modem anyhow to see if it helps. Actually, what I suspect is happening is that FIDO toggles DTR to hang up, waits a few seconds, then checks to see if the carrier is still there. If the remote FIDO has hung up by then (which it usually has) then there's no carrier and no problem, otherwise FIDO does it's beeping thing... Of course while it's beeping away the other computer has hung up or the smart commands FIDO issues as a backup have done their thing, but FIDO is faithful and wants to protect your phone bill so it wakes you up to make sure. You can get the correct instructions for this fix from Jon Tara of FIDO #92. He also published these instructions in FidoNews 203, but please be aware that the instructions as published in the FidoNews are INCORRECT. The corrections were published in FidoNews 315, but it's probably easiest to get the corrected instructions from #92 directly. By the way if you get the corrected instructions from #92, I wouldn't mind having a copy (hint, hint)... FIDONEWS -- 06 May 85 00:01:12 Page 14 CTTY PROBLEMS (STILL) Here's one I still haven't figured out; the CTTY command will not work properly. What I did to test it is to connect with a friend by using the MINITEL communications program, then I dropped into DOS without losing the carrier and typed CTTY AUX: which went over like a led zeppelin. Didn't accept anything from my friend or give him anything back. I don't know if all my patches and mod's had anything to do with it, because I had never tried it before I went in with the knife and soldering iron. I need for this command to work if I'm going to implement FIDO's 0 command to allow the DOS to be run remotely. Also, I haven't even tried Watchdog to see if it runs on the SANYO but I really doubt it will. The Serial port is one of the SANYO's poorest compatibility hangups. What I might do if nothing else works is to write a small program to take the place of the CTTY redirection and the watchdog. Here's my ideas on that so far: o Be invoked from the batch file RUNBBS.BAT. o Redirect standard console input and output to it's own device drivers. The output driver would write to both the local screen and to the remote system. The input driver would read from either the keyboard or from the remote system. This would allow simultaneous typing. Also you could see what the remote Sysop is doing to your poor system... o Load in a copy of COMMAND.COM and run it using the redirected i/o drivers. o To get back into FIDO, just type EXIT which would return control from COMMAND.COM to the supervisor program, which would then restore the standard output drivers and drop back into the RUNBBS.BAT. o The Supervisor program would check the carrier whenever something is output. If the carrier is lost, then it just aborts COMMAND.COM and drops into the RUNBBS.BAT. This avoids the rather drastic re-boot that Watchdog does when it loses the carrier. It is important to those of us without hardware clocks to avoid re-booting. Of course this is not a two-hour project, especially for someone who's never redirected standard output or run .EXE files from withint a program. What I'm saying is, if anyone wants to assist in this endeavor I certainly won't refuse the help. This would probably work for the IBM without FIDONEWS -- 06 May 85 00:01:14 Page 15 modification, so you IBM hackers keep that in mind; I can use help from ANYBODY experienced in assembly language with the things I mentioned above. FOR FURTHER INFORMATION RS-232c Specifications: Elizabeth A. Nichols, Joseph C. Nichols and Keith R. Musson, DATA COMMUNICATIONS FOR MICROCOMPUTERS (McGraw-Hill, 1982) Schematic for the SANYO Serial card: Robert Kong Win Chang, "Build a Serial Card," Byte, vol. 10 no. 3 (March, 1984), 129 Modifying the Anchor Mark XII Modem: Fido Newsletters 208 and 315, or Jon Tara of FIDO #92 ------------------------------------------------------------ FIDONEWS -- 06 May 85 00:01:15 Page 16 From: Mark Welch on Fido 459 (WelchNet, San Francisco, CA) A Telecommunications Dictionary ------------------------------- Tom Jennings at one point brainstormed the idea of a "telecommunications dictionary," essentially using the known frequent content of BBS information to reduce the time it takes to transfer text from a BBS to the user's system. The basic idea is that frequently-used words or substrings (words like "message" or "the") could be encoded in two bytes instead of sending the full strings. If the 'dictionary' were flexible enough, it might include an entire screenful of information encoded as two bytes (a standard menu or help screen, for example, or a log-on logo). I toyed with the ideas, and juggled with some of them a bit, and wrote a quick and dirty program to test the basic theory. While Tom had the idea of a "learning dictionary" in which the user's software could learn new encoded strings from the host as necessary (and in which each host would use a different dictionary), I tended toward the idea of a "standard" string dictionary. By way of background: standard "squeeze" programs use something called Huffman coding to encode strings by using fewer bits to encode characters which occur more frequently. Huffman coding doesn't work with interactive text because (a) it works best on long, arbitrary text files, and (b) Huffman coding abandons the meaning of byte boundaries, so that one dropped bit in a transmission means the entire file is lost unless some sort of error detection and correction (ECC) is included. ECC eats up as much or more bits than are saved. My approach was to examine text files containing captured message bases from a Fido BBS and several other on-line systems. I analyzed the text [using a program quickly written in Turbo Pascal] and found 32 strings (4-, 5- and 6- bytes long) which occurred very frequently. A telecommunications "dictionary set" might include 256 words in each of several dictionaries; in theory, system-specific dictionaries might exist (Fido, CompuServe, etc.). My dictionary program replaced strings like " the " (space,t,h,e,space) and "ing " (i,n,g,space) as two-byte codes. Rather than write a complete BBS and telecomm software to test the theory, my program merely encoded the information from one file into another file. A real telecommunications dictionary would have to do this encoding (at the host end) and decoding (on the user's end) "on the fly," adding a number of potential problems if existing telecomm software is running at or near the capacity of the CPU. FIDONEWS -- 06 May 85 00:01:18 Page 17 My dictionary program, using 32 strings of length 4-, 5-, and 6-, re-coded those strings as two-byte codes: a prefix byte (with a value greater than 128) and a suffix byte from 0..31. A "full" telecommunications dictionary would do the same but might work from as many as 127 dictionaries (using the full range of the prefix byte) and as many as 256 words in each dictionary, or over 32,000 possible strings. The result: By encoding the 32 most-frequent strings, I reduced the file size -- which would translate to transmission time -- by almost exactly ten percent. That 10% savings was constant over about a half-dozen files, ranging from Fido messages to a news column I was writing. I would estimate that a "generalized" dictionary of 256 words might save around 15%. To obtain any significant savings from the encoding, a system-specific dictionary (i.e. Tom's "learning" dictionary, or a Fido-specific dictionary) or a very large standard dictionary would have to be used. [An important aspect of this is that use of a single, standard 128-word dictionary by encoding into one byte rather than two would save about 25%, but that savings could never be enhanced later.] Savings are always enhanced by encoding long strings instead of short strings (i.e. if "message" occurs often and is encoded, you save more bytes than by encoding "the"). A note: software which used some sort of dictionary- coding to save on transmission time would have to "register" its capability during or after sign-on, so that BBSs or services with the dictionary available could still default to a "dumb terminal" mode. If the software used a "learning dictionary," it would have to be able to signal "I don't know that word" at any time; the host would then download the word to be added to the system's dictionary. Most essential: all of this ought to be automatic, transparent to the user. I'd like to know if anyone else is interested in following up on this idea of a "telecommunications dictionary," and what people's ideas are on this. This was Tom's brainstorm but he had other projects and has put it on the shelf; likewise, I'm not actively pursuing it further right now, but thought I should contribute my experience to other telecommunicators. Please let me know if there's interest in this topic; send Fido mail to me at Fido #459 (415-391-0556 6pm-9am PST only), or write to me c/o 425 Battery St., 4th Floor, San Francisco, CA 94111. -- Mark Welch, Fido459 FIDONEWS -- 06 May 85 00:01:20 Page 18 ============================================================ COLUMNS ============================================================ From: Tim Meyers, Fido #365 Dated April 25,1985. Tim Meyers Techn-Source Systems Group. Dear Mr. Meyers: Thank you for your interest in becoming a service provider for Compuserve. The first step to becoming an information provider or a system operator for a Special Interest Group is the preparation of a proposal describing the proposed service. Taken from a recent letter I received from Compuserve Information Services, a proposal to start a Special Intrest Group for Fido. It will be labeled as (GO FID-1) when it arrives, but first I have to know exactly how many people would be interested. My company will invest $5,000 for the initial fee for the creation of the database and files. After which point it becomes the property of me, and or whoever wants it. I have typed a proposal to Compuserve and should get a response within 60 days. I spent about 20 hours on the work of menus, methods, promotional plans, target market, current projection, overview of information etc. etc. Now it is completed and I hope that I haven't wasted my time. Here is a brief review of what will be on the SIG: 1st, the newsletter. At this point in time several people are just not receiving the newsletter. It's very large to download and many people just cannot access the larger systems that have it online. The newsletter would linked to a electronic magazine, in which menus serve as the "Table of Contents" and point to articles that have been written. It works very well for the needs of both users and sysops. 2nd. Mr. Jennings would create a nice little "Welcome to the Fido Special Interest Group". Just a simple letter explaining what Fido is, what's so unique about it, etc. 3rd. Users Questions Answered. That's it, the biggest problem at this point in the network. It would be a great place for all questions and answer to be placed at Compuserve's cost. Everyone has asked for it, now anyone that wishes to chip in can. Questions answered in a day, No more 100 calls to Tom Jennings. Keeps small questions like "What do I do with this modem?" from costing Mr. Jennings 25 cents. Etc. Etc. Etc. I am sure you can see the need for it. At this point mostly FIDONEWS -- 06 May 85 00:01:24 Page 19 all new sysops questions are addressed to Mr. Jennings. This way anyone that has an answer can solve somone's problem. Not just sysops but from a user's standpoint also. 4th. Software. Every single software program related to Fido will be placed on the system. A message will be placed for which version is the newest, when updated etc. I made three phone calls tonight, one to node #1, got the newsletter, one to #375 for this article, one to 51 for the TWIX program. When I could have made just one call to Compuserve, and it's a local charge. This could solve lots of problems with disk space on most systems, although I am sure many sysops will continue to keep Fido software online, they can at least have a common conference area. It's a place to keep in touch. 5th. The Nodelist, Each week it could be put online. Instead of spending the many hours of re-dialing and busy signals you would be able to obtain it whenever you wished. I am sure the sysops of fido #50 would see the need of this. 6th. What does it cost? Well there is a one time connection fee and several other addition cost, but I am signing the check here. I will sign a check for $5,000.00 to form the Fido SIG if I receive enough interest in the project. I wish to help the many other sysops and future sysops of Fido, including the users. We need somthing like this. The problem is, how many people would be interested? With over 250 nodes and growing, again it's needed. My Plan of attack? What is my attitude? Well here are a few simple figures: Fido SIG operates at 10% royalty rate. If Each node had a cumulative of 60 minutes in the SIG it would have approx. 253 hours of use. This is resonable since many SIGs draw less than 100 hours a month, which is a useful amount. At 253 hours a month, Compuserve will be happy to let Fido remain on the system But if it falls to less than 25 hours, I start paying $750.00 a month. That's a chance I will have to take, but first I have to consider how many people use the system. 1) Each node -- users, sysop, etc. -- spend 2 minutes a day on the Fido SIG and we have our goal. 2) Half the nodes spend 2 minutes and we have 2/3 our goal. 3) 50 nodes spend 2 minutes on the SIG and I have to spend about $115.00. Not bad, At least we have provided as much information and equipment that we can to make Fido a FIDONEWS -- 06 May 85 00:01:27 Page 20 nation wide project. All users and Sysops, Please Send any Ideas, Comments, or criticism to The Sysop Fido #365 or #442. Thanks Tim Meyers. 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Contact: USRobotics, Inc. 1123 West Washington Chicago, IL 60607 (312) 733-0497 FIDONEWS -- 06 May 85 00:01:28 Page 22 ============================================================ NOTICES ============================================================ *** Calendar of Events *** 12 May 85 Submissions deadline for next issue of Fidonews. 17 May 85 The Next Occasional NY/NJ Sysop Meeting. 27 May 85 through 31 May 85; Spring 1985 DECUS symposium, New Orleans, LA. Among other events, Kurt Reisler (sysop Fido 74) will give a 1 hour talk on Fido. If you have any event you want listed in this calendar, please send a note to node 107/375.