F I D O N E W S -- Volume 14, Number 24 16 June 1997 +----------------------------+-----------------------------------------+ | The newsletter of the | ISSN 1198-4589 Published by: | | FidoNet community | "FidoNews" | | _ | 1-904-409-7040 [1:1/23] | | / \ | | | /|oo \ | | | (_| /_) | | | _`@/_ \ _ | | | | | \ \\ | Editor: | | | (*) | \ )) | Christopher Baker 1:18/14 | | |__U__| / \// | | | _//|| _\ / | | | (_/(_|(____/ | | | (jm) | Newspapers should have no friends. | | | -- JOSEPH PULITZER | +----------------------------+-----------------------------------------+ | Submission address: FidoNews Editor 1:1/23 | +----------------------------------------------------------------------+ | MORE addresses: | | | | submissions=> cbaker84@digital.net | +----------------------------------------------------------------------+ | For information, copyrights, article submissions, | | obtaining copies of FidoNews or the internet gateway FAQ | | please refer to the end of this file. | +----------------------------------------------------------------------+ NO NEWS IS GOOD NEWS? Table of Contents 1. EDITORIAL ................................................ 1 How hard IS it to format a text file to 70 columns? ...... 1 2. LETTERS TO THE EDITOR .................................... 2 What to do for more articles ............................. 2 3. ARTICLES ................................................. 3 SHARING-the FidoNet World Class, Global Communication E .. 3 4. GETTING TECHNICAL ........................................ 7 FSC-0082 - Proposed New Packet Type ...................... 7 FSC-0083 - Proposed standard for message IDs ............. 18 5. COORDINATORS CORNER ...................................... 37 Nodelist-statistics as seen from Zone-2 for day 164 ...... 37 6. NET HUMOR ................................................ 38 Java the Hutt? ........................................... 38 7. NOTICES .................................................. 40 A_THEIST Echo is on the Backbone! ........................ 40 Future History ........................................... 40 8. FIDONEWS PUBLIC-KEY ...................................... 42 FidoNews PGP public-key listing .......................... 42 9. FIDONET BY INTERNET ...................................... 43 10. FIDONEWS INFORMATION .................................... 45 FIDONEWS 14-24 Page 1 16 Jun 1997 ================================================================= EDITORIAL ================================================================= Even the most primitive word processing [EDLIN anyone?] programs can count the columns live and in color as one is typing an article or notice. Netmail and email is harder to control but text files are difficult to make conform to ARTSPEC.DOC? Nah. If anyone is being held back by the formatting constraints of the ARTSPECs, please be assured that I will reformat [and even spell check if desired] your submission for you. ARTSPEC exists to provide directions to make a file that an automated MAKENEWS operation will not choke on during a weekly run to produce FidoNews. Since I don't run FidoNews as an automatic function, the poorly formatted stuff doesn't get stuck in the dead letter file. A couple promised articles never arrived [and i still have the email link open behind me as i type this, JIC] so here's what we have for this week. BTW, what ever happened to the ASCII_ART Echo? It still isn't in the BACKBONE.NA list and I would have sworn it got the REC requests. And anybody heard any news on the resumption of ops at 1:13/10? My Father's Day ran a little late and so is this Issue. [grin] C.B. ----------------------------------------------------------------- FIDONEWS 14-24 Page 2 16 Jun 1997 ================================================================= LETTERS TO THE EDITOR ================================================================= From: steve@gen.lcrnet.org Date: 13 Jun 97 22:11:07 -0700 Subject: Fidonews - what to do for more articles To: cbaker84@digital.net Organization: Don't Mistake Lack Of Talent For Genius >From steve steffler, 1:342/1022 Hi Chris, feel free to publish this in Fidonews if you wish.. I see in the newest Fnews that you ask what could be done to make readers write articles for Fidonews. I know that for me, the one thing that has kept me from contributing is that I don't like having to carefully follow ARTSPEC.DOC when writing. If you eliminated that document and formatted everything yourself before feeding it into that MKNEWS program (or whatever it's called) then I am confident that more people would contribute to the publication. I'm also a firm believer that there is too much filler content in it - if a 10k Fidonews was released without all the stuff like the PGP key and the FSC documents, perhaps people would open their eyes and see that an important link between individuals in the Fidonet community is on the brink of extinction. Plus, the stuff that never changes from issue to issue is really a deterrent to reading it, but I'll save that for another rant, as I'm sure you've already all heard it all before. ;-) <= (Suggestion: Put the copyright notice, etc, etc, stuff that never changes or rarely changes, into a separate file in the Fidonews archive?) steve@gen.lcrnet.org * http://www.geocities.com/SoHo/3755 * team os/2 -30- ----------------------------------------------------------------- FIDONEWS 14-24 Page 3 16 Jun 1997 ================================================================= ARTICLES ================================================================= Christopher Baker Rights On!, 1:18/14 Edgewater_FL_USA There's a new Echo in town dedicated to the REAL spirit of FidoNet Sysoping. It's called SHARING. Here's the blurb from the EListing: What Sysops will see and learn in SHARING will make it "the place to be." What they will see will be up to them but there will be laughter and wonders and mysteries of FidoNet technology will be explained. SHARE the wonderful experience of our hobby. This Echo will be Awesome. It's the Swiss Army knife of information! There's plenty to learn. Sysops can SHARE everything! Every Sysop in the FidoNet phonebook [Nodelist] is invited to participate but we will have a few simple rules. POLITENESS to each other is EXPECTED! It is REQUIRED! The few off-topic topics are contained in the accompanying SHARING.RUL file. The Moderators reserve the right to declare off-topic any subject getting out of the bounds of politeness and cooperation. The Backbone or any backbone is off-topic automatically except as noted in the rules. mod Christopher Baker, 1:18/14 mod jim barchuk, 1:141/355 mod Debra Milner, 1:112/285 mod Emeritus-Don Dawson, 1:150/730 Backbone status has been in effect for months so Areafix a link from your local Backbone feed or contact any of the Moderators for a direct link via Netmail. Here's the SHARING Echo Guidelines for those without a copy of the current ELRUL file: --- Following message extracted from SHARING @ 1:18/14 --- By Christopher Baker on Sat Apr 20 23:38:03 1997 From: Christopher Baker To: All Date: 15 Apr 97 00:52:32 Subj: SHARING Echo Guidelines - regular repost From: [by Don Dawson] To: Y'all Date: 4 Aug 95 22:27:48 Subj: Da Rulz Sorry, it's dirty work but someone has to do it. :-) What is this echo? ------------------ FidoNet is a World Class, Global, Communications Network of, by and FIDONEWS 14-24 Page 4 16 Jun 1997 for FidoNet Sysops around the Globe. There are other FTN networks but none are of the size of FidoNet. What Sysops will see and learn in SHARING will make it "the place to be". What might they see? We don't have an agenda, hidden or otherwise, but I'm sure we'll laugh at ourselves, cry for each other and everyone will be "just themselves". The wonders and mysteries of FidoNet Technology will be explained!. Learn how and where files fall into dishes. Learn how and where files pop out of the InterNet tunnel. Learn how to eat the Echomail Elephant rather than have it eat you! Learn how to send e-mail to anywhere on the Globe often with a local phone call, including to AOL, Prodigy, C$erve, and perhaps that office down the street. Learn there's no such thing as FREE! SHARE the wonderful experience of our hobby. This echo is Awesome, it's the Swiss Army knife of information! There's plenty to learn, learn, learn and it doesn't matter what hardware, operating system, mailer or BBS Software a sysop uses. Sysops can share those funny experiences we all have. One of mine is a brief story about NERF.BAT. We can laugh with each other and cry with each other. Yes, tragedy, sometimes simple, sometimes bizarre, hits us all. Why not share it? There's good news too: someone is a new parent for the first time, a new grandparent even. Sysops find good deals on all sorts of goods and services. Why not SHARE where, how much and how good so we can all get the most out of our hobby budget? Please! -------- What won't you see? No anger. No threats. No intimidation. No inappropriate language. And none of that politistrivial junk so common in other Sysop Echos. No Zeroes. No Binary addresses allowed. If you're a 0 or a 1, stay away! No a.k.a.'s allowed! Use your real, primary address or stay out, especially those 0's and 1's! Simple enough? Every Sysop in any FTN phonebook is invited to participate, invited to just be themselves and SHARE the FidoNet Technology Experience. FidoNet Technology Sysops are *very* special people, this echo is by, for and about them. Politeness to each other is EXPECTED! It IS REQUIRED. Almost no topic is "off topic" except as noted below. The Moderators reserve the right to BAN any topic. I reserve the right to "suspend discussion" of a topic for a time certain. Be CERTAIN of your FACTS, NAME names, don't take the cowards way out by using "They said, He said". Be SPECIFIC. There are three Moderators. They are: Christopher Baker; jim barchuk; and FIDONEWS 14-24 Page 5 16 Jun 1997 Debra Milner. They are the only ones who will make Moderatorial pronouncements to anyone else. Leave any Moderating to them. We don't expect to have to do much in the way of moderating in a friendly and cooperative Echo. Definitions: ------------ Phonebook: The Nodelist FidoGawd: (or its variations) are prohibited from this Echo. Fight-o-Net: (or its variations) are also prohibited. Policy: Policy4 as indicated in the nodelist. The ONLY policy. If your zone/region/net also has a local policy, be specific. If you use Policy by itself, POLICY4 is assumed. EchoPol: It does not exist, never did. Maybe never will. CRP: Cost Recovery Plan/Program. I prefer Cost Sharing but you call it what you wish. CRaP: Something that sometimes accompanies participation in a CRP. It is and is intended to be an unflattering term. Grunt Sysop: All 30,000+ PEOPLE in the FidoNet phonebook and or any FTN phone book. backbone: or Backbone, whichever you prefer is OFF Topic [except we will share how to get an Echo on the Backbone if asked.] As Mr. Bartles and Mr. James are known to say: Thank you for your support! Short and sweet (?) Moderator Emeritus, former 1:150/730 B-) Don QOFM. Chris Christopher Baker jim barchuk Debra Milner Moderators, SHARING -30- We invite you to join us in a friendly and cooperative Echo for FidoNet Sysops who don't need someone standing over them with a club to behave like adults and who would prefer a Sysop Echo with less tar. FIDONEWS 14-24 Page 6 16 Jun 1997 [grin] QOFM. Chris ----------------------------------------------------------------- FIDONEWS 14-24 Page 7 16 Jun 1997 ================================================================= GETTING TECHNICAL ================================================================= [This is part of the continuing FidoNet History series of FTSC Standards and Proposals. These docs have been reformatted to 70 columns where required. Tables may be askew. Node numbers and phone numbers may be out of date.] Ed. | Document: FSC-0082 | Version: 001 | Date: 14 May 1995 | | Stephan Slabihoud, 2:2446/110.6@fidonet.org A Proposed New Packet Type Stephan Slabihoud 2:2446/110.6@fidonet.org 90:400/410@nest.ftn slabih00@marvin.informatik.uni-dortmund.de 1.Rev: Sep 20, 1994 Status of this document ======================= This FSC suggests a proposed protocol for the FidoNet(r) community, and requests discussion and suggestions for improvements. Distribution of this document is unlimited. Fido and FidoNet are registered marks of Tom Jennings and Fido Software. Purpose ======= This document should introduce a widely used standardised extension to FTS-0001, like FTS-0006, 0007 and 0008 are, and provides a new way to switch to a new more confortable bundling method. I call this method XType-1. This is also more convenient than FSC-0014 (an earlier binary-style msg proposal) and allows multimedia extensions for further support (e.g. samples and pictures like World-Wide-Webb). An example how to implement MM extensions can be found at the end of this document. Note: This proposal does not suggest how to implement MM extensions, it should only demonstrate the flexibility of XType-1. Prologue ======== The new bundling method (XType-1) that document is introducing is NOT backward compatible. So only new software packages may offer this bundling method. Why introducing a new bundle format? ==================================== FIDONEWS 14-24 Page 8 16 Jun 1997 Well, FSC-0001, 0039, 0048 and 0045 are not very comfortable to handle. Software must be very complex to process a Type-2 packet and looking for control lines like SEEN-BYs, MSGIDs, REPLYs and so on slows down the importing, processing and exporting of every mail. How can I recognize a new XType-1 bundle? ========================================= XType-1 bundles are using a new extension "*.PKX" and not longer "*.PKT". So software can recognize a reveived XType-1 packet in a very easy way. Older software that do not know the XType-1 bundling method will not touch the file. But it is highly recommended to send the XType-1 bundles only to nodes you know about that they can process this new bundling method. Filename naming is the same as in FTSC-0001 explained. Only the extension has been changed from "PKT" to "PKX". For older software it is possible to convert the XType-1 format in one of the older formats like FSC-0001, 0039, 0048 and 0045. Packet Header ============= Offset dec hex .-----------------------------------------------------. 0 0 | HeaderVersion ($01) | I/M-Format [1] | [2] +--------------------------+------------------------ --+ 2 2 | ProductCode (*) | ProductCode (*) | +--------------------------+--------------------------+ 4 4 | Revision (major) | Revision (minor) | +--------------------------+--------------------------+ 6 6 | origZone (*) | origZone (*) | +--------------------------+--------------------------+ 8 8 | origNet (*) | origNet (*) | +--------------------------+--------------------------+ 10 A | origNode (*) | origNode (*) | +--------------------------+--------------------------+ 12 C | origPoint (*) | origPoint (*) | +--------------------------+--------------------------+ 14 E | destZone (*) | destZone (*) | +--------------------------+--------------------------+ 16 10 | destNet (*) | destNet (*) | +--------------------------+--------------------------+ 18 12 | destNode (*) | destNode (*) | +--------------------------+--------------------------+ 20 14 | destPoint (*) | destPoint (*) | +--------------------------+--------------------------+ 22 16 | password | | 8 bytes, null padded | +--------------------------+--------------------------+ 30 1E | Date/Time in POSIX 1003.1 format (*) | | (4 bytes) | [5] +--------------------------+------------------------ --+ FIDONEWS 14-24 Page 9 16 Jun 1997 34 22 | CapabilWord (*) | CapabilWord (*) | +--------------------------+--------------------------+ 36 24 | length of origNetwork (in bytes) (*) | [3] +-----------------------------------------------------+ 38 26 | origNetwork, zero when "length of origNetwork"=0 | [4] | null padded to an even length | +-----------------------------------------------------+ ~~ ~~ | length of destNetwork (in bytes) (*) | [3] +-----------------------------------------------------+ ~~ ~~ | destNetwork, zero when "length of destNetwork"=0 | [4] | null padded to an even length | +-----------------------------------------------------+ ~~ ~~ | zero or more | ~ packed ~ | messages | +--------------------------+--------------------------+ ~~ ~~ | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | '-----------------------------------------------------' (*) high-low-byte or low-high-byte according to I/M-Format-Flag (see [1]). [1] This flag defines Intel ($00) or Motorola ($01) format. Intel-Format stores low-byte first, Motorola-Format stores high-byte first. (2) HeaderVersion $01 means XType-1 ($02 means XType-2 and so on). (3) Length of network domain (max. 64k characters). Zero, when no network name is used, not known or your software does not allow a 5D address. When this field is $0000 the next field (the domain itself) will not be stored. (4) Domain names are not case sensitive. (5) POSIX 1003.1 format: Long integer containing the number of seconds since the 1st of January 1970 (00:00:00). Packet = PacketHeader { PakdMessage } $00 $00 PacketHeader = $01 /* $01 means XType-1 header */ I/M-Format /* $00=Intel format, $01=Motorola format*/ productCode /* 0 for Fido, write to FTSC for others */ revision /* revision or 0 */ origZone /* zone of pkt sender (otherwise null) */ origNet /* of packet, not of messages in packet */ origNode /* zone of pkt sender (otherwise null) */ origPoint /* zone of pkt sender (otherwise null) */ FIDONEWS 14-24 Page 10 16 Jun 1997 destZone /* zone of pkt receiver (otherwise null)*/ destNet /* of packet, not of messages in packet */ destNode /* of packet, not of messages in packet */ destPoint /* of packet, not of messages in packet */ password /* session pasword (otherwise null) */ date /* of packet creation, binary coded */ time /* of packet creation, binary coded */ CapabilWord /* bitvector of XType versions known by */ /* orig. software */ origLength /* length of orig domain */ origNetwork /* network of pkt sender */ destLength /* length of dest domain */ destNetwork /* network of pkt receiver */ msb Capability Word lsb Node Supports ------------FTSC Type Supported **)------------ U S 14 13 12 11 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 Type-N,XType-1 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 ^ ^ | +-- "S" Indicates nodes able to process type 2, | type 2+ or stone age style packets +----- "U" Indicates nodes able to process RFC- 822 bundles. ** - In the example bit definitions only XType-1 is defined now. The rest are to be concidered "reserved by FTSC". Generating XType-1 bundles ========================== Do we have a CW Does CW indicate stored for dest? YES ----> higher packets YES ---> Generate higher NO we support? packet | NO \|/ | +-----<----------------------+ FIDONEWS 14-24 Page 11 16 Jun 1997 | Fill header with all info | Add Messages | Terminate packet | Send packet Receiving bundles ================= Receiving a PKX? NO -------------> Old style (PKT) format YES | HeaderVersion = $01 NO -------------> Process XType-Other YES | Store CW | Process Packed Messages in the XType-1 bundle ===================================== To conserve space and eliminate fields which would be meaningless if sent, messages are packed for transmission in a binary style. XType-1 uses two different styles, a netmail style and an echomail style. Packed Netmail Message Offset dec hex .-----------------------------------------------------. 0 0 | 0 | 1 | I/M-Format [1] | +--------------------------+--------------------------+ 2 2 | origZone (*) | origZone (*) | +--------------------------+--------------------------+ 4 4 | origNet (*) | origNet (*) | +--------------------------+--------------------------+ 6 6 | origNode (*) | origNode (*) | +--------------------------+--------------------------+ 8 8 | origPoint (*) | origPoint (*) | +--------------------------+--------------------------+ 10 A | destZone (*) | destZone (*) | +--------------------------+--------------------------+ 12 C | destNet (*) | destNet (*) | +--------------------------+--------------------------+ 14 E | destNode (*) | destNode (*) | +--------------------------+--------------------------+ 16 10 | destPoint (*) | destPoint (*) | +--------------------------+--------------------------+ FIDONEWS 14-24 Page 12 16 Jun 1997 18 12 | Attribute (*) | Attribute (*) | +--------------------------+--------------------------+ 20 14 | cost (*) | cost (*) | +--------------------------+--------------------------+ 22 16 | Time/Date string (20 characters) | [2] +-----------------------------------------------------+ 42 2A | length of origNetwork (in bytes) (*) | [3] +-----------------------------------------------------+ 44 2C | origNetwork, zero when "length of origNetwork"=0 | | null padded to an even length | +-----------------------------------------------------+ ~~ ~~ | length of destNetwork (in bytes) (*) | [3] +-----------------------------------------------------+ ~~ ~~ | destNetwork, zero when "length of destNetwork"=0 | | null padded to an even length | +-----------------------------------------------------+ ~~ ~~ | variable fields | ~ ~ | | `-----------------------------------------------------' Packed Echomail Message Offset dec hex .-----------------------------------------------------. 0 0 | 0 | 2 | I/M-Format [1] | +--------------------------+--------------------------+ 2 2 | Attribute (*) | Attribute (*) | +--------------------------+--------------------------+ 4 4 | cost (*) | cost (*) | +--------------------------+--------------------------+ 6 6 | Time/Date string (20 characters) | [2] +--------------------------+------------------------ --+ 26 1A | variable fields | ~ ~ | | `-----------------------------------------------------' (*) high-low-byte or low-high-byte according to I/M-Format-Flag (see [1]). [1] This flag defines Intel ($00) or Motorola ($01) format. Intel-Format stores low-byte first, Motorola-Format stores high-byte first. Date/Time always stored in the format above! [2] Time/Date string (ascii format) Format (see FTS): DAY [ ] MONTH [ ] JEAR [ ][ ] HOUR [:] MINUTE [:] SECOND [0] DAY: [00] ... [31] MONTH: [Jan|Feb|Mar|Apr|May|Jun|Jul|Aug|Sep|Oct|Nov|Dec] JEAR: [00] ... [99] HOUR: [00] ... [23] MINUTE: [00] ... [59] SECOND: [00] ... [59] FIDONEWS 14-24 Page 13 16 Jun 1997 (3) Length of network domain (max. 64k characters). Zero, when no network name is used, not known or your software does not allow a 5D address. When this field is $0000 the next field (the domain itself) will not be stored. Due to routing, the origin and destination net and node of a packet are often quite different from those of the messages within it, nor need the origin and destination nets and nodes of the messages within a packet be homogenous. PakdMessage = $01 /* $01 indicates packed netmail message*/ I/M-Format /* $00=Intel, $01=Motorola-Format */ origZone /* of message */ origNet /* of message */ origNode /* of message */ origPoint /* of message */ destZone /* of message */ destNet /* of message */ destNode /* of message */ destPoint /* of message */ AttributeWord /* as described in FTS-0001 */ cost /* in lowest unit of originator's */ /* currency */ Date/Time /* message body was last edited */ origLength /* length of orig domain */ origNetwork /* network of pkt sender */ destLength /* length of dest domain */ destNetwork /* network of pkt receiver */ PakdMessage = $02 /* $02 indicates packed echomail message*/ I/M-Format /* $00=Intel, $01=Motorola-Format */ AttributeWord /* as described in FTS-0001 */ cost /* in lowest unit of originator's */ /* currency */ Date/Time /* message body was last edited */ AttributeWord bit meaning FIDONEWS 14-24 Page 14 16 Jun 1997 --- -------------------- 0 + Private 1 + s Crash 2 Recd 3 Sent 4 + FileAttached 5 InTransit 6 Orphan 7 KillSent 8 Local 9 s HoldForPickup 10 + unused 11 s FileRequest 12 + s ReturnReceiptRequest 13 + s IsReturnReceipt 14 + s AuditRequest 15 s FileUpdateReq s - need not be recognized, but it's ok + - not zeroed before packeting Bits numbers ascend with arithmetic significance of bit position. What is a variable field: ========================= A variable field consists of a header of four bytes length: .-----------------------------------------------------. 0 | DATA LENGTH (*) | DATA LENGTH (*) | | $0000 when last field | +--------------------------+--------------------------+ 2 | FIELD-ID | | "ND" (end data) when last field | +--------------------------+--------------------------+ 4 | FIELD-DATA | ~ ~ | zero padded to an even length | `-----------------------------------------------------' Defined FIELD-ID's: =================== FIELD-ID - synonym to -------------------------------------------------------------- FR "From" user TO "To" user SJ "Subject" AR AREA (only used in echomails) PD ^PID TD ^TID ED ^EID MD ^MSGID RP ^REPLY RT ^REPLYTO (used by uucp gateways) FIDONEWS 14-24 Page 15 16 Jun 1997 RA ^REPLYADDR (used by uucp gateways) SN ^SEEN-BY (only used in echomails) VA ^VIA (only used in netmails) RN ^REALNAME SP ^SPLIT CS ^CHARSET or ^CHRS OR Origin (only used in echomails) TL Tearline ML Mailtext follows ND End of data fields -------------------------------------------------------------- multimedia extensions (explanation follows): VO audio data VOC format WA audio data WAV format MI MIDI data GF bitmap data GIF TI bitmap data TIFF JP bitmap data JPEG AV video data AVI -------------------------------------------------------------- write to St.Slabihoud for more... All fields must have an even length. An odd field length must be aligned to an even one with a padded 0. Field = dataLength /* of field data (incl. 0) */ fieldID /* see table */ fieldData /* Field data */ Example (NetMail): ================== From: Stephan Slabihoud on 2:2446/110.6 To : Guenther Paczia on 2:2446/110 Subj: This is a testmail ----------------------------------------- ^PID: AVALON 3.72 ^MSGID: 2:2446/110.6@fidonet.org a3dbcfe5 ^MYCTRL nothing interest This is the message body .-----------------------------------------------------. | MESSAGE-HEADER | ~ ~ | | +--------------------------+--------------------------+ | PACKED NETMAIL MESSAGE HEADER | ~ ~ | | +--------------------------+--------------------------+ | 18 | 0 | +--------------------------+--------------------------+ | 'F' | 'R' | +--------------------------+--------------------------+ | 'Stephan Slabihoud', $00 | FIDONEWS 14-24 Page 16 16 Jun 1997 +--------------------------+--------------------------+ | 16 | 0 | +--------------------------+--------------------------+ | 'T' | 'O' | +--------------------------+--------------------------+ | 'Guenther Paczia', $00 | +--------------------------+--------------------------+ | 18 | 0 | +--------------------------+--------------------------+ | 'S' | 'J' | +--------------------------+--------------------------+ | 'This is a testmail' | +--------------------------+--------------------------+ | 12 | 0 | +--------------------------+--------------------------+ | 'P' | 'D' | +--------------------------+--------------------------+ | 'AVALON 3.72', $00 | +--------------------------+--------------------------+ | 34 | 0 | +--------------------------+--------------------------+ | 'M' | 'D' | +--------------------------+--------------------------+ | '2:2446/110.6@fidonet.org a3dbcfe5\0' | +--------------------------+--------------------------+ | 50 | 0 | +--------------------------+--------------------------+ | 'M' | 'L' | +--------------------------+--------------------------+ | '^MYCTRL nothing interest', $0A | | 'This is the message body', $0A | +--------------------------+--------------------------+ | 0 | 0 | +--------------------------+--------------------------+ | 'N' | 'D' | +--------------------------+--------------------------+ | more messages or zero | ~ ~ | | +--------------------------+--------------------------+ | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | '-----------------------------------------------------' Unknown control lines are stores as usual in the message body. So it is possible to receive a XType-1 packet and convert it into an old style Type-2+ packet to send to it to another systems that do not recognize the new Xtype-n bundles. Messages can be longer than 65535 bytes. Just use the 'ML' fields more than once. When importing such a mail the importer can easily split the mail into smaller parts. All 'ML' fields can be added to one big mail, or each 'ML' text can be stored in its own message. According to older software each 'ML' field should not be longer than 8 kbyte (but it is allowed to use longer fields!). All fields are unsigned integer. FIDONEWS 14-24 Page 17 16 Jun 1997 Example: How to implement MultiMedia extensions (draft version): ================================================================ Graphics and sounds are coded in one of the following fields: Audio: VO,WA,MI Bitmap: GF,TI,JP Video: AV Each field-data starts with a multimedia header: .------------------------. 0 0 | Name (Title) | | 16 chars (zero padded) | +------------------------+ 16 10 | ID | | 32bit Random Number | +------------------------+ 20 14 | Flags | | 16bit bitfield | +------------------------+ 22 16 | 42 reserved bytes | | | +------------------------+ 64 40 | start of data | ~ ~ | | '------------------------' Flags: Bit 0/1 - 1 = align left 2 = align right 3 = center 0 = reserved Bit 2-15 - reserved There are some possibilties for a mail editor to show/play the multimedia extensions: 1. It shows the mail in the first window and a list of all available fields in an extra (selection) window. The user selects the picture/sound from the selection window. 2. Pictures will be put together with the mailtext in ONE window (a button will be shown when it is an audio field). To define the place where a picture (or other multimedia extension) is shown put following ^A-control line into the mailbody: ^MMEDIA: [] is the "variable field" shortcut. is the 32bit ID in hex from the multimedia header. can be used as infotext for buttons. Example of ML field (mailbody): ------------------------------------------------------------ Welcome to\n ^MMEDIA: GF 5417fde6\n\n FIDONEWS 14-24 Page 18 16 Jun 1997 Please select:\n\n To hear my voice click on the button:\n ^MMEDIA: VO 2f4dca67 Say it\n I am watching you ;-):\n ^MMEDIA: GF 5627320f Click here\n ------------------------------------------------------------ This mail could be shown as follows: ------------------------------------------------------------ Welcome to: +------------------------------+ | GIF-Picture | +------------------------------+ Please select: To hear my voice: +--------+ | Say it | +--------+ I am watching you ;-): +-------------+ | | | GIF-Picture | | | +-------------+ ------------------------------------------------------------ Note: All pictures can be shown as button as well. This should be switchable in the mail editor. Credits ======= Thanx to Jonathan de Boyne Pollard, Peter Dreuw, Daniel Roesen and Rowan Crowe for their good ideas. Epilog ====== That's all, now it's up to you to decide whether or not to implement it. -30- ----------------------------------------------------------------- | Document: FSC-0083 | Version: 001 | Date: 17 June 1995 | | Jonathan de Boyne Pollard, FIDONET#2:440/4.0 A proposed standard for message IDs on FTN systems. FIDONEWS 14-24 Page 19 16 Jun 1997 by Jonathan de Boyne Pollard, FIDONET#2:440/4.0 Version 0.02, Sun 19950507 This document is (c) Copyright 1995 Jonathan de Boyne Pollard, all rights reserved. Originally written on Tuesday 19950131. Permission is hereby granted to copy and use this document without modification in any way that you see fit, provided that you do not attempt to make money from it, and that you understand that I take no responsibility whatsoever for any effect that it may have on your machine, data, marital status, or cat. Especial permission to freely use and redistribute this document in its original form is given to developers of FTN softwares and whatever FIDONET Technical Standards bodies may exist from time to time. ----------------------- 0.0 Definition of terms ----------------------- This document assumes familiarity with several terms in common use in discussion of mail systems, such as `User Agent', `Message Transport Agent', and so forth. Robot mail programs qualify as UAs, incidentally. 0.1 Knackered Backward Form --------------------------- This specification uses a modified BNF notation for discussion of textual representation of message IDs. Literal syntax elements (terminal nodes of the grammar) are enclosed in single quotes. 'MSGID:' '@' '<' '"' Non-terminal nodes are enclosed in angle brackets (greater than and less then signs). Production rules comprise a non-terminal, followed by productions. Alternate productions for the same non-terminal are separated by a vertical bar. ::= '"' '"' | FIDONEWS 14-24 Page 20 16 Jun 1997 Optional sequences within a production are indicated in two ways. Square brackets enclose a sequence that may occur exactly once or not at all. [ '@' ':' ] Curly braces enclose a sequence that may be repeated any number of times. A leading numeric prefix (usually 0 or 1) indicates the minimum number of repetitions. 1*{ } 0.1.1 Some standard production rules ------------------------------------ ::= | ::= 1*{ } ::= '0'|'1'|'2'|'3'|'4'|'5'|'6'|'7'|'8'|'9'| 'A'|'B'|'C'|'D'|'E'|'F'| 'a'|'b'|'c'|'d'|'e'|'f' ::= '0'|'1'|'2'|'3'|'4'|'5'|'6'|'7'|'8'|'9'|'A'|'B'|'C'|'D'|'E'|'F' ::= '"' '"' | ::= '"' 0*{ } '"' ::= | '\' ::= '"' 0*{ } '"' ::= 1*{ } Note the difference between the two forms of quoting. is a string with embedded quotation marks represented by double quotation marks (the way that most BASIC languages do). However, is a string with all quotation marks and backslashes (and, indeed, any other character) escaped by the backslash character, in the style of the C and C++ languages. ------------------------------------- 1.0 Definition and use of message IDs ------------------------------------- FIDONEWS 14-24 Page 21 16 Jun 1997 For the purposes of this document, the network is considered to form a vast distributed database of messages, which uses replication and store and forward distribution to ensure that all carriers of the database are kept up to date. Every message, whether netmail or echomail, carries a primary message ID that uniquely identifies it, and zero or more reference message IDs that uniquely identify any messages that it refers to. A primary message ID is a globally unique key that is used for uniquely identifying any single given mail message in the database (that is, counting all replicas of a message over all of the network as "one"). The reference message IDs are used by user agents to form a reply graph, allowing the the user to easily navigate the messagebase. Message transport protocols may require the data in a message ID to be encoded so that it may be safely transported. This standard distinguishes between the "underlying" message IDs and the encoded forms. This chapter discusses the underlying message IDs and the concepts behind them without reference to a particular encoding, and subsequent chapters discuss the various encoded forms. 1.1 Components of a message ID ------------------------------ A message ID comprises two parts, namely a site identifier and a local part. Both of these parts are arbitrary 8-bit binary data, that implementations are free to store in any way they choose, but which they should never alter. There are no distinguished characters in either the site identifier or local part, especially not terminating characters. So implementations must usually store an additional length count for both. The "minimum maximum" lengths for the site ID and local part are 64 octets each, and conforming implementations may not impose shorter maximum length restrictions. In fact, implementations are encouraged to impose no length restrictions on message IDs whatsoever (for example, it is not unreasonable to expect site IDs to exceed 256 octets on occasion). 1.2 Preservation of uniqueness ------------------------------ A site that creates messages (by entering them into the distributed database) must also issue message IDs, and must ensure that the global uniqueness property of message IDs is preserved. A site MUST ensure that it issues unique local parts to individual messages. Two or more sites may not have the same site identifier, unless they *all* co-operate to ensure that they do not issue duplicate local parts. FIDONEWS 14-24 Page 22 16 Jun 1997 The administrative procedures necessary to obtain a unique site identifier are beyond the scope of this document. Usually site identifiers will be FTN 5D addresses, or fully qualified DNS names, because administrative procedures for assigning such are already in place. However, they are not restricted to be such. The means by which a site invents new local parts is beyond the scope of this document. A discussion of some example options for implementors to consider is given in an appendix. 1.3 Reference message IDs ------------------------- Reference message IDs in a message denote messages to which it is related, comprising a "local subset" of the overall reply graph (i.e. the direct and indirect ancestors of the message), which each message carries around with it. Carrying around multiple reference message IDs provides overlap, allowing for the overall reply graph to be reconstructed even in the absence of intermediate messages (if they had expired, or had not yet arrived due to propagation lag, for example). UAs that conform to this standard MUST ensure that only messages that start new threads (i.e. messages entered into the network not in response to any existing message) have no reference message IDs. All other messages that they create MUST contain at least one reference message ID, being that of the message that is being responded to. [[ Luckily, schemes already in existence mean that in practice non-conforming User Agents will generally preserve this single back link, as well. ]] When responding to a message, user agents must create the reference message ID list of the response by taking the list of reference message IDs from the original message, and appending the primary message ID of the original message to the tail. A reference message ID list should not be truncated, unless transport or storage limitations are in danger of being exceeded. In which case, message IDs may only be removed from the head of the list. Removing from the tail would eliminate links to immediate ancestor messages, and removing from the middle would alter the reply graph. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- -- 2.0 Quoted printable encoding for storing 8-bit data in 7-bit transports FIDONEWS 14-24 Page 23 16 Jun 1997 -------------------------------------------------------------- ---------- To encode the 8-bit data in message IDs for transport by 7-bit transport layers, we use a variation on the widely used Quoted Printable form [RFC1521] [RFC1522]. 2.1 Grammar of Quoted Printable encoding ---------------------------------------- The grammar of the 7-bit encoding of 8-bit data in a quoted printable word is as follows. ::= | | [ '=' ] 1*{ } [ '=' ] | ::= '=' 2.2 Conversion from 8-bit to 7-bit ---------------------------------- Rule #1 (non-quoted transparent 7-bit): Where the 8-bit data consist of nothing but ASCII characters above SPACE and below DEL, they may be copied literally to the 7-bit representation. Rule #2 (quoted transparent 7-bit): Where the 8-bit data consist of nothing but ASCII characters except CR and NUL, they may be converted to the 7-bit representation by enclosing them in quotes, and escaping every embedded quotation mark with a second quotation mark. Rule #3 (8-bit quoted): Where the 8-bit data contain CR or NUL, or any non-ASCII characters, they are converted to a 7- bit representation in two stages. Firstly, all non-ASCII characters, all ASCII control characters, SPACE, DEL, '"', and '=', are converted to "quoted" form. Quoted form is an '=' character followed by the hexadecimal value of the character represented as two uppercase hexadecimal digits. Secondly, the entire string is then enclosed by one leading and one trailing '=' character. 2.3 Conversion from 7-bit to 8-bit ---------------------------------- Where the 7-bit field is delimited by equals signs, it is a FIDONEWS 14-24 Page 24 16 Jun 1997 fair bet that it comprises 8-bit data to which Rule 3 has been applied. However, it is possible that sites in the 7-bit world may produce data with leading and trailing equals signs. Reverse of Rule #3 : If, after stripping the leading and trailing '=', the remaining text can be converted back using the reverse of Rule 3, then that 8-bit data is the actual message ID. Otherwise the reverse of Rule 2 should be applied to the original 7-bit data. Reverse of Rule #2 : If the 7-bit data are enclosed by quotes the reverse of Rule 2 should be applied to remove the enclosing quotes and any embedded quotes (8-bit form does not have delimiter characters and so does not require quoting). Otherwise the reverse of Rule 1 should be applied. Reverse of Rule #1 : The 7-bit data are copied to the 8-bit data. 2.4 Rationale ------------- The intention is that tokens will not be parsed as separate words by most 7-bit grammars. The elimination of quotes, whitespace, and control characters by Rule 3 is part of achieving this. Rules 1 and 2 allow message IDs created by 7-bit standards to enter and travel within the 8-bit world, and be restored to their original form when they return to the 7-bit world. Returning 7-bit message IDs to their original form means that 7-bit duplicate checking is not broken by 8-bit gateways. The unfortunate side-effect is that any 8-bit data generated in the 7-bit world will be returned to the 7-bit world as 7- bit data in Q-P encoded form. However, the original 8-bit data are unlikely to work in the 7-bit world in the first place, so this is no great loss. Rule 3 is the most general rule of the three. Rule 3 applies to true 8-bit message IDs generated in the 8-bit world that use 8-bit characters, allowing them to travel across the 7-bit world with a reasonable chance of remaining intact. The elimination of the equals sign by Rule 3, replacing it with its Q-P encoding, ensures that the decoding process can assume that an equals sign not followed by two uppercase hex characters is not a valid Rule 3 encoding, and so fall back to decoding Rule 2. --------------------------------------------------------------------- 3.0 Storage of message IDs in type 2.0, 2.0+, and 2.2 message packets -------------------------------------------------------------- ------- Type 2.0 message packets [FTS0001], type 2.0+ message packets FIDONEWS 14-24 Page 25 16 Jun 1997 [FSC0039], and type 2.2 message packets [FSC0045] are used for message transport over much of FIDONET. They do not have space in their message headers available for message IDs (along with a lot of other things), therefore message IDs must be transferred to the body of the message for transport in these forms, and retrieved from the body of the message afterwards. The existing "kludge line" mechanisms [FSC0068] are used to do this. There are two concerns here. Firstly, it is preferable that as much of the reply graph as possible is preserved, even in the face of tools that use existing MSGID/REPLY schemes [FTS0009]. Secondly, message IDs are 8 bit data, and must be encoded into a 7-bit form that will be reliably transported in the bodies of type 2.0, 2.0+, and 2.2 message packets. 3.1 Conversion to and from kludge lines --------------------------------------- The primary message ID of a message is stored to and retrieved from a "MSGID:" kludge line. All of the reference message IDs of a message are stored, in order from first to last, in a single "REFER:" kludge line. The last reference message ID of a message (its immediate ancestor, in other words) is stored in a "REPLY:" kludge line. Note that the information in the "REFER:" kludge line is a superset of the information in the "REPLY:" kludge line. If a message has zero reference message IDs (it is the start of a new thread), then the "REFER:" and "REPLY:" kludge lines are omitted. If, upon decoding from type 2.0, 2.0+, or 2.2 message transport format, a "REFER:" kludge line exists, then its contents are assumed to be the complete list of reference message IDs (in encoded form) for the message, and the "REPLY:" kludge line is ignored. Otherwise, the content of the "REPLY:" kludge line (if any) is used for the single reference message ID of the message. 3.2 Compatibility with existing MSGID/REPLY schemes --------------------------------------------------- There are two compatibility considerations. It is important that encoded message IDs be correctly parsed by implementations using older less versatile standards. It is also important that implementations expecting older MSGID/REPLY pairs will destroy as little linking information as possible. FIDONEWS 14-24 Page 26 16 Jun 1997 3.2.1 Grammar considerations ---------------------------- There are two valid interpretations of FTS-0009, both of which (should) use the following grammar : ::= 'MSGID: ' ::= 'REPLY: ' ::= ASCII SOH character ::= | ::= 1*{ } The "VFIDO" interpretation assumes that MSGID/REPLY kludges are the textual representation of an (address, number) ordered pair. Systems using this interpretation may change the case of or may renormalise if they find it to be a FTN 5D address. Message IDs from this standard that are stored in MSGID/REPLY kludges will be mangled by software applying the VFIDO interpretation of FTS-0009. Such software is not compatible with this standard. The "Mark Kimes" interpretation assumes that MSGID/REPLY kludges are text separated by whitespace, and preserves the contents of and without change. The encoding scheme outlined in section 2.2 produces two whitespace separated text fields. So software applying the "Mark Kimes" interpretation of FTS-0009 will not mangle the encoded message IDs. In many cases, softwares using the "Mark Kimes" interpretation will in fact parse as ::= As long as software applying the "Mark Kimes" interpretation of FTS-0009 is not written to truncate either field, or complain about a non-numeric portion, it is compatible with this standard. 3.2.2 Reply linking ------------------- FTS-0009 implementations will generate MSGID kludges, transfer the content (Mark Kimes interpretation) of the MSGID kludge data of an original message into the REPLY data of a response message, and will not generate a REFER kludge. So reply linking will be preserved, but reference information beyond the immediate ancestor of a message will be lost. FIDONEWS 14-24 Page 27 16 Jun 1997 3.3 Quoted printable encoding ----------------------------- The 8-bit data in message IDs is encoded into 7-bit MSGID/REPLY data for transport in type 2.0, 2.0+, and 2.2 message packets by using the quoted printable encoding outlined in chapter 2, along with the following grammar. ::= 'MSGID: ' <7-bit-encoding> ::= 'REPLY: ' <7-bit-encoding> ::= 'REFER: ' <7-bit-encoding> 0*{ <7-bit-encoding> } <7-bit-encoding> ::= ::= ::= Applying Rule 1 of Q-P encoding to local parts is safe as long as (from the FTS-0009 grammar) is in actuality treated as by most implementations, as outlined in the compatibility notes. Rule 2 should not be applied to local parts, because the grammar of FTS-0009 does not allow for quoted text in the portion. The restrictions in Rule 3 have deliberate effect here. FTS- 0009 sites will rarely produce data with leading and trailing equals signs, so reversing Rule 3 will be unlikely to be subject to spurious data. In theory, relaxing Rule 3 reversal to include decoding lowercase hexadecimal as well as uppercase hexadecimal would mean that sites that convert the case of MSGID/REPLY (as part of the "VFIDO" interpretation) would not break Q-P encoding. However, the "VFIDO" interpretation will usually do far more damage than simple case conversion, which will be impossible to restore. Rather than attempt the reverse conversion (which could have the undesirable effect of causing different messages to end up with the same 8-bit message ID if the local part were truncated to eight characters in the 7-bit world), any "VFIDO" mangling that occurs will prevent Q-P decoding from succeeding. This means that 8-bit message IDs that look like incomplete or damaged Q-P encodings are not gateway problems, but are more likely to be the result of a site using the "VFIDO" interpretation in the 7-bit world. ------------------------------------------------------ 4.0 Storage of message IDs in type 2.3 message packets ------------------------------------------------------ FIDONEWS 14-24 Page 28 16 Jun 1997 The storage format of type 2.3 messages (so-called "extensible type 2" [TYPE2EXT]) provides space in the message headers for both a primary message ID and an arbitrary list of reference message IDs. All message IDs are stored as 8-bit binary strings, using length counts rather than delimiters. Therefore message IDs can be stored directly in type 2.3 messages. ------------------------------------------------------ 5.0 Storage of message IDs in type 3.x message packets ------------------------------------------------------ There is such a wide variety of type 3 message formats that this standard doesn't hope to cover them all. For those with binary "chunks", chunk types 'PMID' (primary message ID) and 'RFER' (reference message IDs) are expected to have the following form : |-----------------------------------------------------| | Length of site identifier WORD32 | |-----------------------------------------------------| | Site identifider ... | |-----------------------------------------------------| | Length of local part WORD32 | |-----------------------------------------------------| | Local part ... | |-----------------------------------------------------| Those schemes that use text format headers and require field delimiters may care to use the Q-P encoding outlined in chapter 2. --------------------------------------------------------- 6.0 Storage of message IDs in RFC822 and RFC1036 messages --------------------------------------------------------- The grammar of "Internet" messages is defined by the standards for ARPA text messages [RFC0822] and for Usenet news messages [RFC1036]. 6.1 Restrictions on interconversion ----------------------------------- Interconversion between a FIDO message ID and an RFC822 Message-ID is restricted by several factors. The major factor is that RFC0822 actually places greater restrictions upon Message-IDs than this standard does upon FIDO message IDs (in part because this standard is designed to also be able to handle X.400 message identifiers and others transparently as well). It mandates that the
portion of a Message-ID FIDONEWS 14-24 Page 29 16 Jun 1997 be a valid DNS name. A secondary factor is reversibility, in that many gateways exist between FTN and RFC822, and so message IDs that cross the boundary more than once will retain as much of their original ID information as possible. There is more information contained within a FIDO message ID than in an RFC822 Message-ID. In particular, the
portions of RFC822 Message-IDs are not case sensitive, whereas the site ID of a FIDO message ID is treated as 8-bit data for the purposes of comparison. These are handled by restricting the allowable conversions that a conformant gateway may use on a message ID, by ensuring that all of the FIDO information is not lost when converted to the (narrower bandwidth) RFC822 Message-ID format, and by allowing gateway softwares to infer a meaning from the site identifier portion of a message ID. This is the *only* part of this standard where it is allowed for softwares to place a meaning on the site identifier of a message ID. 6.1 Converting to RFC822 form ----------------------------- 6.1.1 Site identifier recognition --------------------------------- Gateway softwares are allowed to examine a site identifier of a message ID and determine whether it is in a format that they recognise or not. This standard specifies what gateway softwares should do when they encounter a site identifier that is a recognisable DNS name or one that is recognisable FIDO 5D address, and what form the DNS name for RFC822 must take. Site identifiers that are not FIDO 5D addresses are really beyond the scope of FIDONET documentation. If an implementation recognises another form of site identifier (such as X.400 O/R addresses) then it is free to translate that site identifier to and from DNS form, as long as it knows how (there are RFCs on how to perform X.400 conversion). This message ID standard imposes no restrictions on site identifiers, allowing any scheme to be administered on FIDONET. It is therefore up to the site identification schemes themselves to provide their own mappings to and from DNS names. Gateways are free to drop messages with message IDs that they do not understand how to convert. Both the FIDONET and RFC worlds depend heavily upon message IDs for detecting messages duplicates, and so it is better that a gateway should NOT distribute messages with message ID formats that it doesn't understand how to convert to RFC822 form, rather than that it does so incorrectly. FIDONEWS 14-24 Page 30 16 Jun 1997 6.1.1.1 Site identifiers that are DNS names ------------------------------------------- If the site identifier of a message ID can be parsed as a legal DNS name according to the grammar of RFC822 then, even if it cannot be resolved to an IP address or MX record, it must be used as the domain name of the RFC message ID, and the local part must be passed through unchanged. This allows for RFC message IDs to enter and leave 8-bit FIDONET without change, even via gateways that have no knowledge of or connectivity to the originating RFC host. 6.1.1.2 Site identifiers that are FIDO 5D addresses --------------------------------------------------- The conversion process for message IDs where the site identifier can be parsed as a FIDO 5D address in the forms DOMAIN#Z:N/N.P or Z:N/N.P@DOMAIN depends from the "domain" (in the FIDO sense of the word) of the address. 6.1.1.2.1 Site identifiers that are 5D addresses in FIDONET ----------------------------------------------------------- If the site identifier of a message ID is parseable as a FIDO 5D address of the form Z:N/N.P@FIDONET or FIDONET#Z:N/N.P (i.e. in the FIDONET domain itself), then the DNS name used for the RFC message ID must be the DNS equivalent of that address. This is because MX records exist in the DNS for all of the zone:net pairs for 5D addresses in the FIDONET "domain", in the form p#.f#.n#.z#.fidonet.org where # is a number without leading zeroes giving the appropriate portion of the 5D address. Therefore this is the conversion that must be used. 6.1.1.2.2 Site identifiers that are 5D addresses outside of FIDONET -------------------------------------------------------------- ----- Most other "domains" (in the FIDO sense of the word), are free to choose their own DNS domain name, but have not yet done so. Therefore, constructs such as p3.f0.n444.z81.os2net.ftn (which several people have INCORRECTLY inferred from other FTS documentation) are NOT ALLOWED as the DNS name in an RFC Message-ID. .ftn is NOT a valid top-level DNS domain, for a start, and there is no guarantee that OS2NET would adopt that DNS name, either. (p#.f#.n#.z#.os2net.fidonet.org anyone ?) FIDONEWS 14-24 Page 31 16 Jun 1997 6.1.1.2.3 Conversion of local parts ----------------------------------- Where a gateway has recognised a site identifier to represent a FIDO 5D address that it knows the DNS name for, the local part must then be encoded. According to the grammar in RFC822, any ASCII character (from NUL to DEL) is legal in the local part of an RFC822 Message- ID, because (q.v.) allows any special characters to be escaped. Since RFC822 transport is merely 7-bit just like type 2.0, 2.0, and 2.2 message packets are, we use the quoted-printable scheme given in chapter 2. However, 6.1.1.3 Site identifiers that are not recognisable 5D addresses -------------------------------------------------------------- - No implementation may extend the FIDO 5D address to DNS name conversions for site IDs that are given above. If the message ID is "almost, but not quite" a FIDO 5D address, then the message should for preference be discarded at the gateway rather than being passed through. Message IDs with abitrary site identifiers are perfectly acceptable to this standard, since it ascribes no meaning to site identifiers within FIDONET. However, RFC822 and the existing RFC domain name system can only handle a restricted subset of the whole range of FIDO 5D addresses. 6.1.1.4 Other site identifiers ------------------------------ As mentioned before, gateways are allowed to support other site identification schemes that are not FIDO 5D addresses, and convert site identifiers in those forms to DNS names as they please. It should be borne in mind when designing such conversion schemes that the domain part of an RFC 822 message ID can only contain ASCII characters that are not control characters, whitespace, or special delimiter characters, because of the definition of in that standard (q.v.). The quoted printable encoding outlined in chapter 2 of this document is probably not sufficient for handling full 8-bit site identifier schemes, in which case the scheme in RFC1522 should be investigated. 6.1.2 Preserving information ---------------------------- FIDONEWS 14-24 Page 32 16 Jun 1997 Although this standard recognises two forms for a FIDO 5D address, there is only one valid form for that address in the DNS. For reverse conversions to succeed, when an RFC message re-enters 8-bit FIDONET (possibly via another gateway), the *exact form* of the original site identifier must be reconstructed, otherwise FIDO softwares will treat the two message IDs as different. Although other schemes exist, which encode the 5D address in the local part, and use a "generic" domain name of "fidonet.org" (which is not a valid host name), it is preferred that the semantics of a message ID ("WXYZ local part generated at ABCDE site") be preserved, especially as FIDONET sites are visible to the RFC world via the DNS anyway. It is therefore suggested that the original FIDONET site identifier (since it will be 7-bit text) be encoded as a token immediately following the relevant message ID, using quoting to escape any embedded punctuation (q.v. the grammar in RFC 822). 6.2 Converting from RFC822 form ------------------------------- When converting from RFC822 form back to 8-bit FIDONET message IDs, gateways should determine whether the address portion of the Message-ID is a hostname under the fidonet.org domain. If it is, a comment token should be scanned for to find the original form of the 5D address, and the site identifier should be reconstructed from it if found, or from the given DNS name in the form DOMAIN#Z:N/N.P if no comment token were present. The inverse of the quoted printable encoding outlined in chapter 2 should then be applied to the local part. Otherwise, the 7-bit RFC822 Message-ID should be stored in the 8-bit FIDONET message ID without change. 6.3 Reply linking ----------------- According to RFC1036, message IDs occur in the Message-ID: and in the References: header for news (echomail). Although RFC822 specifies an In-Reply-To: header for mail (netmail), it makes it difficult to use, because it need not contain a message ID. The model for message identification used by RFC1036 closely matches the model outlined in this standard (it is probable that there is only one way to skin this particular cat). There is thus a direct mapping between the primary message ID defined by this standard and the RFC1036 Message-ID: header, and also between the reference message IDs defined by this standard and the RFC1036 References: header. FIDONEWS 14-24 Page 33 16 Jun 1997 This means that in normal use the reference message ID list will be properly maintained by Usenet softwares. ----------------------------------------------- A.0 Discussion on generating unique local parts ----------------------------------------------- How any given site generates unique local parts is up to it. So this appendix should only be taken as a guideline. On sites where there is only one piece of software assigning message IDs (e.g. there is only one UA, or the MTA itself assigns message IDs), then a simple "take a ticket" scheme could work. Multiple instances of that piece of software running simultaneously would need to arbitrate access to that "ticket dispenser" amongst themselves. A discussion of `sequencers' (which is the proper name for this idea) and how atomic operations on them can be implemented, can be found in any good computer science textbook on concurrent systems. Unfortunately, in today's heterogeneous world, it is difficult to the point of impossibility to get every piece of software to agree to use one single central sequencer. It is obvious that using just the date/time for a message ID is insufficient on multitasking systems, or even on single tasking systems that can generate multiple messages per clock tick. What is less obvious is that it is not a good idea to use the name of the software generating the message ID and a sequencer maintained by that software as the unique local part. The problem here is that it is not guaranteed that different softwares will use different names (especially if they are called "Message Editor" (-:), so it is possible that different softwares could generate duplicate local parts. Some form of "product ID code" would of course rectify this, but given the amount of software in use and under development these days, a centrally administered product ID database hasn't been a viable option for decades now. There are, of course, simpler schemes, that can guarantee to produce unique local parts, because they rely on features that are guaranteed unique to every individual application running, and do not rely on different applications co-operating to use the same central facilities, such as a site-wide sequencer. One commonly used scheme is to use a combination of the current date and time and the process and thread IDs of the software creating the message ID. e.g. 1995Jan31.123426.26.1 or 1995013112343600260001 FIDONEWS 14-24 Page 34 16 Jun 1997 This doesn't have to be human-readable calendar time, of course. It could equally well be the POSIX 1003.1 time (seconds since The Epoch), or the Julian date plus the time of day. If the time isn't granular enough, a sequence number (which can be maintained individually by each process) can be added to increase its granularity. On just about every operating system in the world, including multi-user ones, the 4-tuple will be unique on one machine *forever* (or until the clock wraps around, at least). e.g. 1995Jan31.123426.26.1.2 or 19950131123436002600010003 On multiple machine sites, where all machines share the one site identifier, the above scheme can be extended to include the "hidden" local machine name, which will be assumed to be made available (in some fashion) to the softwares generating the message IDs. This yields a unique 5- tuple. e.g. utopium.1995Jan31.123848.26.1.4 or utopium.19950131123907002600010005 Again, the "intra-site" machine name can be anything, from the local uname() (for UNIX people) to the NETBIOS machine name (for PC based LAN systems). ------------------------- Bibliography and Author ------------------------- [FTS0001] A Basic FIDONET Technical Standard, version 15. Randy Bush, Pacific Systems Group. FIDONET#1:105/6.0. 30th August 1990. ( Defines the type 2.0 packet message transport format. ) [FTS0009] A standard for message identifiers and reply chain linkage, version 1. Jim Nutt. FIDONET#1:114/30.0. 17th December 1991. ( Defines the MSGID/REPLY kludges. ) [FSC0034] Gateways to and from FIDONET. Technical, administrative, and policy considerations. Randy Bush, Pacific Systems Group. FIDONET 1:105/6.0. 30th August 1990. ( Discussion on features that should be preserved across gateways, and on good gateway behaviour in FIDONEWS 14-24 Page 35 16 Jun 1997 general. ) [FSC0039] A type 2 packet extension proposal, version 4. Mark A. Howard. FIDONET#1:260/340. 29th September 1990. ( Defines the type 2.0+ packet message transport format. ) [FSC0045] A proposal for a new packet format, version 1. Thom Henderson. FIDONET#1:107/542.1. 17th April 1990. ( Defines the type 2.2 packet message transport format. ) [FSC0068] A proposed replacement for FTS-0004, version 1. Mark Kimes. FIDONET#1:380/16.0. 13th December 1992. ( Defines kludge lines. ) [RFC0822] Standard for the format of ARPA Internet text messages. David Crocker, University of Delaware. 13th August 1982. ( Defines the grammar and semantics of RFC messages. ) [RFC1036] Standard for the interchange of USENET messages. M Horton, AT&T bell labs; and R. Adams, Centre for seismic studies. December 1987. ( Defines changes to the grammar and semantics of RFC822 that are required for news instead of mail, including reply linking. ) [RFC1521] MIME (Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions) Part One: Mechanisms for specifying and describing the format of Internet message bodies. N. Borenstien, Bellcore; and N. Freed, Innosoft. September 1993. ( Defines Quoted Printable encoding of text. ) [RFC1522] MIME (Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions) Part One: Message header extensions for non ASCII text. K. Moore, University of Tennesee. September 1993. ( Defines how to use Q-P encoding in message headers. ) [TYPE2EXT] An extension to type 2.0, 2.0+, and 2.2 message transport formats to eliminate most kludge lines from the message body. Jonathan de Boyne Pollard. FIDONET#2:440/4.0. [ Not yet released. ] ----------- Jonathan de Boyne Pollard FIDONEWS 14-24 Page 36 16 Jun 1997 FIDONET#2:440/4.0 ----------------------------------------------------------------- FIDONEWS 14-24 Page 37 16 Jun 1997 ================================================================= COORDINATORS CORNER ================================================================= Nodelist-statistics as seen from Zone-2 for day 164 By Ward Dossche, 2:292/854 ZC/2 +----+------+------------+------------+------------+------------+--+ |Zone|Nl-136|Nodelist-143|Nodelist-150|Nodelist-157|Nodelist-164|%%| +----+------+------------+------------+------------+------------+--+ | 1 | 8367| 8277 -90 | 8277 0 | 8182 -95 | 8182 0 |31| | 2 | 15879|15855 -24 |15835 -20 |15774 -61 |15703 -71 |60| | 3 | 800| 761 -39 | 765 4 | 758 -7 | 758 0 | 3| | 4 | 543| 543 0 | 543 0 | 519 -24 | 514 -5 | 2| | 5 | 87| 87 0 | 87 0 | 87 0 | 87 0 | 0| | 6 | 1083| 1077 -6 | 1078 1 | 1078 0 | 1078 0 | 4| +----+------+------------+------------+------------+------------+--+ | 26759|26600 -159 |26585 -15 |26398 -187 |26322 -76 | +------+------------+------------+------------+------------+ ----------------------------------------------------------------- FIDONEWS 14-24 Page 38 16 Jun 1997 ================================================================= NET HUMOR ================================================================= From: "Mike Riddle" To: "Baker, Christopher" Subject: Fwd: Java's Year 292 Million Bug ==================BEGIN FORWARDED MESSAGE================== Received: from austin.onu.edu (austin.onu.edu [140.228.10.1]) by monarch.papillion.ne.us (8.7.4/8.6.9) with ESMTP id BAA23416 for mriddle@monarch.papillion.ne.us>; Fri, 16 May 1997 01:19:06 -0500 (CDT) Received: from austin.onu.edu (localhost.onu.edu [127.0.0.1]) by austin.onu.edu (8.8.5/8.8.5) with SMTP id CAA85786 for ; Fri, 16 May 1997 02:11:31 -0400 Date: Fri, 16 May 1997 02:11:31 -0400 Errors-To: david@drw.onu.edu Reply-To: network2d-l@austin.onu.edu Originator: network2d-l@austin.onu.edu Sender: network2d-l@austin.onu.edu From: jenniferrose To: mriddle@monarch.papillion.ne.us Subject: Java's Year 292 Million Bug YEAR 2000 WOES DON'T AFFECT JAVA UNTIL A.D. 292271023 [5/13/97] Sun Microsystems Inc. today acknowledged the Year 292 Million Bug in the Java computer language, which could cause problems for Social Security recipients and millions of other computer-dependent users in 292271023 A.D. Dr. James Gosling, the inventor of Java, divulged the problem and hastened to add that a team of specialists is now at work attempting to solve the problem sometime within the next 292,271 millennia. "We can't be certain Java will be around that long," said Gosling, inventor of Java. "But then again, we can't take any chances. Two hundred and ninety two million-plus years may seem like a long time for a species. But relatively speaking, in astronomical terms, it's nothing." Added Gosling, "I don't mean to brag, but Java is taking on a life of its own. We do see it as the computing platform of the 21st century and well beyond." For more information contact Lisa Poulson at lisa.poulson@eng.sun.com or 408-343-1630. http://java.sun.com/pr/1997/may/spotnews/sn970513.html _____________________________________________________ FIDONEWS 14-24 Page 39 16 Jun 1997 jennifer j. rose jjrose@redoak.heartland.net jrose@giga.com Lawyer, Attorney, Counselor, All-Purpose Bitch P.O. Box 616 Shenandoah, IA 51601-0616 voice 712-246-5531 fax 712-246-5533 home unlisted VISA/Mastercard Accepted ===================END FORWARDED MESSAGE=================== ----------------------------------------------------------------- FIDONEWS 14-24 Page 40 16 Jun 1997 ================================================================= NOTICES ================================================================= Christopher Baker Rights On! 1:18/14 A_THEIST Echo Available A_theism means free of religion in the way a_political means free of politics or a_sexual means free of sex characteristics or drives. With that in mind and ever cognizant of the continued pressure of religion to intrude itself into our government and its operations, the A_THEIST Echo is provided to inform and alarm and hopefully wake up the sleeping and too long silent majority to the peril on our doorstep. It is a Zone 1 Backbone Echo Hosted and Moderated by Rights On! [1:18/14] and Christopher Baker [card carrying member of American Atheists, Inc.]. Initial links may be obtained from your local Backbone source connection. The Echo is open to anyone who can discuss, without proselytizing, the extreme desirability of maintaining the absolute separation of State and church in this country as provided for in the U.S. Constitution and other Constitutions around the world. A sample of the first few messages and the statement of purpose of the Echo is available as A_THEIST.ZIP from this system anytime except 0100-0130 ET and Zone 1 ZMH [USR HST ds online] if you wish to get an idea of whether to commit disk space to the Echo. An archive of the past traffic from the Echo is also available as A_ECHO1.ZIP, A_ECHO2.ZIP, and A_ECHO3.ZIP. Ask your Backbone connection to get it for you! The complete info is available in the current ELISTnnn.XXX file available from your NEC or REC or here. [Request ELIST.] I hope you will join us or ask your Sysop to request a link via their regular Backbone connections! QOFM. Chris ----------------------------------------------------------------- Future History 1 Jul 1997 Canada Day - Happy Birthday Canada. 9 Jul 1997 Independence Day, Argentina. FIDONEWS 14-24 Page 41 16 Jun 1997 1 Aug 1997 International FidoNet PENPAL [Echo] meeting in Dijon, France 13 Oct 1997 Thanksgiving Day, Canada. 1 Dec 1997 World AIDS Day. 10 Dec 1997 Nobel Day, Sweden. 12 Jan 1998 HAL 9000 is one year old today. 22 May 1998 Expo '98 World Exposition in Lisbon (Portugal) opens. 1 Dec 1998 Fifteenth Anniversary of release of Fido version 1 by Tom Jennings. 31 Dec 1999 Hogmanay, Scotland. The New Year that can't be missed. 1 Jan 2000 The 20th Century, C.E., is still taking place thru 31 Dec. 15 Sep 2000 Sydney (Australia) Summer Olympiad opens. 1 Jan 2001 This is the actual start of the new millennium, C.E. -- If YOU have something which you would like to see in this Future History, please send a note to the FidoNews Editor. ----------------------------------------------------------------- FIDONEWS 14-24 Page 42 16 Jun 1997 ================================================================= FIDONEWS PUBLIC-KEY ================================================================= [this must be copied out to a file starting at column 1 or it won't process under PGP as a valid public-key] -----BEGIN PGP PUBLIC KEY BLOCK----- Version: 2.6.2 Comment: Clear-signing is Electronic Digital Authenticity! mQCNAzINVLcAAAEEAM5dZN6t6j5Yc0kl7qegVFfiBeVoteuhDg4ay8h43u38Q4kO eJ9Mm7J89wXFb9vgouBVb4biIN6bTWCwcXTbGhBe5OIceLvluuxuEKsaIs/UwXNe Ogx5azIPhRfC7MJDe41Z8tMEBuHY/NE88cuxQ8yXWO126IRttavu6L/U5BwRAAUR tCRGaWRvTmV3cyBFZGl0b3IgPDE6MS8yM0BmaWRvbmV0Lm9yZz6JAJUDBRAyGwFS JZMgw7eCKz0BAZl0A/9xrfhpsEOqGiPfjy2qd9dv6tvSVPPVFu+Wy1lGTHYtuTtg FIN3fQ47AM3XzqHxWRWvp/xZYgR6sRICL7UFx94ShYBQc7CyqBBZKA0IvIWqXP/g c4Br+gQJR6CLiQK7TUyjUbqNbs6QAxuNUi4xFQM+O2Gene5/iTjHFmmSDj2C9YkB FQMFEDIOmHDTQ6/52IG1SQEBQ78H/Rz/mleIrtZwFIOhzy3JH4Z6FUTfZuM9nPcs 1ZLjZCPptHvY7wEYJWGr03lPPJ6tj1VBXwTrWJTf/hOLsoi00GKV8t1thjqGDo23 O91/bSQ+Vn0vBQ2vOEJys8ftxdoLJAyI5YLzHVT+RsMTQLIXVuPyrNcKs1vC2ql+ UDHpU1R+9cG9JUEHpGI6z0DPnQ74SKbQH3fiVBpHhYx4BmvcBC4gWQzKMkDWFiq3 8AssIZ7b9lWl3OBgQ4UM1OIDKoJyjRewIdKyl7zboKSt6Qu8LrcsXO3kb81YshOW ZpSS3QDIqfZC4+EElnB15l4RcVwnPHBaQY0FxUr4Vl4UWM36jbuJAJUDBRAyDpgY q+7ov9TkHBEBAQGoA/sFfN07IFQcir456tJfBfB9R5Z6e6UKmexaFhWOsLHqbCq6 3FGXDLeivNn6NTz81QeqLIHglTuM3NP1mu8sw215klAG8G3M1NA2xLw7Eqhspze2 raGvNeEwxl8e+PY9aZwBj4UWU+CmIm6QNiP0MtvR7QYDIKn5mZCDc3CLmr942IkB FQMFEDIOh0O8AhTPqRipPQEB4EYH/1gkDmdHL6lbEkFuQLrylF+weBl0XQ+kv7ER vWXYrvIrkppxtc4VAge6CXXEbOGJnvkFHgyNZzO9Q9O64QsmZvjip+4lhDLeNrdH X9DizS4YKXxkSKr9Yltmn2/AlBCx6jwcDIfkqy/P1tNWcikxZZMd6KryK0Wsres9 Ik12OmVmJjQSxb5bS6Q8aYUbV3qwosGXTqy+BzYh/UYAX/XJIWa5kxFVSPKFSZ+5 toiSzANd9SpHPEogGvQDHJlJ23lmsMx/6uHsR1LTsQ8su8zIk92XyqePJTjlMx2j D7KJWNR7Zzu4QHCXBkga5W8l2FfPk7D3+o7bXTLRuR1yTYGdNoiJAJUCBRAyDhwt SlKLwP4OFW0BAdaMA/9rcWQlSq44K9JuJ7fZUgt9fwxGreTud9fC8DvlbUW79+CA AHLTLLagcEF1OKsWzVBWcA2JEAp+TUTqktRN0oD8vnaw3uNJd1G5KK59hw0WR8x1 v4ivypbSjiq95Y3gBunb7WjpyiFRWDlm0PrKrWHtbWzjnpPIpetln1UuqsSfbokB FQIFEDIOG9C3N61ZQ4Dr/QEBIzMH/1VxxztmBPBszbjZLDO8Svcax9Ng8IcWpcDy WqHCAA2Hoe5VtMD0v6w31ZgVqTPIvCark2Y/aTR1GofiuN9NUqbVV534AgAYLzYk DMT1swsPvqDTpOYgQl6PCGh6A5JGAbWJfKkX9XCUHJAAmiTsEVRNnjOgL+p6qjoh EfIG8CGehghWSRKl5eGeDAtbXupZKNjFI1t2XV+ks0RFQ/RPuTH7pF7pk7WO6Cyg +Dk2ZMgua0HRL1fXvHKb5Xzr3MVgsbAl5gP8ooIiD9MI/x5Irh3oo58VyoEZNBs/ Kz+drGFDPljcS6fdiVCFtYIzMrshY6YsfLi0aB8fwOvFtxgBqli0J0NocmlzdG9w aGVyIEJha2VyIDwxOjE4LzE0QGZpZG9uZXQub3JnPrQoQ2hyaXN0b3BoZXIgQmFr ZXIgPGNiYWtlcjg0QGRpZ2l0YWwubmV0Pg== =61OQ -----END PGP PUBLIC KEY BLOCK----- File-request FNEWSKEY from 1:1/23 [1:18/14] or download it from the Rights On! BBS at 1-904-409-7040 anytime except 0100-0130 ET and Zone 1 ZMH at 1200-9600+ HST/V32B. The FidoNews key is also available on the FidoNews homepage listed in the Masthead information. ----------------------------------------------------------------- FIDONEWS 14-24 Page 43 16 Jun 1997 ================================================================= FIDONET BY INTERNET ================================================================= This is a list of all FidoNet-related sites reported to the Editor as of this appearance. ============ FidoNet: Homepage http://www.fidonet.org FidoNews http://ddi.digital.net/~cbaker84/fidonews.html HTML FNews http://www.geocities.com/Athens/6894/ WWW sources http://www.scms.rgu.ac.uk/students/cs_yr94/lk/fido.html FTSC page http://www2.blaze.net.au/ftsc.html Echomail http://www.portal.ca/~awalker/index.html WebRing http://ddi.digital.net/~cbaker84/fnetring.html ============ Zone 1: http://www.z1.fidonet.org Region 10: http://www.psnw.com/~net205/region10.html Region 11: http://oeonline.com/~garyg/region11/ Region 13: http://www.smalltalkband.com/st01000.htm Region 14: http://www.netins.net/showcase/fidonet/ Region 15: http://www.smrtsys.com/region15/ [disappeared?] Region 16: http://www.tiac.net/users/satins/region16.htm Region 17: http://www.portal.ca/~awalker/region17.htm REC17: http://www.westsound.com/ptmudge/ Region 18: http://www.citicom.com/fido.html Region 19: http://www.compconn.net ============ Zone 2: http://www.z2.fidonet.org ZEC2: http://fidoftp.paralex.co.uk/zec.htm [shut down?] Zone 2 Elist: http://www.fidonet.ch/z2_elist/z2_elist.htm Region 20: http://www.fidonet.pp.se (in Swedish) Region 24: http://www.swb.de/personal/flop/gatebau.html (in German) Region 25: http://members.aol.com/Net254/ FIDONEWS 14-24 Page 44 16 Jun 1997 Region 27: http://telematique.org/ft/r27.htm Region 29: http://www.rtfm.be/fidonet/ (in French) Region 30: http://www.fidonet.ch (in Swiss) Region 34: http://www.pobox.com/cnb/r34.htm (in Spanish) REC34: http://pobox.com/~chr Region 36: http://www.geocities.com/SiliconValley/7207/ Region 41: http://www.fidonet.gr (in Greek and English) Region 48: http://www.fidonet.org.pl ============ Zone 3: http://www.z3.fidonet.org ============ Zone 4: (not yet listed) Region 90: Net 904: http://members.tripod.com/~net904 (in Spanish) ============ Zone 5: (not yet listed) ============ Zone 6: http://www.z6.fidonet.org ============ ----------------------------------------------------------------- FIDONEWS 14-24 Page 45 16 Jun 1997 ================================================================= FIDONEWS INFORMATION ================================================================= ------- FIDONEWS MASTHEAD AND CONTACT INFORMATION ------- Editor: Christopher Baker Editors Emeritii: Tom Jennings, Thom Henderson, Dale Lovell, Vince Perriello, Tim Pozar, Sylvia Maxwell, Donald Tees "FidoNews Editor" FidoNet 1:1/23 BBS 1-904-409-7040, 300/1200/2400/14400/V.32bis/HST(ds) more addresses: Christopher Baker -- 1:18/14, cbaker84@digital.net cbaker84@aol.com cbaker84@msn.com (Postal Service mailing address) FidoNews Editor P.O. Box 471 Edgewater, FL 32132-0471 U.S.A. voice: 1-904-409-3040 [1400-2100 ET only, please] [1800-0100 UTC/GMT] ------------------------------------------------------ FidoNews is published weekly by and for the members of the FIDONET INTERNATIONAL AMATEUR ELECTRONIC MAIL system. It is a compilation of individual articles contributed by their authors or their authorized agents. The contribution of articles to this compilation does not diminish the rights of the authors. OPINIONS EXPRESSED in these articles ARE THOSE OF THE AUTHORS and not necessarily those of FidoNews. Authors retain copyright on individual works; otherwise FidoNews is Copyright 1997 Christopher Baker. All rights reserved. Duplication and/or distribution permitted for noncommercial purposes only. For use in other circumstances, please contact the original authors, or the Editor. =*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*= OBTAINING COPIES: The most recent issue of FidoNews in electronic form may be obtained from the FidoNews Editor via manual download or file-request, or from various sites in the FidoNet and Internet. PRINTED COPIES may be obtained by sending SASE to the above postal address. File-request FIDONEWS for the current Issue. File-request FNEWS for the current month in one archive. Or file-request specific back Issue filenames in distribution format [FNEWSEnn.ZIP] for a FIDONEWS 14-24 Page 46 16 Jun 1997 particular Issue. Monthly Volumes are available as FNWSmmmy.ZIP where mmm = three letter month [JAN - DEC] and y = last digit of the current year [7], i.e., FNWSFEB7.ZIP for all the Issues from Feb 97. Annual volumes are available as FNEWSn.ZIP where n = the Volume number 1 - 14 for 1984 - 1997, respectively. Annual Volume archives range in size from 48K to 1.4M. INTERNET USERS: FidoNews is available via: http://www.fidonet.org/fidonews.htm ftp://ftp.fidonet.org/pub/fidonet/fidonews/ ftp://ftp.aminet.org/pub/aminet/comm/fido/ *=*=* You may obtain an email subscription to FidoNews by sending email to: jbarchuk@worldnet.att.net with a Subject line of: subscribe fnews-edist and no message in the message body. To remove your name from the email distribution use a Subject line of: unsubscribe fnews-edist with no message to the same address above. *=*=* You can read the current FidoNews Issue in HTML format at: http://www.geocities.com/Athens/6894/ STAR SOURCE for ALL Past Issues via FTP and file-request - Available for FReq from 1:396/1 or by anonymous FTP from: ftp://ftp.sstar.com/fidonet/fnews/ Each yearly archive also contains a listing of the Table-of-Contents for that year's issues. The total set is currently about 11 Megs. =*=*=*= The current week's FidoNews and the FidoNews public-key are now also available almost immediately after publication on the Editor's new homepage on the World Wide Web at: http://ddi.digital.net/~cbaker84/fidonews.html There are also links there to jim barchuk's HTML FidoNews source and to John Souvestre's FTP site for the archives. There is also an email link for sending in an article as message text. Drop on over. =*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*= A PGP generated public-key is available for the FidoNews Editor from FIDONEWS 14-24 Page 47 16 Jun 1997 1:1/23 [1:18/14] by file-request for FNEWSKEY or by download from Rights On! BBS at 1-904-409-7040 as FIDONEWS.ASC in File Area 18. It is also posted twice a month into the PKEY_DROP Echo available on the Zone 1 Echomail Backbone. *=*=*=*=* SUBMISSIONS: You are encouraged to submit articles for publication in FidoNews. Article submission requirements are contained in the file ARTSPEC.DOC, available from the FidoNews Editor, or file-requestable from 1:1/23 [1:18/14] as file "ARTSPEC.DOC". ALL Zone Coordinators also have copies of ARTSPEC.DOC. Please read it. "Fido", "FidoNet" and the dog-with-diskette are U.S. registered trademarks of Tom Jennings, P.O. Box 410923, San Francisco, CA 94141, and are used with permission. "Disagreement is actually necessary, or we'd all have to get in fights or something to amuse ourselves and create the requisite chaos." -Tom Jennings -30- -----------------------------------------------------------------