From gst@gnosys.svle.ma.us Fri Feb  8 01:14:06 1991
From: gst@gnosys.svle.ma.us (Gary S. Trujillo)
Subject: Re: Re: FCNL hotline 1/25/91
To: MATHRICH@umcvmb.missouri.edu (Rich Winkel UMC Math Department)
Date: Mon, 28 Jan 91 19:08:09 EST
Cc: zaphod!harelb@gargoyle.uchicago.edu (Harel Barzelai)
In-Reply-To: <9101282248.AA18520@BU.EDU>; from "Rich Winkel UMC Math Department" at Jan 28, 91 4:32 pm
X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.2 PL11]

Rich,

Thanks for your response.

> This is actually a problem with the peacenet software.

One of many.  I thought of making a list, but I think it's just throwing
good money after bad, since my real complaint is with the basic design
of their user interface and with the fact that there are so many glitches.

> It could probably be avoided if I used kermit or xmodem, but
> the problem with THAT is I download over 300K of data every night,
> and using such a protocol greatly increases the download time.

Sadly, you're right.  The problem would seem to be with their implementation
of the protocols or some other bottleneck at their end, since I observe the
same problem at 9600 baud (I connect via Telenet using a v.32 connection,
when I do a manual login and the effective throughput for kermit and xmodem
transfers is no better than it is at 1200 baud, though I get effective through-
put of around 13,500 baud on average on uucp transfers, which is close to the
theoretical maximum for PEP mode using Telebit modems, as we are).  Or perhaps
it's some limiting factor imposed by Telenet - I dunno.

> What do you mean when you say to use a uucp based feed?  I'd still
> have to logon to peacenet and 'visit' all the conferences of interest,
> wouldn't I?

Not if you had things set up the way I do.  I have them feed me stuff
directly from the conferences I've selected, so I don't have to log on
at all.  Once a day, my machine "gnosys" does a bidirectional transfer
with their machine, "cdp" in Menlo Park.  They send me stuff in rnews
format, and my software prepares articles for posting to conferences
such as gen.nativenet in this same format (which is an extension of
RFC 822 mail header format).  Any mail waiting on either end is ex-
changed in the same way, using the rmail utility on both ends.  How-
ever, we rarely exchange mail directly, since my userid ("gtrujillo")
at cdp is aliased to an Internet address which sends directly to my
account on gnosys.  Similarly, my machine has an Internet alias for
cdp, so that any mail I want to send to IGC users is sent via Internet.

My machine, gnosys, runs UNIX, so doing uucp, rnews and rmail is easy.
However, there is software available for IBM PeeCees which is soon to
be released to the world as a commercial product which would allow you
to do the same thing I do without having to have a UNIX machine.  This
product, called "DistNet" works very well.  I have a Beta copy, which
I obtained directly from the author, Doug Thompson, who lives in Ottawa,
and who is very interested in activist causes.  I'm sure Doug would let
me send you a Beta copy for test purposes, if you're interested.

In order to use DistNet, you'd need to get the technical folks at IGC
to set up news feeds to you.  It's a simple matter technically, but you
have to jump through a few administrative hoops with the powers that be.
I could help you get things set up, though.  It would just be a matter
of your specifying which newsgroups you want to have fed to you.  You
would receive the complete text of all new articles posted in any of the
newsgroups (oops, they call 'em "conferences," don't they - oh well) you
have selected by prior arrangement each time you poll.  This is just the
same way that UNIX machines exchange news among themselves (cdp is a 486
running UNIX, and they're planning to go to a Sun-based system shortly).
The only drawback that I'm aware of is that you have to get all articles
in each newsgroup/conference, rather than being able to be selective, as
you now are.  However, I think that the time you save (both connect time
and your own time, devoted to deciding which articles you want to receive)
more than makes up for this fact.

One snag in this scheme is that at present, uucp cannot be performed via
a Telenet connection.  It used to work, but no longer does - thought their
techies think the problem could be figured out with a bit of experimentation
(which they claim not to have time to do, since at present I'm the only one
who is affected by the problem).  But if you do a direct dialup, which is
only slightly more expensive (they estimate $8/hr, rather than $5/hr), it
works just fine.

If you have access to a UNIX machine that's connected to the Internet, and
are on good terms with the system administrators, things could be made a lot
simpler.  There is some software that will run on your end that can com-
municate with cdp via an ftp connection, or some such - it works with sockets
and daemons and good things like that.

I'd like to help you get things set up so that you can do what you're doing
more efficiently, and I'd also like to investigate working about a relation-
ship with you and Harel that would permit us to collaborate on areas of com-
mon interest.  I'd appreciate your looking carefully at the other issues I
brought up in my recent memo ("petition to indicate Gulf War sentiments?" of
15:51:03 EST on 1/27/91).  Please let me know if anything in that note is
unclear.

In solidarity,

Gary