There are 9 messages totalling 422 lines in this issue. Topics of the day: 1. membership decline (2) 2. Decoding problem and pictures on the net. (2) 3. FTPMail, Agora, etc. statistics 4. is there a way an ISP could lose just SOME mail? 5. <No subject given> 6. techweb (was blank) 7. newsgroups and membership decline ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ACCMAIL Info (automatically generated) ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ To UNSUBscribe: Send UNSUBSCRIBE ACCMAIL to [EMAIL PROTECTED] To get the ACCMAIL FAQ: Send e-mail to "[EMAIL PROTECTED]" and enter only this line in the BODY of the note: send usenet/news.answers/internet-services/access-via-email ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Sun, 11 Jul 1999 09:50:44 +0500 From: Irfan Khan <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: Re: membership decline though i don't read all of the discussion on the ACCMAIL mailing list, i enjoy -- and learn -- a lot from the ones that i read. i also have a very high opinion about Gerald Boyd, and the FAQ that he maintains. it has been pointed out that with changing times the readership of this list is declining. while i understand that the internet/ e-mail connectivity and access is becoming cheaper (and, in some cases, free) in the developed countries (call them the North, or the West if you wish to), the case is not so in the developing countries. in a recent article in the Communications of ACM (June 1999), Petrazzini and Kibati have presented data that shows that, compared to the USA, full internet access costs 4 times more in India, 5 times more in Kenya, and 6 times more in Armenia. Based on hearsay, it can be said that the situation in other South Asian, African and Eastern Europe countries is not that different. this leads me to believe more and more in the plain and simple electronic mail for the rest of us ;-) i see the audience of ACCMAIL in the countries where the internet is inadequate or expensive. yes, outreach is an issue. maybe, approaching local ISPs is one of the solutions. for the developed countries, the niche lies is pointing out methods to retrieve *content* via e-mail -- that is to say, instead of generic methods of retrieving information, specific solutions like "how to get information on movies by e-mail?". (the answer is already present in the ACCMAIL FAQ.) i think that this is enough rambling from a lurker! irfan ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 11 Jul 1999 01:06:10 EDT From: William C Andrews <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: Re: Decoding problem and pictures on the net. Ron Burnett <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: >uudeview does process these files, but my graphics >programs don't recognize them as .jpg format. > >Can anyone give me any clues as to what to do. I ran into a similar problem. What I found out is: there is a variant of .jpg that browsers IE3+/NN3+ have no problem with, but many old graphics programs like QPV v1.7 and PSP 3.1 won't read. MS Imaging will read. My suggestion: try opening the file in a browser off-line and then use something like Paint Shop Pro to screen capture or open it in a more up to date program and then make sure you save it as a format or .jpg variant that you can read. This is a problem that a number of people that design websites don't think of. To answer G. Boyd about why would someone would want or put graphics on the net other than porn. Why would someone want an art book with pictures? Being able to see a picture of a painting, or of an actor/ actress that one has heard of, or of a singing star, or how to hold one's hand to use sign language, or seeing what an electron shell looks like, or what a nebulea looks like, or Niagra Falls/Grand Canyon/ other natural wonder looks like, or seeing a map of the area of the former Soviet Union, or an illustration of a living cell, or 'cloud chamber' track from CERN might be of importance to someone who doesn't have access to a library. Having heard that South Africa accounts for 1/2 of all African internet users and most of the others don't have access to a library. Only 1 in 1800 people in Africa have any access to the net and if SA is excluded the figure changes to 1 in 4000. I for one would like to see these people be able to learn as much as they can. -- William Andrews [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.geocities.com/CapeCanaveral/Runway/3091/ ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 11 Jul 1999 06:01:27 +0100 From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: FTPMail, Agora, etc. statistics FTPMail, Agora, etc. statistics for Sat 10 Jul 1999, posted Sun, 11 Jul 1999 05:00:28 GMT Less than 1 hour [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] 1-4 hours [EMAIL PROTECTED] 4-10 hours [EMAIL PROTECTED] More than 10 hours None Response within 4 hours in at least 5 out of 7 recent tests [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] Note: [EMAIL PROTECTED] doesn't reply to .net or .com addresses. This data is generated automatically around 0600 GMT/BST most days. The performance reported is dependant on many factors and your experience may vary. You can also access this list: On the Web at http://www.netservs.com/mrcool/stats.htm (We recently discontinued the copy available via FTP) Mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] and say "get file stats.txt" (no quotes) Want this list every day? Send mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] and in the body of your message put "join statistics" (no quotes) No liability is accepted for inaccuracies. Mirroring, links to and copying of this entire file (not extracts) is permitted until further notice. Slow downloads? Try Mr. Cool! See http://www.netservs.com/mrcool/ Copyright Net Services 1999. ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 11 Jul 1999 11:58:43 +0200 From: Massimo Mezzini <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: is there a way an ISP could lose just SOME mail? Hy Accmailers; sorry if this is (partially) off-topic, but I've been banging my head for a few days already, trying to understand this problem. Since last Thursday, I suddenly stopped receiving most of the mailing list digests for the 6 or 7 lists I'm in - including Accmail. Some mail is coming through - and this means that there is nothing wrong with my address - but I got the impression that my primary ISP (IOL.it) cannot deal with some servers. Not sure if it makes any sense, but I can't imagine why some mail would come through and some other - always the same - just vanishes. Another hint is the fact that has been a while since I've been able to retrieve html pages through www4mail. If I mail the request though IOL, it just vanishes, with no reply and no result. Sometimes - days later - I would receive a message like this: .... This Message was undeliverable due to the following reason: Your message was not delivered because the destination computer was not reachable within the allowed queue period. The amount of time a message is queued before it is returned depends on local configura- tion parameters. Most likely there is a network problem that prevented delivery, but it is also possible that the computer is turned off, or does not have a mail system running right now. Your message was not delivered within 4 days. Host web.bellanet.org is not responding. The following recipients did not receive your message: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Please reply to [EMAIL PROTECTED] if you feel this message to be in error. .... These error mesages had happened before too - and sometimes even for requestes that had been successfully served already. But lately no reply, no errors, no pages. Tried [EMAIL PROTECTED] - no result. And the crazy thing is that last night I tried re-sending all the latest 30 something requestes through a different ISP (different SMTP and different return address) and I started getting the first pages as soon as I finished mailing the last request. Now, since I've checked with some lists and they are working as usual, can GEB and the other mail-gurus help me to understand how this thing could happen? I've tried reporting it to my ISP's support, but they deny any malfunctioning. I need some stronger ground to fight them, please. NOTE: since I'm not getting the digest (and I would expect not receiving single list messages neither) would it be possible to carbon copy any reply to these addresses: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] thanks in advance Massimo Mezzini ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 11 Jul 1999 13:21:42 +0300 From: Ibrahim E Abdul-Hafiz <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: <No subject given> Dear AccMailer, I use Agora to send to TechEncyclopedia (Glossary) to get meaning of some technical words like Software Engineering : http://www.techweb.com/encyclopedia/defineterm.cgi?Software+Engineering I got in replay the following " Software Engineering , There was no exact match" Kindly is any other site which can be interrogated to get such definitions ? Thanks in advance Ibrahim E. Abdul-Hafiz ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 11 Jul 1999 07:56:30 -0700 From: "Gerald E. Boyd" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: Re: membership decline At 09:50 AM 7/11/99 +0500, Irfan Khan wrote the following: >it has been pointed out that with changing times the readership of >this list is declining. while i understand that the internet/ e-mail >connectivity and access is becoming cheaper (and, in some cases, >free) in the developed countries (call them the North, or the West if >you wish to), the case is not so in the developing countries. in a >recent article in the Communications of ACM (June 1999), Petrazzini >and Kibati have presented data that shows that, compared to the USA, >full internet access costs 4 times more in India, 5 times more in >Kenya, and 6 times more in Armenia. Folks, I know that every once in a while I get carried away with non-topics, but this is interesting news. An informal poll on Help-Net back in 1997-98 showed that Mexico had the highest phone and ISP fees. A doctor on that list spent 1/4 of his income on 'net access. A had a user in Kenya that spent 1/2 of his income on access. BTW, I have asked Deja to try to implement email access to MyDeja. A somewhat positive response was received -- a little better than "we'll look into it". Cross your fingers. I also have repeatedly asked Reference.com about their service -- nothing received. The reason I mention this is I did have good luck back in 1995-96 with Scotty Southwick of Liszt. Prior to a request by me he only had web access to the mailing lists. PS, DSL service will be hooked up on the 14th. Test of data transmission yesterday showed my location is in the upper end of high transmission speeds -- I'm close enough to the central office. DSL is limited to about 17.5 miles from telco facilities. -- Gerry Boyd -- [EMAIL PROTECTED] ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 11 Jul 1999 08:04:53 -0700 From: "Gerald E. Boyd" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: Re: Decoding problem and pictures on the net. At 01:06 AM 7/11/99 EDT, William C Andrews wrote the following: >To answer G. Boyd about why would someone would want >or put graphics on the net other than porn. Why >would someone want an art book with pictures? Being >able to see a picture of a painting, or of an actor/ >actress that one has heard of, or of a singing star, >or how to hold one's hand to use sign language, or >seeing what an electron shell looks like, or what a >nebulea looks like, or Niagra Falls/Grand Canyon/ >other natural wonder looks like, or seeing a map of >the area of the former Soviet Union, or an >illustration of a living cell, or 'cloud chamber' >track from CERN might be of importance to someone >who doesn't have access to a library. Probably true but then again I spend most of my time in answering questions. So I use search engines exclusively. Graphics on the search pages serve no purpose other than generating ad revenue and time-wasting. In addition most of the questions and answers here involve "how to do" type questions. What good is graphics on a web page that answers a question about "how to decode" or "how do I use gophermail" Take a look at Google search engine page. Except for the AltaVista text search pages, this has to be the least graphics intrusive search engine I've ever seen. -- Gerry Boyd -- [EMAIL PROTECTED] ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 11 Jul 1999 09:28:37 -0700 From: "Gerald E. Boyd" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: Re: techweb (was blank) At 01:21 PM 7/11/99 +0300, Ibrahim E Abdul-Hafiz wrote the following: >I use Agora to send to TechEncyclopedia (Glossary) to get meaning of some technical words like Software Engineering : >http://www.techweb.com/encyclopedia/defineterm.cgi?Software+Engineering > >I got in replay the following >" Software Engineering , There was no exact match" > >Kindly is any other site which can be interrogated to get such definitions ? You are missing a parameter.. Try this string: http://www.techweb.com/encyclopedia/defineterm?term=Software+Engineering Stripped form looks like... <form action="/encyclopedia/defineterm" METHOD=GET> <input type=text size=18 name=term> -- Gerry Boyd -- [EMAIL PROTECTED] ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 12 Jul 1999 00:28:40 +0300 From: Dan Platon <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: Re: newsgroups and membership decline > > > > Good question, how does a total email only user find out anything? > > > > ... from whoever provides the email account! > Why to do that??? By mail I can get unlimited :-) WWW access without extra-pay. If I'm forced to on-line access I'll have to extra-pay. So no reason for the ISP to advise you. The statistics it's tricky, fouls you. Not the actual number is important, but the magnitude of the flux, new-comers and leavers. Why are the limited quota? How many WWW-pages per day could manage a WWWmail so the owner is forced to quota? How those heavy users have learned to retrive WWW-pages by e-mail? Every month in Net-Happenings is a message What news in Russophilia, why not What is new in how to access WWW by mail. ------------------------------ End of ACCMAIL Digest - 10 Jul 1999 to 11 Jul 1999 (#1999-193) **************************************************************
