You will need a computer account in order to participate in receiving and sending electronic mail messages and in carrying out other class assignments on the internet. An on-line registration procedure has been set up by ACNS.
Computer terminals are available at several places on campus, including the basement of Dirac Science Library, second floor of Strozier Library Annex, 317 Carothers, and 331 University Union. (Those of you who have a computer with a modem, see the remote access information below.) Some of these will have a DOS prompt, in which case you type telnet register.acns.fsu.edu. Some will have Netscape, which can launch a telnet session by entering the URL telnet://register.acns.fsu.edu. Some will have a windows telnet application. Some will have a menu, from which you pick "Network", then "Other", and at the telnet> prompt type: register.acns.fsu.edu. If you do not have a computer account, then at the login prompt type: newuser, and at the password prompt type: public. If you already have a computer account and are just adding your name to the class mailing list, then at the login prompt type: newclass, and at the password prompt type: public. You must have with you:
Follow the instructions. You will be given an account name and a password. Write them down exactly as they appear. Case is important (C is different from c). Your account will be ready in about 24 hours.
To access your new account, you telnet (as above) to garnet.acns.fsu.edu. (Or pick garnet from the telnet menu). Log in with your account name and the password you were given. You will be asked to give a new password at this time. It should contain at least six characters, including one non-alphanumeric character and a mixture of upper case and lower case characters. Have one ready, and have it written somewhere so you don't forget it. Do not share your password with others--they would be able to access your account. There is an option on the menu to change your password at a later time if you wish.
Those of you with a computer off campus equipped with a modem can dial 644-4211 (1200/2400 baud) or 644-2206 (9600 baud or greater). 644-4211 attaches you to a machine called ANNEX. At the prompt, type:
rlogin garnet -l username
(username = the account assigned to you; l is a letter, not a number, and there must be a space between rlogin, garnet, -l, and username.)
644-2206 attaches you to a machine called NetBlazer. At the prompt, type:
fsu
at the next prompt which says "Top>" type:
rlogin -8 -l username garnet
(username = the account assigned to you; l is a letter, not a number, and there must be a space between rlogin, -8, -l, username, and garnet.)
After logging out of garnet (from menu or typing logout), you will be back at ANNEX or NetBlazer, and will need to type logout there as well.
For any other machine anywhere connected to the internet, just type
telnet garnet.acns.fsu.edu
For those of you with the appropriate equipment, a PPP connection is possible through faster modems accessing the numbers 4-2700 or 4-3258, and allowing you to run networking software such as Netscape from your machine. You should pick up software and instructions from 320 Carothers. Bring 4 formatted high density disks (IBM machines) or 5 formatted high density disks (MACs).
Garnet is a UNIX machine. If you are familiar with UNIX, you can get out of the menu system to the UNIX prompt. Most of you who are novices will want to use the menus to explore the system. From the first menu, pick 1. services. Then for reading and sending email, pick elm or pine. Both are fairly easy to use once you get the hang of it. I don't have much experience with them, but am told that pine is probably the more user friendly. A copy of instructions about "Managing Your Mail with Elm" and "Secrets of Pine" are in the "Light BCH 4053" notebook on reserve in Dirac Library. You may make copies, but do not remove the original. (Pine also has good on line help information.)
You should do two things immediately to configure your account for use. Pick settings from the main menu, and chfn from the next menu, and at the prompt type your name. This will cause your real name as well as your account name to appear in the header of your mail messages, so you are easier to identify. (You should still sign the messages). Second, if you are using elm, when you are in elm, type o at the prompt (for options), and then the letter U (for user) and hit the space bar to change this options from beginner to intermediate, hit the enter key, and then type > and enter to save the new options. This change gives you more options for your mail messages, such as saving one to a named file as opposed to a folder.
You will also be interested in the menu item tass, which allows you to read posted news announcements of many news groups. After entering the number for tass, enter g followed by fsu.class.bch4053 at the newsgroup prompt. That is where I will post answers to some questions, announcements, etc. You can post something there by sending mail to bch4053. There are other newsreader programs on the menu that I don't know anything about, and those of you using Netscape can configure it to read news items.
When you have time, you may be interested in exploring the Seminole Information System (SIS) which provides menu driven access to computer information systems around the world through Lynx, which is a client for the World Wide Web, and through gopher, which is an older information system that is gradually being replaced by the World Wide Web. Pick lynx or gopher from the services menu. (Strozier library runs workshops on accessing these internet resources.) Lynx only handles textual material from the web. You need a browser such as Netscape or Mosaic to access images.
Practice sending each other mail. You can send me mail by addressing it to rlight if you are logged onto garnet, or rlight@garnet.acns.fsu.edu if you are on another machine. Your friends, relatives, etc. anywhere in the world can send you messages by addressing xxxxxxx@garnet.acns.fsu.edu, where xxxxxxx is your login account number.
Check your email daily, or at least every couple of days. Also check the newsgroup. I plan to communicate a number of things to you in this way.
Printing from your email account is a little involved, and it could be different depending on where you log in. Basically, you need to get your message from garnet to your local PC by a process known as "downloading", and there are several different procedures depending on the software you are using to hook up. For those in Dirac and Strozier you transfer by the FTP protocol. Go through the following steps. You need to have your own floppy disc to put in Drive A or B. After reading your message, type s (for save) (from elm) and give it a name (better to be 8 letters or less, so the name is compatible for a DOS file later). Lets call it "problem1" for example. The message is then saved as a file in your home directory on garnet. Type x to exit elm, m to get main menu, and q to quit garnet. (Before quitting, you can verify that the file is in the correct place by going to the Unix prompt, then typing ls or ls -l which will list all the files in your home directory). If you use pine, pick the save option, and give the message a title as above. You will be asked if you want to create a folder with that name, and you say yes. This will put the message as a file in the "mail" directory. When you exit pine, don't delete the message from the inbox (just to be safe), then go to the Unix prompt, type cd mail to change to the mail directory, and ls to confirm that the file is there. After logging off garnet go to the FTP selection on the PC menu, or at the DOS prompt type:
ftp garnet.acns.fsu.edu
You get the following prompt after logging in with your password:
ftp>
Type "get problem1" (or whatever filename you want, without the quotes) if you saved the message from elm in your home directory. If you saved it from pine, you will need to type "cd mail" to go to the mail directory before typing "get problem1". After you are told the file is transferred, type "bye" (without the quotes). You are then back to the home PC, with the file in your local directory. Either use the DOS print commmand (print problem1), or load the file into WordPerfect and print from there after formatting to your taste. If you are logged in from a modem, there will be some other downloading procedure I am not familiar with.
Dr. Light