var@cbnews.ATT.COM (gary.t.varney) (10/12/89)
Users, I'm fairly new to netnews so please bear with me. I've heard a lot about this mysterious SIMTEL20. Could someone fill me in on where it is? What the phone # is? Modem settings, etc...? From what I've read here, it looks like there is a lot of good software on it. Please post responses on this newsgroup, or e-mail to me if you know how to reach me above. Thanks in advance. Gary V.
ppd491@leah.Albany.Edu (Peter P. Donohue) (10/12/89)
In article <10153@cbnews.ATT.COM>, var@cbnews.ATT.COM (gary.t.varney) writes: > I'm fairly new to netnews so please bear with me. I've heard > a lot about this mysterious SIMTEL20. Could someone fill me in on > where it is? What the phone # is? Modem settings, etc...? The SIMTEL20 archives are access through FTP (standing for File Transfer Protocol) from your machine hooked up to internet. I don't believe it can be accessed through calling in with a modem. If you have FTP ability from your node, then you should be able to access SIMTEL20 with the following commands... (the commands you enter are capitalized, everything else is my comment). FTP WSMR-SIMTEL20.ARMY.EDU This calls the account that simtel20 is on. If all works, you will get the prompt asking for a user id. At that prompt, enter as your userid... ANONYMOUS Enter your userid as the password (I believe you can enter anything, but to be nice to the operators of simtel20 you should enter your userid). If the machine lets you on (it doesn't a lot of times because of the amount of users on at the time), you will get a prompt saying FTP. At this prompt, there are many commands you can use. Here are a few... HELP - lists commands and short description. CD - change directory. 'CD name' moves down to directory 'name' and 'CD ..' will move up one level. DIR or LS - list directory GET filename - calls for file to be transferred from the simtel20 archives to your account on your machine. BINARY - must be specified before GETing a binary file (anything in .ZOO, .ZIP, .ARC, .EXE, or .COM format is binary). This tells the machine that you are transferring a binary file rather than an ascii file. I don't FTP to simtel20 that often because it is such a pain to get logged on (that ever present too many users message), but do access other sites (such as HOTEL.CIS.KSU.EDU and VEGA.HUT.FI). I believe the simtel20 archive is running TOPS operating system, so a couple of the commands I have stated may be slightly different (I believe the BINARY command is different, but I don't remember what it is). Another way of accessing the files is through a listserv on bitnet. If you have bitnet access, then you may be able to access many of the files in this way. I access the files from a VAX running VMS using JNET command. If you don't have this set up, I am not sure how you would access the listservs. I access the listserv using the interactive command, SEND. The format of the command is... SEND name_of_listserv command The listserv I use is 'LISTSERV@RPIECS' (the jnet send command uses the format of userid@node). Here are a couple of the valid commands... HELP - pretty self explanitory command /PDDIR PD:<subdir1.subdir2> nn - asks for a directory of files that are less than 'nn' days old. /PDGET PD:<subdir1.subdir2>filename.extension format - asks for file The directory format is PD:<subdir1.subdir2> The subdir1 that I use often is MSDOS. Subdir2 is the actual directory that the files are stored in. For example, one that I have called recently is LOTUS123. In each directory, there is a file called 00-INDEX.TXT. This file lists many of the files in the directory and a short description of what they are. The 'format' in the /pdget command is where you tell the listserver how you want the file. For my system, I always use 'TRANSLATE' for ascii files and 'UUENCODE' for binary files. I would assume that this is operating system relavent, so you may have to try different stuff for a while. Here are some examples of commands... SEND LISTSERV@RPIECS /PDDIR PD:<MSDOS.*> 100 tell me what files you have in all directories (one of the few times that the listserv will take an '*') that are less than 100 days old. SEND LISTSERV@RPIECS /PDGET PD:<MSDOS.LOTUS123>00-INDEX.TXT TRANSLATE send me the file that lists the files in this subdirectory. Translate it so that it is understandable by my ascii machine. SEND LISTSERV@RPIECS /PDGET PD:<MSDOS.EDUCATION>FREN1_23.ARC UUENCODE Send me the french tutor program from the education subdirectory. Anything that you ask for uuencoded has to be uudecoded. Somewhere in the archive are source codes for uudecode and uuencode in basic, pascal and c. They should be the first files you go for and compile (after getting any of the help files and such) SEND LISTSERV@RPIECS HELP I didn't understand a single thing that guy said. Let me see if listserv can do any better. Listserv is nice in that you send one command, forget about it, and a short while later find that you have recieved the files. It isn't nice in that it limits you to about 150k worth of files a day (usually one or two files will beat that). I hope this helps somewhat. Pete -- Peter P. Donohue ppd491@albny1vx.bitnet . "Education is a journey, ppd491@leah.albany.edu . not a destination..."
halliday@cheddar.cc.ubc.ca (Laura Halliday) (10/12/89)
In article <2081@leah.Albany.Edu> ppd491@leah.Albany.Edu (Peter P. Donohue) writes: > BINARY - must be specified before GETing a binary file (anything in > .ZOO, .ZIP, .ARC, .EXE, or .COM format is binary). This > tells the machine that you are transferring a binary file > rather than an ascii file. >(...) >commands I have stated may be slightly different (I believe the BINARY >command is different, but I don't remember what it is). You bet it's different! You must say either: tenex or: type l 8 ^---that's an L, not a 1 to get around some peculiarities in how Simtel20 stores its files. If your ftp client is braindamaged and doesn't understand either of the above (there are a few that don't) you need to say: binary quote type l 8 You'll get a warning from Simtel20 when you specify `binary'. Ignore it. ...laura
mcdonald@uxe.cso.uiuc.edu (10/13/89)
Simtel20 -Where is it? That's interesting. I too would like to know where it is (physically, that is - waht city and state).
link@stew.ssl.berkeley.edu (Richard Link) (10/14/89)
In article <110200014@uxe.cso.uiuc.edu> mcdonald@uxe.cso.uiuc.edu writes: >Simtel20 -Where is it? >That's interesting. I too would like to know where it is (physically, >that is - waht city and state). White Sands Missile Range, New Mexico. (the WSM before Simtel in the e-mail address). Dr. Richard Link Space Sciences Laboratory University of California, Berkeley
tim@apollo.HP.COM (Timothy R. Giebelhaus) (10/20/89)
In article <5242@ubc-cs.UUCP> halliday@cc.ubc.ca (Laura Halliday) writes: >You bet it's different! You must say either: > > tenex I have tried this but some how the the binaries did not arrive in good shape. An arc t worked part of the way and then it suggested a newer version of arc. I would able to run crc.exe (which was also transfered from simtel), but crc reported all of the non-ascii files as messed up. Crc would not report whether it's own crc was correct. Any information on what the problem is would be appreciated. Thanks. UUCP: tim@apcimsp.uucp ARPA: tim@apollo.hp.com Nobody I know admits to sharing my opinions. I don't even have a pet which will share my opinion.