root@rpp386.UUCP (Super user) (06/22/88)
In article <net.rarebit.4@rutgers.edu>, webber@rutgers.edu (Net.Rarebit) writes:
] Path: rpp386!vector!killer!osu-cis!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!bloom-beacon!husc6!uwvax!dogie!uwmcsd1!ig!agate!ucbvax!ucsd!sdcsvax!rutgers!webber
] From: webber@rutgers.edu (Net.Rarebit)
] Newsgroups: news.admin.ctl
] Subject: sendsys
] Message-ID: <net.rarebit.4@rutgers.edu>
] Date: 20 Jun 88 22:20:20 GMT
] Control: sendsys
] Organization: Pain in the Ass, Inc.
] Lines: 0
hey, mel - would you go down to webbers office and beat him up or something?
i got this sucker 3 times on my system with 3 different message id's. [ see
the above referenced references ]
needless to say, webber should be emptying out his mailbox for years to
come! unless this is a forgery, in which case, Bravo! Bravo! Bravo! looks
like it came in at husc6. here's the paths i saw:
rpp386!dalsqnt!pollux!killer!osu-cis!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!bloom-beacon!\
husc6!bbn!uwmcsd1!ig!agate!pasteur!ames!rutgers!webber
rpp386!dalsqnt!pollux!killer!osu-cis!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!husc6!bbn!\
uwmcsd1!ig!agate!ucbvax!rutgers!webber
rpp386!vector!killer!osu-cis!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!bloom-beacon!husc6!\
uwvax!dogie!uwmcsd1!ig!agate!ucbvax!ucsd!sdcsvax!rutgers!webber
- john.webber@porthos.rutgers.edu (Bob Webber) (06/22/88)
In article <3071@rpp386.UUCP>, root@rpp386.UUCP (Super user) writes: ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ [well actually, anyone who uses news software while running as root can probably better be said ``to scrawl.''] > In article <net.rarebit.4@rutgers.edu>, webber@rutgers.edu (Net.Rarebit) writes: > ] Path: rpp386!vector!killer!osu-cis!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!bloom-beacon!husc6!uwvax!dogie!uwmcsd1!ig!agate!ucbvax!ucsd!sdcsvax!rutgers!webber > ] Newsgroups: news.admin.ctl > ] Subject: sendsys > ] Message-ID: <net.rarebit.4@rutgers.edu> ^^^^^^^^^^^^^ too short for a standard rutgers message id > > hey, mel - ... Mel is at Usenix in California. Apparently you aren't though. Just sitting home and bored huh. [Shuffle list of suspects.] > needless to say, webber should be emptying out his mailbox for years to Hardly. So far, less than a megabyte of mail has come in. Since the unix mail program allows one to delete message numbers by range (and save in a similar manner), the roughly 300 messages I have recieved so far have been rather easy to handle (fortunately, I am on a system with a reasonable amount of disk space and cpu). Of course, since rutgers generates a message informing the sender that webber@rutgers.edu is no longer an appropriate mail address (rutgers is a communications machine whose name used to be an alias for a now deceased dec-20 but is now being reused for other purposes), the systems that have to pay for the 1.5 meg of mail (including those return notifications) this has generated so far are the real victims of this. > come! unless this is a forgery, in which case, Bravo! Bravo! Bravo! looks Well, clearly it is a forgery. It is also easy to prove that it was not generated at any of the local machines. The first time I had to deal with a burst of a hundred mail messages in one day (over a year ago), it was a bit time consuming, but now it is rather easy. The big trick is to treat your mail as a textfile instead of using the mail interface. Both the standard mail and the standard news interfaces seem to fall apart when the flow gets high, but the standard unix file manipulation tools step in rather well (if you have enough cpu to let them run). > like it came in at husc6. here's the paths i saw: > > rpp386!dalsqnt!pollux!killer!osu-cis!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!bloom-beacon!\ > husc6!bbn!uwmcsd1!ig!agate!pasteur!ames!rutgers!webber Actually, agate (presumably agate.berkeley.edu) is the common denominator to all of the paths I have seen. Of course, anyone could fake a message off such a site -- so a more interesting source of people to look at are those who have posted messages complaining about the net.rarebit postings. Of course, it could even have been done by a backbone member. ----- BOB (webber@athos.rutgers.edu ; rutgers!athos.rutgers.edu!webber) P.S., so far I have been saving all of these messages since they do actually contain some interesting information about how news flows through the system. Anyone who has anonymous ftp access and is interested in them should let me know. It will be a while before I get around to writing the scripts necessary to analyze the contents of all of these sendsys files.
wcf@psuhcx.psu.edu (Bill Fenner) (06/22/88)
In article <3071@rpp386.UUCP> root@rpp386.UUCP (Super user) writes: | |i got this sucker 3 times on my system with 3 different message id's. [ see |the above referenced references ] We got 16 here. It said that it sent the file out each time, but I can't find any logs of it (in the uucp or sendmail log files)... |needless to say, webber should be emptying out his mailbox for years to |come! unless this is a forgery, in which case, Bravo! Bravo! Bravo! looks Even if it's a forgery, he'll probably be emptying out his mailbox for years to come, if enough systems are running smart mailers... Bill -- Bitnet: wcf@psuhcx.bitnet Bill Fenner | "How can we dance Internet: wcf@hcx.psu.edu | When the beds are burning" UUCP: {gatech,cmcl2,rutgers}!psuvax1!psuhcx!wcf | Fido: Sysop at 263/42 | Now wait a second . . .
lmb@vsi1.UUCP (Larry Blair) (06/23/88)
Hey, I received 4 of these sendsys messages from webber. Up until now, I
considered this guy to be an amusing, but harmless part of USENET. Now, with
his counterfeit messages and flooding the net with "sendsys", he is beginning
to become expensive. If one of our users acted like this, he would no longer
have access to Usenet (at least through our machine). Well, Mel, the ball's
in your court. Are you going to allow this "JJ" to continue?
--
* * O Larry Blair
* * O VICOM Systems Inc. sun!pyramid----\
* * O 2520 Junction Ave. uunet!ubvax----->!vsi1!lmb
* * O San Jose, CA 95134 ucbvax!tolerant/
* * O +1-408-432-8660werner@utastro.UUCP (Werner Uhrig) (06/23/88)
In article <3071@rpp386.UUCP>, root@rpp386.UUCP (Super user) writes: > In article <net.rarebit.4@rutgers.edu>, webber@rutgers.edu (Net.Rarebit) writes: >>>>>>> lots deleted <<<<<<<<< > hey, mel - would you go down to webbers office and beat him up or something? you should not make such suggestions in public; lawyers love this (if/when somehthing like this should ever happen, Zeus forbid!) talking about a smoking Email-message ... > needless to say, webber should be emptying out his mailbox for years to > come! unless this is a forgery, in which case, Bravo! Bravo! Bravo! looks I suspect it is a forgery myself, in which case I'd like to rap the authors knuckles ..... oops, I'm making the same mistake.... as it defeated my kill-file. just when I thought I had heard the last of webber ....(-: he really isn't such a bad guy - when you don't have to see his posted articles. If there were fewer of them, I'd even think I'd not mind reading them ... the only really lost case is era1987 (or multi-incarnations) for which I have little hope to ever make it above my tolerance level.
webber@porthos.rutgers.edu (Bob Webber) (06/23/88)
In article <710@vsi1.UUCP>, lmb@vsi1.UUCP (Larry Blair) writes: > Hey, I received 4 of these sendsys messages from webber. Up until now, I > considered this guy to be an amusing, but harmless part of USENET. Now, with > his counterfeit messages and flooding the net with "sendsys", he is beginning > to become expensive. If one of our users acted like this, he would no longer > have access to Usenet (at least through our machine). Well, Mel, the ball's > in your court. Are you going to allow this "JJ" to continue? Mel is out at USENIX, of course. Indeed, a number of our systems staff are out at USENIX (although a few stayed back so they could go to interesting conferences instead). I have never posted a counterfeit message although I have assumed a different From: line when speaking as ``official representative of the backbone'' (so that people don't confuse those with my regular postings). Also, I have NEVER sent out a sendsys request. The uselessness of such data was adequately demonstrated when one was sent out by page@lowell (sp?) to try and determine the scope of the alt.* net sometime within the past year. However, since it is piling up, I will take a look at it some time, just to see how it corresponds to the auditron data. Considering the Message Id of the message and the Organization listed, I sort of get the feeling that the person who sent it out didn't expect anyone to actually think I sent it. Probably just thought it would be amusing to send a ton of mail with minimal likelihood of exposure. Of course, since the mail is exceptionally stereotyped and I have a reasonable amount of computer resources that I can expend on the handling of such stuff, the inconvenience to me has been minimal. The inconvenience to those handling mail near rutgers (both incoming sendsys and outgoing automatic reminders that the faculty aliases on rutgers.edu are going away) may be enough that someone will start collecting log files. On the other hand, considering the volume of mail that normally passes thru rutgers, this silliness may not cause much effect locally. One person has mentioned that it is generating some transatlantic flow, so who knows? Someone might even fix the software, but I don't recall hearing that that happened after the misc.test digest fiasco, so I don't hold out much in the way of hope in this case. ------ BOB (webber@athos.rutgers.edu ; rutgers!athos.rutgers.edu!webber) p.s., As you can imagine, I currenty don't read any of the mail coming from addresses such as nobody@, daemon@, news@, root@, guest@, ..., which different people have configured their system to be the sender of these sendsys messages. So if you are sending me a message to flame about it all, the odds are high I will never read it unless you send it from an account that has a ``real-looking'' user name. p.p.s., If you have any bright ideas about how to track down where this initiated, I am all ears. It does not appear to have originated at any computers within the rutgers internal network. p.p.p.s., Actually I do have some sympathy for people who are thoughtlessly reacting to the sendsys request without looking at it closer first. When I first heard of it, I managed to change my password on all the local systems before I realized that it ``claimed'' to have come from a machine I don't even have an account on, i.e., rutgers.edu.
chuq@plaid.Sun.COM (Chuq Von Rospach) (06/24/88)
> My point is that we're not certain whether it is >Webber or someone trying to flood Webber's mailbox. Personally I think it's >Webber but I have no evidence or proof, but the rutgers news administrator >has a log. If he did, indeed, post the sendsys messages, they will appear >in the rutgers log. If he didn't then they won't. I'd be willing to bet it's not in the rutgers logs. Even if they did come from rutgers (and I think they didn't, but not completely convinced) they were forgeries outside of the standard system. The four messages went to four different sites (ucbvax, agate, ames and husc6) -- the only thing they have in common is that they're all NNTP sites. The messages were all posted at 20:20. Because of the way USENET/NNTP transfers are done, if all four really were posted on rutgers at the same time and then distributed normally, it'd be very unlikely for them to take two different paths. I find four different paths too implausible to consider. What seems to have happened was that someone (on rutgers or masquerading as rutgers) fired up an nntp connect with each of the four sites and fed it the forged message. This guarantees maximum speed in disbursal, a minimum chance that a site will catch and kill the messages and the greatest amount of confusion as everyone goes tracking back to the common site looking for the source of the forgery. (for really good forgeries, there is no common source, as these messages show). Who did it? Damn good question, and I can only speculate. o Webber did it: why? two conflicting reasons. First, to flood the net with lots of bogus mail messages, just for jollies. He could also proceed to claim that someone was forging the messages as an attempt to "get" him, thereby (maybe) engendering a little sympathy. Or even simply to get some more attention. Who knows. o Someone did it to Webber. Why? because Webber's a pain in the neck. I'm sure someone out there could rationalizing vandalizing the network just to "get" Webber. Or perhaps they thought it was cute and didn't realize the implications. Guerilla tactics on USENET. What a concept. If folks really want to track this down, I suggest the following: o rutgers: was Webber logged on at the time? o the four sites that received the message initially: do the logs (if they still exist) shed any light on where the message really came from? Do you have logs of nntp connections that can tell you who really was hooked up when the message came in? Personally, I doubt the logging information is good enough to get and solid information. More importantly, I think we need to re-think control messages, especially mailback control messages. My suggestions (right off the top of my head). o mailback messages should be zapped from the next release (or patch set) of the software. The minimal useful purpose they have is overshadowed by the potentials for nastiness, especially with the size of the net these days. o admins who can play with source should disable them without waiting. If you're really motivated, set up the source to trap the message as it goes through, so you don't propogate it to downstream sites taht might not trap it (and therefore will send messages back up the pipe through you!) o the backbone, especially, should trap and kill these things. Chuq Von Rospach chuq@sun.COM Delphi: CHUQ Robert A. Heinlein: 1907-1988. He will never truly die as long as we read his words and speak his name. Rest in Peace.
webber@porthos.rutgers.edu (Bob Webber) (06/24/88)
In article <107@carpet.WLK.COM>, bill@carpet.WLK.COM (Bill Kennedy) writes: > In article <710@vsi1.UUCP> lmb@vsi1.UUCP (Larry Blair) writes: > ... > I can not disagree with Larry, I posted a complaint yesterday and suggested > that the malicious mischief be severely punished. Personally I agree with >what Larry considers "severely punished". I would have the user's plug pulled > before they could blink. My point is that we're not certain whether it is > Webber or someone trying to flood Webber's mailbox. Personally I think it's > Webber but I have no evidence or proof, but the rutgers news administrator > has a log. If he did, indeed, post the sendsys messages, they will appear > in the rutgers log. If he didn't then they won't. The rutgers log was been inspected as soon as I found out what was going on. As pointed out before, the purpose was to find out if they went out from rutgers itself or not. They didn't go out from rutgers. [If you are so bloody curious about it and won't take my word for it, send mail to the sysprog who looked it up for me, mcgrew@aramis.rutgers.edu.] > > Well, Mel, the ball's > >in your court. Are you going to allow this "JJ" to continue? > > That's not altogether fair to Mel, I don't think he's the news administrator. Actually he is the news administrator. He is also at USENIX as has been mentioned countless times before. > He's certainly a very visible figure at rutgers, but I don't think he bears > the news cross too. I _do_ think we deserve a report, one way or another as > to whether or not Webber posted the sendsys. It shouldn't be that hard to > grep out of the log. A simple "nope, he didn't" or "yup he did" would be > enough to shut me up on the subject. The matter of appropriate punishment > becomes more tangled. Well, actually the logs would be completely meaningless. Since I don't have an account on rutgers, I would have to break in in order to make the posting. If I had broken in, then anything on the machine would be suspect. If someone else broke in, then anything on the machine would be suspect. The fact that I don't have an account on rutgers.edu was already verified by killer!wisner via finger (something any arpa user can do to look at rutgers.edu). It is a silly little Sun-3 with loads of 20 or so and not the sort of machine people who don't absolutely need access to get accounts on. [Even my request based on the notion that it was the only machine at rutgers from which the bay area groups could be read was turned down as insufficient reason for an account.] > For the sake of this example *ONLY*, let's assume that Bob Webber is a > mischievous meddler and did this for some obscure reason. OK, you are Actually, why don't we assume, for the sake of this example *ONLY*, that Bill Kennedy is a mischievous meddler and did this for some obscure reason. OK, you are > the news administrator at rutgers, what do you do? Perhaps the net is the news administrator at rutgers, what do you do? My preference would be to drop WLK.COM from the maps. > demanding his scalp. He's faculty and can make an airtight case for need > to use the UNIX system so you can't do what Portal did, i.e. cancel his > account. Do you go in and hard code his user ID into the posting programs > to send them to /dev/null? Definitely the simplest thing to do. But rutgers is a university environment running a rather complicated network of unix boxes. Picking up someone elses account at a university has always been a trivial matter. Back when I first used school computers, the game was to pick up a card deck from the output racks, dupe the password card etc., and then return the deck to the racks (if asked about it -- just say you picked it up by mistake). With hardcopy terminals came the art of reading typewriter ribbons. Watching people type in their passwords has always been a winner (a lot of slow hunt-and-peck typists around these days). [I remember one day when it was discovered that someone had added a new game to the online basic library that asked each user for a password before going on -- quickly yanked off the system when it was discovered that users were typing in their login passwords and the program was recording them in a file. How stupid can a naive computer user with a free acount be? It boggles the mind.] The list goes on ... > ... Some news wizard has found a way to fake news paths and things > to make them look like someone else did it. They take it upon themself to > punish people with whom they disagree (e.g. Webber, weemba, Mark Ethan Smith, > even JJ). They do this and get everyone screaming about someone that we're > probably already mad at, step back and enjoy the conflageration. Now *THAT* > is the one who needs their plug pulled! The (five by my count) sendsys > and "Speaker for the Net" or whatever it was are trivial when compared with > the truckloads of traffic they spawn (this posting included!). ``Speaker To the Net'' [cf Larry Niven's Ringworld] with Sender: webber... From: net.rarebit... were legitimate normal postings (at least the ones that I have seen) and in no way to be confused with forged messages such as the sendsys thing. > JJ sent a > few Kbytes, we lobbed grenade after grenade, maybe gigabytes. The person > who torches something for the sheer enjoyment of watching it needs to be > promptly and surgically removed from the net (even if it _is_ Bob Webber). Actually, these _Bill Kennedy_ postings seem pretty inflamatory to me. Time for some chainsaw surgery? ------ BOB (webber@athos.rutgers.edu ; rutgers!athos.rutgers.edu!webber)
lyndon@ncc.Nexus.CA (Lyndon Nerenberg) (06/25/88)
In article <107@carpet.WLK.COM> bill@ssbn.WLK.COM (Bill Kennedy) writes: > Do you go in and hard code his user ID into the posting programs >to send them to /dev/null? No, you turn on the FASCIST option! (I *knew* there was a reason for it being there) -- {alberta,pyramid,uunet}!ncc!lyndon lyndon@Nexus.CA
bill@carpet.WLK.COM (Bill Kennedy) (06/25/88)
In article <57793@sun.uucp> chuq@sun.UUCP (Chuq Von Rospach) writes: [ he said it better, I'll not repeat it ] Thank you! Before the napalm was dropped that was what I was trying to say. Webber is a touchy subject. That apparently obscured my point and stimulated precisely what I wished to avoid. >Guerilla tactics on USENET. What a concept. Worse! Anonymous... >Personally, I doubt the logging information is good enough to get and solid >information. Certainly not if the person is as expert as Chuq suggests. >More importantly, I think we need to re-think control messages, especially >mailback control messages. My suggestions (right off the top of my head). Thank you again! That was what I was looking for, some suggestions of how the news software can protect itself against anonymous punishment. >o admins who can play with source should disable them without waiting. > If you're really motivated, set up the source to trap the message as > it goes through, so you don't propogate it to downstream sites that > might not trap it (and therefore will send messages back up the pipe > through you!) That will work for my site and I'll do it, but does it give us any immunity unless everyone does it? >o the backbone, especially, should trap and kill these things. That's immunity. It's a shame that we need it. Will they do it? I can see where mail backs serve a useful purpose but the balancing act gets pretty complex. When you add in rutgers' auto reply, as someone else pointed out, it's doubled again. For those who didn't see it, the mailer sends you a polite note that tells you how to properly address oldaddress@rutgers.edu and then it indulges you by enclosing your original message... -- Bill Kennedy Internet: bill@ssbn.WLK.COM Usenet: { killer | att-cb | ihnp4!tness7 }!ssbn!bill
jbuck@epimass.EPI.COM (Joe Buck) (06/25/88)
In article <57793@sun.uucp> chuq@sun.UUCP (Chuq Von Rospach) writes: >The four messages went to four different sites (ucbvax, agate, ames and >husc6) -- the only thing they have in common is that they're all NNTP sites. >The messages were all posted at 20:20. If Chuq is right about this, it will be trivial to determine the forger's site, since NNTP logs all connections by time. The sys admins in question can just check their logs and see what site connected to them at that time. (Erik Fair pointed this out, along with a few other suggestions: all NNTP admins should occasionally check their logs for connects from sites that don't usually do so). >o Someone did it to Webber. Why? because Webber's a pain in the neck. > I'm sure someone out there could rationalizing vandalizing the network > just to "get" Webber. Or perhaps they thought it was cute and didn't > realize the implications. Almost certainly. The hostility expressed against Bob Webber at Usenix, even by people who were unaware of the sendsys messages, was pretty intense. I did like the T-shirts saying Bob Webber -- Just Say "n" >Guerilla tactics on USENET. What a concept. > >If folks really want to track this down, I suggest the following: >o rutgers: was Webber logged on at the time? He doesn't have an account on Rutgers, according to Mel Pleasant. I disagree with Chuq about getting rid of sendsys. Without it, we never would have been able to clean up all the botches in people's sys files after the Great Renaming and 2.11 installation. People sending out sendsys with distribution "ba" and checking for problems performed an invaluable service. So tell me, Chuq, why so radical these days? You seem to have a new major change to propose at the drop of a hat (drop all nontechnical groups because AT&T changed their MAIL policy; drop all mailback control messages because of one abuser, etc). Seems to me there should be a little thought before we go making radical changes.
flee@gondor.cs.psu.edu (Felix Lee) (06/25/88)
In article <2239@epimass.EPI.COM> jbuck@epimass.EPI.COM (Joe Buck) writes: > If Chuq is right about this, it will be trivial to determine the > forger's site, since NNTP logs all connections by time. Here at Penn State, <net.rarebit.1@rutgers.edu> has a very short path: "psuvax1!rutgers!webber". As far as I can tell, it actually was on rutgers. Inews says it arrived from rutgers at 22:39 on 21 Jun, and the NNTP log says that rutgers sent 43 articles between 22:30 and 23:05. -- Felix Lee flee@gondor.cs.psu.edu *!psuvax1!gondor!flee
dg@lakart.UUCP (David Goodenough) (06/29/88)
I think the results of the sendsys at lakart tend to suggest that Mr.
Webber was not responsible. uucp received four letters from mailer-daemon
saying that it didn't know how to send to 'webber@rutgers.edu'. This is
because we are a UUCP site and our local sendmail doesn't know internet
addresses from blue cheese. I have watched Mr. Webber's postings, and
I feel sure that he would not make the assumption (mistaken) that every
one of the 10986 or so systems in the .UUCP world know how to talk to
internet.
Now if only the sendsys requests were still around, I could look at
them and start figuring where they did come from.
--
dg@lakart.UUCP - David Goodenough +---+
| +-+-+
....... !harvard!cca!lakart!dg +-+-+ |
+---+root@pigs.UUCP (Joe Bob Willie) (06/29/88)
In article <1348@wa4mei.UUCP>, news@wa4mei.UUCP (usenet news id) writes: > Sorry to do this again but the first group got munged up. > There are some fantastic sys files out there and some that > are really messed up. Because of the messed up ones I am > getting replys from all over instead of just Georgia as > the distribution is set for. And guess what, whatever caused the control message to screw up the last time, caused it to screw up this time. The control message which arrived here didn't even have a distribution line, and since you posted it to news.admin, it propagated over the entire planet. Next time someone wants to restrict the distribution, use a restricted newsgroup. Something like ga.general.ctl should work. - John.
dan@hrc.UUCP (Dan Troxel) (01/28/89)
How do I use sendsys to receive a systems sys file? I wish only to get certain sites sys file. -- Dan Troxel @ Handwriting Research Corporation WK 1-602-957-8870 Camelback Corporate Center 2821 E. Camelback Road Suite 600 Phoenix, AZ 85016 ncar!noao!asuvax!hrc!dan hrc!dan@asuvax.asu.edu
clarke@acheron.UUCP (Ed Clarke) (01/28/89)
From article <197718@hrc.UUCP>, by dan@hrc.UUCP (Dan Troxel): > How do I use sendsys to receive a systems sys file? I wish only to get > certain sites sys file. Don't do it! I tried this and got a number of people p*ssed off at me. I used a distribution of ny but it got out all over North America. Furthermore, for I got a 'sys' file for every workstation at a college here in NY. This caused some irritation in the system administrator ... and responses kept coming in for weeks. If you still want to try it, it's a control message that's explained in the B news documentation. -- Ed Clarke uunet!bywater!acheron!clarke
bdb@becker.UUCP (Bruce Becker) (02/02/89)
In article <469@acheron.UUCP> clarke@acheron.UUCP (Ed Clarke) writes: +----------------- |From article <197718@hrc.UUCP>, by dan@hrc.UUCP (Dan Troxel): |> How do I use sendsys to receive a systems sys file? I wish only to get |> certain sites sys file. | |Don't do it! I tried this and got a number of people p*ssed off at |me. I used a distribution of ny but it got out all over North America. |Furthermore, for I got a 'sys' file for every workstation at a college |here in NY. This caused some irritation in the system administrator |... and responses kept coming in for weeks. | |If you still want to try it, it's a control message that's explained |in the B news documentation. |-- |Ed Clarke |uunet!bywater!acheron!clarke +----------------- Here's a more satisfying explanation - included below is a bare-bones script I use for this purpose. I don't seem to get any response from C news sites however - not sure why this is... --------- 8< --------- 8< --------- 8< --------- 8< --------- 8< --------- /usr/lib/news/inews -t sendsys -n to.$1.ctl -d to.$1 -c sendsys </dev/null Cheers, -- _ _/\ Bruce Becker Toronto, Ont. \`o O| Internet: bdb@becker.UUCP, bruce@gpu.utcs.toronto.edu \(")/ BitNet: BECKER@HUMBER.BITNET ---mm-U-mm--- "Moderation in pursuit of justice is no virtue" - Oliver North
news@wa4mei.UUCP (USENET admin) (02/04/89)
In article <197718@hrc.UUCP> dan@hrc.UUCP (Dan Troxel) writes: > >How do I use sendsys to receive a systems sys file? I wish only to get >certain sites sys file. >-- >Dan Troxel @ Handwriting Research Corporation WK 1-602-957-8870 >Camelback Corporate Center 2821 E. Camelback Road Suite 600 Phoenix, AZ 85016 >ncar!noao!asuvax!hrc!dan hrc!dan@asuvax.asu.edu Please be very careful with this. The sendsys command is a control command that is sent out to other systems that will cause them to return a copy of their sys files to you. If you want to check with just one system use the to.system group to make sure that it only goes to that one group. If you want to know what a lot of others have let me know and I will send you the approximatly 7 MB that I received when I let a sendsys request get out without a restricted distribution on it. -- Randy Jarrett WA4MEI UUCP ...!gatech!wa4mei!rsj | US SNAIL: P.O. Box 941217 PHONE +1 404 493 9017 | Atlanta, GA 30341-0217