gnu@hoptoad.uucp (John Gilmore) (10/20/86)
From FidoNET Newsletter, Volume 3, # 39: > In conclusion, I would like to thank Jeff Rush of the Rising Star > Fido (124/206) for conceiving of and implementing EchoMail. He > should be remembered by the networking historians for developing > a utility that gives you just about everything that UseNet does > without half the hassle. I think this is particularly ironic considering it appeared immediately after a complex two-page description of how to add a newsgroup! -- John Gilmore {sun,ptsfa,lll-crg,ihnp4}!hoptoad!gnu jgilmore@lll-crg.arpa (C) Copyright 1986 by John Gilmore. May the Source be with you!
randy@oresoft.UUCP (10/21/86)
>I think this is particularly ironic considering it appeared immediately >after a complex two-page description of how to add a newsgroup! >-- >John Gilmore {sun,ptsfa,lll-crg,ihnp4}!hoptoad!gnu jgilmore@lll-crg.arpa >(C) Copyright 1986 by John Gilmore. May the Source be with you! Gosh, and that was the kinky EchoMailer for Fido. There are even simpler systems in the new FidoClone, Opus. If anyone is really interested in FidoNet (~1,200 public nodes and God knows how many private ones), I can post the data structures and state diagrams of the protocol etc. There is even a FidoNet/Usenet gateway (actually, for over a year). randy
james@reality1.UUCP (james) (10/22/86)
In article <1204@hoptoad.uucp>, gnu@hoptoad.uucp (John Gilmore) writes: > From FidoNET Newsletter, Volume 3, # 39: > > He > > should be remembered by the networking historians for developing > > a utility that gives you just about everything that UseNet does > > without half the hassle. > > I think this is particularly ironic considering it appeared immediately > after a complex two-page description of how to add a newsgroup! What makes this funnier is that EchoMail is not very hassle free at all. By far the biggest problem with usenet is finding someone willing to feed news. I queried 30 people and got two willing to feed news to me. Once you've done that the software & setup is fairly easy if time consuming and not especially well documented (although the price is certainly right!). EchoMail can be painful in the extreme. An Echomail "area" requires that the systems involved be precisely set up to avoid infinite message propogation: EchoMail doesn't tag each message with a Message-id as usenet does! Another problem is that FidoNet must be in either mail transfer mode or in human caller mode, and one can call when it's in the other mode. I keep thinking that the next version of Fido will have a calling Fido log in as a user and then cause the called Fido to switch to network mode, but not yet. Many busy Fidos are in network mode most of the night, preventing humans from using them during cheap LD hours. But then again, Fido and in particular EchoMail are brand new even by unix standards. And no one gets paid to sit around and figure out message transmission methods for Fido... EchoMail does work, but it is not as advanced or effective as most Fido users seem to think. -- James R. Van Artsdalen ...!ut-ngp!utastro!osi3b2!james "Live Free or Die"