F I D O N E W S -- Vol.13 No.23-27 (3 Jun - 1 Jul 1996) +----------------------------+-----------------------------------------+ | The newsletter of the | ISSN 1198-4589 Published by: | | FidoNet BBS community | "FidoNews Editor" | | _ | +1-407-383-1372 [1:1/23] | | / \ | | | /|oo \ | | | (_| /_) | | | _`@/_ \ _ | | | | | \ \\ | Editor: | | | (*) | \ )) | Christopher Baker 1:374/14 | | |__U__| / \// | | | _//|| _\ / | | | (_/(_|(____/ | | | (jm) | Newspapers should have no friends. | | | -- JOSEPH PULITZER | +----------------------------+-----------------------------------------+ | Submission address: FidoNews Editor 1:1/23 | +----------------------------------------------------------------------+ | MORE addresses: | | | | submissions=> cbaker84@digital.net | +----------------------------------------------------------------------+ | For information, copyrights, article submissions, | | obtaining copies of FidoNews or the internet gateway FAQ | | please refer to the end of this file. | +----------------------------------------------------------------------+ ======================================================================== Table of Contents ======================================================================== 1. Editorial..................................................... 1 2. Articles...................................................... 2 How to get published in FidoNews: ARTSPEC updated........... 2 3. Fidonews Information.......................................... 3 ======================================================================== Editorial ======================================================================== The last issue of FidoNews published by Donald Tees appeared on 27 May 96 [Issue 1322]. Since then nothing has been heard from the former Editor. This issue is a manual composite comprising Issues 23 through 27 for the sake of numbering continuity and historical reference. [see Header] FidoNews is now edited by yours truly from 1:374/14, Rights On!, in Titusville, FLorida, USA. The Nodelist adjustment to the FidoNews listing will appear in NODELIST.194 next Friday [12 Jul 96]. In the meantime, you may wish to set a temporary override for 1:1/23 to reflect the following telephone number: 407-383-1372. Flag override should be: CM,H14,V32B,XA as well. FidoNews submissions may be made to 1:1/23 as before or to my Internet address: cbaker84@digital.net. Submission standards are available in the file ARTSPEC.DOC from this system anytime except Zone 1 ZMH [0900-1000 UTC/GMT]. ARTSPEC.DOC has also been sent to every Zone Coordinator for distribution down the chain. Submissions made as Netmail or email require manual processing so allow more lead time for the issue in which you wish to have it appear. FidoNews Issue 28 will put the standard numbering and submission processing back on track for 1996 [Vol. 13]. -------------------------------------------- FidoNews 13-23/24/25/26/27 Page: 2 3 Jun - 1 Jul 1996 ======================================================================== Articles ======================================================================== How to get published in FidoNews: ARTSPEC.DOC updated Christopher Baker 1:1/23, FidoNews Editor FidoNews has had a long-standing policy of publishing nearly anything sent to it. The submission standards for the content of a FidoNews article do not exist although the Editors, traditionally, have maintained final control over articles that are repetitious or defamatory in nature. That tradition will continue. The submission standards for the physical parameters of the data structure of anything sent to the Editor are contained in the file called ARTSPEC.DOC. ARTSPEC [article specifications] has changed very little over the years but many people in FidoNet are not familiar with the physical requirements of a FidoNews article. Those new to FidoNet or FidoNews should obtain a copy of this file from 1:1/23 or their local FidoNet Coordinator. In the meantime, here is the entire ARTSPEC.DOC file for reference until you can get your own copy: ----- FidoNews Article Submission Guidelines FidoNet address 1:1/23 Updated 5 Jul 1996 by Christopher Baker Updated 29 May 1991 by Tom Jennings Based on the original work by Thom Henderson "Fido" and "FidoNet" are registered trademarks of Tom Jennings, Box 77731, San Francisco CA 94107, USA and are used with permission. -------- SYNOPSIS: FidoNews is the newsletter of the FidoNet computer network, its Sysops and users. It is passed to its readers electronically via the FidoNet and other computer networks and to non-network readers as well. This document intends to tell you how to write and submit articles for publication in FidoNews. Much of it describes the technical specifications which an article must meet in order to be included in the newsletter, as well as broad (very) guidelines on content. (Of course you realize articles can be submitted only electronically.) Please read it carefully. The article you save might be your own. FidoNews 13-23/24/25/26/27 Page: 3 3 Jun - 1 Jul 1996 ------------ INTRODUCTION: FidoNews was originally founded in early 1984 to include all parts of the lives of its member Sysops and users, which of course means not just technical matters. We do not have fixed goals of maximum distribution or maximum readership (i.e. lowest common denominator) but only to meet the needs of our individual network members. The success of this venture has always been contentious at best (ahem). In any case the grand experiment continues. Twelve years later (at this writing) and over 30,000 Nodes in the network, the editorial policy, or lack of one, of FidoNews has shown to best fit our ever-changing and unpredictable needs. -------------- SUBJECT MATTER: Articles on any subject of interest to FidoNet members and users are welcome and encouraged, not necessarily of a technical nature, though priority may be, but not necessarily, given to articles of importance to the FidoNet, its technology and its uses; other networks such as uucp and the Internet; social aspects of communications; ethical issues; other related matters. -------------- ARTICLE LENGTH: Try to keep articles short. The longer it is, the less likely people are to read it. Consider splitting long articles (more than five pages) into smaller articles to be run serially. Exceptions will be made at the whim of the editors. For practical reasons, we will attempt to keep FidoNews to a "reasonable size", which is of course a highly subjective and variable thing. As of May 1991, the goal is under 100,000 bytes. Decisions regarding content may be made based upon this, though in general it shouldn't be an issue. FidoNews 13-23/24/25/26/27 Page: 4 3 Jun - 1 Jul 1996 ------------------ WRITING GUIDELINES: We are not all professional writers, nor is that even a goal for the FidoNews -- we want real communication to and from real people; even at the expense of so-called "good writing", which is frequently a tool to exclude. There are a few minimum requirements though for any successful writing, even for the lowly FidoNews: * The subject discussed must be clear to people other than the author! Don't assume that people will pick up the context from your writing. Tell them explicitly. * Why are you writing this? It may seem obvious -- "Review of the new Acme 75-baud Modem" -- but it's not. Are you the manufacturer? An irate customer? Let us know your point of view. * Who are you? A good question! Anonymity is acceptable, though most people want to take credit for their work. Include full contact information including electronic mail addresses. * Articles will appear when space becomes available, not necessarily the "next" issue. If your article is of a time- critical nature, please say so when you submit it; the editor still has final say. * The editor reserves the right to request changes from an author to meet these "standards", which you have to admit are pretty loose. It is not the intent for this to be a mechanism to refuse articles the editor does not like, but simply to keep the contents intelligible. * If we have a backlog of articles, we may get fussier about things. Historically, this has not been a serious problem. --------------------- SUBMITTING AN ARTICLE TECHNICAL REQUIREMENTS: If all that hasn't scared you away, the next step is to create a text file which contains the text of your article. The resulting file should be sent or uploaded to "FidoNews Editor", FidoNet address 1:1/23. The "physical" location (and phone number) of FidoNews varies, and hence must be found elsewhere, such as within a recent copy of FidoNews itself. FidoNews 13-23/24/25/26/27 Page: 5 3 Jun - 1 Jul 1996 Filenames must follow the MSDOS standard: FILENAME.TYP a 1 to 8 character file name (A - Z, 0 - 9) a period, a 0 to 3 character file type (A - Z, 0 - 9) File types are used to distinguish types of submissions, as follows: .ART An article, commentary, open letter, or general news item. .AD "For Sale", "Wanted" or other advertisement. .NOT A notice for the back of the issue. If your file doesn't have one of the above extensions, then it will lay around taking up disk space until someone takes a look at it and realizes what it is. Maybe. The name of the file is up to you, though you should use a name which is not likely to be "stepped on" by someone else -- the system will not guarantee file names are unique. For example, FNEWS.ART is probably not a good name for an article. -------------- CHARACTER SETS: The character by character contents of the file itself must meet the following standards or it cannot be published in FidoNews. The FidoNews staff WILL NOT be responsible for making file contents conform to these standards. * FLUSH LEFT MARGIN: Please do not put a "left margin" on your articles. Have the text start at the very first column. * RIGHT MARGIN AT COLUMN 72 OR LESS: Less is tolerable, more is definitely not. * RAGGED-RIGHT TEXT: Word-Star style "justification" (inserting spaces into sentences so that a paragraph is perfectly rec- tangular) is extremely hard to read, and consumes needless space. Please don't use it! * NO FUNNY CHARACTERS: This includes formfeeds, returns without linefeeds, linefeeds without returns, tabs and other oddities. The only control codes (character codes 0 through 31 decimal) allowed are carriage return (CR) and linefeed (LF). The only exception is: Control-Z "end of file" terminator characters are tolerated. Not required. * NO GRAPHICS CHARACTERS: Believe it or not, not everyone in the world has an IBM PC. Please restrict yourself to printable ASCII characters in the range 20 hex to 7E hex (space to tilde). * LINES TERMINATED: Each line in the article should be terminated with a 'newline' -- either the MSDOS standard (CR/LF) or the unix standard (LF only). FidoNews 13-23/24/25/26/27 Page: 6 3 Jun - 1 Jul 1996 ----------------- SUBMISSION FORMAT: Below is a sample article properly formatted. Features of it are discussed further below. --article file example begins below this line-- * A Sample Article This is My Title by Joe Schmoe, [Netmail/email address] And here is my article. Note that it is flush left (zero indent). Also note that the right margin is at column seventy so that it won't overflow "most" text windows. Each line has a newline. Note the *'ed first line. My article will be listed in the table of contents exactly as it appears after the * above. Figure 1. Table 1. +-------+ ======== | A Box | Alpha +-------+ Bravo Note that we am not using any funny-o characters. This ensures that the final article will look the same to every user, no matter what sort of hardware he has. This is the last sentence of our article. --article file example ends above this line-- The first line of text is the Table of Contents line. It must begin with an asterisk * as shown above. If you do not, the article will not be listed in the table of contents. * Everything that follows the *'ed line will appear in the body of the newsletter. * Next should be the title or name of your article, your name, and contact information (network address(es), Postal Service address, etc) Try to keep it to one or two lines each. * Put a blank line between paragraphs. Paragraphs that all run together are very difficult to read, and may be rejected. * If you want to put in a table or a figure, go right ahead. We do not rearrange text, so your table or figure will remain exactly as you entered it. Try to limit them to ones that make the communication CLEARER. FidoNews 13-23/24/25/26/27 Page: 7 3 Jun - 1 Jul 1996 * Don't put a lot of blank space at the top or bottom. The FidoNews-generator programs will visually separate articles automatically. * Please check for basic errors in spelling, grammar, and punctuation. We're not publishing a textbook, but you don't want it to embarrass yourself do you? * Don't use FidoNews to grind your personal axes against other FidoNet members. An article presenting a side of an internal dispute is one thing. An article defaming or perseverating over several issues is another. Articles that merely quote endlessly from other sources to no particular effect are also not a good idea. * Don't republish copyrighted material from other sources WITHOUT the permission of those sources. Include the permission in such articles. * Remember that FidoNews is no better or worse than the articles submitted to it. If you want FidoNews to be a useful newsletter, get involved and submit useful articles. It's up to YOU to make it work. -- END -30- Okay. Now, YOU have the information to make your own article submission to FidoNews. What are you waiting for? The NEXT issue could be yours. [grin] All FidoNet Coordinators are encouraged to forward articles from their respective Nodes in FidoNet Policy. Likewise, they should obtain and make available the ARTSPEC.DOC file for anyone who wants to load or file-request it. TTFN. Chris ------------------------------------------ FidoNews 13-23/24/25/26/27 Page: 8 3 Jun - 1 Jul 1996 ======================================================================== Fidonews Information ======================================================================== ------- FIDONEWS MASTHEAD AND CONTACT INFORMATION ---------------- Editor: Christopher Baker Editors Emeritii: Thom Henderson, Dale Lovell, Vince Perriello, Tim Pozar, Tom Jennings, Sylvia Maxwell, Donald Tees "FidoNews Editor" FidoNet 1:1/23 BBS +1-407-383-1372, 300/1200/2400/14400/V.32bis/HST(ds) more addresses: Christopher Baker -- 1:374/14, cbaker84@digital.net cbak.rights@opus.global.org (Postal Service mailing address) FidoNews Editor P.O. Box 5921 Titusville, FL 32783-5921 U.S.A. voice: (407) 264-2994 [1400-2100 ET only, please] [1800-0100 UTC/GMT] --------------------------------- FidoNews 13-23/24/25/26/27 Page: 9 3 Jun - 1 Jul 1996 FidoNews is published weekly by and for the members of the FIDONET INTERNATIONAL AMATEUR ELECTRONIC MAIL system. It is a compilation of individual articles contributed by their authors or their authorized agents. The contribution of articles to this compilation does not diminish the rights of the authors. Opinions expressed in these articles are those of the authors and not necessarily those of FidoNews. Authors retain copyright on individual works; otherwise FidoNews is Copyright 1996 Christopher Baker. All rights reserved. Duplication and/or distribution permitted for noncommercial purposes only. For use in other circumstances, please contact the original authors, or the ed. OBTAINING COPIES: The most recent issue of FidoNews in electronic form may be obtained from the FidoNews Editor via manual download or file-request, or from various sites in the FidoNet and Internet. PRINTED COPIES may be obtained by sending SASE to the above postal address. INTERNET USERS: FidoNews is available via FTP from ftp.fidonet.org, in directory ~ftp/pub/fidonet/fidonews. Anyone interested in getting a copy of the INTERNET GATEWAY FAQ may file-request GISFAQ.ZIP from 1:133/411.0, or send an internet message to fidofaq@gisatl.fidonet.org. No message or text or subject is necessary. The address is a keyword that will trigger the automated response. People wishing to send inquiries directly to David Deitch should now mail to fidonet@gisatl.fidonet.org rather than the previously listed address. SUBMISSIONS: You are encouraged to submit articles for publication in FidoNews. Article submission requirements are contained in the file ARTSPEC.DOC, available from the FidoNews Editor, or file-requestable from 1:1/23 as file "ARTSPEC.DOC". Please read it. "Fido", "FidoNet" and the dog-with-diskette are U.S. registered trademarks of Tom Jennings, and are used with permission. ' ' disagreement is actually necessary, or we'd all have to get in fights or something to amuse ourselves,, and create the requisite chaos." -Tom Jennings -- END -------------------------------------------------------------------