 1 tips
 2 Hotmail
 3 email problems
 4 spam
 5 Survive the Savage Spam
 6 Windows Winsock TCP/IP


\1 tips

Here are some other interesting things you can do by e-mail. (Some of them are accessible only by e-mail!)

* THE INTERNET TOURBUS Take a virtual tour of the Inet - hop on The Inet TourBus! You'll receive a short mailing twice a week highlighting fun and interesting sites on the Internet. It's absolutely free, and you can join 80,000 others by sending SUBSCRIBE TOURBUS Fname Lname in the BODY of a msg to "LISTSERV@LISTSERV.AOL.COM".

* GERMAN <-> ENGLISH TRANSLATION SERVICE The LEO translation svc is now available by email, by sending to translate@leo.org. The helpfile at http://www.leo. org/dict/mail.html can be retrieved via webmail.

* REMINDERS BY E-MAIL The E-minder service sends you reminders about your events. For directions on setting e-minder appointments by e-mail, send a msg to e-minder@netmind.com, with Subject line "e-minder help".

Tips: I have placed all my PC bookmarks on a floppy disk. I can bring the disk with me on vacation to any public library that lets its patrons go online using their public PC . Each bookmark is linked so I can go to any of my favorite web sites. Who knows how to do the same with PC email ? A virtual Louis d'or to the first person to tell me : 1-How to put my email addresses on a floppy as links Armand Stella 2-The links must let me send email from any PC to any addressee on that email disk. of my addressees just as if I were at my home desk top computer. just as if I were on my home desktop computer. 

amstella1 - 10:44pm Jun 12, 1998 EDT (#2 of 517) A Louis d'or to the first person to tell me how to put my email addresses on a floppy disk with each address linked so I can go to any PC and email to any addressee on the disk. I have a floppy with my bookmarks that I bring with me any place and go to any of my favorite web sites using the linked urls on the disk. My affection and gratitude, particularly the latter to any one who can help me with this. Armand Stella. 

gdgrimm - 12:47am Jun 15, 1998 EDT (#3 of 517) amstella1 6/12/98 10:44pm I don't think you can do that, UNLESS you know what e-mail client you're going to use. For example, I use Netscape Communicator for my e-mail client. I can place my address book onto a floppy disk, and carry it around with me. Any computer that has Netscape Communicator can than quickly be setup to use my address book. Unfortunately, if it only has MS Eschange or Eudora for reading e-mail, I'm out of luck. But I'll see if anybody else has any suggestions to help you. One thing you might try, is moving your e-mail to an internet site (i.e. Yahoo!). I'm guessing that they allow you to build address books as part of their e-mail service. That way, anyplace you can get on the internet at, you can use your address book. 

big-z - 09:51am Jun 15, 1998 EDT (#4 of 517) My "It's Never Too Late" (103 articles to date on the life of Yankee transplants in Far West Texas) is proof positive that a computer and the Internet can jet propel a 72 year old into the field of writing. Edna M. Zoulek http://www.overland.net/~edna/ edna@overland.net 

gordons4 - 02:03pm Jun 15, 1998 EDT (#5 of 517) I am a general internist in Portland, Oregon. By definition, my practice is heavily weighted toward the senior community. I read today's article with interest and wonder what internet resources my patients have to easily access RELIABLE medical information. Any good web sites or tips readers may have that I could pass on to my patients? 

mr206 - 02:05pm Jun 15, 1998 EDT (#6 of 517) Brooklyn Girl To amstella1: Use a page of HTML mailto links. This will Open the default mail program on the computer that you are working on with a message to the person. a href="mailto:yourfriend@domain.com">Your Friend's Name /a> YOu must open the line with an open carrot for it to work. If I had done that then it would have appeared as a link! Also there is another open carrot before the /a> 

cklsl - 03:03pm Jun 15, 1998 EDT (#7 of 517) Some have mentioned taking a floppy disk of web addresses and e-mail addresses with them on trips. They can then use this floppy with Internet computers in public libraries of the towns they visit. This may work in some libraries. However, many libraries outlaw use of outside floppies in their computers because of the fear of viruses. Furthermore, many libraries prevent the use of e-mail on their public access machines. Here are two legitimate and FREE ways around these restrictions. 1. For the addresses of web pages, I recommend storing web addresses at Log-Me-On-Com (http://www.hw.ac.uk/libWWW/irn/irn44/irn44.html). This free and easy service allows you to create a list of bookmarks online, accessable from any Internet computer in the world. 2. For lists of email addresses, I recommend getting a HotMail account (www.hotmail.com). This is a free fully-functional e-mail account available through the web. HotMail gives you your e-mail account with e-mail address and password. HotMail also allows you to check several other e-mail accounts from any Internet computer in the world. Both of these web services are free and easy to use. Set them up at home. Then when you are one the road, go to a public library with public access to Internet. Go to these pages and you have your web page addresses and e-mail addresses ready for use. Chris Rippel Central Kansas Library System Great Bend, Kansas crippel@ckls.org 

cklsl - 03:17pm Jun 15, 1998 EDT (#8 of 517) To gordons4 the general internist, For medical information for laypersons, I recommend my own "Links to Lists: Medical" at http://skyways.lib.ks.us/kansas/central/post/websites/ links/medical.htm This page is a subject index of links to annotated lists of medical sites. In other words, look up a disease or medical condition. There will be links to lists of web sites for that medical problem. Most of the lists describe each web site. Even if you don't like this page, you will also find useful links at the bottom of each page of the index. Also clicking the "About Links to Lists" link will retrieve a list of good web medical indexes. Finally, the link called "Bigger Print, Please" increases the size of print on my web pages. Chris Rippel Central Kansas Library System Great Bend, Kansas crippel@ckls.org 

jonbeath - 03:36pm Jun 15, 1998 EDT (#9 of 517) ErisX Web Design Re the email addresses: Try iName. You can choose to have your email relayed to your home ISP mail account OR have it kept on the iName site for pickup (and switch between these options any time). Thus you can get your mail at home when you're there, and get it at their site when you're not. You can create a personal address book on their site as well. I've been using it for nearly a year and have found the service to be quite reliable. You can also choose an easy-to-remember email address with one of over a hundred different domain names (mail.com, myself.com, mindless.com, europe.com, whoever.com, engineer.com, etc., etc.) And it's free. 

As e-mail becomes increasingly essential to corporate, home-office, and student users everywhere, it pays for all e-mail users to brush up on the best ways to use and manage their messages. This article will help you get more out of your current e-mail, regardless of what type or where its located. Organize Your Inbox An uncluttered inbox helps you easily track and respond to new e-mails. Whether youre an e-mail pack rat or you prefer to delete most e-mails and keep just a few, consider e-mail organization as being similar to hard drive organization. When you install a program to your system, the default is to make a unique folder for the program files. However, most programs use the same folder (MY DOCUMENTS) for the files you create. To keep your word processing, Web site, spreadsheet, and graphics files separate, you will either change the default for data storage to a unique folder for each program, or youll at least create new subfolders in the MY DOCUMENTS folder for each file type. In a similar way, whether you use a Web-based e-mail program or an e-mail software package, you should create folders for your e-mail to classify incoming e-mail by sender or by other criteria. Unlike hard drive programs or data folders, which you create with Windows Explorer, you create e-mail folders with the e-mail client program you use. You may also be able to create these folders if your e-mail is Web-based. The difference is where the folders are located. If you use an e-mail client such as Eudora or Outlook, the folders will reside on your hard drive, while Web-based e-mail services such as Hotmail (http://www.hotmail.com) and Yahoo! Mail (http://mail.yahoo.com) have users store folders on their e-mail servers. In either case, once you receive e-mail, you can delete it, leave it in your main inbox, or move it to the appropriate folder for easier management. At work, you could create folders for mail from your immediate supervisor (a Boss folder, for example), co-workers in your department (Workgroup), information systems (MIS), vendors (Vendors), company announcements (Company), and so forth. Most e-mail systems will let you nest folders so that under the Workgroup folder, you could create folders for mail from each person in your department. At home, you might create folders for e-mail from your spouse, children, other family members, and friends. In both cases, you should also create a Junk Mail folder for the inevitable spam, just in case you want to keep any of it or to make it easier to get rid of it and keep it away for good. Automatic Sorting Once you have created folders, most e-mail systems let you go a step further: They offer optional automatic sorting of e-mail by topic or by sender. The name of this feature varies by e-mail system. Microsoft Outlook Express calls it New Mail Rules, for example, while Hotmail refers to this feature as Filtering. A typical sorting system works as follows: You specify what to sort by (such as subject, name, address, carbon copy, attachments, or message size) and what to do with the message depending upon which sorting rules or filters match the message. Most systems let you apply multiple rules or filters to each message to fine-tune sorting. This way, sorted e-mail is automatically placed in the appropriate folders in your inbox, discarded, or left in the main inbox if it doesnt meet any of the sorting criteria you specify. Heres how a simple set of sorting filters could work for you.  Filter 1: If the message is from JoeB@mycompany.com, file it in the JoeB folder  Filter 2: If the message is not from JoeB but is from another co-worker (@mycompany.com) file it in the Mycompany folder  Filter 3: If the subject contains free or another such spam word, file it in the Junkmail folder  Filter 4: If the message is from somebody in your family (Mikey22@AOL.com, Cheryl999@AOL.com), file it in the Myfamily folder  If the message doesnt match any filter, file it in the normal inbox. See Figure 1 for an example of how these filters will handle different messages. You also can set filters to place unwanted junk mail into the Trash or Deleted Items folder of your e-mail system. However, by using a Junkmail folder instead, you can easily take advantage of e-mail address blocking, which is another feature offered by some e-mail systems. 

\2 Hotmail and most other e-mail services and clients let you manually or automatically move e-mail to folders for easier management. E-mail address blocking prevents any mail from a specified address from reaching your inbox. If you simply delete suspected junk mail, you will probably continue to get mail from the same unwanted senders. If you place junk mail in its own folder, you can select to block the address of each message in the Junkmail folder and then delete the messages. Over time, you wont need to throw away as much unwanted e-mail. Meanwhile, you can still act on the occasional legitimate offer buried in the mass of junk. Use Multiple E-mail Accounts If you have only a single e-mail account provided by your employer, you run the risk of getting spam at work and worrying about dealing with privacy issues if you receive or send personal e-mail. With Web-based free e-mail services abounding, consider multiple e-mail accounts. You can use your works e-mail account for strictly business-related activities (as you should), use another account for family- and friends-only e-mail, another one for contests, and another one for e-commerce. Outlook Express and most other e-mail clients and services let you set up automatic sorting and handling rules for incoming messages.Used properly, each e-mail account will provide you a level of self-sorting. If you make sure you use the correct e-mail address for each type of correspondence you perform, you will make the task of working with each e-mail type easier. Protect Your Identity Whether you have a single e-mail address or spend the time to set up multiple addresses, protect yourself from spam with these additional steps.  Give out only the appropriate e-mail address to each type of correspondent. Give your family the family e-mail address youve selected, use the contest e-mail address only when entering online contests, and so forth.  If your Web browser provides your e-mail address when requested by sites using cookies, use the contest or junk mail address rather than one of your more private ones.  When you post a message online, create a spoofed version of your address that can easily be deciphered by anybody who wants to send you a message, but not by the e-mail harvester bots (automatic search programs that look for e-mail addresses for use in spamming). If your address is really johnsmith@anisp.com, you could spoof it into johnsmithDELETETHIS@anispTAKEOUT.com. Place a note in the body of the e-mail to remind readers to remove the spoofed portions of the address. Multiple e-mail identities can help you track where e-mail from unfamiliar senders may be coming from, but dealing with more than one e-mail account can be difficult. Keep Track Of Accounts As suggested above, you may have a company e-mail account, an e-mail account supplied by your ISP, and one or more Web-based free e-mail accounts. Keeping track of all of these accounts can be tricky if you insist on using a separate client for each e-mail account. One method offered by some e-mail clients is a feature called multiple identities. This isnt as useful as it sounds. With this method, you must log off one e-mail account and log on to another account. This method lets you use a single e-mail client, but its primarily designed to let multiple users share a client; you cant access multiple e-mail addresses at the same time. A second option is to use a feature included in some Web-based free e-mail systems such as Microsofts Hotmail. You can use some of these services to check any standard POP3 (Post Office Protocol 3) mail server; the other servers messages are listed along with any new Web-based e-mail messages. This lets your Web-based e-mail perform double-duty. However, some Web-based clients may not transfer the correct received date on POP3 e-mail. This is the problem we had when we used Hotmail to check our POP3-based e-mail server and asked it to bring over all (not just new) messages. All messages transferred from our normal e-mail server had the current date (not date received) stamp, making it difficult to trace message threads. If you enable the option to keep your originals on your POP3 e-mail server, you can use this option to copy all messages (or new ones only) from your POP3 e-mail server to your Web-based account for easy access via the Internet when you are traveling without losing the messages on your normal e-mail server. If you delete the POP3 configuration information after you transfer the messages, a copy of the messages from your POP3 server will remain visible in your Web-based client. 

You can use many Web-based e-mail services, such as Hotmail, to access your normal POP3 e-mail service.A third option is to see if your e-mail client will let you check all your e-mail accounts with a single login. Recent versions of many e-mail clients, including Microsoft Outlook 98 and Microsoft Outlook Express, offer this option.Access Multiple E-mail Clients Typically, youll need to know the following information to set up your e-mail client to access a given e-mail account:  The e-mail type (HTTP [Hypertext Transfer Protocol], POP3, or IMAP [Internet Message Access Protocol]). HTTP e-mail is Web-based; you normally access it through a Web browser. POP3 e-mail normally moves e-mail from the server to the e-mail client (although you can set your client to leave a copy on the server). IMAP e-mail lets you create folders and sort e-mail on the server, rather than on the client as with POP3. (HTTP e-mails ability to sort and filter depends upon the service.)  The e-mail server names for outbound and inbound mail; these will be different. Outbound mail servers use the SMTP (Simple Mail Transfer Protocol) to transfer messages.  Your username and password If your e-mail client will let you set up multiple accounts without making you log off and log on as a new user, you can use it as the gateway to your company, personal, contest, and family e-mail personalities. If your current e-mail client doesnt have this feature, you can download various third-party freeware programs you can use to manage multiple clients. You can set Maxlands SimpleCheck version 5.0 to check multiple e-mail accounts, and you can try it for free or register it for $12.99. Older freeware versions are also available at http://www.maxland.homepage.com. Similar freeware programs include LetterBox 3.1.0 and Poppy for Windows. These are available at http://freeware32.efront.com in the Internet in the Email category. E-mail On The Road You may be a master of your domain when youre in the office with your normal e-mail client program. But when you travel, you will find yourself in circumstances when:  Your only way to access e-mail en route may be through a kiosk PC set up at a trade show or in an airport terminal, or  You want to view your current e-mail, but you dont want to transfer it to your notebook computer. To get ready to travel and make e-mail access simple, take the following steps:  Get a free Web-based e-mail account from Hotmail, Yahoo! Mail, Netscape Netcenter (http://www.netscape.com), or one of many others. This lets you check at least that account using just a Web browser, the e-mail sites URL (universal resource locator), and your username and password. It takes just a couple of minutes to sign up, and you can start getting e-mail routed to it right away. Choose an account that will also let you access your POP3 e-mail accounts.  Carry a list of your e-mail server names, usernames, and passwords with you for your normal POP3 corporate e-mail accounts. This will let you set up a Web-based service to access your normal e-mail without using your normal e-mail client.  Send your new Web-based e-mail account a message with your e-mail addresses in the body of the document. This lets you contact the same users on the road that you communicate with through your normal e-mail service. Whether you use a Web-based e-mail service or an e-mail client in your notebook computer when youre on the road to access your POP3 e-mail, make sure you select the option to Leave A Copy Of The Message On The Server. Otherwise, youll have some of your messages on your office or home PC and some of them on your notebook computer or in your Web-based e-mail service. In Outlook Express 5 (included with Internet Explorer 5), you select this option during the E-mail Account Setup. This is under the (Mail) Servers tab of the properties sheet for the Account. Other e-mail systems with this option will also list this option on the same screen as the mail servers, since it affects how mail servers operate. Protect Your Privacy Accessing your e-mail on the road used to be difficult. If you couldnt bring along your own computer, you were out of touch unless you wanted to create a temporary identity on another users system. As we saw above, Web-based e-mail changes everything. Weve checked our e-mail with just minutes between flights by stopping by an airport kiosk and using the airports browser-equipped public-access computer. If you only use Web-based e-mail, youre just a Web site, username, and password away from accessing your e-mail. Take a few minutes longer, and you can also get your POP3 e-mail. (See above for specific information.) Keeping your Web-based e-mail private is essential. Some Web-based e-mail messages may wind up in the disk or memory cache of the computer containing your browser. Even after you finish using the service, you can easily surf back to the Web site containing your mail with the Back button on the browserand so can the next user. We recommend a five-step approach to keeping your Web-based e-mail safe. The first two steps take place when you log on to the service: 1. Make sure your name and password are not saved. Clear any checkbox that offers to do this for you. While this feature saves you a few seconds at home, its a security hole on the road. If anybody shoulder-surfs you while you are typing in your username, all they need to see is the first few characters of your username if this feature isnt disabled. 2. Some services have a feature called extra security for shared computers when you log on. Enable it. This will clear out the browser cache when you log off the service. The last three steps take place when youre finished reading your e-mail, and they eliminate any trace of your connection. 3. Log off the e-mail service when you are finished. This will drop the connection and prevent the next user from using the Back button on the browser to dip into your e-mail 4. Delete Temporary Internet Files and history in Microsoft Internet Explorer or clear the History, Location Bar, Memory Cache, and Disk Cache in Netscape Communicator. With IE 5.x, use Tools, Internet Options to access the menu to delete these files. With Netscape Communicator 4.x, use Edit, Preferences, Navigator to locate the History and Location Bar features. Move to Advanced, Cache to delete the memory and disk caches. 5. Close the browser. These easy-to-use precautions will prevent other users of a public machine from accessing your e-mail from either the browser or from the hard disk of the computer you used. Keep Attachments Safe The humble, practically free 1.44MB (megabyte) diskette may not be the most popular storage system anymore, but if you need to get attachments on the road from a Web-based e-mail service, theyre like gold. They work in any kiosk computer set up in an airport or at a trade show, and theyre just big enough to hold the maximum 1MB size for attachments supported by popular services such as Hotmail. Carry a few of them with you when you travel. To make the best use of them:  Make sure theyre good. Preformatted diskettes sometimes dont have a good magnetic structure. Chcck them with ScanDisk or Norton Disk Doctor or reformat them with the Full (Unconditional) option in Windows Explorer.  Save your downloaded file attachment to the A: (diskette) drive for privacy. Although its a bit faster to save your downloaded attachment to the hard drive and then copy it to the diskette, youll leave a retrievable copy of the attachment behind. Even if you delete it, a program such as Norton Disk Doctor will have little trouble retrieving it.

Simple Mass Mailings Are you sending out mailings to the same people on a frequent basis? Rather than selecting each name from your address book (or entering each name manually), create a group containing everyones name and send e-mail to the group. Most recent e-mail clients offer this feature as part of their address books. Typically, you create the group and then enter each name and e-mail address into the group. To send mail to the group, specify the group name; the e-mail client will substitute the individual users names for the group name when the e-mail is sent. In Outlook Express 5, start by opening the address book. To create a new group, select the New button and select New Group. Once you specify the name of the group, you can select New Contact and type in the information for each member. Or, to add people from the address book to the group, click Select Member. Each name in the address book is listed on the left side of the display. Click each name you want to add and click Select to copy the names to the group. Click OK when youre done. The group displays in the same list as the other names in the address book, and you select it the same way. To send mail to multiple groups, specify each groups name in the appropriate location in the e-mail form. Use BCC If you dont want to advertise to everyone in your mailing list who else is receiving the message, use the BCC: (blind carbon copy) field for your recipients. Unlike To: or CC: (carbon copy), BCC: preserves the privacy of your recipients and makes it harder for spammers to harvest your e-mail for addresses. Some e-mail clients require you to put at least one e-mail address in the To: field. If you use the BCC: field to send the message to all the members of a group, you can just address the e-mail to yourself and discard it to get around this requirement. Most e-mail clients and Web-based services support BCC: with a separate field. If youre using AOLs e-mail service, though, there is no separate BCC: field for these addresses. Instead, you put parentheses around each address you want to send a BCC: message to. The addresses can be either in the To: or Copy To: fields.Reuse Your Messages If you must send a series of messages with similar text, check your Sent Messages folder in your client or Web-based service and display the message you want to reuse. You may need to copy and paste the text to a Compose window, or you can sometimes just re-enter the e-mail address or change the text and send it as is. Its a big time and effort saver. Messages Everyone Can Read While those of us in a Microsoft-centric world might believe that everyone uses an e-mail client with appearance options such as Decor (adds graphics) or HTML/RTF (lets you add boldface and italics), many receivers of your message may be using text-based e-mail systems that lack support for some or all of these bells and whistles. If in doubt, dont add these features to your message. Some e-mail systems turn your enhanced message into a separate file attachment, which makes your user open the attachment to see exactly the same text. Line length is also important. Its frustrating to open a message thats full of half-length lines. Instead of pressing the ENTER key at the end of each line, let your e-mail editor word-wrap your lines when you compose a message or a reply. This allows most e-mail systems to adjust the paragraph width to match the width of the viewing window when the e-mail is received. If you are sending someone a URL reference in your message, put it on a separate line. While some e-mail clients try to make these clickable links, many times more complex URLs are not understood correctly. If the URL is on a line by itself, the user can manually copy it into the browser window to go to the site. by Mark Edward Soper 

FINGER BY E-MAIL is a utility that returns info about another user. Usually it's just boring stuff like last logon, etc., but sometimes people put fun or useful info in their finger replies. To try out finger, send this line (in the message BODY) to a webmail server:

send http://www.mit.edu:8001/finger?<user@site>

Use one of the e-mail adrs below instead of <user@site>

nasanews@space.mit.educoke@cs.cmu.edu quake@gldfs.cr.usgs.govcopi@oddjob.uchicago.edu

A New Trick Gives Snoops Easy Access to E-Mail  By AMY HARMON  Feb 5 2001  For those still harboring the illusion that e-mail exchanges are private, a watchdog group has uncovered a new trick that enables someone to essentially bug an e-mail message so that the spy would be privy to any comments that a recipient might add as the message is forwarded to others or sent back and forth.

The maneuver does not take advantage of any security flaw in e-mail software. It is simply one feature of a fancier and increasingly common form of e-mail known as HTML mail, which enables users to send and receive e-mail messages that look and act like a Web page. 

With the spying technique, a few lines of a programming language called JavaScript, often used on Web sites to create pop-up windows and navigational aids, can be embedded in such a message. This implant, not visible to the recipient, enables the text to be secretly returned to its original sender every time it is forwarded to another recipient, as long as the recipients' e-mail programs are set up to read JavaScript.

Although HTML e-mail often includes images and animations, it can also be made to look like a plain text e-mail. To figure out whether a message is HTML or text, a user can right-click on the message body. If one of the menu choices that appears is "view source," it is HTML mail. By choosing "view source," a user would be able to see any JavaScript code embedded in the message. But whether the code was designed to bug a message would likely still be difficult to recognize for someone unfamiliar with the computer language.

"I looked at this and I said, `Whoa,' because it lets you spy on people, and it's so easy," said Richard M. Smith, chief technology officer for the Privacy Foundation, an educational and research organization based in Denver that plans to publicize and demonstrate the technique today. 

"Most of us won't release a computer virus, but this is something people would use, particularly if a service started offering it," Mr. Smith said. "It's just kind of human nature."

Invisible tags sometimes called Web bugs are widely used in HTML e-mail by marketers and others to detect whether an individual has opened an e-mail message. The Congressional Privacy Caucus has announced plans to hold hearings to investigate the use of Web bugs later this month. Mr. Smith said that it was now clear that JavaScript could be used to create a more powerful Web bug so that not only can someone find out when a message is read, but also what is being said about it.

Because many e-mail users continue to hit "reply" during long e-mail exchanges rather than initiating new messages, the JavaScript code could enable an individual to eavesdrop on an entire conversation between business associates about a proposal he or she had e-mailed to one of them, for example. It could also be used to harvest e-mail addresses when a message like a joke was forwarded over and over to groups of people across the Internet. 

The widely used e-mail programs that are vulnerable to the exploit include Microsoft Outlook, Outlook Express and Netscape Messenger 6. America Online users and users of Web-based e-mail programs like Hotmail would not be affected. 

By going to the "preferences" command under the edit menu in Netscape Messenger, users can turn off JavaScript in about five steps. To disable JavaScript in Microsoft Outlook and Outlook Express takes about 15 steps, which are outlined on the privacy foundation Web site at www.privacyfoundation.org. The newest version of Outlook Express comes with JavaScript turned off, as a result of customer feedback, a Microsoft spokesman said.

"At this point in time, it's really a personal choice everybody has to make whether they are more concerned about a security risk or about the advanced functionality you get by having these features enabled," said Lisa Gurrey, product manager for Microsoft Office. "We are just doing the best we can to give our customers different options."

But turning off JavaScript does not necessarily mean that e-mail cannot be spied on, because a bugged message will still be returned to its original sender if it is replied to or forwarded to someone who reads the message with an e-mail program that is vulnerable.

Today, the Privacy Foundation plans to provide public demonstrations of the process, which the group calls "e-mail wiretapping" and believes to be illegal. The group is calling for the major vendors of e-mail programs to provide their software with JavaScript automatically turned off. The potential for such e-mail spying was first discovered by Carl Voth, an engineer in British Columbia, who brought it to the attention of Mr. Smith at the Privacy Foundation. 

"What bothers me is that in this case, my vulnerability is a function of what you do," Mr. Voth said. "I can be careful, I can take every precaution, I can turn off JavaScript, and it doesn't matter. If my neighbor isn't diligent and I send him an e-mail, I'm still vulnerable."

\3 email problems

3rd Ed Feb 2000 Vol.4 Iss 1. What To Do When You Can't Send Or Receive Msgs. If you can't imagine living without it (and wonder how you ever did), you're in good company.

E-mail is the most popular feature on the Internet. It's more popular than surfing the Web, lying about your looks in chat rooms, or swapping stories about alien abductions in newsgroups. Between junk mail, subscriptions to electronic newsletters, and regular correspondence, you can expect to receive twice as much e-mail as you send out. Tally it up, and every day hundreds of millions of e-mail messages rocket all over the wired world.

The universal capabilities of e-mail have not actually been around that long. When commercial online services first arrived, marking the beginning of ubiquitous e-mail use, messages could only be sett to other members of the same service. For example, an America Online (AOL) user couldnt send a message to a Prodigy user. The phenomenal growth of the Internet has made it possible to send e-mail messages from one desktop to another without worrying about what type of network or what software is being used, says Mark Levitt, resource manager at IDC, an industry research firm based in Framingham, Mass. E-mail is so easy and inexpensive that after a few weeks of use it becomes indispensable, replacing many fax and telephone communications. But you probably know that already. What you may not know is that there is a whole lot of stuff going on after you click the Send button. 

Once you tell your mail reader to fire off that msg, yr computer will have to connect to your Internet service provider (ISP), then your mail program will have to connect to your ISP's outgoing mail server, and then that server will have to connect to your recipient's incoming mail server, often through a variety of Internet hubs and routers. If any one of these steps is wrong or fails, your e-mail program is not going to send or receive anything. Even when everything works with the precision of a Swiss watch, e-mail can get lost on the Inet.

E-mail addresses change. Internal networks crash. Servers are overcrowded. Bandwidth is overloaded. Commercial online services go offline for internal restructuring. National ISPs go down. Local ISPs go belly-up. In other words, stuff happens. So the million dollar questions are: How do you know when your e-mail program is guilty? What can you do to fix it? When its not at fault, how can you tell? What should you do next? 

If youve already tried the solutions and techno-tricks revealed in Going Online: Tracking Down & Solving Online Mysteries and youre still having digital dilemmas, here are the troubleshooting steps our e-mail experts recommend. 

Error messages are there for a reason. Often they will contain the information that you and/or a technical support representative can use to find a solution for your problem. 

Check your connection. I cant get my e-mail, is the No. 1 technical support question received by every major e-mail publisher. As obvious as it sounds, make sure youre connected to the Internet, says Kenneth Breshears, supervisor of technical support at the Eudora Division of Qualcomm. Its common for the Internet to disconnect you every now and then. Many Internet providers such as AOL and EarthLink automatically disconnect you after 15 minutes of idle time. You may be reading whats on-screen, but the Internet only counts typing and clicking. Look for the modem icon in the lower right area of your toolbar. If its gone, chances are, so is your Internet connection. Do you see an error message? If so, write it down. If your machine hasnt locked up, see if you can click the Details buttons. If you can, write down the module that the program is failing in. Kim Akers, product manager at the Microsoft Outlook Express division, says, A DLL message is a dead giveaway that its your e-mail program, and you should stop everything and call tech support. (NOTE: DLL refers to dynamic-link library, an executable subroutine stored as a file, separate from the programs that may use it. DLLs allow for the efficient use of memory because they are loaded into memory only when needed.) The same is true if youre getting what Windows 95/98 (Win9x) and Windows NT advanced users call BSOD, the blue screen of death. Thats when your monitor suddenly switches to a blue screen crammed with hexadecimal dump codes of gobbledygook. All hardware and software is locked. Your only recourse is to physically turn off your computer and start it up again. Before you do, try pressing the ENTER key a couple of times. In some instances, it will return you to Windows. If it does, save your work as quickly as possible (if you can), and then get out so you can restart Windows. Tip: Before installing the latest e-mail or Web browser software, scan for viruses. Then, run your disk defragmenter, which efficiently organizes and rewrites the scattered parts of a file into adjacent sectors on a disk (within the hard drive) so it can store a maximum amount of information. If any portion of your e-mail program is installed on a bad sector, it wont run. 
 Outlook Express lets you use multiple e-mail accounts. If youre having problems sending mail with one, try the another account. Tip: Make sure you have the latest drivers for your video card. If you are having problems opening a window, it is a sure sign that youre using an older video driver, says Bob Visse, product manager at the Microsoft Internet Explorer division. Even if youre using McAfees Web-based Clinic ($29.95 for a year subscription, http://www.mcafee.com, 408/988-3832) or Win98s Windows Update, check your video manufacturers Web site for possible updates. To find out what video driver you have installed in Win9x, right-click any blank spot on your Desktop. Select Properties, click the Settings tab, then click the Change Display Type button. Your video driver will be listed under Adapter Type. Once youve downloaded the new driver and are ready to install it, repeat this process, click the Change button, and follow the instructions. Check your settings. If youve tried rebooting and youre still having problems, its time to check your e-mails incoming (POP3; Post Office Protocol 3.0) and outgoing (SMTP; Simple Mail Transfer Protocol) settings. Like a techno-traffic cop, these internal e-mail settings make sure messages flow smoothly between you and your ISP. Incorrect or incomplete settings are responsible for the majority of e-mail tech support calls and the #1 place where people get in trouble, Akers explains. Such symptoms include: your e-mail program cant connect to your ISP server, or you can send e-mail but cant receive it (or vice versa). We see this problem a lot, especially with new users, Akers says. Theyve gotten their Internet connection, installed the browser, and surfed to their first Web page. Then they want to try sending e-mail to a friend. They make an assumption that just because they can browse the Web, their e-mail program is automatically set up. Its not. The solution: call your ISPs technical support staff for these settings. A good ISP, such as EarthLink Network (http://www.earthlink.com, 800/395-8425), will walk you through this process with any major e-mail program. You can do it yourself, however, provided you know the unique lingo of your ISP. In Win9x, to set your e-mail account up for the first time in Outlook Express, click Tools, then Accounts, then the Mail tab. Click Add, then select Mail. This summons an Internet Connection Wizard and then you simply answer the questions. (NOTE: If you dont know your e-mail address, POP3, or SMTP settings, dont guess. When in doubt, call your ISP or check its Web site.) Naturally, the POP3 and SMTP settings are different for every ISP. What works for EarthLink wont work for AT&T WorldNet Service (http://www.att.net, 800/967-5363). Also, just because these settings were correct yesterday, doesnt mean theyll be correct tomorrow. ISPs are locked in the same race you are, trying to keep pace with all the evolutions and revolutions in Web-o-rama technology. Tip: If its been four to six months since installing your ISPs dialing software and youve noticed your e-mail seems sluggish, call your ISPs technical support staff and double-check these settings. Tip: Most ISPs will have this information available on their Web pages. Find it and print it. Then bookmark the page for future reference. Most ISPs will also have a page for revealing their technical difficulties and planned downtimes. Bookmark and visit that page (if you can) when difficulty arises. 
 Make sure that your incoming and outgoing server names are correct in your mail readers configuration settings.
 Does your browser work? If your e-mail program still isnt working, see if your Web browser works. If it cant connect to a Web page, chances are the problem is your ISP connection. (It sounds ridiculous, but just because your dial-up program gets a connection to the Web through your ISP, it doesnt automatically mean that youre actually connected to the Web.) Try dialing into your ISP using another access telephone number. If you can connect, and both browser and e-mail programs are working, the guilty party was that particular ISP line. If you cant dial in, your ISP is having server problems. (Or you may be having modem problemssee the article Modems: Solve Your Communications Hang-Ups for more details.) If your ISPs server is causing your problems, stop troubleshooting because theres nothing you can fix. Your only recourse is to wait until your ISP repairs the problem. Try again in a few hours. Tip: When you call technical support to set up your e-mail program, get a list of alternative ISP access numbers. Tip: New users should choose an ISP that offers 24-hour technical support, such as IBM Internet Connection (http://www.ibm.net, 800/455-5056) or EarthLink. If you have children, consider kid-friendly commercial providers, such as AOL (http://www.aol.com, 800/827-6364) or Prodigy Internet (http://www.prodigy.com, 800/776-3449). Check the e-mail address. If your e-mail program can get mail, but cant send it, carefully check the recipients e-mail address, especially if it was automatically inserted from your Address Book. As versatile as the Web is, its still a harsh enforcer when it comes to misspellingsand it can even be case-sensitive. A good e-mail strategy is to always use lowercase letters in all e-mail addresses. Send yourself e-mail. Another quick trick: try sending an e-mail message to your own address. Youll quickly discover whether your e-mail program works. If you can send and receive your own e-mail, that is evidence that the problem is the recipients e-mail address or ISP server. If you know the e-mail address is correct, try sending the message later. Your recipients mail server is probably not working. Tip: The quickest way to verify the e-mail address is to call and ask the recipient. But when you are on the Web, you can avoid a phone call by just firing up your browser and checking to see if the recipient is listed in the e-mail directory search engines such as Yahoo! People Search (http://people.yahoo.com) or BigFoot (http://www.bigfoot.com). Tip: If you are using Outlook Express with Microsoft Internet Explorer 4.0 and higher, you can search several Internet White Page directories without loading your browser. Click the Compose button on the toolbar, and when the New Message window appears, click the cardfile icon next to the To: field. When the Select Recipients box pops up, click the Find button. When the Find People window appears, click the drop-down arrow and select a directory service, such as Yahoo! People Search, Bigfoot, or WhoWhere. Next, type in the recipients full name and click the Find Now button. Remember, however, if youre not connected online, this wont work. Also, the person youre searching for has to be listed with a service, so you may end up trying several services and still wind up calling for the e-mail address. Delete the message and try again. If the recipients e-mail address is correct and you still cant send the message, go into your Outbox, delete [the message], create another message, and try sending that one, Akers advises. Tip: If you cant find the Outgoing message, look in every mail folder. Depending on the e-mail program, the folders could be called: Outbox, Sent, Unsent, Send Later, Trash, or Deleted Items. You might have accidentally put the file in the wrong folder. Also, many e-mail programs are configured to automatically send e-mail. Your message may already be gone. Tip: If possible, pick one e-mail program and stick with it. Otherwise, youll have incoming and outgoing e-mail scattered in different programs, making it too easy to misplace a message. Tip: If you do have multiple ISP accounts, such as AOL, MSN, and AT&T, consolidate your e-mail and make only one of them your dominant account. In Outlook Express, you can choose where replies should be sent, no matter what e-mail address you are sending from. Select Tools, then Accounts, click the Mail tab, highlight the e-mail account you want to attach a reply address to, and then click Properties. Select the General tab, and under Reply Address, type the e-mail address to which you want people to respond. From now on, your outgoing e-mail will automatically include your preferred e-mail address. 
 An e-mail search service can be a convenient way to investigate the validity of a recipients address. Tip: Most e-mail programs can be configured to handle multiple e-mail addresses. For example, you have a different e-mail address for work, another for home. Youll have to pick one, for example, your office, as the default. In Outlook Express, to send messages using your other account, simply create your message and, instead of clicking the Send button, click File, and then select Send Message. Highlighting with the mouse reveals your different e-mail accounts. Click the one you want to use.
 Unattach or cut down on attachments. If the offending outgoing message has an attachment, detach the file(s), then try sending the message. Tip: Dont weigh down outgoing messages with too many attachments, especially big multimedia files or graphics. Instead of sending your cousin 12 digitized photos of Tintin all at once, attach a few pictures to several messages. Not only is it easier for your ISP server to deliver the e-mail, but your cousin will also appreciate your restraint. Remember, the recipient must wait for the download. Is your cousins modem and computer as fast as yours? This same attachment strategy applies even if youre compressing files with a utility such as Nico Mak Computings WinZip ($29, http://www.winzip.com, 860/429-3539). Tip: In Outlook Express, you can put a halt on big file attachments automatically being downloaded into your e-mail Inbox. Select Tools, Inbox Assistant, and click Add. When the Properties dialog box appears, check the Larger Than box to set a message size limit. Depending on whos sending you what (text files or multimedia monsters), you can start at 100 kilobytes (KB) and adjust it up or down later. Also check the Do Not Download From The Server check box, then click OK. Next, you should see If Message Size Is Greater Than 100KB, Then Dont Download inside the Inbox Assistant dialog box. Make sure its checked, then click OK. (NOTE: When doing this, make sure you dont go over your ISPs limit for individual server space by leaving all your messages on the server.) The next time someone tries to send you e-mail with too many Ratzo pictures, just the message will arrive in your Inbox. Of course, if you want to download the attachment, youll have to go back and uncheck the box, then click Send and Receive to get it. Repeat the process to reactivate it. Tip: Most attachments will arrive at their destination without a hitch. However, every once in a while, a recipient wont be able to run, view, or load it because the file got corrupted. This is standard operating procedure. Just resend it. Tip: If youre using the latest e-mail program, another reason recipients might be having problems with your attachments is theyre still using an older e-mail program that simply cant see or read features such as the new business card or stationery attachments in Outlook Express and other HTML-capable mail programs. Tip: If youre writing messages you dont want anyone else to see, use the built-in encryption in both Netscape WebMail and Microsofts Outlook Express. Another alternative is: PGP Personal Privacy V6.5.2a ($59.95; http://store.mcafee.com; 888/712-1477, 970/346-1332). Get help on the Web. One of the best places to look for technical support is on the e-mail publishers own Web site. Youll find Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs), troubleshooting tips, a Knowledge Base at both Microsoft and Netscape, and, if youre lucky, a patch that fixes your problem. For Microsofts Outlook Express (http://.www.microsoft.com/ie/ie40/oe), click Support, then the link to Search The Knowledge Base. Fill in the appropriate text field and click Find to retrieve answers to hundreds of questions. Also from the Support page, check the link to Critical Updates for information about integral patches and fixes. You will find online technical support for Netscape WebMail (http://webmail.netscape.com/tpl/Door/Login?) by scrolling to the bottom and clicking Here for more information, answers to FAQs, and technical support. Youll also find phone and e-mail support telephone numbers at http://help.netscape.com/contact.html, but you will have to pay a minimum of $29 per incident for technical support. You will find online technical support for Qualcomms Eudora products at http://www.eudora.com/techsupport. Qualcomm also has telephone technical support available at (800) 238-3672. 

Try uninstalling and reinstalling. When a program in Win9x stops operating properly, a common solution is to uninstall and then reinstall it. This will often fix the problem, says William Goldstein, a Los Angeles-based Internet consultant. This is especially true if you are downloading gigabyte-heavy browsers or e-mail programs where even the tiniest bit of line noise online can corrupt a small portion of a bigger program. The only solution is to start all over again. To uninstall any Win9x e-mail program, go to the Control Panel and select Add/Remove Programs. Then, select the Install/Uninstall tab, and when you find the program you want to get rid of, highlight it with your mouse, and select the Add/Remove button. Tip: Netscape Communicator doesnt let you selectively uninstall WebMail, the e-mail portion of the program. Microsoft Internet Explorer 4.0 and above, however, have no such limitations. Youll need the CD-ROM to reinstall Outlook Express. Dont worry about losing your e-mail or personal settings; its smart enough to ask you if you want to delete your e-mail messages. Switch to another e-mail program. If you cannot fix the problem, try another e-mail program. Qualcomms Eudora Light (800/238-3672; http://www.eudora.com), Microsofts Outlook Express (800/426-9400; http://www.microsoft.com/ie/default. htm), and Netscape Communicator (http://www.netscape.com/download) are all free, and you can easily download them from the Web sites. Change your ISP. If the people youre sending e-mail to are complaining that its taking too long or if your e-mail is consistently delivered late, blame your ISPs mail server. AOL, for example, is notorious for slow delivery; sometimes it can take as long as three hours. You have two choices: wait for your ISP to catch up or get a new one. Tip: If you subscribe to AOL but access it through your own ISP, youll get faster delivery service if you use AOLs e-mail program to send messages to people on AOL. In other words: AOL to AOL is faster than e-mail coming in from the Internet to AOL. Tip: Its better to keep an ISP that is a little slow on the e-mail delivery trigger than one that consistently doesnt deliver. Unless youre on a closed system like AOL, in most cases, you wont know whether your e-mail was received until you get a response, or an angry where-is-it call, Levitt says. Despite advances in areas of standards, the Internet has a long way to go before reliable return/receipt options are available. E-mail may be making our lives easier, but as with any advancing and improving technology, there will be plenty of kinks to work out. Sometimes it may seem like were having to take a step and a half back for every step forward, but remember that its all worth it when you can get that important message in a matter of minutes with e-mail, rather than waiting for several days before it arrives in your lonely, curbside mailbox. 


\4 spam

email SPAMs & FAQs

People all over the world, at all hours of the day and night, send and receive electronic mail messages. Some are as simple as Hi Grandma. Others are complex legal documents. According to Internet research company Forrester Research, people send millions of e-mail messages every day. Forrester reports that daily, global Internet e-mail traffic will increase from 100 million e-mail messages per day in 1996 to 1.5 billion per day in 2002. As commonplace as e-mail is, however, many people dont fully understand how it works. If youve ever wondered what a domain, POP account, or IMHO are, youre not alone. To explain the ins and outs of e-mail and clear up any confusion, Smart Computing spoke with Mark Leigh, vice president of product development (also known as The E-mail Guru) at Mail.com (http://www.mail.com), a global provider of Internet messaging services to both the consumer and business markets. E-mail is not going away any time soon, Leigh says. New technologies such as voice recognition and the ability to send audio over the Internet are quite promising enhancements to e-mail functionality, he says. But the e-mail Inbox will always remain the foundation for these and other types of messaging. What is e-mail? What does it have to do with the Internet? E-mail (electronic mail) is a system used to send and receive electronic messages over a computer network, such as the Internet or your companys internal network, to a person or a group of people. Besides a message, an e-mail may have an attached file or graphic, as well. It is a great, low-cost way to keep in touch with friends, family, and colleagues across the world. In fact, e-mail is the most popular application of the Internet. Why is e-mail so popular? Leigh says e-mail is popular for several reasons: It is easier to send than hard-copy correspondence and typically arrives within minutes. Its cost is low. E-mail users can easily distribute and forward messages to many recipients. This electronic communications format offers electronic filing, searching functions, and editing capabilities that are not generally available for voice-mail and other form of communications. People can read much faster than they can listen. How long has e-mail been around? E-mail has been around since the 1960s, when students at Smith and Dartmouth exchanged an electronic message using the same computer. Roy Tomlinson sent the first message to a different computer in 1971. At first, computer scientists and other technical users primarily used e-mail. Now, e-mail is the most frequently used tool on the Internet. Messaging Online, an information service for messaging professionals, reports that there were 569 million e-mail boxes in 1999. What do @, .com, .net, BCC, and CC mean? The @ sign, which was chosen by Roy Tomlinson, separates the user name from the domain name. A domain name is an identifying title given to a set of computers. The .com and .net extensions are top-level domains. A top-level domain is the last part of an Internet address, and it specifies what kind of organization or company owns the address and in which country the organization is based. For example, the address http://www.smartcomputing.com has .com as its top-level domain. There are six top-level domains in the United States: .com: commercial/for-profit companies .net: network providers .org: organization .edu: educational .gov: government .mil: military CC stands for carbon copy. The CC: field is normally used to keep other recipients up-to-date in e-mail discussion, even when they are not directly involved. BCC stands for blind carbon copy. Use the BCC: field to send e-mail to a recipient without the knowledge of other recipients (in the To: and CC: fields). How does e-mail work? An e-mail address, such as yourname@mail.com comprises three main elements: the user name (such as yourname in this example), the at symbol (@), and the domain name (mail.com in this example), which includes the network name.

You can think of an e-mail address like the street address of your house. The user name is the equivalent of your name written on an envelope with a letter addressed to you. (In the world of e-mail, the user name is the name of your mailbox.) The domain name is the equivalent of your street, city, state, ZIP code, and country written on that same envelope. (In e-mail, the domain is the name of the set of machines on which your mailbox resides.) When a computer wants to deliver an e-mail, it reads the e-mail address from the back to the frontthe same way the post office reads a mailing address from the bottom up. E-mail systems look at the top-level domain name, such as .com or .net, and then the second-level domain (mail) to find the specific computers where your electronic mailbox is located. The mail system then examines the user name to find your mailbox. What is an e-mail attachment? An e-mail attachment is a file attached to an e-mail message. You can attach almost any type of file, including a text document, a spreadsheet, a sound, or an image, to an e-mail. (NOTE: When you send a large file to someone, it may take him or her a long time to download the message if he or she has a slow connection to the Internet.) What is an ISP? An ISP is an Internet service provider. They are the companies that provide you with access to the Internet, usually for a monthly fee. ISPs generally provide users with an Internet connection, an e-mail address, and Web browsing software. What do I need to send and receive e-mail? You need: Access to the InternetYou can get access to the Internet by getting an account with an ISP. The most popular ISPs and online services (which provide Internet access, as well as their own content) include AOL (America Online; http://www.aol.com) and EarthLink (http://www.earthlink.com). An e-mail accountMost ISPs give you an e-mail account when you register with them. An e-mail programAn e-mail program is an application that lets users send and receive e-mail. Some of the more popular e-mail clients are Microsoft Outlook, Eudora, and Netscape Messenger. Many ISPs will give you an e-mail program when you register for an account. As an alternative, you can use a Web-based e-mail service. Web-based e-mail services dont require an e-mail program. All you need is a Web browser, such as Microsoft Internet Explorer or Netscape Navigator, to send and receive e-mail from anywhere in the world. What are the benefits of using a Web-based e-mail client? Web-based e-mail or Web-mail is different from regular e-mail because you can access it directly through a Web browser by going to an Internet site. This is different from traditional e-mail where you need to set up an e-mail program such as Eudora or Microsoft Outlook to access your e-mail. With Web-mail, you can send and receive e-mail from any Internet-connected computer in the world without configuring or setting up an e-mail application. In addition, a Web-mail account is separate from a work e-mail address, which can help you to keep personal and work e-mail separate. A few Web-mail sites include Hotmail (http://www.hotmail.com), Mail.com (http://www.mail.com), and Bigfoot (http://www.bigfoot.com). How can I be sure someone has received an e-mail I sent? The best thing you can do is to make sure you are sending your message to the correct e-mail address and you havent misspelled anything. Many e-mail programs also let you request a return receipt when you send a message. When the recipient reads your e-mail, you receive a confirmation e-mail. For this capability to work, both your e-mail service and the recipients e-mail service needs to support the return receipt feature. What is spam? Spam is unwanted or unsolicited e-mail messages. You may also have heard spam referred to as USE (unsolicited commercial e-mail) or UBE (unsolicited bulk e-mail). Most spam is commercial advertising sent to hundreds or thousands of people without their permission. Spam costs the sender little to send; most of the costs are borne by the recipient or e-mail providers. How can I get e-mail? If you have an ISP, you most likely already have an e-mail address. Your employer or your university may also provide you with an e-mail address. In addition, you can sign up for Web-mail through an e-mail service provider. What is POP3? POP3 stands for Post Office Protocol version 3. POP3 is the language or protocol your computer uses to collect your e-mail from another computer on the Internet. You may hear techies referring to their e-mail as their POP account.

What should I do if I get an e-mail message I consider obscene or vulgar? If you know the person who sent the e-mail, you should contact the person and ask him or her to stop sending you offensive e-mails. If the person continues (or if you dont know who the person is), you should contact the network administrator of your e-mail provider. The provider will take the appropriate action (legal or otherwise). Just how long of a message can I send via e-mail? Most e-mail providers do not impose any limit on the text in an e-mail. They do, however, impose restrictions on the total size of an e-mail, including e-mail attachments. If you are sending a written message via e-mail (without any attachments), it is unlikely you will ever reach any limitation (unless, of course, you type thousands of pages). (NOTE: It is also important to point out that e-mail etiquette dictates it is best to keep your e-mail as short as possible.) How often should I check my e-mail? This decision is entirely up to you. It depends on what you use e-mail for and what kind of lifestyle you have. That said, it is probably a good idea to check your e-mail at least once per day. Are free e-mail services really free? Yes. Just like television and radio, advertiser sponsorship is an important foundation for low-costing and reliable e-mail services. Advertiser sponsorship permits e-mail providers to offer free e-mail services and low-costing, value-added services using the latest e-mail technology and infrastructure. Most free e-mail providers do offer enhanced/premium services for a fee if a user requires more advanced e-mail services. What happens when I delete an e-mail message? Is it really gone for good? It depends on the type of e-mail program you are using. Most e-mail programs put deleted e-mails in a TRASH or DELETED ITEMS folder so users can restore them if necessary. Bear in mind that your e-mail application may automatically empty the TRASH folder when you exit the application. (NOTE: Your application usually lets you control settings such as the deletion of messages.) What is a signature file and why would I use one? A signature file is text your e-mail program automatically adds to the end of an outgoing message (usually to identify the sender). A signature can be whatever you want, but it usually gives contact information such as your name and e-mail address. An e-mail program that automatically inserts a signature file saves you from typing the same information over and over again. What is instant messaging? If e-mail is the online equivalent of sending a paper-based letter, instant messaging is perhaps the online equivalent of a phone call. With instant messaging, you can have a live conversation with someone by typing instead of speaking. With instant messaging (as with a phone call), the conversation between both parties happens in the same time period. With e-mail (as with a letter), time separates communicating parties. What etiquette or rules should I follow when creating and sending e-mail messages? Here are just a few to get you started: Write subject lines that describe the main theme of your message and then stick to that theme or subject. Be careful with sarcasm and humor. E-mail lacks the tonality and subtleties of face-to-face communication, so it is easy for someone to interpret your well-meaning joke as an insult. Dont use capital letters. People will think you are shouting. Dont send a mass-mailing advertisement. Remember that an e-mail message is a written record and proof of your words. When you send an e-mail to someone, that person could forward the e-mail to someone else. If you want to better ensure your words will not come back to haunt you, dont send an e-mail you are uneasy about. What do LOL, IMHO, and those other strange abbreviations mean? Just like abbreviations used elsewhere, these are shortened forms of commonly used phrases. Some of the more popular ones include the following: LOL Laughing out loud ROTFLRolling on the floor laughing IMHOIn my humble opinion FYI For your information FWIWFor what its worth BTWBy the way What should I do about e-mail chain letters? Internet chain letters play on peoples emotions to get them to forward the message to their friends. You should not forward chain letters; they slow down the computers of e-mail services and delay other valid messages from getting through. You can find more information about Internet chain letters at the U.S. Department of Energys Computer Incident Advisory Capability Web site at http://ciac.llnl.gov/ciac/CIACChain Letters.html and the CAUCE (Citizens Against Unsolicited Commercial E-mail; http://www.cauce.org) Web site.

What is all the technical data that sometimes is included with e-mail that I receive? Some of the technical data included with e-mails are headers. The headers show the exact path across the Internet the message took to arrive in your mailbox. Generally, you can ignore this information. However, it is sometimes useful to give this information to a technical support representative if you are experiencing any problems sending a particular message. What is wireless e-mail/Internet access all about? Everything mentioned so far assumes youre using a computer connected to some kind of network via a cord such as a phone line. The latest wireless technology lets you send and receive e-mail with no cords attached. Some notebook computers are equipped to do this. Many cellular phones and personal digital assistants are equipped with wireless capability, as well. by Mark Kakkuri  

Spamitize Your Inbox How To Prevent & Deal With Junk E-mail   

No look at Internet spam can truly be complete without a brief nod to The Monty Python group and its homage to the tasty meat treat in a can. The British comedy troupe turned a rather pedestrian processed pork brick into a cultural icon with its amusing musical tribute. Even though electronic spam can certainly be filling, its definitely nothing to smile at. If youve ever received e-mails from people named KandyKane or MegaMillions that promised adult pictures, incredible business opportunities, impossible health cures, or free college diplomas, you have received spam. Spam is the extreme state of UCE (unsolicited commercial e-mail), and it has turned into a flood of messages the Internet has proven incapable of stemming. At the least, its an annoyance; a constant trickle of the unwanted and inappropriate. At the most, its a real threat to legitimate Web businesses that find every e-mail they send being lumped in with the garbage messages. 

 Low Fat Or Regular? There are two types of spam. The first is of the newsgroup variety. These are messages sent to numerous Usenet newsgroups at once. This involves no e-mail addresses on the part of the spammer, and as such, this spamming technique is easy to use. Usenet has been so plagued with spam that its popularity has seen a steady decline over the past couple of years. ( Usenet is a giant bulletin board on the Internet consisting of user news, e-mail, and forums that discuss thousands of topics. A newsgroup is a virtual area on the Internet reserved for the discussion of a certain topic.) The second type of spam involves your e-mail inbox. As well show in a moment, your e-mail address is extremely vulnerable, and spammers are pros at harvesting addresses from Usenet, Internet mailing lists, and the Web itself. All it takes is a mailing list and a simple piece of bulk e-mail software, and a spammer is immediately up and running, sending hundreds of thousands of e-mails a day for a few pennies. 

 The Price Of Canned Meat. The recipients of spam bear its real cost. For those with measured phone service, spam is an obvious drain on the pocketbook because it costs money to download junk mail. It also costs ISPs (Internet service providers) and online services to transmit and handle so much e-mail, and these providers then pass their costs on to the consumers. Spam also sucks up bandwidth (the capacity a network or data connection has for carrying data), slowing traffic to a crawl as millions of Free Valium and Freedom From Your Debt messages clog the system. As the cheapest ways to mass advertise, spamming tends to attract businesses with products that are of such poor quality it does not make sense to pay to advertise them. Spam also attracts people selling illegal products and services, and as the e-mail nobody wants, spammers pretty up their messages with misleading subject lines and invalid e-mail addresses to try to thwart filtering attempts and get recipients to open them. Spammers can spoof addresses in the From field to make it seem as if they came from just about anywhere (even from you). In addition, with Trojan horses (viruses that falsely appear to be useful applications and slip into a system unnoticed) such as BackDoor-G and BackOrifice, systems without updated virus-protection software face the possibility of having their systems actually being physically used to send out spam. Even though spam is a big problem, there are things you can do to protect yourself from this junk e-mail.

Inoculation. Without exception, the best way to deal with spam is to shut it down before it happens. Its much more difficult to get your name off a list than to keep it off in the first place. You should diligently guard your e-mail address and selectively reveal it to others. These are the keys to keeping your spam inflow to a minimum. Posting to Usenet newsgroups is the classic way your e-mail address can fall into the wrong hands. Spammers using simple harvesting software can easily and quickly strip addresses from thousands of posts. So the harder you make it for them, the better your chances to escape with your e-mail address unharvested. One long-time trick is to place NOSPAM text somewhere in the address, such as name@NOSPAMdomain.com. Unfortunately, this has become so popular that it may be easy for spammers to strip the NOSPAM text out, so try a different phrase. One more way to duck the harvesting bots is to avoid putting your address in a click-to-e-mail form, such as mailto:name@domain.com. Even though this makes it easy for people to respond to you, its also something bots look for. By the same logic, dont put a click-to-e-mail link on your Web page.
 Try to avoid member directories or other locations on the Internet where e-mail addresses gather (and spammers prowl), as well. Because these people deal in bulk your e-mail address by itself isnt going to appeal to them. Your e-mail address in a group of thousands, though, is too tempting to resist. You also can try to choose a user name that begins with a letter further along in the alphabet (admit it, youre always fancied yourself as a Zelda). Spammers often sign up for trial ISP accounts to run their programs, and these mass-mail sessions are often cut short. Because most mailing lists are sold in alphabetical order, a user name beginning with the letter Z, for example, is much less likely to be harvested. One more strategy you may want to try is to employ a system of using many e-mail addresses. The Internet is now rich with free e-mail systems such as Hotmail (http://www.hotmail.com) and Yahoo! Mail (http://mail.yahoo.com), and you can easily dispose of these if they become clogged up with junk. By using these accounts to post to newsgroups and other high-risk areas, youll also keep your primary ISP account clean. 

 Infection. Too late! you cry, your inbox awash with fresh offers for loans and fake licenses. Youre already knee deep in spam, and its rising fast. What can you do?
 First, dont spam the spammer. Not only will this confirm your e-mail address is valid but also attract the special attention of someone whose primary skill is the ability to send out 1 million e-mails a day. In addition, if a spammer is using an innocent third party to forward the mail (or spoofing the From address), you may be dumping on someone who doesnt deserve it. Dont threaten, dont mail bomb (when someone transmits mass amounts of e-mail and attachments and clogs a single recipients mail system), and dont respond, even to the Click This To Have Your Name Removed link. (They usually dont work anyway). Dont bother adding your name to an opt-out list, either. Spammers know you hate them and dont want their e-mails. They know one in 10,000 actually does, and theyre willing to bury those 9,999 to find the one. It costs them pennies and is still legal almost anywhere, and it is the way they do business. Why should they spend time comparing opt-out lists with their mailing lists? At the very least, opt-out lists are just another possible revenue source for many. In addition to filtering (see the Sift Out Spam sidebar), complaining to the right sources can often help. One good source is the postmaster of the ISP where the mail came from, and for this, youll need the real domain (a group of connected computers) where the mail originated from. Dont bother with the From field; it usually contains an invalid address. To find the real point of origin, check the Message-ID field. (You may need to tinker with your e-mail client to get it to show up.) This field will have a considerable amount of information. What youre looking for is the domain name after the at (@) sign. Forwarding the message to postmaster or abuse at this domain (such as abuse@domain.com) will often result in the ISP canceling the offending account. 

Third-party filtering solutions such as SpamBuster offer a variety of advanced features, such as the ability to display charts that detail how much spam you receive. 

Another option is to report the spammer online. Sites such as the Spam Recycling Center (http://www.chooseyourmail.com/spamindex.cfm) and Abuse.net (http://www.abuse.net) let you forward spam to authorities and system managers who can act on the messages. Both sites also offer free antispam filters and other tools and resources to help you control spam. One unique solution of questionable efficiency comes from Junkbusters (http://www.junkbusters.com). This site offers a ton of information on spam, junk mail, and telemarketing calls, as well as a Notification And Offer section, which contains a text passage you can cut and paste into replies to spammers offering to purchase spam messages for $10 a shot. In other words, if they send you spam, they must pay for the right to do it. Even though this threat of possible litigation may be enough to stop some spammers, youll still need a valid reply address to send it to (as mentioned, few use these). You can find the Notification And Offer at http://www.junkbusters.com/ht/en/spam.html#strong. 

 There Ought To Be A Law. The forces for good are beginning to strike back at the behemoth, spam. AOL (America Online), which was receiving 1.8 million spam e-mails a day at one point (at a cost of 5,000 hours per day in connect time), has taken spammers to court and forced them to stop bombarding its users. States such as Colorado have enacted legislation or are attempting to pass bills that would sharply limit a spammers ability to hide behind fraudulent e-mail addresses or misleading subject headers. Even the federal government is considering the issue, with the Spam Unsolicited Electronic Mail Act, a bill that promises to put up many roadblocks in the way of potential spammers. ( NOTE: At press time, this bill was slated to go before the full House in late spring.) But this legislation isnt bulletproof. A judge in March of this year threw out the first case brought under a Washington state antispam law, ruling it was unduly restrictive and burdensome. One thing is for sure: The battle over spam should continue for some time to come. by Rich Gray  

Sift Out Spam One of the best ways for individuals to deal with incoming spam is to filter it. Web-based e-mail, such as Hotmail (free; http://www.hotmail.com) and Yahoo! Mail (free; 408/731-3300; http://mail.yahoo.com), presently feature e-mail filtering tools, and most other e-mail clients also provide filtering features. With filtering, you can have your e-mail client screen incoming messages at the door for specific words and known spammer e-mail addresses. You can then have your e-mail client automatically reroute the suspect spam to a specific folder. Clients such as Microsoft Outlook ($109; 800/426-9400, 425/882-8080; http://www.microsoft.com/office/outlook) easily let you add junk senders and messages with adult content to a special file. (To turn on these e-mail features in Outlook, select Organize from the Tools menu and click Junk E-mail. Then highlight a message and select Junk E-mail from the Actions menu. Choose Add To Junk Senders List or Add To Adult Content Senders List.) If you want even more protection, try a third-party solution such as Novasofts SpamKiller ($29.95; 888/236-2446, 913/469-5900; http://www.spamkiller.com) or Contact Plus Spam-Buster ($19.95; 800/366-9876, 321/984-2592; http://www.contactplus.com/spam/spam.htm). These programs offer more options to deal with and report spam. 

E-mail Troubleshooting. Using E-mail is easy, fast, and generally reliable, but that doesn't mean things don't ever go wrong. After all, we are still dealing with computers. Rain, snow, and the dead of night might not keep E-mail from appointed rounds, but balky servers, routers, phone lines, and even human error can veer a message straight off into nowhere.

Return To Sender. Occasionally, as in the real world, a msg you thought was safely on its way to a recipient lands back on your doorstep. The most likely cause behind a bouncing E-mail is a simple misspelled address. E-mail addresses arent known for being easy to say, remember, or type. Oftentimes, the returned mail will be accompanied by an explanation such as, The following message could not be sent to bob@nowhere.com because the host nowhere.com does not exist.

Other times, the host might be real, but the user ID, in this case Bob, might be wrong. Perhaps he spells his name Bawb or adrses at nowhere.com include a last initial: BobB. You might have to make a phone call or visit a company World Wide Web site to figure out where you went wrong. It's poss that the adrs is correct but a computer prob prevented the message from being delivered anyway. The computers over at nowhere.com or even your own Internet service provider (ISP) might be temporarily out of order. Unfortunately, Internet mail systems in such a state do not always send helpful diagnostic communiqu's. Your message might just slip out into the Net and vanish into so many electrons. The Internet can be a rough place that way. If something is important, remember to ask your recipient to send a confirmation E-mail message so youre sure your message arrived. 

Occasionally, some Internet puta will let you know if an msg failed to get through. We aren't always so lucky. 

Slow Going. A few messages make it to the right mailbox but only after hours or even days of lost contact. A trip around the dark side of the moon can cause this phenomenon, but a more likely scenario is computer delay.
 Slow E-mail is sometimes the unavoidable result of sending messages between two types of network systems. 

For example, E-mail sent from someone using an independent ISP to a friend on America Online might get caught up for a while at AOLs gates. The ever-growing company seems to have trouble occasionally both with getting E-mail out to the Net and reeling Net E-mail back in. It isnt uncommon for messages to be held up for a day or more. The same sorts of holdups can happen with other corporate or educational networks that might check for Internet mail only at specified times. 

There isnt a whole lot individual users can do about this problem other than determining that the time lag isnt on their end. Start by checking that your E-mail is being sent when you think it is being sent. Many E-mail programs send messages you complete to an outbox. Outbox contents might immediately be sent to the Net, sent on a preset schedule, or sent only when the user presses a certain button. Read the Help screens for your E-mail program and check whether E-mail you thought was sent isnt actually piling up in your own outbox. Another avenue to explore is your ISP. Call their help desk to see if anyone else experiences the same E-mail problems. It could be something on their end of which they arent yet aware. Theres a good chance, however, that the slowdown is beyond the control of you or your ISP. Attachment Detachment. Sometimes E-mail messages appear to make it through the Net labyrinth unscathed, but attachments to those messages arent so lucky. Many attachment problems have to do with the way such files are encoded to get ready for their Internet trip. If a recipients E-mail program doesnt have the ability to decode an attachment your E-mail program encoded, the file is doomed. Today, most E-mail programs use the MIME (Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions) format for sending and receiving attachments. Users who arent sure if they are MIME-equipped should check manuals, help screens, and configuration boxes to find out. If attachments are sent in MIME and the recipient has the ability to decode MIME, the fault may lie in the type of file you are trying to attach. Once the file is decoded, it must be viewed with the proper application. For instance, if you send a Microsoft Word document, your recipient is going to need a program that can open Word format to read it. If you arent sure, try to send files in common, basic formats such as .TXT and .RTF for text and .BMP, .JPG, and .GIF for graphics. Experimentation is frequently the best tool for finding a combination of settings that two computers can agree upon. Just remember to ask recipients for feedback so you can rest easy that your messages and attachments

\5 Survive the Savage Spam

Ever feel like shooting off an angry note to a spammer? One morning, Roberta (not her real name) decided she had suffered enough from unsolicited e-mail. She owns a wholesale distribution business with retail stores and a Web site, and she was particularly tired of receiving spams from a seller of golf balls. She wrote a curt note asking to be removed from the mailing list, saying, "I don't play golf, but if I did I wouldn't buy balls from a spammer."A few hours later, Roberta found 1490 messages waiting for her on her company's mail server. Most were bounced copies of the original spam sales pitch. Some were angry messages from others complaining about the spam. (Some spams are set up so that if you reply to them, they're rebroadcast to thousands more e-mail boxes or Internet mailing lists from your address.) "Reading the message headers, I realized that this jerk was using my company's domain name, adding random numbers to the beginning of the address, so his spams looked like they were coming from us," she says. "Since America Online and CompuServe apparently have blocks on the words 'golf balls' to filter his spams, all their bounces were coming to my company's domain name." Within a few hours, more than 10,000 messages flooded the server. Angrily, she headed out on the Web and quickly found the spammer's real name, street address, and phone number. (There are a number of antispammer Web sites that list this info for notoriously obnoxious spammers. One place to start is the Blacklist of Internet Advertisers, at www.cco.caltech.edu/~cbrown/BL.) She called and left a message on his answering machine demanding that he remove her company's domain name from his spams. The bounced and angry messages trickled off over the next 24 hours. What the spammer did is a felony. Redirecting e-mail messages to a victim's mailbox or server qualifies as telephone harassment, so Roberta might have been wise to contact the FBI. For quicker action, contact your ISP immediately, explain the situation, and ask the provider to configure a filter to delete the spams. And never dash off a heated response or write to the "postmaster" at the domain name listed in the message's Reply field. Your note may ricochet to an innocent victim--who'll complain to you. Save Entire Web Pages If you're running Netscape Communicator or Professional, you can save an entire Web page to disk, including its graphics, by selecting File*Edit Page. In the Netscape Composer dialog box, select File*Save. The page's HTML code and graphics will be saved in the directory you specify. You can later view the page offline with either Communicator or Composer. To save pages in previous incarnations of Netscape (or in Microsoft's Internet Explorer), you need an additional utility like WebWhacker, available on PC World Online at www.fileworld.com.

You Know Juno, But Did You Know This? There is no cheaper or simpler way to tap into the Net than Juno, the Web's premier free e-mail service. You download a simple mail program from Juno's Web site (www.juno.com) or get it from a friend.

It will work on just about any PC all the way back to grandma's 386 with 4MB of RAM and a VGA monitor. You don't even need a fast modem; a 9600-bits-per-second model will do. The software dials a local number (there are about 500 around the country) to send and fetch mail. It's mindlessly simple (see the figure). The only price you pay is having to look at ads on the screen when you log off. If you believe Juno's figures, the service has acquired more than 3.5 million subscribers in its first two years. Juno president Charles Ardai claims that 43 percent of subscribers access the Internet in ways other than Juno, but prefer the simplicity of Juno e-mail--and of course its nonexistent price tag. There are limits to how much mail you can send and receive. Juno won't confirm what those limits are, but it appears you can log on 12 times a day, send 20 messages each time, and receive about 1MB of mail. Messages can be only 64KB in length, and you can't send or receive messages with file attachments. Juno has no plans to change those restrictions. Will Juno offer Web browsing? While ads for a Juno Web service have recently appeared in national magazines, Ardai claims the company is only "test marketing to gauge consumer response." The basic free Juno service will remain unchanged for the foreseeable future, but Juno may launch some related services. An excellent mailing list exists to discuss Juno and all the ways you can access the Internet with it. To sign up, send a note to majordomo@world.std.com. The body of your message should contain only the following line: subscribe juno(underscore)accmail your e-mail address You'll find a Web page for the list at www.junoaccmail.org. If Juno is your only means of accessing the Net, you can obtain the page's contents by sending a message to agora@dna.affrc.go.jp. In the body of the message, type the following: send http://www.junoaccmail.org For directions on using Juno mail to search the Net and obtain software and the contents of Web pages, get a copy of Bob Appleton's Email4U by sending a message to pfinlaw@usa.net. In the subject line, type the following: send email4u A good book on downloading software and searching the Internet with Juno e-mail is Juno: More than Free E-Mail by Bob Rankin ($12.95, No Starch Press, 1997, 800/420-7240). You can find more tips and directions on cruising the Net via e-mail by visiting www.biz.mhv.net/drbob. Secrets For File Downloads have you ever run into a file that your browser just won't download? You click on the file, but instead of your browser saving it, a plug-in fires up, or an error message like 'Unable to launch external viewer' appears. This is particularly common with sound and movie clips. Here are tricks for handling it. Netscape Communicator 4.0. If you can't download the file without running the plug-in, look for it in the cache: 1. Bypass the plug-in. Press the Shift key while clicking on the file link. Even if your browser is set up to run a plug-in when it encounters this type of file, it will download the file without loading the plug-in. 2. Instruct Communicator to download rather than play files. Select Edit*Preferences. In the Category box, under Navigator, click on Applications. In the box under Description, select the kind of file you wish to download, then click the Edit button. The Edit button will be grayed out if a browser plug-in is installed that displays or plays that file type. For instance, if RealAudio is installed, that program will automatically play sound files that end in .wav or other common sound file extensions. To change these files' setups, you'll first need to uninstall the plug-in. You can find out which plug-ins are activated by heading to Communicator's Help menu and selecting About Plug-ins. In the MIME Type line of the Edit Type dialog box, type application/octet-stream. Check the Save to Disk box. If you're asked to specify an application to handle the file, type unknown. 3. Head to Communicator's cache. If all else fails, you'll find in Communicator's cache subdirectory a copy of any file that the browser displayed or a plug-in has played. Look for it at C:\Program files\Netscape\ Users\yourname\Cache. It's going to have a funny name like MV2CC2g1.wav, but the file extension should give it away. Internet Explorer 4.0. Instead of automatically running a plug-in when you click on a file of a certain type, IE gives you the option of saving it. It also stores the file in a temporary folder. 1. Instruct Explorer to save files to disk. Position the cursor over a file name on a Web page and left-click it. A dialog box will ask if you'd like to save the file to disk. 2. Look for the file in the Temporary Internet Files directory. When you click on a file link on a Web page, if Internet Explorer attempted to run the plug-in or display the file, chances are it saved a copy of it to C:\Windows\Temporary Internet Files. To check, select View*Internet Options and click the General tab. Under Temporary Internet Files, click the Settings button, then click the View Files button. Explorer will present a list of all the files in its Temporary Internet Files directory.

If you save files this way, be sure to give the browser enough time to copy the entire file to disk. Since you won't get any progress messages on the download, you'll need to watch your modem's flickering lights (when they stop flickering, the file has probably finished transferring), or any configured plug-in that may pop up. Find files from this article on PC World Online at www.fileworld.com. Internet Tips welcomes your questions and tips and pays $50 for published items. Contributing Editor Judy Heim is a coauthor of The Quilter's Computer Companion (No Starch Press, 1997, 800/420-7240). Five Tips for Using Juno E-Mail 1. To avoid disconnects and 'network error' messages, exit from any other Internet mail programs or Web browsers so that they won't interfere with Juno. 2. When installing a new version of Juno's software, first make a copy of the old address book. Head to the Juno folder and look for the subfolder user0000. In it, look for the addrbook.nv file. Copy the file to a different folder. After you install the new version of Juno, you can replace its address book file with addrbook.nv. Or, since addrbook.nv is a text file, you can open it in a word processor and cut and paste its contents into the new address book file. 3. To keep backups of messages and resend them, select Options*Automatically save all sent mail. If you need to resend a message, head to the Sent folder and click on the message. Click Move to Folder and then type Outbox when prompted. Messages are stored in the file fold0001.frm, which can be safely deleted when Juno is not running. 4. To retrieve deleted messages, select Features* Export folder. In the next dialog box, highlight Deleted and click OK. Save the deleted messages in a file named deleted.txt. Next, select Features*Import folder and select the file deleted.txt. Create a new folder for it, and click OK. You can now read the contents of the new folder by clicking the Read tab and selecting the folder from the Folder field. 5. To send file attachments, make them part of a message's text: Select File*insert text file into message. You can use this feature to send graphics or even software. First, though, you must encode it as a text file, and break it into segments of less than 60KB. You can do this with Snappy Software's freeware Wincode, available from PC World Online at www.fileworld.com.


\6 Windows Winsock TCP/IP
 
   alt.winsock is an unmoderated newsgroup for general discussion of the
   WinSock (Windows Sockets) API and the myriad applications that run
   under it. Postings range from questions on how to setup a WinSock
   application to more advanced topics concerning Internet protocols and
   programming. This group is also open to both newcomers and advanced
   programmers alike. Unfortunately, this openness has made alt.winsock a
   very high volume newsgroup. That is why this FAQ was created. If you
   have a question or suggestion, please do not be afraid to post it.
   Flames have never been a problem and people will usually answer what
   seem like the dumbest questions. But, in order to reduce the volume on
   this newsgroup, we ask that people consult this FAQ prior to posting a
   question. We've put together an abundance of information which we'll
   try to keep as up to date as possible.

WinSock is short for Windows Sockets.  Today's most popular Internet applications for Microsoft Windows and IBM OS/2 are developed according to the WinSock standard.
 
   1) Where Did WinSock Come From?
   -------------------------------
 
   WinSock is short for Windows Sockets, and is used as the interface
   between TCP/IP (Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol), and
   Windows. TCP/IP has been called "the language of the Internet" and
   rightly so--most of the Internet is comprised of systems that use TCP/IP
   to talk to one another.
 
   The WinSock specification was born at one of the "Birds of a Feather"
   sessions at the Interop conference in Fall of 1991. The current
   version of the specification is 1.1, but work continues on the WinSock
   2.0 specification, which is scheduled for completion mid-1995.
 
      A) Berkeley Sockets
      -------------------
 
      Berkeley Sockets is the standard programming model for TCP/IP
      networking under Unix. Windows Sockets was designed to be very
      similar to Berkeley Sockets so that those experienced in programming
      with sockets in Unix will be able to easily make the transition to
      Windows Sockets. However, there are a few deviations in the WinSock
      standard that take advantage of Windows-specific features not
      supported in Unix. For more information, see the following:
 
        ftp://ftp.microsoft.com/bussys/winsock/spec11/winsock.txt
 
   2) How does it work?
   --------------------
 
   WinSock is a .DLL (Dynamic Link Library) and runs under Windows 3.x,
   Windows for Workgroups, Windows NT, and Windows 95. The WINSOCK.DLL is
   the interface to TCP/IP and, from there, on out to the Internet.
   (TCP/IP stands for "Transmission Control Protocol / Internet
   Protocol," the "language" that computers on the Internet use to
   communicate with each other.)
 
   The easiest way to show how it works is with a diagram:
 
       WinSock-compliant Application (e.g., Netscape, WinVN)
                              |
                          WINSOCK.DLL
                              |
                            TCP/IP
                              |
                     Modem or Network card
                              |
                       Network and beyond
 
   WINSOCK.DLL actually acts as a "layer" between your WinSock
   applications and your TCP/IP stack.  Your WinSock applications tell
   WINSOCK.DLL what to do, WINSOCK.DLL translates these commands to your
   TCP/IP stack, and your TCP/IP stack passes them on to the Internet!
 
   But the most important thing for you to remember about WINSOCK.DLL is
   that the WINSOCK.DLL you're using must match the version of TCP/IP
   that you're running. Don't assume that because all WinSocks are called
   WINSOCK.DLL that they're all the same--they're not. So, for example,
   if I'm using Microsoft's TCP/IP, I can't use Trumpet Winsock.
 
   Similarly, if I'm running on a SLIP connection, and I want to switch
   from Chameleon Sampler's Winsock to Trumpet Winsock, I first need to
   remove Chameleon's version of WINSOCK.DLL before installing the new
   one.
 
   If you end up with multiple versions of WINSOCK.DLL floating around
   your hard disk, you're asking for trouble. Before you come screaming
   at alt.winsock, take a couple of minutes to check your hard disk for
   multiple WINSOCK.DLLs.
 
   For more information, see NCSA's winsock.dll page on the Web at:
 
     http://www.ncsa.uiuc.edu/SDG/Software/WinMosaic/winsocks. htm
 
   3) What do I need to run WinSock applications?
   ----------------------------------------------
 
   Using WinSock applications to access the Internet requires:
 
   - A suitable connection to the Internet.
   - A TCP/IP stack (which includes it's own WINSOCK.DLL).
 
   Your connection to the Internet may take the form of a direct
   connection via a network card or a dialup account using a modem.  Most
   users reading this FAQ will be using the latter.  You'll probably need
   to acquire an account with an Internet service provider (or else
   get an account through work or school, if available) -- either a
   SLIP or PPP account (these are protocols for communicating with the
   Internet via modem; either is fine, though PPP is generally preferred),
   or a shell account which allows you to run a SLIP emulator (covered in
   Section VI.)
 
   The TCP/IP stack you use depends upon your needs.  Some operating
   systems include stacks, such as Microsoft Windows 95 and IBM OS/2. For
   other operating systems, like Microsoft Windows 3.1/3.11 or Microsoft
   Windows for Workgroups 3.11, you'll need to add a stack. Section IV.
   of this FAQ covers some of the most popular.  Some are free, some are
   shareware (if you continue to use them after an evaluation period, you
   must pay a small fee), and others are commercial.  Some include no
   WinSock applications, while others include all the basic apps you'll
   need.
 
   A fast computer, 8MB or more of memory, and a high speed modem for
   dialup connections (at least 14.4k) are also recommended.
 
   And, of course, you'll need some WinSock applications.
 Section VII.
   points to lists of WinSock applications available.
 
  III.  What Are SLIP and PPP? ============================
 
   There are several different ways individual PC users can get access to
   the Internet. Of all the access methods available, SLIP (Serial Line
   Interface Protocol) and PPP (Point-to-Point Protocol) accounts give
   you the most options, as far as applications are concerned.
 
   SLIP has been around since the mid-1980s. It was originally designed
   to allow Unix machines to connect to one another over the phone. It
   essentially "tricks" your computer into thinking that its modem
   connection is a dedicated network connection (the kind you would
   usually need a network card for).
 
   PPP is based on SLIP, but it is a more sophisticated protocol. It
   contains additional error checking and authentication, which makes it
   more reliable than SLIP. For most PC users, there really isn't much
   difference between the two. Because PPP is more reliable and is
   generally accepted to be the standard of the future, you should get
   PPP if you're offered a choice between the two.
 
   WinSock works great with SLIP and PPP. Most WinSock versions come with
   dialer programs to do the actual connection over your modem.
 
  IV. What WinSocks Are Available and Where Can I Get Them? =========================================================
 
   1) Trumpet Winsock
   ------------------
 
   Peter Tattam's Trumpet Winsock is one of the most popular WINSOCK.DLLs
   available. It includes both WINSOCK.DLL and a dialer program to get
   you connected if you're using SLIP or PPP. Versions 2.0b and 2.0e have
   been replaced by version 2.1. Version 2.0b is still available from:
 
     ftp://ftp.cica.indiana.edu/pub/pc/win3/winsock/twsk20b. zip
     ftp://ftp.coast.net/SimTel/win3/winsock/twsk20b.zip
 
   Version 2.1 is still in development. Recent developments have improved
   PPP performance and fixed scripting errors. Like version 2.0, version
   2.1 supports both SLIP and PPP. A fairly powerful scripting language
   is also included for login, logout, and other actions. Trumpet Winsock
   is shareware. After 30 days, you must register (international: US$25,
   Australia: AU$25).
 
     ftp://b-box.trumpet.com.au/pub/winsock/twsk21f.zip
 
   Mirrors:
     ftp://ftp.synapse.net/contrib/trumpet/winsock/twsk21f.zip
     ftp://ftp.coast.net/SimTel/vendors/trumpet/winsock/ twsk21f.zip
 
   Make sure you read the README.1ST file if you're upgrading from Trumpet
   Winsock 2.0x.
 
   There is a 32 bit version of Trumpet Winsock for Windows 95/98/NT.
   For more iformation, see:
 
    http://www.trumpet.com.au/winsock/winsoc5.html
 
   More Information:
      http://www.trumpet.com.au/wsk/winsock.htm
 
      A) Which MTU, TCP RWIN, and TCP MSS settings are best?
      ------------------------------------------------------
 
      Unfortunately, there isn't a simple answer to this question.
      It really depends on what kind of connection you have. Ethernet,
      SLIP, PPP, and CSLIP all require different settings. Also, your
      Internet provider may require that you use certain values. But there
      are a few rules that may help you find the best values.
 
      First check which values your Internet provider recommends. These
      values will generally be the best. However, not all providers have
      experience with Trumpet Winsock, or the values they give you may
      still need additional adjustment for optimal speed and reliability.
 
      The INSTALL.DOC that comes with Trumpet Winsock also lists a few
      general rules for setting these values. MTU should be TCP MSS+40.
      TCP RWIN should be 3 or 4 times TCP MSS. It suggests starting with
      the following values: MTU=256, TCP RWIN=848, TCP MSS=212. However,
      these are only general rules and there may be better values for
      your particular situation.
 
      Peter Tattam also believes that MTU should be pushed up to 1500 if
      supported by your provider, although many providers recommend
      setting the MTU at 1006.
 
      He also recommends that you set the values for SLIP/PPP as follows:
      TCP MSS=512, TCP RWIN=2048. CSLIP/CPPP values should be: TCP
      MSS=212, TCP RWIN=848.
 
      Ethernet and TIA users should use the following values: MTU=1500,
      TCP RWIN=4096, TCP MSS=1460.
 
      B) Registration Problems
      ------------------------
 
      One of the biggest problems Trumpet has been having is responding
      to user registrations. Be patient because they are busy. But if you
      find that they never respond, send e-mail to
      registrations@trumpet.com.au.  Give your full name and Trumpet
      should respond promptly with your registration number.
 
         More Information:
 
            Trumpet Software International Home Page:
               http://www.trumpet.com.au/
 
 
   2) Chameleon Sampler
   ---------------------
 
   Chameleon Sampler is was a popular WinSock. It has reached end-of-life.
 
   3) Microsoft TCP/IP-32
   ----------------------
 
   This is Microsoft's stack for use with Windows NT or Windows for
   Workgroups 3.11.  Unfortunately, this stack does NOT support dialup
   connections. Free for owners of Windows NT or Windows for Workgroups.
   Available from:
 
      ftp://ftp.microsoft.com/peropsys/windows/Public/tcpip/
 
   4) NetCruiser
   -------------
 
   NetCruiser probably doesn't belong on this list, as it's not 100%
   WinSock compatible.  NetCruiser includes a proprietary stack and
   suite of applications included with SLIP accounts from Netcom (a
   large Internet service provider), the latest version has added
   *some* WinSock compatibility. NetCruiser itself works only with Netcom.
 
   Compatibility Notes: WinSock applications known to have difficulty with
   NetCruiser include WinTalk and mIRC.
 
   More Information:
      http://www.netcom.com/faq/
      http://www.netcom.com/
 
   5) Do I Need This Stuff Now That Windows 95 Is Out?
   ----------------------------------------------------
 
   Nope.  Windows 95 includes all the 32-bit TCP/IP and WinSock drivers
   that you'll need.  And, it includes its own "Dial-Up Networking" that
   lets you use SLIP or PPP.
 
   A lot of Windows 95 beta users have installed Trumpet Winsock and are
   using it quite happily.
 
   More Information:
      http://www.microsoft.com/Windows/
      http://www.calamistrum.com/Win95Soft/barry/wn95slip.html
      http://www.trumpet.com.au/wsk/faq/win95.htm
      http://www-leland.stanford.edu/~llurch/win95netbugs/faq. html
 
   6) IBM OS/2 Warp
   ----------------
 
   IBM's OS/2 Warp operating system includes a stack and a suite of
   applications that have been well-received.  Aside from the included
   applications, native WinSock software for OS/2 is sparse.  Most
   Windows WinSock applications run well. Included with the operating
   system (street price approx. US$70-140 depending upon
   configuration)
 
    More Information:
      http://www.austin.ibm.com/pspinfo/warp.html
      http://pclt.cis.yale.edu/pclt/winworld/os2.htm
 
  V. Common WinSock Problems ==========================
 
   1) "Call to Undefined Dynalink"
   ---------------------------------------------------
 
   Although this error message can be caused by a number of different
   problems, as far as WinSock users are concerned, it probably has to do
   with having multiple versions of WINSOCK.DLL hanging around your hard
   disk.  To solve this problem, make sure that you do not have multiple
   versions of WINSOCK.DLL in your PATH. If so, remove or rename the
   versions you're not using. If you only have a single version of
   WINSOCK.DLL, it may not be in the path. Simply put it in
   \WINDOWS\SYSTEM or add your WinSock's directory to the PATH statement
   in your AUTOEXEC.BAT file.
 
   2) COMM Overrun
   ---------------
 
   This error occurs when the modem goes too fast for the COM port and
   Windows.  There are a couple of things you have to check.  First, if
   you've got an external modem running at 14.4kbps or above, make sure
   you're connecting it to a COM port that uses the UART 16550a (or some
   1655xx variant) chip. You can check this using the MSD.EXE program that
   comes with Windows.
 
   Now, once you've got that verified, you need to replace the old
   COMM.DRV driver that came with Windows 3.x, because it was designed to
   work with the older UART 8550 chip.  (Windows for Workgroups 3.11
   users don't need to worry about this.)  The two most popular
   replacement COMM drivers are  CyberCom and WFXComm. Documentation is
   included and they can be found at the following sites:
 
      ftp://ftp.coast.net/simtel/win3/commprog/cybercom.zip
      ftp://ftp.winsite.com/pub/pc/win3/misc/wfxcomm.zip
 
   Also, you need to edit your SYSTEM.INI file to include the following
   statements in your [386Enh] section:
 
      com1FIFO=1
      com1buffer=1024
      comboosttime=8
 
   (If you're using a COM port other than 1, change the com1 to com2,
   etc.)
 
   Although it is quite out of date, There is a FAQ that provides a more
   in-depth discussion of this subject:
 
    http://www.inetassist.com/faqs/tcpibmpc.htm
 
   3) Can't Find C:\TEMP Directory" (Netscape)
   -------------------------------------------
 
   Most Windows users have their temporary directory set to
   C:\WINDOWS\TEMP -- but Netscape assumes that you use C:\TEMP unless
   you tell it otherwise.
 
   To correct this problem, do the following:
 
   1. In Netscape, go to the "Options" menu.  Choose "Preferences."
   2. At the very top of the dialog there will be a drop-down listbox.
      Click it, and choose "Directories, Applications, and News."
   3. Change C:\TEMP to C:\WINDOWS\TEMP (or whatever your actual
      temporary directory is) and click "OK."
 
   Users of Windows or Windows for Workgroups can determine their
   temporary directory by examining their AUTOEXEC.BAT file.  The line
   will look similar to this:
 
     SET TEMP=c:\windows\temp\
 
   If no such line exists, you'll want to add one.  Make sure that the
   indicated directory exists.
  ========================================================= ========= There are currently over a hundred WinSock applications out there. We won't try to tell you which one is the best one for your needs. To a certain extent, you're going to have to figure that out for yourself.
 
   There are several regularly updated lists of WinSock applications. If
   you're looking for something, try these lists first. You can FTP the
   files directly through either of the Web-based lists.  Here are the most
   popular and useful:
 
   - Stroud's Consummate Winsock Apps List (updated regularly)
     http://cws.wilmington.net/cwsa.html
 
   - The Ultimate Collection of Winsock Compliant Software
     http://www.tucows.com/
 
   - Ed Sinkovits' Winter List (updated weekly)
     http://www.mbnet.mb.ca/winter/index.html
      or
     ftp://ftp.coast.net/SimTel/win3/winsock/winter15.zip
 
   - Craig Larsen's Winsock Application FAQ (complete list of all
     Winsock applications)
     http://www.primenet.com/~larsenc/faqhtml.html
 
   - Stardust Technologies, Inc. WinSock Page
     http://www.winsock.com
 
   2) Windows 95 Software
   ----------------------
 
   Finding WinSock applications for Windows 95 is much more difficult
   than finding software for Windows 3.x. Fortunately, there is a
   new software archive that exclusively lists Windows 95 applications:
 
   - Net Ex Unofficial Windows 95 Software Archive
     http://www.netex.net/w95/index.html
 
   - Windows95.com
     http://www.windows95.com
 
   3) Shareware is Not Freeware
   ----------------------------
 
   The WinSock community has been very fortunate to have many freeware
   applications available. For this, everyone should be grateful to the
   many authors who have put many countless hours writing these programs.
 
   However, not all winsock applications are freeware. Many are
   shareware, and shareware is NOT the same as freeware. Please use your
   conscience. If you try out a shareware program and find it to be
   useful, send in the registration fee. The prices are usually quite
   reasonable. Moreover, it encourages and enables further development of
   many great applications.
  ============================
   1) Application FAQs
   -------------------
   There are a growing number of FAQs and an abundance of README files
   available for many individual WinSock applications. Several FAQs are
   listed below. The following site also provides a fairly descent
   selection of README files and other text documents covering a variety
   of WinSock applications.
     ftp://ftp.best.com/pub/schaft/Internet_Apps/TXT_FILES
  IX. Where to Find the FAQ ========================= The alt.winsock FAQ will be posted to alt.winsock every month. It can also be found in HTML format at:
  http://t2.technion.ac.il/~s2845543/alt.winsock-faq.html
  The FAQ will be archived monthly through news.answers as of this posting. It can be found at:
 
  ftp://rtfm.mit.edu/pub/usenet/news.answers/windows/ winsock-faq
  Or send e-mail to mail-server@rtfm.mit.edu with the following message:
