5.0162 Rs: Listserv v. ftp; Mail Readers (2/54)
Elaine Brennan & Allen Renear (EDITORS@BROWNVM.BITNET)
Wed, 19 Jun 91 16:51:52 EDT
Humanist Discussion Group, Vol. 5, No. 0162. Wednesday, 19 Jun 1991.
(1) Date: Wed, 19 Jun 91 13:51 GMT (26 lines)
From: GRAHAM@EGFRCUVX
Subject: listserv vs. ftp
(2) Date: Tue, 18 Jun 91 13:27:58 PDT (28 lines)
From: James Crump <jjcrump@u.washington.edu>
Subject: newsreader for mail folders
(1) --------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 91 13:51 GMT
From: GRAHAM@EGFRCUVX
Subject: listserv vs. ftp
One of your contributors describes LISTSERV as "clunky", bemoans the
fact, & suggests a change to FTP. All well & good, but there are many
places (such as Cairo, where I am) which have BITNET but not INTERNET, &
thus don't have (direct) access to FTP.
There might be theoretical advantages to transferring to FTP, but if you
do you will deprive a good number of people in the non-Western world of
useful -- if not vital -- facilities; the more so since email and fax
are practically the only reliable ways to communicate from here -- you
can forget about the mail, & the telephone is complicated and expensive.
Incidentally, I have been conducting a job search from here, with the
following interesting results. I included on each application letter a
paragraph saying "please don't reply by mail, it will never get here,
use fax or (better) email". I applied to over 20 places in the States,
only one took ANY NOTICE AT ALL OF THIS. By contrast, places in Canada
and Britain were much more aware of email. I thought you guys were
supposed to be up to the minute? Or is it just that you can't imagine
living in a part of the world where the mail doesn't function?
Graham White
American University in Cairo
(2) --------------------------------------------------------------40----
Date: Tue, 18 Jun 91 13:27:58 PDT
From: James Crump <jjcrump@u.washington.edu>
Subject: newsreader for mail folders
Just a small discovery which might be of interest to listserv
subscribers. With reference to:
> (2) --------------------------------------------------------------45----
> Date: Thu, 13 Jun 91 17:09:59 CDT
> From: Richard Goerwitz <goer@sophist.uchicago.edu>
> Subject: archeology online
>
> Regarding the new LISTSERV-based archology group:
>
> Also, what distribution there is comes in the form of mail,
> which creates a lot of duplication at various sites (from everyone get-
> ting LISTSERV mail), and can't be read by the terriffic "news-reading"
> software that Usenetters are now quite accustomed to.
The UNIX based system here at the U. of Washington has, in addition to
the usual "rn", a newsreader called "nn" which _can_ be used to read
mail folders. One cannot respond to postings from within nn, but I
have found it very useful for previewing postings, sorting and filing
them. the format is very much more congenial for reading though you
must still use your usual mailing program to reply or post.
Jon Crump
jjcrump@milton.u.washington.edu