Usenet, often times referred to as "the net" is a loose collection of cooperating computers. In the past, all of Usenet ran UNIX, but now with other computers and operating systems supporting UUCP, hosts could be running anything from MS-DOS to VAX/VMS. All that is required to be considered a computer on Usenet is that you communicate via the UNIX to UNIX Communications Protocol (UUCP) to another computer. Usenet consists of electronic mail, file transfers, and network news. It is via network news that most of the programs you read about in this column are distributed.

If your computer talks to Usenet or to another computer via some protocol other than UUCP, you are considered to be on an internet (lower case "i"), short for inter-network. This just means that you are using some network other than the UUCP-based Usenet. This generic internet includes "the Internet" and several other networks such as CSNET and BITNET. The actual connection to Usenet is via a gateway computer that talks to both the network you use and Usenet.

The Internet (capital "I") is the computer network loosely managed by the Network Information Center at SRI. The Internet is a collection of networks that grew out of the Defense Department's ARPANET (Advanced Projects Research Agency Network). Usenet sites make phone calls to other computers; the Internet is mostly machines connected with dedicated leased lines. These lines usually run faster than the dial-up lines used by UUCP. The Internet has many sub-networks associated with it, including NSFNET, the National Science Foundation Networks. These newer networks run at much higher speeds and currently also pick up a lot of the long distance traffic for Usenet's Network News. In my area, the local NSFNET related network is called PREPnet and has a backbone consisting of 1.544Mb/s (million bit per second) data links and each site either has a 1.544Mb/s or a 56kb/s (thousand bit per second) hookup to the network. The main backbone NSFNET is now all 1.544Mb/s data links and is quickly upgrading to 45Mb/s data links as they become available. Whereas only mail and news is usually available over the Usenet via UUCP, the Internet runs the TCP/IP protocol and supports news (NNTP, Network News Transfer Protocol), mail (SMTP, Simple Mail Transfer Protocol), remote logins to any computer on the network provided you have an account there (telnet), and remote file transfer (FTP, file transfer protocol), and many other services. All of these services coexist and work in real time.

The problem with the Internet providing much of the bulk transfers for Usenet is that they use two different addressing methods. Since a large amount of the software mentioned in this column comes from Usenet or the Internet, you'll need to understand how to format the two types of addresses. A UUCP or Usenet address is made up of site names separated by exclamation points, as in bpa!dsinc!syd. If a site wants to mention more than one "well-known site" to use as a route, it usually lists them in curly braces as in {bpa, vu-vlsi}!dsinc!syd (meaning you can use either bpa!dsinc!syd or vu-vlsi!dsinc!syd). Such addresses assume that you know the complete path from your site to one of the named "well-known sites". Some systems run programs to help with this routing, and Usenet's UUCP Mapping Project publishes maps to automate this process. However, not all sites have registered to be listed in these maps. Registration is free and accomplished by sending your entry to rutgers!uucpmap. The maps are continuously updated and distributed via the comp.mail.maps news group.

On the Internet, all sites have a unique "Fully Qualified Domain Name" which is administered by the NIC. My site's domain name is node.DSI.COM, where node is the individual computer at my site. Thus, my full current address is syd@dsinc.DSI.COM, but our mailer, like the mailers at a lot of Internet sites, is smart and knows how to forward the mail to me even if you send it to syd@DSI.COM. This allows me to move around within the DSI.COM domain without having to tell everyone a new address. The Internet does not require users to know the complete path to the site; it is sufficient to know the domain name.

Now a word of warning. Mixing both @ and ! in the same address leads to trouble. Not everyone follows the standard and processes the addresses correctly. Converting sitea!user@DSI.COM to a UUCP address would produce dsinc!sitea!user. Note that the @ has higher precedence than the !. Many sites get this wrong, causing your mail to bounce (be returned to you as undeliverable). Some sites, ours included, allow UUCP mail to have addresses including domain names in the ! path, as in dsinc!host.domain.type!user. Where allowed, this convention is usually more reliable than mixing the ! and @s.

Lastly, what is Public Domain Software and what is Freely Distributable Software? Much of the software described in this column is free in that no licensing fee is required for personal users. In some cases even commercial users aren't required to pay a licensing fee. However, almost all of the software mentioned in this column is not in the Public Domain. For software to be in the Public Domain, either the copyright must expire (and not be renewed) or the authors must specifically renounce copyright protection. The copyright to most software mentioned in this column is reserved by the author or some group. Though the copyright is reserved, the holders have given the user the right to use and distribute the software without fee. This does not place the software in the public domain. You still cannot sell this software nor pretend that you wrote it. Many of the licensing agreements restrict how the software can be used for business purposes. Freely Distributable Software is also different from Shareware. Shareware expects (but doesn't require) the user to pay a fee if they intend to continue using the program. Freely distributable software does not.

Now, how do you get the software mentioned in this column? Much of the software mentioned in this column is distributed in Usenet's network news, especially in the comp.sources.unix or the comp.sources.misc news groups. Game software is in the comp.sources.games group. There are also groups for amigas, atari sts, macs, suns, and computers running the X windowing system. The Usenet news groups are distributed via a store-and-forward broadcast from Usenet neighbor to Usenet neighbor either via UUCP or NNTP. However, news articles are kept online at a particular site for only a short period of time, usually less than two weeks. By the time a piece of software appears in this column, it will have been expired and deleted for a long time.

Thus, it is necessary to access a news archive site. Many sites around the country have agreed to archive specific news groups. These sites are listed in the comp.archives news group. Many sites are also identified as archive sites in their Usenet Mapping Project map entry. Some have even been listed in this column. These sites allow access to their archives to retrieve the sources. How one accesses the archives depends on where they are and how that site has set up access. Most archives are available for either FTP or UUCP access and a few even allow both.

If a site supports FTP access, you need to be on the Internet to access them. FTP allows for opening up a direct connection to the FTP server on their system and transferring the files directly to your system. FTP will prompt for a user name and optionally a password. Most FTP archive sites allow a user name of anonymous. If it then prompts for a password, any password will work, but convention and courtesy dictate that you use your name and site address for the password.

If a site supports UUCP access, anyone with UUCP can access the archives. Most sites of this type publish a sample entry for the Systems (L.sys) file showing the system name, phone number of their modems, the connection speeds supported, and the login sequence. Using the uucp command, one can poll the system directly and retrieve the software. Many sites post hour restrictions on when you should access the modems. Courtesy dictates that you follow their requests, and some sites enforce the limit with programs. Be sure to call far enough before the end of the period to complete your transfer in time.

A third method, used for smaller files, allows access to an electronic mail-based archive server. With these sites, you send an electronic mail message to the archive server's mailbox name specifying the files you wish. The files are then returned to you via electronic mail. Remember that many sites have a limit on the size of a single mail message, so don't ask for too much at once. Also remember that the archive server is a program, so phrase your request exactly as specified in the instructions for that archive server, and limit your message to exactly that request. Other comments in the message could confuse the program and it might not honor your request.

Lastly, for those sites not connected to any network, some sites will copy the software onto your media if you send them a disk or tape along with return postage and a mailer. Other sites sell media with the software already copied onto it. This is especially useful for the largest distributions, such as the X windowing system, which runs multiple tapes.

For those sites without Internet access but who do subscribe to UUNET, UUNET will retrieve the files via FTP for you and make them available for UUCP access.