At the first all-in-one menu, select Telecommunications
and Kermit (on campus)
Get into CWIS using your name and password as you
would for e-mail
Select Communications/Mail and hit enter
Scroll down to News: . . . and hit enter
After several seconds you will see a screen with
general information about News and a message asking you to wait. Then you
will see a list of names, these are all News groups. When you first get
into News you are "registered" for every news group. The first step is
to select which ones look interesting.
Note that at the bottom of the screen there is a
NEWS> prompt. This prompt will always be right there, and there are various
commands you can give when you see it.
To get into News--from a linked web page
Click on the highlighted text in a web page
If you are in Netscape Communicator you will
go directly to the dialogue box specified by the page creator.
If you are in Netscape Navigator you will need
to click on an appropriate icon ("New Msg," "Reply," etc.)
Then post, read, reply, etc. [To post, once you are
in the mail screen, type in a subject (title) and tab to the box below
where you can type (and edit) your message. When you have finished,
click on the send icon.]
To move to a different group, type its newsgroup
name in the dialogue box (try it!)
News group names
You can tell from the name what kind of news group
you are looking at. If it begins with du. it is a Drew news group and can
only be read by people in the Drew network. If it begins du.cla. it is
a news group for a class; du.cla.eng... is a news group for an English
class, and so on. If it does not begin with du. it is a larger news group
which may be read by people all over the world, such as nj. rec, and vmsnet.
Groups whose title includes the term listserv send messages to people at
other sites who are subscribers to the list. clari groups are read-only
rather than discussion groups. The computer aid station can give you more
information about any of these non-Drew lists.
Registering
and unregistering for groups
At the NEWS> prompt, type dereg/all and hit enter.
The screen will be empty except for the NEWS> prompt,
type dir/all and hit enter.
There are over 1700 groups on this list, arranged
alphabetically. Scroll through this list using the arrow key. To cut straight
to du.cla. listings, type 1524 at the NEWS> prompt, this will take you
to group number 1524. You will need to scroll down a little further to
find the class group. When you do find it, type reg at the NEWS> prompt,
and hit enter.
Repeat this process for any other groups that look
interesting.
Once you have enough groups, type dir/reg at the
NEWS> prompt and hit enter and you will see a list of the groups you registered
for. [We will call this "screen one."] After each group title you will
see a number, this is the total number of messages in that group; the final
number indicates how many new messages there are since you last looked
at the news group.
To unregister from a group, type dir/reg to get a
list of all groups you are currently registered for, scroll the arrow down
to the group you wish to unregister for, type dereg at the NEWS> prompt,
and hit enter
To see a list of groups you aren't registered for,
type dir/unreg at the NEWS> prompt and hit enter. You'll see the same numbers,
and you can register for other groups as above.
To read messages
At the NEWS> prompt, type dir/reg and hit enter.
You will be at "screen one."
Scroll the arrow down to the group you want to read
first (the class, of course), and hit enter. This will take you to what
I will call "screen two."
Now you will see a list of all of the messages that
have been posted to the news group. Each message has a number and a name,
and after the name you will see the user name of the person who posted
it and the date.
Messages you have not read will appear in bold/highlight.
Scroll the arrow down to the message you want to
read, and hit enter. You will see the message. [I will call this "screen
three."] If the message is longer than one screen, hit enter again.
To simply read the next message in the group, hit
enter again.
To return to the list of messages, type dir at the
NEWS> prompt, and hit enter.
To return to the list of news groups to which you
are registered, type news at the NEWS> prompt, and hit enter
To read all unread messages in all news groups to
which you are registered, type read/new at the NEWS> prompt, and hit enter.
This will start with the first message in the first group and move down
the list every time you hit enter. Hitting F10 will achieve the same result.
To see only groups containing new messages, type
dir/new at the first NEWS> prompt, and hit enter.
To post messages to
the news group
At "screen one" or "screen two" type post at the
NEWS> prompt, and hit enter.
You will get a prompt asking you which group you'd
like to post a message to. The message will begin news groups: and then
list the name of a group.
If you are looking at the screen containing messages
for a group (screen two), the default group at the prompt will be that
group. If that is the correct group, hit enter.
If you are at "screen one," or would like to post
something to another group, type the name of that group at the newsgroups:
prompt and hit enter.
To send a message to more than one group, type the
names of all of the groups at the newsgroups: prompt and hit enter.
The next screen will be a blank screen with [EOB]
on it.
Type your message.
When you are finished, hit GOLD-f (F1-f).
You will then be prompted with the word subject:
after which you should type the title of your message (try not to be too
cryptic for class messages!
Finally, you will be asked whether you want to post
this message to the news group listed.
--to post it, type y and hit enter.
--to cancel, type n and hit enter.
To reply to a message
This feature allows you to post a message that repeats
someone else's message and then lists your reply. Your readers thus know
exactly what you are responding to without having to .
If you are in screen two, scroll the arrow to the
message to which you would like to reply.
Type ans at the NEWS> prompt, and hit enter.
If you are still inside the message, also type ans
at the NEWS> prompt, and hit enter.
You will see a screen that says "In article <date
of article.some numbers> name and address of sender writes: title of message:
> message...
Use the arrow key to move to the end of the message
(after the last > in the left margin), skip a line, and then type your
reply.
When you have finished, hit GOLD-f (F1-f).
Your message will be titled "Re: title of original
message"
The prompt will ask you whether you want to post
the message, type "y" and hit enter (or "n" and then enter to cancel).
To forward a message
This is the same as the forward command in e-mail.
It allows you to forward particularly interesting messages to someone else:
Select the message you would like to forward using
the arrow keys.
At the NEWS> prompt, type forward and hit enter.
This will give you the To: prompt, at which you should
enter the e-mail address to which you would like to forward the message.
Hit enter.
At the subject: prompt, hit enter (or use the backspace
key to erase the original title and give it one of your own, then hit enter).
You will be able to edit the message at this point.
Hit GOLD-f (F1-f) when you are finished.
You will be asked whether you want to mail this message
to the address listed, if the answer is yes, type y and hit enter.
To exit from News
Hit F10 and you will return to the Communications/Mail
menu, then hit L to logout, or stop and read your e-mail messages before
returning to your homework..