sunflash-Distributed to mailing list sun/NC/north-carolina sunflash-Send requests, problems to owner-sunflash@suntri.east.sun.com ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- The Florida SunFlash Sunergy Newsletter #12, November 1993 (part 1 of 2) SunFLASH Vol 59 #14 November 1993 ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- 59.14.A Sunergy Newsletter #12, November 1993 Introduction to the November Sunergy newsletter. 59.14.B Broadcast Summary 7th Sunergy interactive broadcast aired on September 28. This article is a recap of the topics covered. 1. Internet Talk Radio/Internet Town Hall 2 Internet Faxing 3. WAIS (Wide Area Information Servers). 4. National Information Infrastructure. 5. Video Teleconferencing. 59.14.C Upcoming Broadcast Next Sunergy Broadcast: January 11, 1994 59.14.D Tips -N- Tricks By richard.w.scott@Corp.sun.com. Some Sound Ideas 59.14.E WAIS (Wide Area Information Servers) WAIS Inc., of Menlo Park, California, is positioned to provide publishing systems and services to help "Network Publishers" set up shop on the Internet. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 59.14.A Subject: Introduction to the November Sunergy newsletter This newsletter was submitted to me by Vicki.Pedretti@Corp.sun.com (Vicki Pedretti, Sunergy Program). I have broken it into a couple of articles as many mail programs cannot handle mail messages bigger than 32K. I dropped one part (*6* SunSolutions Announcement of ShowMe 2) as I posted that article to SunFlash already. I added SunFlash digest style Subject lines to the articles and formatted the text to be easy to read on 80 character wide screens. Many thanks to the Sunergy people for the newsletter and the broadcasts! -johnj ********************************* * * * S U N E R G Y E M A I L * * * ********************************* NEWSLETTER 12 November, 1993 Distributed by Press Relations (PR), Sun Microsystems Computer Corporation, a Sun Microsystems, Inc., business. All rights reserved. Sunergy Manager: Larry Lettieri Sunergy Editor: Vicki Pedretti Managing Editor: George Paolini Contact the Sunergy editors over e-mail at: sunergy@sun.com. ============================================================================== = CONTENTS - ISSUE #12 = ============================================================================== ANNOUNCEMENTS *1* Broadcast Summary Sunergy #7 Satellite Broadcast *2* Upcoming Broadcast TECHNICAL TOPICS *3* Tips -N- Tricks *4* WAIS (Wide Area Network Servers) *5* "The Network is STILL the Computer" PRODUCT UPDATES *6* SunSolutions Announcement -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 59.14.B Subject: *1* Broadcast Summary The 7th Sunergy interactive broadcast aired on September 28. Entitled "Cyberjockeying in the 21st Century" this broadcast focused on the current status of the internet and other "information highways" and what these "highways" can do for you today. Hosted by John Gage of Sun Microsystems, the guest list included: Brewster Kahle, President - WAIS Inc. Whitfield Diffie, Distinguished Engineer, Security - Sun Microsystems Carl Malamud, President - Internet Multicasting Service Larry Irving, Asst. Sec. for Communications - US Department of Commerce Here is a recap of the topics covered: 1. Internet Talk Radio/Internet Town Hall. 20 million people in 140 countries are currently using the internet "the global village". Internet Multicasting Service, an international, non-profit radio network currently has 100,000 listeners in 30 countries. They publish radio shows on the internet including events such as the National Press Club luncheons. Internet Talk Radio is a science and technology channel, and the Internet Town Hall is devoted to public affairs. For a listing from Internet Multicasting Service of frequently asked questions about Internet Talk Radio and Internet Town Hall, email your request to: info@radio.com. 2. Internet Faxing. Integrating special purpose telephone devices, ie., fax machines, telephones, TTD devices, etc., into the internet. "An Experiment in Remote Printing" is a project in outreach to integrate the email and facsimile communities. This growing service, currently available in four countries, provides the ability to fax via the internet to areas currently served for one-thousandth the cost of a regular fax. For more information on this service send email to: tpc-faq@town.hall.org. 3. WAIS (Wide Area Information Servers). WAIS is a software product based on international standards that allows users on the internet to search hundreds (currently 475) of databases and libraries around the world. "The Library of Congress on everybody's desk." (See the article on WAIS in this issue of the Sunergy newsletter.) 4. National Information Infrastructure. Larry Irving with the US Department of Commerce, National Telecommunications and Information Administration, discussed implementation of the National Information Infrastructure Agenda for Action (Copy available via the Sunergy ftp site. Instructions for retrieval follow). Working with the National Information Task Force committee chairperson, Sally Katsen (fax: 202/395-3047), they are looking at information policy and helping industry and government decide what the right issues are, ie., security, privacy, copyright, etc. The Dept. of Commerce is also working with NIST on domestic and international standards and the relationship regarding the global information infrastructure. (NIST Director: Dr. Arati Prabhakar arati@micf.nist.gov). 5. Video Teleconferencing. Video teleconferencing via the internet using sd (session directory) developed by Van Jacobsen of Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory and Ron Fredricks of XeroxPARC was demonstrated. White papers and other supporting materials from this broadcast are available at the Sunergy ftp site. Back issues of the Sunergy newsletter are also available. To login to see what is available type the following: $ ftp (or Iftp) sunsite.unc.edu username: anonymous password: **FOR WHITE PAPER RETRIEVAL AND SPEAKER INFORMATION**: ftp> cd /pub/sun-info/sunergy/broadcast_docs/sept_93 ftp> get **FOR BACK ISSUES OF THE SUNERGY NEWSLETTER**: ftp> cd /pub/sun-info/sunergy/newsletters ftp> get -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 59.14.C Subject: *2* Upcoming Broadcast Sunergy Presents Sunergy Live #8 "Great Minds @ Sun" An Interactive Satellite Broadcast January 11, 1994 8:00 am - 10:00 am PST Topic and guests to be announced IF YOU WISH TO BE INCLUDED IN THIS ANNOUNCEMENT, AND FUTURE SUNERGY BROADCAST ANNOUNCEMENTS SEND EMAIL TO: sunergy@sun.com -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 59.14.D Subject: *3* Tips -N- Tricks TECH TIPS and IDEAS ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ from the pages of the GEMs file (and various other sources) richard.w.scott@Corp.sun.com A SOUND IDEA - Part II ~~~~~ Last time, we discussed AudioBiff, a way to get SOUND alerts when EMail came in from specific sources. And by the way, thanks to all of you who responded personally with suggestions and questions. Just a few days after we "went to press" last time, someone made me aware of another fine utility called Personal Postmaster. If you can find this program (it's floating around out there, honest!), you might consider replacing AudioBiff. Personal Postmaster not only gives you the alert capability of AudioBiff, it ALSO allows you to presort incoming mail and even pop up additional MailTools (I have seven!) as needed. But enough of this, for now. Let's move on to some other SOUND ideas... If your system is on a network with NIS (YP), you are probably subject to an occasional visit from others. For me this is a cause for concern or at least interest. Once in awhile I happen to be watching the console window when someone "visits", but often as not, my attention is elsewhere. What can you do to find out when someone has dropped by? I use a simple line in my root .login file (default .login when someone visits). if ( $user != "root" ) then /sounds/play /sounds/alert.au endif In this case the alert.au is the voice of Captain Kirk calling for "Red Alert, All Hands Battle Stations" and the sound of the claxon from the bridge of the Enterprise. Of course you can use any .au file you can find or make your own using AudioTool from OpenWindows. I have recorded sounds directly from TV or Radio and sent them to AudioTool via the microphone jack and a simple mono mini-plug from Radio Shack. This audio alert system tips me off when someone is poking around my system and a quick /usr/ucb/w command lets me know who the "culprit" actually is. Another SOUND idea has to do with the crontab and various sound files. For example, my system plays the rooster.au file at the start of my workday and spacemusic.au when it's time to vacate the premises. Even more fun, though is the use of a shell script written by someone here at Sun. The script is called saytime.sh. Unfortunately, I could not locate the author of this script, but as it has no "copyright" notice I am including it for your use and enjoyment. ============================= cut here ==================================== #!/bin/sh # # saytime.sh - shell version of saytime by david@eng.sun.com SDIR=${1-${SAYTIME-.}} # n leadingzero saynumber () { num=$1 zero=$2 set - `expr $num / 10 ; expr $num % 10` tens=$1 unit=$2 case $tens in 0) case $zero in y) say oh ;; esac saydigit $unit ;; 1) say $num ;; *) say ${tens}0 saydigit $unit esac } saydigit () { case $1 in [1-9]) say $1 ;; esac } say () { file=$SDIR/$1.au if [ ! -f $file ] ; then echo "`basename $0`: cannot find $file" exit 1 fi play $file } say the_time_is set - `/bin/date '+%H %M %S'` h=$1 m=$2 s=$3 case $h in 0) h=12 ;; 1[3-9]|2[0-3]) h=`expr $h - 12` ;; esac saynumber $h n case $m in 00) say oclock ;; *) saynumber $m y esac case $s in 00) say exactly ;; 01) say and saynumber $s n say second ;; *) say and saynumber $s n say seconds esac ============================= cut here ==================================== You will also need the following files which, if you cannot find at your site or around the various ftp sites, you'll have to record yourself using AudioTool: 1.au 10.au 11.au 12.au 13.au 14.au 15.au 16.au 17.au 18.au 19.au 2.au 20.au 3.au 30.au 4.au 40.au 5.au 50.au 6.au 7.au 8.au 9.au and.au exactly.au oclock.au oh.au second.au seconds.au the_time_is.au ----------------The crontab entries might look like this:----------------- 0 6 * * * /sounds/crow 0 6-13 * * * /sounds/time/saytime.sh 30 6-13 * * * /sounds/time/saytime.sh 0 14 * * * /sounds/space 45 6-13 * * * /sounds/time/saytime.sh 15 6-13 * * * /sounds/time/saytime.sh -------------------------------------------------------------------------- Note: crow and space (above) are simple scripts: #!/bin/csh /sounds/play /sounds/soundfilename.au That's it for now. Next time, if there is sufficient interest, we'll do one more SOUND excursion and discuss using AudioTool with the telephone, controlling OpenWindows with your voice, and perhaps a short jaunt into the interesting area of Text-to-Speech conversion. Remember, if you have anything you'd like to see in this column or have a contribution of a favorite shellscript, command alias or short C program, you can email me at: richard.w.scott@Corp.sun.com Until next time, remember, it was Meatball Fulton who said: "What appears to be coming AT you, is coming FROM you!" -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 59.14.D Subject: *4* WAIS (Wide Area Information Servers) WAIS Inc. pursues publishing opportunities Much recent attention is being paid to digital distribution of information. Home shopping, digital libraries, customized newspapers, classified advertising... the list is endless. However, most of the futures being discussed will require years of network upgrades, exotic new server hardware, and dramatic price/performance breakthroughs in user devices. However, the current Internet offers a model of what future information highways can become; where thousands of information providers can address the needs of millions of users. The technologies of the Internet, including client/server information distribution systems such as Gopher, WAIS (Wide Area Information Servers), and World Wide Web, promise to provide the tools needed by information providers. WAIS Inc., of Menlo Park, California, is positioned to provide publishing systems and services to help "Network Publishers" set up shop on the Internet. Last April, WAIS Inc. announced their WAIS Server product line, which offers a level of stability not found in the publically available WAIS tools, as well as support, improved search characteristics (including boolean and fielded search), smaller index sizes, and enhanced reporting features. WAIS Inc. licenses their server products (binaries or in source code) to a wide range of commercial publishers, government agencies, educational institutions and libraries. Since then, WAIS Inc. has also addressed the needs of organizations with "firewall" machines with the development of the WAIS Forwarder, which allows enterprise LAN networks to exchange WAIS information with the Internet through the use of an intermediate machine. In addition, WAIS Inc. is pursuing collaboration with publishers to set up and run an information service from their Menlo Park offices, hosting "name brand" information services for the Internet community. The service will use WAIS, Gopher and other Internet-developed tools as a publishing platform. These tools in their current state offer WAIS Inc. the ability to provide services in the following areas: 1) Subscription services: This category involves the sale of editorial product to end users or to user organizations. User access can be restricted to individual databases, requiring sign-up and setting up payment methods in advance of permitting access to editorial materials. 2) Sponsored services: This category involves providing electronic distribution of proven, popular, online services (such as news headlines, weather, sports, etc.). Initial Internet usage stats show significant activity in these areas, but users may opt to obtaining these materials for free rather than to pay for retrieving them. 3) Transaction support services: This category involves creating electronic catalogs that users can browse which conclude with the purchase of some product from a vendor. Use of the catalogs will be free to users. As these services come online, WAIS Inc. will work carefully with its publishing partners to determine the best mix of technologies to meet the needs of commercial publishers. The WAIS Inc. online service will also become a development target and test-bed for future publishing technologies. By operating a successful Internet-based publishing service, WAIS Inc. will be able to provide network publishers with a continued stream of improved products. The distribution channels now available for Internet based services has grown dramatically: * An e-mail based service (agenting or email search and retrieval) can reach over 25 million readers through compuserve, AOL, and many corporate gateways. * An interactive service can reach not only the millions of users directly connected to the Internet, but also WAIS and Gopher services can be accessed via Delphi and soon by AOL audiences. WAIS Inc. products and services, in conjunction with the markets available through the Internet, provide publishers with an immediate opportunity to participate in the digital information businesses of the future. --------------------- For detailed technical information, send email to info@wais.com and ask for the 40 page Technical Description of the WAIS Inc. product line. Pricing information is also available. Shareware versions of current wais servers and clients for a variety of popular user platforms are available via anonymous ftp from ftp.wais.com, in the /pub/freeware directory.