Date: Fri, 25 Sep 1992 14:23:46 ECT Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Carol Roberts Subject: Networking Conventions and Networking Conventions and FAQs Does this group have a FAQ (frequently asked questions) file yet? If so, could I see it? If not, all the stuff about what indexers read to keep in touch, what books beginners should buy and read, names and addresses of professional organizations, etc., etc., could go in it. ------------------------------ This is Charlotte speaking--to answer Carol's question--such a file is in the works, and should be ready within two weeks or so (that is, if I can remove the librarian's hat long enough to get to it!) In the meantime, you can look at past messages to this list by doing the following: Send the following message to listserv@bingvmb: get index-l log9207 (or log9208 or log9209) Each file contains the messages for one month. In the future, if you want to know what files are in the index-l archives, send the following message to listserv@bingvmb: index index-l Hope this helps, now back to Carol------ -------------------------- On an entirely different topic (networking conventions to help the vision-impaired), I saw the following posting on another list and thought it sufficiently important to repost. I apologize for the length, but it seems a bit of background is probably needed to appreciate the problem. [ QUOTE ] Dear networkers, I would like your input on the following suggestions for changes to network conventions : There are now a number of unsighted network users who operate various wonderful bits of technology which turn mail messages into heard speech. Typing and spelling errors which cause such machines to spell words instead of "say" them. A number of standard conventions also cause words to be spelt out letter by letter. Some of the conventions for adding emphasis do this for some machines. For example, a Dectalk talking terminal can pronounce anything that contains just letters with at least one vowell. If words concatenate without a space, include numbers or other ASCII characters, the Dectalk spells the entire word. ( i.e. Enclosing titles in asterisks or underscores causes the Dectalk to spell the words bounded by the marks. ) The practice of using the angle bracket at the beginning of a quoted line is a problem if the mark touches the first word in the line, if there is a space after the mark, there is no problem. Some filters are available to assist with taking out some of the more creative pictures and other junk from headers and signitures but these are not as intellegent as they might be. Consider how a standard signiture at the bottom of an email post would "read". The signiture file often has non-alphabetic symbols as dividing lines, in more than one column, white space dividing unrelated text on the same line and so on. These files which LOOK perfectly readable at first sight SOUND quite confusing. Apart from limiting signitures to alphabetic characters with only information that logically follows on each line, which would make life dull, how do we make life easier for partially sighted or unsighted electronic mail users ? Perhaps starting the signiture with a "[ SIGNATURE ]" symbol and ensuring that full names and mail addresses are immediately after this. Other Information could then start on line 3 of the signiture file in a free format. At the moment to show we are quoting from another message we use a symbol at the start of each line ( e.g. > or | or * or < ) This must also be a real pain if your email is "read to you" by the machine on your desk but it is a standard email convention. Perhaps using a marker such as "[ QUOTE ]" at the beginning and "[ UNQUOTE ]" at the end would be of assistance. These suggestions were produced with the help of members of the CHRISTIA@ASUACAD (BITNET) List, at least one of who use talking terminals. Any comments to add to these suggested solutions would be welcomed, as would any ideas as to how to introduce such conventions. [ SIGNATURE ] Carol A Long, email : Z_STAFF_CL@UK.AC.SOUTHAMPTON-INSTITUTE Information Technology Service, Southampton Institute of Higher Education East Park Terrace, Southampton, England Post Code : SO9 4WW UK Fax No : (0703) 222259 DISCLAIMER - merely musings unless otherwise stated. SPELLING - entirely due to typing errors and poetic licence. RELEASE - repost at will, with acknowledgements to author. [ UNQUOTE ] [ SIGNATURE ] Carol Roberts Carol_Roberts@qmrelay.mail.cornell.edu PUBS, Cornell ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 25 Sep 1992 14:48:11 ECT Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group Comments: Warning -- original Sender: tag was dminer@MAILER.CC.FSU.EDU From: "(David Miner)" Subject: UMI & the Internet ----------------------------Original message---------------------------- I was told today that UMI is trying to set up for our students at FSU to be able to purchase copies of articles and have them delivered via the Internet. We have a debit card which also serves as our student/staff/faculty ID card. The copyright/delivery charges would be assessed against the Access card. I believe that what would be sent would be a graphic image of the article, not something that would allow manipulation of the text. I am not a professional indexer. I am the Lab manager here at SLIS and a doctoral student whose interest is in the indexing of the online databases. But I think that this has implications for the way things are indexed, where they are indexed and, more inportantly, if they are indexed. Regards, David ---------------------------------------------------------------------- David Miner School of Library & Information Studies R106 Florida State University voice: (904) 644-8107 Tallahassee, FL 32306-2048 fax: (904) 644-9763 Internet: miner@lis.fsu.edu Bitnet: miner@fsu.BITNET ---------------------------------------------------------------------- ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 25 Sep 1992 16:19:25 ECT Reply-To: Indexer's Discussion Group Sender: Indexer's Discussion Group From: Birdie MacLennan Subject: Re: Networking Conventions and In-Reply-To: Message of Fri, 25 Sep 1992 14:23:46 ECT from ----------------------------Original message---------------------------- FYI, there is also a document that describes how you can go in and *search* the archives for index-l (not just retrieve the monthly logs). You can search by keyword (from mail headers & the text of messages) character strings, and specify boolean operators, a range of dates, et al. This document is useful for the many BITNET listservs that maintain archives. To get these search instructions, type an email message to LISTSERV@BINGVMB (or your closest backbone LISTSERV site) that reads: INFO DATABASE F=MAIL A rather lengthy document will be sent to you (20 pages). A shorter document that describes this process was written by Charles Bailey and is available from the pacs-l fileserver. Just send a message to: LISTSERV@UHUPVM1 that says: GET SEARCH DOC F=MAIL In my opinion, the Bailey tutorial that you will receive back (approx. 3 pgs.) is the best guide around for learning how to seach listserv archives. And quite a bit more gratifying than the Info Database document ... but both serve a purpose and are quite useful in their own ways. -- Birdie