[Word Wide Web] [EMail] [Usenet] [FTP] [Telnet] [Gopher] [WAIS] [Other Applications]
In order to access the functionality of the Internet once you are connected to the CCN via PPP you need to do so through so-called 'client applications'. These are applications that run on your Macintosh just like any other applications and accesses particular Internet protocols through the linkage that PPP has created into the Internet. There are many of these client applications; some specialized to utilize one particular protocol while others can perform a variety of tasks.
The following material supplies links to sources where you can download some of these client applications as well as notes as to how to configure them. We don't document all of them, simply some of the most popular, and supply the general information you need to configure others.
Most of the following applications have on-line documentation and/or tutorials that accompany them or documentation that is downloaded along with the application itself. Read these carefully to learn the specifics of how to use them! The CCN does not supply or support details on how to use all of these client applications! If you are unfamiliar with the Internet visit the CCN Internet Guide and Tutorial which gives a general introduction to many of these Internet protocols and their associated functionality.
World Wide Web (WWW) Clients are popularly known as browsers. Lynx, the text-only browser you may have been using on the CCN previously, runs on the CCN server and works through a terminal emulation window created by a telecommunications program. When connected to the Internet through PPP Macintosh users can use a variety of other graphical browsers including:
If you don't have a WWW browser follow one of the previous links to download a copy or find out how you can purchase a CD containing one of them.
There functionality and features of graphical WWW browsers is a very large topic which we cannot cover here. If you are unfamiliar with graphical browsers visit the on-line CCN Internet Tutorial section on Internet Browsers. In terms of using them on the CCN, they are pretty much plug & play!
After having secured a PPP connection, launch Netscape, select the Work On-line option when launching the program and when the browser window loads, presto, you are on the WWW ready to surf away!
You may wish to have the CCN home page as your own WWW home page and the departure point for your explorations. In this case go to Preferences under the Edit menu and select the Navigator category. Under Home page location type http://plus.chebucto.ns.ca/ and every time you launch Netscape it will automatically open the CCN Home Page.
To congigure Internet Explorer to have the CCN Home Page as its home page, go to Preferences under the Edit Menu and select Home/Search and enter http://plus.chebucto.ns.ca/.
World Wide Web resources are accessed under the HTTP protocol (HyperText Transfer Protocol). When you see a URL that beings with http:// you know that it refers to a WWW resource. In addition, many browsers have at least some ability to deal with EMail, Usenet, FTP & Gopher resources. In this way browsers can be used as a convenient front end for dealing with other Internet resources as well.
The older browsers listed above are primarily of use on older Macintosh systems where the operating systems or limited RAM make using the more contemporary browsers problematic. They all offer only limited support for HTML 3.2 & 4.0 features as well as limited support for audio, video, animation and graphics which are increasingly becoming a standard part of today's WWW environment.
If you don't have an EMail program follow one of the above links to download one. All these applications make use of what is known as POP Mail. If you are unfamiliar with POP Mail visit the on-line CCN Internet Tutorial section on EMail.
To configure Netscape Navigator go to Preferences under the Edit Menu and select the Mail & Groups category. Under Identity enter Your name, EMail address, Reply-to address (the same or different according to you desire if you have another Email account), and Organization (if applicable). Under Mail Server enter your user login-id under Mail server user name and mail.chebucto.ns.ca under both Outgoing mail (SMTP) server and Incoming mail server. Make sure that the POP3 radio button is selected.
Note: if you want Netscape Mail to leave a copy of your EMail messages on the CCN (so that you can also later access them in PINE) the check the Leave messages on server after retrieval box. Otherwise they will be removed from the CCN mail server.
Internet Explorer takes a somewhat different approach that Netscape Navigator in that it allows one to specify a client EMail application which will be used with the browser. to do this go to Preferences under the Edit Menu and select Protocol Helpers. Under mailto see which EMailer is specified. If you want to change the one being used select the Change button and select the appropriate EMailer.
The standard EMail client to use with Internet Explorer is Outlook Express which is included with the package of Internet Explorer materials which one downloads. In Internet Explorer go to Preferences under the Edit Menu and select the EMail: General. There are a number of fields for you to set your Name, EMail address, Organization, Account ID (login-id), and Password. Enter mail.chebucto.ns.ca in both the SMTP host and Mail host. Make sure that the POP3 radio button is selected.
To launch Outlook Express simply click on the Mail on the Internet Explorer menu bar and whatever Emailer has been specified is automatically launched. To send or receive messages click on the Send & Receive button on the Outlook Express menu bar.
In Eudora Lite select Settings under the Special menu. There are several separate panels to enter information.
There are several other panels that allow you to customize various features of the way in which Eudora works. You can use Eudora Lite either as a stand-alone application or in conjunction with Internet Explorer.
In Claris Emailer select Internet Setup under the Setup menu. Enter the appropriate information in the Account name, User name, Email address, Email account, Email password, and SMTP host (mail.chebucto.ns.ca) fields. According to your desires leave the Do not delete read messages box checked or not.
There are various other ways that you can customize the way in which Claris Emailer works. Select Preferences under the Setup menu. You can use Claris Emailer either as a stand-alone application or in conjunction with Internet Explorer. Note: Claris no longer actively supports this application.
There are many programs which offer access to the Usenet newsgroups which are an important component of the Internet. If you are unfamiliar with Usenet visit the on-line CCN Internet Tutorial section on News Groups. These include many stand-alone applications as well as the News components of Netscape Navigator and Outlook Express.
Configuring these to access news is actually quite simple.
In Netscape Navigator under Preferences in the Edit menu select the Mail & Groups category. Under Groups Server in the Discussion groups (news) server enter news.dal.ca The Port number should be 119. Then in the Navigator menu choose Collabra Discussion groups. You need to specify which news groups you wish to 'subscribe' to which you do via the Join Groups button on the menu bar.
In Outlook Express select Preferences in the Edit menu. Then select News in the Accounts section and type Chebucto Community Net in the Server name field and news.dal.ca in the Server address field.
In NewsWatcher select Preferences under the File menu. Under Server Addresses enter news.dal.ca in the New Server field and mail.chebucto.ns.ca in the Mail Server field. Under Personal Information enter Name, Organization, and EMail Address. There are a number of other settings which you can set to customize the operation of NewsWatcher.
The first time you open NewsWatcher you need to set the preferences and quit. subsequently you launch the application it will query you for your password before connecting you to the News server.
FTP is an acronym for File Transfer Protocol. FTP is an Internet protocol used for transferring files between computer systems. There are a number of Macintosh FTP client programs which carry out a variety of tasks. They include
If you don't already have an FTP client program you can download one or more of the above.
Fetch is a straightforward FTP client which allows you to get (download) or put (upload) a file to another computer on the Internet (provided you have permission to do so). On the CCN your private home directory (that you access via the shortcut 'G)o files') is FTP accessible. This means you can get or put files to it. To configure Fetch to access this directory select New Connection under the File menu. In the Host field enter chebucto.ns.ca; in the User ID field enter your login-id; in the Password field entry your password (your regular CCN password, not your Chebucto Plus password (if different)); leave the Directory field blank.
You will then be presented with a dialogue box showing a listing of your files in your private directory. You can select a file and get it or change directories. Specify text or binary files or under the automatic setting Fetch will guess which it is. You can also rename or delete files by selecting them and then choosing the correct option in the Remote menu.
If you are an editor for a CCN Information Provider group you will see a directory called 00ip. It contains symbolic links to the IP directories that you are authorized to edit. By selecting them you can go directly to one of these IP directories and get or put files there.
Anarchie Pro is a more full-featured FTP client program. In addition to being able to get and put files to and from directories on other computers to which you have authorization, Anarchie Pro also allows you to conduct keyword searches for files in FTP archives across the Internet in the same way that WWW search engines allow you to search for pages.
To configure Anarchie Pro for use with your CCN home directory select Get via FTP in the File menu. Under Server enter chebucto.ns.ca; leave Path blank; in the Username field enter your login-id; and in the Password field enter your password. The click Save to save this as a bookmark and List to receive a listing of your home directory.
As in Fetch you can get or put binary or text files, remove or rename files or directories. You can also change Unix file permissions, create directories, and automatically download all the files located within a directory. By selecting Get via HTTP you are presented with a listing of all files and links that are referenced from a given WWW page. All these are things which you cannot do with Fetch. You can also view files that you locate using helper applications which have been designated by Internet Config. All these options are accessed via the Remote menu.
Anarchie Pro also facilitates the get and pur process by allowing you to carry out these operations simply by dragging files between appropriate windows - a great time and labour saving device!
However, the prime differences in the programs are that in Anarchie Pro you can search for FTP resources using either Net Search or Archie, two very powerful utilities which are accessed via the Search menu. You employ these utilities to conduct keyword searches of FTP. These are very powerful and useful utilities.
We should note in passing that WWW browsers such as Internet Explorer and Netscape Navigator also have some intrinsic FTP functionality. They allow you to 'get' files, both binary and text files and also files located in FTP archives. They both cleverly will automatically de-binhex files after they download them. Internet Explorer has a special Download Manger utility accessed via the File menu. Neither program, however, will allow you to 'put' files. Telnet also has some ability with respect to FTP, however, I simply don't know the details of this. Feel free to investigate!
Telent is a very straightforward Internet protocol which allows you to connect as a user to another computer on the Internet. In this way you can connect to your CCN account just the same way as if you dialed into the account from your computer using a telecommunications program such as Microphone, Zterm or White Knight.
In this way you can still use the Lynx browser, access your EMail via PINE, check Usenet groups via TIN, edit files on-line using PICO or otherwise manage your files.
There are a number of Macintosh Telnet clients including:
The war-horse of the Macintosh Telnet world is NCSA Telnet. To open a telnet connection to the CCN simply select Open Connection in the File menu. In the Host/Session Name field enter chebucto.ns.ca. You can give the window any name in the Window field, for example Chebucto.
This procedure will automatically open a telnet session to the CCN. Login just as you normally would from a dial-in connection. If you select Save Set in the File menu this set will be saved as a 'bookmarked' configuration that you can access each time you use NCSA Telnet by selecting Load Set.
Another, reportedly better, telnet client is Better Telnet. Opening a telnet session and saving a set are exactly as with NCSA Telnet. Both programs, particularly the latter, have a great variety of setting and configurations most of which you need not ever have to worry about unless you are carrying out very specialized tasks. Both programs allow for a certain amount of FTP functionality, however, you'll have to explore this on your own since I've never tried it!
The CCN does not run its own gopher server so you cannot directly use a gopher client such as Turbogopher with the CCN.
If you need to access gopher resources you have two options:
To configure Turbogopher select Prefernces from the Gopher menu and enter the gopher server of your choice in the Home Server field. The Port number should be 70. The advantage of this approach is that you can access gopher search utilities such as Veronica. Once running you can have connections open to several gopher servers simultaneously.
Be aware that the CCN is not running a gopher server and hence any difficulties you encounter working on other gopher servers are the result of problems on those servers and not ours. You're on your own! The CCN does not support queries on gopher-related issues.
WAIS is an acronym for Wide Area Information Servers. The CCN does not run a WAIS server. As is the case with gopher resources, if you need to query a WAIS resource, your best bet is to access it via a WWW browser using a URL of the form wais://.
Alternatively you can download a WAIS client application like MacWAIS and point it to a public WAIS server such as quake.think.com and conduct the query through there.
You're completely on your own here! The CCN does not support queries on WAIS-related issues.
There are many other useful Internet applications and utilities. Two good compilations of these for the Macintosh OS are located at:
If you have queries on PPP and client applications send EMail to ppp-help@chebucto.ns.ca.
Good luck and have fun!
Christopher Majka: CCN Editor-in-Chief