A.Lizard's Help for New Users!

This page is presented as a public service by Reptilian Associates.

©1997 by Reptilian Associates. Reproduction of this document for non-commercial use is permitted as long as this notice is included and a pointer to this site is included. To reproduce this document for commercial use, whether for print or a for-profit Web site, request permission from alizard@ecis.com

I just started this page rather recently, there'll be more on it when I get around to it. I'm planning to include some of the files and letters, etc. I've written in answer to questions from users.

To learn about services available from your Internet Service Provider and what they do, click here. `

For information on Web search techniques, check here. Also here will be information on the Web, how to get better use of your browser, and related stuff.

Protect Yourself Online

Most Internet users are nice, friendly, helpful people. However, with 50,000,000 plus people on the Net, even a small percentage of whackos can mean big trouble if one decides to hit on you. The rules below are for personal users, you won't be able to follow some of them in business situations or corporate environments. In some cases, you are going to want people to find out where you are physically, e.g. if you want them to show up in person to your store to buy something. The good news is that every rule you don't follow increases your level of personal risk.

Defensive measures:

• 1. In general, don't put information in the public domain that can be used to physically track you down.
• 2. Your "real name" online should be a "handle". A handle is a cyberspace psuedonym.

alizard@ecis.com 

The A.Lizard part of the address is the "real name" portion. A.Lizard is my handle.

This is a good idea even in business / corporate environments. If you ever expect that you even might post to a newsgroup, or if there's even the slightest chance that your e-mails might inadvertently show up on Usenet (accidents happen. . . see IBM) or mailing list, that's reason enough to use a handle.

• 3. The address your ISP or BBS or any other place in cyberspace has for you should be a post office box or rented private mailbox. Your phone number, at least the one on record should be a voicemail or pager. That way, if you become unfriends with whoever provides your Internet service or more likely, with some outsider capable of hacking the directory files, you're covered. Note that if you're paying by credit card, your ISP knows where you live. I suggest moving that address to a PO Box as well.
• 4. Never put your home phone number or address or real name in a public post. (Usenet or mailing list) or on your Web site.
• 5.Your e-mail is NOT private. It is the equivalent of a paper postcard. It can be read by anyone with system administrator access at your ISP, the recipient's ISP, and any of what might be dozens of relay points inbetween. This includes outside hackers or anyone working at your ISP. If you're sending anything confidential, put it in a digital envelope. You can find out how by clicking here. Friendly bit of advice, use 2048 bit keys. To do this from the freeware DOS version, the command is

You can also use PGP to generate digital signatures for your messages which will insure your ability to prove that either a message is exactly as you sent it or that it has been tampered with.

11. While this isn't a matter of life or death, if you get on an Internet mailing list, make sure that it's available in "digest" format. This means instead of getting every single piece of mail put on the list as a separate e-mail, you'll get the information on the list on a daily or weekly basis. This is much more fun than finding 20 or more pieces of e-mail that don't have to be individually dealt with in your mailbox per day, or worse, several hundred posts after a few days' absence. What I describe is far worse on a high-traffic mailing list.

Downloading

What to download first!

1. Download an archive program, otherwise you won't be able to do anything with your downloaded files.

• 2. Download a virus scanner.
• 3. Download an Adobe Acrobat reader.
• 4. Download PGP.

You can find out where to get each and why you need them below. There are versions of each of the recommended programs for DOS, Windows 3.x , Win95, Mac and in some cases, unix.

Archive Programs

Shareware and most other kinds of files that you can download from the Net are usually compressed. (archived) This means that a file that might be 500 kilobytes in ready to use form might be 225K as stored on the Net. This makes for faster downloading and less usage of hard drive space for the person who put it onto a site. Particularly at sites that start with 'ftp', you'll often find yourself in a directory listing; you won't see a regular Web (html) page like this one, you'll just see a list of filenames and icons. Text (.TXT) files you can read by pointing and clicking at the filename. For most other filetypes, point and click and your download starts. If there's a README.TXT file in the directory you're looking at, read it, it'll frequently tell you things you need to know. Which version if there's more than one in the directory is one of them.

DOS/Windows/Win95

If there are 2 Windows versions of a program in a directory, the one with '32' somewhere in the filename is the one for Windows 95. (Windows 3.xx is 16 bit, Win95 is 32 bit.)

The archiving program I recommend for Windows / Win95 is WinZip. It also can be linked to the McAfee and other virus scanners to allow automatic scanning of downloaded programs. I think it also can be linked to external archive programs for other formats that were popular in the past (.ARC or .LZH) or unix formats (.Z,.ZOO)

For MSDOS, PKZIP has been a popular shareware archiving program for quite some time. You can get it here. Download the one with that ends .EXE .

If you see a file that ends .EXE available for downloading,

MacIntosh

Macintosh users should go to here for a copy of Stuffit-Lite, the shareware version of Stuffit, the standard Mac archiving utility which will give you the ability not only to de-archive .sit and .hqx (standard Mac archive format) files, but a limited number of DOS and Unix formats. While you won't be able to run DOS and unix programs, there are quite a few text files that are archived in these formats you WILL want to read sooner or later. Also, you might find formatted Word and other cross-platform documents in these archives you can use.

Adobe Acrobat Document Reader

An increasing amount of documentation for software and other things is winding up in the Adobe Acrobat format. This is because there are readers you can get free of charge that'll work on the DOS/Windows/Unix/Mac formats. You should be able to get the one for your machine here. I decided I'd better include this here when I checked the McAfee site and noticed that the 'readme' file (00-index.txt) said that the docs for the virus scanners listed below were in Acrobat.

Virus Scanners

If you install enough software into your computer, sooner or later you'll find your computer has a virus. This can cause any number of problems, from weird messages on your display to a trashed hard drive. The good news is that you can protect yourself if you follow the simple procedures below. They will stop over 99% of the viruses in existence today.

Virus-check any software you get from ANYONE OR ANYWHERE. This includes shareware, software purchased at a computer store or via mail order, software from your friends, your employers, downloaded... check EVERYTHING. Buying all your software from stores will NOT protect you. Also, make sure that you're running the latest updates of whatever virus scanner you're using. This is expecially important if you bought your package at a computer store. These programs are updated every few weeks. On downloaded programs, you can get your updates (usually) wherever you got the original program. For versions you bought at a computer store, you'll usually get the most current updates at their Web or ftp site.

"Any software" includes anything you got on CD-ROM, CD-ROMs have no virus immunity.

The newest software categories are "applets", downloaded and run automatically from the Web as you download the Web pages they are found on. (animations, active forms, chat. . .) The "Java" and "ActiveX" applets can potentially do just as much damage to your computer as any other application, they can also do things like grab information out of your computer. For information on their damage potential, go to the Digicrime site, they link to places where you can see dummy hostile Java applets in action. For what to do about them, check the McAfee site for their WebScanX product due to be out in August 97.

Here's what Wired News (7/10/97> said about it: 
"A new virus-scanning product that also screens ActiveX and Java applets will be available from McAfee Associates beginning next month. WebScanX will be able to recognize potentially dangerous downloads, executables, and email attachments by comparing the object's code with a library of known hostile programs. When an applet or other object is allowed to execute, the program will still monitor it for suspicious activities, such as deletions from a hard drive."

The Michaelangelo virus that got lots of media play a few years ago became a national problem because a major software manufacturer (never mind who) accidentally distributed it in a major software release. Nobody is immune from being the victim or the accidental distributor of a virus, in many cases, all you have to do is to stick a disk containing a virus into your floppy drive and read a file and suddenly, your whole office LAN is contaminated. Or you download a file and run it or load it into your word processor. . . Remember that when you download from the Internet, you may be getting files from literally anywhere on earth from anyone on earth. Some people put viruses in files due to malice, the usual reason is that they didn't check the files for viruses before uploading them.

The first line of defense is a virus scanner. This automatically checks files against a database filled with portions of program code unique to a specific viruses and tells you if it finds matching program code in your files or hard drive. A good backup to this are the TSR (Terminate and Stay Resident) and their Mac equivalents that continuously run in the background and look for programs that do things in ways that harmful viruses do them.

One bit of good news. . . in general, DOS / Windows viruses can NOT infect Macs or Unix machines. However, a virus contaminated file for a DOS / Windows or Mac system can be uploaded to a Unix system and while it won't give the Unix system any problems, the virus will be alive and well when you download it into your machine. That's how viruses spread via download.

A good virus scanner site is the McAfee Associates site. If you have Symantec AntiVirus or Central Point AntiVirus or are using the anti-virals built into DOS6.22 / Win3.x / Win95, I recommend switching to the McAfee software NOW.

If you're a Mac user, you can also get scan utilities from the the McAfee Associates site, or you can get the best known virus scanner for the Mac, Disinfectant.

McAfee also supplies a unix virus scanner.

For more virus information, check out the FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions) of comp.virus here or the comp.virus newsgroup itself for discussion. The FAQ is the best short reference on viruses I've seen. Some of the people posting on comp.virus are writers of anti-virals, others are virus writers. Of course, like any other newsgroup, info is on a "let the buyer beware" basis, while most advice given here is rather good, some of it will be worthless. If you get advice requiring major changes you can't evaluate for yourself, get local help. New places to check on virus info are and a href="http://www.virusbtn.com/">Virus Bulletin which includes comparative test results for a wide range of scanners.

Computer Problems?

Never overlook the obvious. . . you can try calling the dealer, there is hopefully a telephone number under the heading "customer service" or "technical support" in the documentation that came with your computer. By the way, there may also be an e-mail address or Web site address in that tech support information. Use it, this is generally less hassle than trying to get through the voicemail systems that usually are between you and customer service, and you are much more likely to find someone who knows what you're talking about the first try.

If there's a Web site, there are generally technical support FAQs which may cover the question you're looking for someone to ask along with the answer. Also, there will usually be the very latest copy of the software drivers necessary to get your new gadget or software package to talk to your computer. Often, downloading and installing the right driver will solve your problem. Then, there are Usenet newsgroups devoted to major (and not so major) products, and user groups who might have your answers for you as well as unofficial Web sites devoted to a product or company. . . from a non-company viewpoint which will often tell you things you need to know about your product that the company that made it hopes you'll never find out.

Then, there's Bugnet, a commercial site devoted to announcing the latest software and hardware bugs in all major products and many minor ones. Some info is available for free, for full database access, you'll have to pay. If you do this for a living, it's probably worth it.

Usenet

Usenet is the collective name of the on-line conferences hosted on the Internet. The format is that someone posts a message (like on a cork bulletin board) and people post their own messages. Mailing lists are generally for a smaller audience, and generally a bit more focused than newsgroups, you can often find topics there that you can't find among the 30,000 Usenet newsgroups. See the warnings about posting on these conferences elsewhere on this page.

Check out the Usenet newsgroup news.newusers.questions for general questions about software (mostly unix) and other Net-related topics. Note: ALWAYS read a newsgroup before posting there. Posting on the Internet gives you a chance to make a fool of yourself before an international audience of tens of thousands on a SMALL newsgroup.

If your e-mail replies to posts bounce, check the message you responded to, the From: line may have been changed to defeat the automatic scanners which try to add every poster to Usenet to junk-mail lists. The signature files that are automatically appended to posts and e-mail generally tell you in this case how to really contact the person you want to talk to.

To find newsgroups that might interest you or postings on newsgroups that cover specific information you're looking for, go to Dejanews and select "Search ... Usenet" from the "Where to Search" dialog box. You can find this kind of information on mailing lists at Reference.COM and quite a few other things besides.

To find the FAQ (Frequently Asked Question - a summary of the topics dealt with by a Usenet newsgroup) document for a newsgroup, go to this search engine here,or to the newsgroup list. These summaries are often some of the best quick descriptions available for the subject matter dealt with by the newsgroup, especially for topics that just aren't that well known. Also, many of the questions you might want to ask the users of the newsgroup will be dealt with in the FAQ document, which is one of the most important reasons to read the FAQ before posting. If you can't find the Usenet newsgroup FAQ you were looking at at the above link, try the RTFM MIT site.

Finger

Like to know if someone you sent e-mail to has read it or not? If you're accessing this from a shell account, simply type:
finger username@usersite.xxx
from the command line.

From the Web, go here and type username@usersite.xxx into the blank form entry space.

Spam

Getting commercial junk e-mail you'd like to make go away? Junk mail and junk Usenet posts are generically called SPAM. Yes, there are things you can do about it. Some may even work for you. Start here. Another solution is called the killfile, see below.

Killfiles

A killfile is a file in which there is a list of people's addresses and/or a list of discussion threads and/or (depends on the system) you NEVER, EVER want to see again, this is used with a newsreader or e-mail program. The program looks at an incoming post or e-mail, compares it with the list in the newsreader or mail reader killfile, and if it matches, ZAP. You never see it. If you're reading this from a SLIP/PPP account, your best solutions are listed on my SPAM page, or in the documentation of whatever you use to read e-mail and Usenet. If you're reading this from lynx, go here for newsreader killfiles from shell accounts, and here for shell account e-mail solutions.

IRC Chat

Related to Web chat, sort of... but using a separate app. I'll have more to say later...

How to get more done on line

Remember that you can do several things at once online... and you should. Run e-mail in the background, run a couple of windows in your browser so you can read something while something else downloads. You can download from your browser, but if you've got several files to load, you can grab them via a separate FTP application... tell it to get the files and do something else that takes less bandwidth (like IRC Chat) in the meantime. You can also read Usenet... right now, I've got everything except FTP running... a chat in progress... a text editor for this page and I'll be uploading this in a few seconds.

Where to find files:

An excellent search engine for finding files on ftp sites is here. It covers Win/DOS, Mac, Unix. On this site, knowing the filename you're looking for helps. If you don't know the filename, check the shareware.com or the OAK Software Repository or for Mac users, one of the Info-Mac sites or the ZDNet Mac software directory. By the way, if a site requests that you use a mirror site, do so. If a site is using mirrors, it means that it's so popular that it's massively overloaded, and if you do as they ask, it'll probably download faster, possibly a lot faster. I also found an encyclopedic site for Atari users, believe it or not, here it is.

For Website developer information, start here. You'll be glad you did.

For definitions of terms not available in my Glossary Page, go to whatis.com, it is encyclopedic, there are even a few terms there I don't know the definition of. That's one other thing to remember about the Web. You don't need to know everything that's out there. You can't know everything that's out there, the last number for sites I heard was 30,000,000. That number is out of date. Then, there are ftp sites and Usenet posts and . . . You do need to know how to find the information you're looking for. The bad news is that not everything is on the Web, at least for free, the databases you're most likely to need that aren't on the Web yet will require paid subscriptions or worse, you'll simply have to buy the CDROM or even information on paper.

Whatis also has chat/IRC/BBS acronyms, e.g. BTW (by the way), IMHO (in my "humble" opinion)(Note: don't take the word "humble" seriously in this context!!!) and quite a few others. If you don't understand something you see online, check whatis.

If you wait long enough, I've got a book in progress that may be called "A.Lizard's Netguide" or something like that. . . it's a book more oriented towards teaching what to do with the Internet than how to physically use it. I'm open to suggestions on what should be included.

Let me know if the links don't work.