The Internet is a world-wide system of interconnected computer networks which communicate using a common protocol known as TCP/IP. Many different organizations are represented on the Internet, including colleges and universities, elementary and secondary schools, government agencies, commercial businesses, and non-profit organizations. This document addresses accessing the Internet through node Gemini on the Academic and Research cluster.
Services available to Internet users include electronic mail, remote login, file transfer, and information services such as Gopher and World-Wide Web. In order to use some of these services, you may need to know the name of the computer you want to access. That is, you will need to know either its hostname (such as apple.com or gemini.cc.tntech.edu) or its IP address (such as 130.43.2.2 or 149.149.11.7).
Electronic mail allows you to send messages to users at other Internet sites. Electronic mail can also be sent to sites on many other networks, such as BITNET or UUNET, which are not part of the Internet.
In order to send a message to someone, you will need to know that person's e-mail address. How do you find out someone's e-mail address? The easiest way is often to contact that person by phone or letter and ask. Internet e-mail addresses are of the form user@hostname, such as rp31@ns.cc.lehigh.edu.
Mail is sent on the Internet using VMS MAIL, which you enter by typing mail at the $ prompt. To send a message, type send, and then, in response to the To: prompt, enter in% followed by the e-mail address enclosed in quotes (e.g. in%"rp31@ns.cc.lehigh.edu").
MAIL> send To: in%"clyde@ux1.cso.uiuc.edu" Subject: Testing
Type your message, then press [CTRL-Z].
In order to send mail to a non-Internet address, it may be necessary to convert the address to a different format. The most commonly-encountered non-Internet addresses are BITNET addresses, which are of the form user@node (e.g. jones@ukcc). To send a message to a BITNET address, append .bitnet to the end of the address, as shown in the example below.
MAIL> send To: in%"js2345@ustate.bitnet" Subject: Testing
Type your message, then press [CTRL-Z].
For help with other types of non-Internet addresses, contact Academic Computing Support.
If someone wants to send you e-mail, he or she will need to know your e-mail address. Your Internet address is of the form username@tntech.edu. For example, if dwm3387 is your username, then dwm3387@tntech.edu is your e-mail address.
For more information about using mail, pick up a copy of Getting Started with VMS MAIL, which is available in Clement Hall computer labs.
A remote login to a computer on the Internet is used to access resources such as library catalogs, databases, and supercomputing facilities. In order to log into another system, type telnet followed by the hostname (or IP address) of the system you wish to access.
$ telnet librot1.lib.unc.edu
If a user: prompt appears, you will need to type in the appropriate username. The commands that you will use while you are connected will vary from site to site; fortunately, there is usually on-line help available. Note that on some systems, your regular backspace key will not work as expected; in these cases, pressing [CTRL-H] generally works.
When you are finished using the remote computer, conclude the telnet session by using the exit command specified by that computer's help screen, or by typing [CTRL-SHIFT-^] and pressing q. Please note that the latter will not work for many IBM-based sites.
For more information about using telnet, type help telnet at the $ prompt.
If you wish to log into your account at TTU from another Internet site, telnet to the following host: gemini.tntech.edu
Remember that the use of any computer resources at Tennessee Tech is intended for authorized users only and is subject to the Code of Computing Practice.
Gopher is a menu-driven program that allows you to browse for resources on the Internet and retrieve information that interests you. Gopher also serves as Tennessee Tech's on-line campus-wide information system.
Some of the services that are available through Gopher include Veronica, Archie, FTP, WAIS, World-Wide Web, on-line phonebooks and telnet access to library catalogs and databases. You can also connect to over 1,500 Gopher servers worldwide through Tennessee Tech's Gopher server.
To access Gopher, type gopher at the $ prompt. If you wish to initially connect to a different Gopher server besides Tennessee Tech's, specify the appropriate hostname on the command line (for example, gopher gopher.uiuc.edu).
Once the main Gopher menu appears on your screen, you can use your cursor keys to move up and down through the menu structure. To select an item, move the screen pointer to that item and press [RETURN]. Help on using Gopher is available by pressing ? (a question mark) from any menu.
The World-Wide Web is a hypertext-based document system. Services available through the Web are similar to those available through Gopher, but the interface and organization of information is different. Access to the World-Wide Web is available on Gemini through the lynx browser. To connect to the World-Wide Web server at Tennessee Tech, type lynx at the $ prompt. The TTU home page will appear on your screen. To select a bolded item (a hypertext link), press the [TAB] key until the item is highlighted and press [RETURN]. For help while using lynx, press ? (question mark).
To connect to a specific service rather than the default World-Wide Web server, type lynx followed by the URL (Uniform Resource Locator) of the item desired in quotes. For example, to retrieve the text of Supreme Court Decisions at Cornell University, you would type the following at the $ prompt:
lynx "http://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/"
FTP (File Transfer Protocol) is used to transfer files between two computers. In order to access files on another computer via FTP, you'll need to have an account on that system or make use of a special public account (anonymous FTP). Since FTP can create a heavy network load, please try to restrict your FTP session to times which are after the remote site's normal business hours.
An FTP session is invoked by typing the command ftp followed by the hostname of the remote computer.
$ ftp ftp.cwru.edu
The FTP server at the remote site will respond, requesting a username and a password. For anonymous FTP, the usernames ftp or anonymous usually work. Use your e-mail address (i.e. username@tntech.edu) for the password. Note that the password will not echo to your screen.
gemini.tntech.edu MultiNet FTP user process 3.2(106) Connection opened (Assuming 8-bit connections) <po FTP server (SunOS 4.1) ready. Username: anonymous Password: <Guest login ok, access restrictions apply.
The following examples show some of the operations that can be performed using FTP.
Change to the hermes subdirectory and get a short directory listing:
PO.CWRU.EDU> cd hermes PO.CWRU.EDU> ls <ASCII data connection for /bin/ls (149.149.11.12,1712) (0 bytes). INFO Index README.FIRST README.SECOND README.UPDATE ascii atex word-perfect xywrite <ASCII Transfer complete.
Get a full directory listing of the hermes subdirectory:
PO.CWRU.EDU> dir <ASCII data connection for /bin/ls (149.149.11.12,1713) (0 bytes). total 99 -r-r-rr 1 root wheel 2692 Jun 25 1990 INFO -r-r-rr 1 uucp daemon 41998 Feb 1 15:12 Index -r-r-rr 1 root wheel 878 Feb 8 14:23 README.FIRST -r-r-rr 1 root wheel 2603 Feb 8 14:24 README.SECOND -r-r-rr 1 root daemon 998 Feb 8 14:29 README.UPDATE drwxrwxr-x 2 uucp daemon 21504 Feb 1 15:12 ascii drwxrwxr-x 2 uucp daemon 9216 Jun 27 1991 atex drwxrwxr-x 2 uucp daemon 8704 Feb 1 15:12 word-perfect drwxrwxr-x 2 uucp daemon 10240 Jun 27 1991 xywrite <ASCII Transfer complete.
Obtain the file README.FIRST (note that many FTP sites are running a Unix-based operating system and are case-sensitive, so you must enter filenames with upper or lowercase letters exactly as they appear):
PO.CWRU.EDU> get README.FIRST <ASCII data connection for README.FIRST (149.149.11.12,1714) (878bytes). <ASCII Transfer complete.
Change to the word-perfect subdirectory, set mode to binary (in order to transfer a non-text file), and transfer the file to your account under a different name:
PO.CWRU.EDU> cd word-perfect PO.CWRU.EDU> binary Type: Image, Structure: File, Mode: Stream PO.CWRU.EDU> get 90-0857.ZD1 sample.wp <Binary data connection for 90-0857.ZD1(149.149.11.12,1715) (24615 bytes). <Binary Transfer complete.
End the FTP session:
PO.CWRU.EDU> quit <Goodbye. $
Since FTP servers are located on various types of computers, be aware that some of the above commands and results may vary from site to site.
For more information about using FTP, type help ftp at the $ prompt.
Archie is a tool for searching a database of files available for anonymous
FTP. To use Archie, at the $ prompt, type Once Archie has returned information, you will need to use anonymous FTP to retrieve the file from one of the sites listed.
For more information about using Archie, type help
archie at the $ prompt.
Network News is a world-wide bulletin board system covering a wide
variety of topics. It is accessed by typing news
at the $ prompt.
The following commands will help you get started reading Network News:
For more information (including how to post articles to a newsgroup), pick
up a copy of
Getting
Started with NEWS available in Clement Hall
computer labs.
More information about using the Internet is available through Gopher. To see a list of documents, enter Gopher and choose item 4 (TTU Computing Information). Internet Information will be listed as one of the options.
Two excellent introductions to using the Internet are Zen and the
Art of the Internet by Brendan Kehoe and The Whole Internet User's
Guide and Catalog by Ed Krol. Both of these books are available at the library.
If you need additional help, contact Academic Computing Support at 372-6315.
Example 1: Search for the file The.Internet.Companion (exact-match search)
$ archie The.Internet.Companion
Example 2: Perform a case-insensitive substring search on hitchhiker
and place the results in the file results.out
$ archie -s -o results.out hitchhiker
$ type results.out
Network News
dir/all List all available newsgroups
dir/reg List groups you've registered
register groupname Register a newsgroup
[RETURN] Select a newsgroup or article by
pressing [RETURN]
read/new/followup Read the current article and all
followups to it
help Get help on NEWS commands
exit Leave NEWS
For More Information
Maintained by:
Academic Computing
Support
D.W. Mattson Computer Center
Tennessee Technological University
Revised January, 1998