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This is a Frequently Asked Questions document initially designed to provide answers to questions which crop up regularly and persistently on mhc.comp.questions. It is not meant to prevent questions' being asked and answered on the newsgroup, but simply to allow people to find answers to common questions in less time and without repeating the same questions over and over. Many of the answers in this document are explained elsewhere; this document is intended to be a quick reference, especially to these other sources of information. It also has a guide on how to ask questions.
| Other places to find help: | TSR Virtual Help Desk |
| mhc.comp.questions | |
| Help Desk (x2600) |
In general, there is information on many topics available through
your Mount Holyoke shell account. Type
see topics at the prompt
for the list of available topics. In addition, there are always the UNIX
man pages. Simply type man pine, for example.
Finally, several common questions are referenced in the message of the day. Type motd at the prompt to see it. The text of it (as of May 19, 2001) is reproduced here for convenience:
============================================================================= Digital UNIX V5.1 -- `exit' or `lo' to logout. Enter: motd To display this message of the day again. ============================================================================= Password changing and password security. Enter: see passwd For information about Internet email hoaxes. Enter: see hoax Continuing your account after graduation? Enter: see graduation Information on how to set email forwarding. Enter: forwarding Setting a vacation or auto-reply message. Enter see vacation Information on connecting to MHC from home. Enter: see access Obtaining a student computer IP number. Enter: ip-request Information about your various disk spaces. Enter: see accountspace Inclement weather and general information. Call: 413-538-2330 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Web information. Residence hall networking: http://www.mtholyoke.edu/lits/network/resnet Other network/systems use: http://www.mtholyoke.edu/lits/network General computer help: http://www.mtholyoke.edu/lits/tsr ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Information on the health of our computer/network systems, enter: sysnews -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
This FAQ, and all the other documentation availabe at Mount Holyoke and elsewhere, may not contain the answer to your problems. In that case, you need to ask your question in a way that assures you the best solution with the least hassle to your or anyone else.
This means, mainly, giving as much information as you know, even if you think it might be irrelevant. If something used to work and doesn't any more, mention anything else that changed in the meantime. What were you doing at the time? Can you reproduce the problem? Did you get any error messages? (What were they? Cite them as accurately as possible.) Are you sure it's not something really obvious and simple? (If the printer won't respond, is it plugged in?) Do some problemsolving and experimentation before asking for help, and then report what you did and found out. More information is always better.
But most of all, get to know your computer system and the MHC system. Hopefully this FAQ will help you with that. Read through it, experiment, make mistakes, and learn from them. The next time you have a question to ask, you'll have that much more knowledge backing you up so that you get an answer as good as the question.
For questions that are not answered here, Pine has a help file (H from wherever you're stuck). You can also type see pine at the prompt or look at Pine Technical Notes for more information than you really wanted to know. The University of Washington, where Pine was developed, also has a Pine Information Center. More helpfully, TSR has Pine instructions. For some more useful tips, type see pinetips at the prompt.
A word about attachments and viruses: Viruses often send themselves by email, so you need to take precautions when sending attachments but also when receiving them. Don't open an unexpected, unexplained attachment, even when it appears to come from a trusted friend. If you don't know what it is, email the sender to ask for more explanation. It could be a virus. Also, when sending attachments, make sure that you fully explain what the file is. Virus emails are characterized by brief and vague descriptions.
Potentially virus-laden attachments arriving on the MHC system are now suffixed "-VirusRisk" in an attempt to raise awareness of the risk of viruses. This suffix does not mean that there definitely is a virus in this file, only that this type of file has the potential to carry viruses. If you know the sender and why s/he sent it, download the file as explained below (you will have to change the filename to remove the "-VirusRisk" tag), but always virus-scan attachments, no matter what, and make sure that your virus definitions are up-to-date also.
When viewing an email with an attachment, hit V to view the list of attached files. Highlight the file to be saved, then hit S. Edit the filename if you wish, then hit enter. The file is saved in your home directory. Now either map your network drive or connect using FTP, retrieve the file, virus-scan it, and be happy. Don't forget to delete the file from your network space when you're done.
To send an attachment, put the file in your home directory through either mapping your network drive or using FTP. Then start Pine and compose an email. Put your cursor in the header field labeled "Attachments" and either type the name of the file or hit Ctrl-T to select it from a list. Compose and send the email normally. Be sure to explain clearly, in the body of the email, what the attachment is.
For more information, look at http://www.mtholyoke.edu/lits/tsr/local.experts/attachments/.
There are two ways to create folders. One way is to arrow down to a message which you want to store in the new folder and hit S. Enter the name of the folder and hit Y when Pine asks you if you want to create it.
The second way is to hit L for "Folder List" and then move down into the "Folder-Collection (Mail)" section. Hit A to add a new folder. Enter the name and hit Enter. You can also edit existing folders by hitting R for "Rename" or D for "Delete."
Type see folder-collections at the prompt for more information.
In the main menu of Pine (hit M to get there), hit S for "Setup," R for "Rules," and F for "Filters." Now hit A to add a rule. Use arrow keys to navigate and hit C to change values. Once you're done, hit E to exit and Y to save changes.
Decide on a sig which is reasonably short. General
netiquette recommends that a sig should be less than four lines; in no
circumstances should it exceed seven. In addition, it should be preceded
by a separator: "-- " (dash dash space return).
This separator allows programs such as Tin to snip everything below it
automatically when replying. This bit of text is going to be appended to
every email you send out; people aren't going to read it more than once,
so making it longer than these guidelines is a waste.
First way: In the main screen of Pine (hit M to get there if you're not), hit S for "Setup" and once again for "Signature." Enter and/or edit the text. When you are done, hit Ctrl-X to save. The signature will now appear in every email you send.
Second way: At the prompt, enter the command: pico .signature. Type your desired text, then hit Ctrl-X to save the file. Confirm the file name by hitting return, select y to confirm that you want to save it, and you are now back at the prompt.
Contributed by Carolyn Crowley.
If you want to change your email address manually, on a per-email basis, you'll need to change Pine's settings to allow you to edit it like you would the To: header. Go to the Main menu, then Setup and Configuration. Enter W to search for the string default-composer-hdrs. Here, enter the headers you want (for example From:, To:, Cc:, and Subject:). You will need to enter each on a separate line (after entering the first line, press A to enter an additional value).
If you want to modify a header systematically, you can set up roles (press S, R, R from the main menu). For more information, see the Pine Technical Notes.
Pine is an email client which runs on the UNIX servers at MHC; it is also possible to configure desktop email clients to retrieve MHC email.
Netscape has an email client, Netscape Messenger, built in. Microsoft Outlook and Outlook Express are Microsoft products and therefore common. Another extremely good email client is Eudora, which has two free versions.
For instructions on setting up Netscape Messenger and Outlook Express, see http://www.mtholyoke.edu/lits/network/imap/imap.html.
General instructions, including other email clients, are at http://www.mtholyoke.edu/lits/network/email/desktop-email.html.
POP and IMAP are different email protocols. One difference is that MHC supports only IMAP for off-campus users, not POP. Read http://www.mtholyoke.edu/lits/network/email/desktop-email.html for more information.
For more information, enter see access at the prompt or look at http://www.mtholyoke.edu/lits/network/doc/access.txt.
You do this through the forwarding command in Telnet. Enter forwarding at the prompt for more details.
Type see vacation at the prompt for more information.
First of all, you should always keep the email that tells you how to unsubscribe. For MHC lists, write to listname-owner@mtholyoke.edu. Do not reply to the whole list. This rarely works, it annoys everyone on the list, and it creates unnecessary traffic.
Chain letters are abuse of the MHC system because they waste resources. They are against MHC account policy. In addition, chain letters which ask for sending money through the post are illegal. Type see chain at the prompt for more information.
Mailbombing is sending someone so many email messages that they can't manage it and/or his email system breaks down; it's a type of denial-of-service (DOS) attack (another is artificially giving a web site so many hits at once that it can't handle the load). This is bad. Even though people sometimes say to do it in a good cause, don't do it. It's wasteful of bandwidth and resources, and it's counter-productive. Besides, it's illegal. Stopspam.org has a few reasons not to do it.
"UCE" stands for Unsolicited Commercial Email and "UBE" for Unsolicited Bulk Email; "spam" is a slamg term for both. They basically mean the same thing. It's the emails for porn sites and get-rich-quick schemes that flood your inbox, usually with forged addresses and headers. Spamming is illegal.
For more information, look at Abuse.net or the Coalition Against Unsolicited Commercial Email.
Spamtrapping is falsifying your email address in the headers of email or usenet posts so that spammers won't get it. Many people do it, but it's against the RFCs and MHC policy. It's mostly done on usenet, where spambots search headers for addresses.
You can't change your From: address if using Pine. It is against MHC account policy to forge your email address.
Type see harass at the prompt for more information.
That's a good question. Part of the difference is technical; whereas every person to which an email is sent receives a different copy, a usenet post is stored only one time on every news server, and anyone with access to a news server that carries that newsgroup can download and read it. For more information, read the What is Usenet? FAQ which is periodically posted to news.announce.newusers.
Pine is an email client. Tin is a dedicated newsreader. This means that in some ways, Tin manages newsgroups better. For example, it marks cross-postings read in all groups when they have already been viewed or marked read in one; it also threads discussions by subject. On the other hand, sorting messages by subject in Pine does approximately the same thing.
Multiple posting is when you send the same post individually to multiple newsgroups (or to the same group more than once, which is even more annoying). Cross-posting is when all groups are listed together in the subject line. With cross-posting, only one copy is stored on the server, and Tin conveniently marks cross-posts read in other groups.
In Pine: Hit L to go to the "Folder List" and move down to the bottom section, "News-Collection." Now hit A for "Add," type either all or part of the name of the newsgroup you want, and hit enter. Pine will search the list of groups for ones matching the string you entered; select the group you want and hit enter, then once again. You can also hit Ctrl-T to search the whole list of available groups.
In Tin: In the main screen, hit Shift-S and enter the name of the newsgroup you want. Hit enter. You can also hit y to yank in all available groups and then select the ones you want to subscribe to. (The yanking process will take a while; be patient.) Arrow down to the group you want and hit s to subscribe (u to unsubscribe). Note: Commands in Tin are case-sensitive.
For more information, type see tin at the prompt or look at this Tin help page.
In Tin, you can either "hot" or "kill" an author, subject, and/or message-id. While reading the message you want to filter, hit Ctrl-A to auto-select the message (posts that match the filter criteria will be marked with '*') or Ctrl-K to kill it (these posts will not be displayed). You will then be confronted with a page of options.
| Kill text pattern: | If there's a generic pattern to the subject/author/etc. you want to filter, type it here, for example "XXX" to get rid of many sex spams. |
| Apply pattern to: | Press space to toggle your options here until you see one you like. Press return to take you to Select Lines. |
| Alternatively, you could press return without typing anything on the first line, and it would take you to Kill Subject. | |
| Kill Subject: Kill From: Kill Msg-Id: |
Press space to toggle whether or not to kill on these criteria. |
| Kill Lines: (</>num): | (I honestly don't know what this option does.) |
| Kill time in days: | Number of days the terms are good for; the default if you just press return is 'unlimited'. |
| Kill pattern scope: | Default is the newsgroup you are viewing when you enter the killfile menu. |
Or just press Ctrl-K and mess around until you get something that works. You can quit the killfiling process without changing anything by pressing Esc.
Contributed by Whitney Fraser.
You, personally, can not actually "delete" a post. A distinction must be made here and it is based on where you are reading your newsgroups from.
Reading news from within Tin: Whenever you read someone's post it will automatically be marked as "Read" and by default it will not appear again the next time you are within that newsgroup. However, these "Read" posts are readily available by hitting r.
Reading news from within Pine: Whenever you read a post, it will no longer be marked as N (New). However to make it disappear from your list, you would need to hit D to "Delete it". At this point, if you hit X, you can "eXclude" deleted posts from your list so that they will go away. Also, if you quit Pine and then re-enter that newsgroup you will no longer see your deleted posts.
However, similar to as within Tin, the post will not really be deleted. Deleted posts are readily accessible by hitting & to "unXclude" them.
Note: The news server is set up to completely get rid of posts that are older than a certain amount of time. This is apparent in both Tin and Pine.
Contributed by T. Milewski.
In Tin, be reading the post you want to cancel/delete and hit Shift-D. This will send a cancel-post. However, some news servers do not honor cancel requests, and the later you send the cancel, the more people will have seen your post. Thus, cancelling is of very limited utility.
Netscape and Internet Explorer are the two big graphical browsers, but there are also others such as Opera and the open-source Mozilla. Which of these to use is the subject of browser wars and not the purpose of this FAQ. They all have advantages and disadvantages. In the end, it comes down to personal preference.
In contrast, lynx is a text-only browser. To start it, type lynx at the prompt. You will, by default, be taken to MHC's index page. Hit ? for help, q to quit.
For more information, see http://www.mtholyoke.edu/help/creating-pages/FAQ/browser.shtml. Also see lynx.
All of the graphical browsers listed above can be downloaded for free.
In addition, Netscape Communicator can be copied from
\\ambr\distribution.
To get started, enter homepage at the prompt. Information about writing pages for the MHC website is at http://www.mtholyoke.edu/help/creating-pages/.
You basically have two options: WYSIWYG (What You See Is What You Get) or a text editor. A WYSIWYG editor acts more or less like a word processor for a web page; with a text editor, you write the code yourself. Common WYSIWYG editors include Netscape Composer, Microsoft Frontpage, Adobe PageMill (no longer available), and Dreamweaver. Common text editors are Notepad, NoteTab, and HTML-Kit.
Both types have advantages. Many people feel more comfortable with dealing with the way a WYSIWYG editor looks; on the other hand, hand-coding gives a lot more control over the code (though not over the final output by the browser - it will render the code the way it wants to). And the price is a big difference, too; Dreamweaver, widely considered a very good HTML editor, costs $300, whereas all the text editors I mentioned are free.
CSIT has periodic training workshops on various aspects of web development, and all handouts are on their webpage.
Absolutely not. If you're thinking about hand-coding (or even if you're not), take a look at this Understanding HTML, which is an explanation of what HTML is and isn't.
Beyond that, there are lots of tutorials on the web:
Australasian Web Publishers' Association's Introduction to HTML
HTMLgoodies.com
The World Wide Web Consortium's
Introduction (assumes knowledge of html, meta, head, and body tags)
Webmonkey
There are also lots of books out there. One of the best is O'Reilly's HTML & XHTML: the Definitive Guide, but you probably don't need that much; there's really enough on the web already.
Networking web page: http://www.mtholyoke.edu/lits/network/
Look at http://www.mtholyoke.edu/lits/network/resnet/. Also see dataport.
Windows:
http://www.mtholyoke.edu/lits/tsr/vhelpdesk/networkspaces.shtml#accesswindows
Macintosh:
http://www.mtholyoke.edu/lits/tsr/vhelpdesk/networkspaces.shtml#accessmacintosh
Scroll down to the bottom and then up a bit until you get to the top of the "Using network file spaces" section.
See also Quotas.
Note: Mapping a network drive is only possible on campus. Off-campus users must use FTP.
For more information type see accountspace and/or see filespace at the prompt. See also http://www.mtholyoke.edu/lits/tsr/vhelpdesk/networkspaces.shtml#filespacebyfunction.
Don't. It's much easier and more reliable simply to map a drive.
Before you do this, realize that your files will be accessible not only on campus but also throughout the whole of the internet. This decreases the security of your computer, and thus you should think carefully about what files you share. In addition, you should password-protect them with a secure password. Also, you are responsible for any copyright violations caused by your sharing files.
In Windows 95/98, double-click on My Computer and find the the folder or file to be shared. Right-click the folder or file (or already if in the folder, right-click on a blank spot in the explorer window) and select Properties. Click on the Sharing tab and select Share this folder. You can change the sharing name if you want. See also http://www.mtholyoke.edu/lits/network/doc/share-risks.html and http://www.hawaii.edu/its/micro/pc/fps9x.html. The latter page also includes information about sharing printers.
FTP stands for File Transfer Protocol. It is a way to transfer files, like HTTP (Hypertext Transfer Protocol). It is often used inconspicuously by web browsers to download files such as program installers; however, there are also FTP clients such as the two elaborated below.
Windows has a basic command-line FTP client built in. To get to it, open the Start menu, click on Run, and type ftp mhc.mtholyoke.edu. (If you want to connect to your webspace, type ftp www.mtholyoke.edu.) When it connects, you will be prompted for your username and password.
When you start FTP this way, you'll be in some random directory on your
PC. To change this you can either use the lcd command listed
below or prevent the problem by starting FTP from a MS-DOS command prompt,
having already navigated to the desired directory with the DOS command
cd. (It may help to use Windows to create a directory
such as c:\temp and copy web files there to be uploaded, since
there can be problems with folder and file names that have spaces.)
Here are a few basic FTP commands. (Note: these should not be confused with either DOS or UNIX commands, though they may be similar.)
| put filename.ext | Copy a file from PC to server |
| get filename.ext | Copy a file from server to PC |
| dir | List the contents of current directory on server |
| pwd | Display current directory on server |
| cd foldername | Move into a subdirectory on server |
| cd .. | Move up into the parent directory on server |
| lcd | The same as cd, except on local PC |
| lcd c: | Change to C: drive on local PC |
| ascii | Change to ascii mode |
| bin | Change to binary mode |
| quit | End FTP session and break connection with server |
For more information, type see ftp at the prompt. I have also written up an example FTP session, starting from a DOS prompt.
WS_FTP LE (Light Edition) is available for free on the web or from
\\ambr\distribution. It is much easier and self-explanatory
than command-line FTP.
When WS_FTP starts up, it will prompt you to connect to a FTP server.
enter the server information (mhc.mtholyoke.edu or
www.mtholyoke.edu), your username, and your password, and
click connect. The basic FTP process is the same as with command-line FTP,
but you don't have to remember the commands, and it's easier to remember
what folder you're in.
Binary mode transfers the file exactly the way it is. This is for files such as images. Ascii mode is for plain-text files such as HTML and other web documents. It changes the file format from your computer's (Windows or Mac) to the server's (at MHC, UNIX). Basically, if you can open it in Notepad and it doesn't come out with all sorts of funny characters, it's ascii. However, if in doubt, you can use binary mode. Your HTML won't care (most of the time), but it'll make a huge difference to your animated gifs. If you're using WS_FTP, you can also let it choose the mode automatically.
Here's a table of file extensions to help clarify which should be transfered in which mode. This is, however, not a comprehensive list of either category.
| ascii | binary |
|---|---|
| .txt | .doc |
| .html | .gif |
| .htm | .jpg |
| .shtml | .mp3 |
| .css | |
| .js |
mhc.mtholyoke.edu
and www.mtholyoke.edu?mhc.mtholyoke.edu connects to your home directory.
www.mtholyoke.edu connects directly to your webspace; while
you can get there from mhc, www will automatically
set the correct permissions for the web.
\\ambr\distribution from off-campus?No. This is because there are some programs for which MHC has on-campus licenses. The other programs that are available there, such as Netscape, are available free elsewhere, and MHC doesn't want people to use it as a distribution site.
talk and ytalktalk is a two-person chat program. ytalk is
basically the same but has more functionality, including the possibility of
chatting with more than one person.
talk is a program which involves two specific machines
connecting. For example, when someone wants to talk request me, they would
type talk username@mhc.mtholyoke.edu or
talk username@axis.mtholyoke.edu where mhc and
axis are specific machines. The best way to find out how to
talk to someone at another location (barring trial and error) is asking
them if they have talk and at what machine they log into. That's where
finger comes in. If someone does a finger username@mhc.mtholyoke.edu
they will see the last time that I was logged in. If I am logged in, they
can then send a talk request.
Contributed by Diane Bono, Class of '97
For more information, type see talk at the prompt.
Type mesg n at the prompt. If you want to receive messages again, type mesg y. To check your status, simply type mesg.
IRC is a "multi-user, multi-channel chatting network." There are many programs available for it, for example mIRC and Pirch; the version on the MHC system is called ircII (type irc at the prompt to run). If you can, it's better to download one of the other versions (most people use mIRC) and run it on your own computer.
For more information, type see irc at the prompt.
For more information, type see finger at the prompt.
To change your "real life" name, office info, etc., type chfinger and then simply write in what you want your finger info to be. (Moved from AXIS to MHC August 2001.)
To change your organization. At the prompt, type pico
.login. This is your "login file" and it saves a lot of
needed info so your account won't backfile and such. Do not
change anything listed there yet. (Although there is one
change you can make that I will get to soon). To put in a new
organization, go to the end of the list where things start with
setenv. Add a new line. On that blank line, type
in setenv ORGANIZATION "", and between those
quotation marks, put whatever you want your organization to be.
Contributed by Soli Johnson
To change your project or plan, do the following. At the prompt, type pico .project or pico .plan and then in the space provided type whatever you want your plan to be. If you know a lot of people finger your account, then you might want to keep it a little short.
Contributed by Soli Johnson
For more information, type see plan at the prompt.
Type chmod 644 .plan at the prompt.
UNIX is the operating system used on the MHC servers. Telnet and SSH are protocols used to create a connection with the server. Tera Term is one example of a telnet client. PuTTY can be used for both, and a patch is available for Tera Term which allows it to use SSH.
One of the most important things to remember about UNIX is that it was designed for geeks who know what they're doing. That means it assumes you know what you're doing, too, and if you tell it rm thesis.doc it won't ask you if you really want to delete that file, it'll just do it. So make sure you do know what you're doing.
Type see help for more information.
Some UNIX commands are similar to ones that you may be familiar with from MS-DOS, such as cd, but others are completely different. Here is a short list of useful commands:
| mkdir directory | Create a new directory |
| cd directory | Change current working directory - see cd, see changedir |
| ls ls | more | List contents of current directory (pipe to more if the files run over a page) - see ls |
| pico file.ext | Edit a file with the Pico text editor - see pico |
| cp file.ext newfile.ext | Copy a file - see cp, see copy |
| mv file.ext newfile.ext | Rename a file - see mv, see copy |
| rm file.ext | Delete a file - see rm |
| chmod 644 file.ext | Set web permissions for a file - see chmod |
| lynx | Browse the web with Lynx - see lynx |
| finger username | Find out info about a user - see finger |
| who | more w | more | Find out who's logged onto the MHC system - see who |
| telnet axis | Login to axis |
| man | UNIX manual pages |
| stands for 'pipe', and | more lets you see long output more easily by spewing it out one screen at a time (such as with ls and w above).
If you want to know more, there are many lists of commonly used UNIX commands on the web. You can also type see h at the prompt.
Enter see access at the prompt or look at http://www.mtholyoke.edu/lits/network/doc/access.txt.
If you are going to connect to the server from off-campus, please use SSH rather than telnet. SSH is roughly the same as telnet, but it encrypts data, especially your password, so that no one can grab it as it passes from your computer to MHC. It is secure.
First find out the process ID number of the session you want to kill. Type ps at the % prompt to do this. This will list the process ID (PID) and location (TTY). One of these sessions is your current one, so type tty to find out your current location. Kill the other session(s) by entering kill -TERM # # # (where "#" is a PID number).
For more information, type see kill at the prompt.
Locking your session means that no one can do anything with it until it's unlocked. To do this, type lock at the prompt. You will be asked for a key to unlock the session, and then to confirm the key.
By default, the lock program will time out in 15 minutes. You can change this by either specifying the time limit with lock -300 (for 300 minutes) or lock -0, which will lift the limit completely.
If you forget the key, you can sign in and kill the lock process as explained just above.
Type hostdisplay at the prompt and choose the option you want.
If you want to change it to something other than the options offered
there, quit that and type pico .login. Ignore most of the stuff
on this page (if you accidentally change something, you can quit without
saving any changes and start over) and arrow down to the line which starts
with set prompt=. In this line, change what's inside the
double quotation marks to whatever you want. If you want the prompt to still
have the numbers and % sign at the end, leave the \!% bit in.
When you've done making your changes, hit Ctrl-X to quit and
hit Enter to confirm the filename. The new prompt will show up
the next time you login.
You should set your terminal emulation program to send ^H
(Ctrl-H) for the backspace/erase character. This can be done in
Tera Term by clicking on the Setup menu, selecting Keyboard,
and checking Backspace key. Enter see backspace at the
prompt for more information.
MHC has limits, or quotas, to the amount of server space it allows to its users. There are two kinds of quotas, hard and soft. It is possible to exceed the soft quota temporarily, but not the hard quota. Once the soft quota is filled, there is a grace period of a few days; if the usage is not then brought below the soft quota, the soft quota becomes the hard quota, and nothing more can be stored (i.e. no incoming email). Type hquota at the prompt for more information.
Type quota at the prompt on mhc. The numbers in the column
under blocks is how much you have saved (in kilobytes);
quota and limit are, respectively, the soft and
hard quotas.
More information about quotas is at http://www.mtholyoke.edu/lits/tsr/vhelpdesk/networkspaces.shtml#quotas.
What appears as your classwork directory is actually a symbolic link (like a Windows shortcut) to directory on another filesystem. You can see this clearly by entering ls -l or dir at the prompt (in your home, starting directory). You will have a line which looks something like this:
lwrxwrxwrx 1 root student 36 May 13 2000 classwork -> /classwork/users/student/02/lbmelton
The first l means that this entry is a link (d
stands for directory, - for file). (The next 9 characters define
the permissions
of the link.) The last column in the line is the most interesting for us; it
shows the name of the link (classwork) with an arrow to its
target, in my case /classwork/users/student/02/lbmelton. The
target is in a completely different part of the file hierarchy from your home
directory. This is why you can't simply navigate up a level to get back to
home.
You could create a symbolic link back to your home directory, but the simplest way to get back there (for those using a shell) is to type cd $HOME, cd ~, or even simply cd.
If you really want to create that link (perhaps useful when mapping one's
network drive on a PC or Mac), the command is ln -s [target-path]
[link-name]. You can find out the path of your home directory by
typing echo $HOME ($HOME is an environment variable,
and the echo command displays its value). In my case, if I wanted
to call my link "home", I would cd to my classwork directory and then type:
ln -s /classwork/users/student/02/lbmelton home.
There's a handy little utility called leave which will remind you to log out at a specific time. Simply type leave at the prompt, and the program will ask you "When do you have to leave?" Enter an absolute time, without punctuation, in either 12-hour or 24-hour time (for example 530 or 1730). Or you could enter a time interval, for example +45 if you want to leave in 45 minutes. Unix will then check the time periodically and remind you at five minutes before, then one minute before, when time is up, then once a minute for ten more minutes. The last reminder is
You're going to be late! That was the last time I'll tell you. Bye.
Another way to start the program is to enter the time on the command line, for example leave 530 or leave +45.
Your password should be secure. Type see passwd at the prompt for more information on how to make your password secure.
Type chpasswd. For more information, type see passwd. (Moved from AXIS to MHC August 2001.)
If you anticipate logging in from an insecure location (such as traveling), you can create a series of one-time passwords for your account. This will ensure that even if someone gets that password, it won't be any use. Make sure you create the passwords from a secure location. Type see skey at the prompt for more information.
In interacting with the world internet "community" it's important to keep safety and security in mind. First of all, never provide your account password to anyone, for any reason. This is a security violation not only for you but for the whole Mount Holyoke system. Also be careful not to provide compromising information about yourself or anyone else. For more information enter see abuse at the prompt. Also see breakin, see pwscam, see pwscam2.
You should install and use anti-virus software. Information about viruses is at http://www.mtholyoke.edu/lits/labs/virus.shtml. There is also more information on email hoaxes and viruses available by typing see hoax and see virus at the prompt.
Networking has a page about security issues for Windows 95, 98, and NT.
Type getgrades at the prompt.
You can also email them to yourself: getgrades | mailx -s Grades username@mtholyoke.edu.
Type see graduation at the prompt.
Glossary of common internet terms
Copyright © 2002 Mount Holyoke College. This page created and maintained by Laura Melton. Last modified on February 11, 2002. |