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Wizardry No browser on your PDA? Only have email access to the Internet? You can still access many Internet services if you know how. By Ed Gagle The Internet is a great place to perform many business and personal tasks. But, oftentimes an individual is limited in the tools he/she needs to perform those tasks. The information in this article will show how Internet users, armed only with a simple email account, can do such things as browse and search the Web, get files via FTP, finger an address, read and post articles in newsgroups, use Archie to find files, and send anonymous email. There are several reason why you may need to perform more advanced Internet tasks using only an email account. Some of the more obvious ones are:
Using email to perform these tasks is certainly not as easy as using a dedicated application created to do the job. After all, that's why they were developed. But you can perform some more advanced Internet tasks if you know what commands you need to use. Accessing FTP Via Email In order to perform these tasks by way of email, it will be necessary for you to through a server that converts your email requests to a remote FTP connection. The remote server acts as a go between and will mail back your requests as a copy of the screen or file information you request. Several servers on the Internet exist for just this purpose. For the
examples used in this article, try any of these sites: Format your request carefully. In the subject line of the message just put
anything -- example: Try these commands for starters: To get a text file, send another email message to the same site and
include the following commands in the body of the message: Can't find any servers to download from? Try starting with one of these: Or, try using Archie to find a specific file you are looking for. Send an email message to: archie@archie.bunyip.com Subject: anything can be typed here Now any files that match the name of the file you requested will be shown in the results. Keeping Anonymous A number of netizens are concerned about safety and security on the 'Net. One way of providing yourself with some measure of security is to try to remain as nameless as possible. But, when you use email for any correspondence your return address is plastered all over the Internet. Getting anonymous email through email servers is fairly simple, and worth the effort if for some reason you don't want your email address known publicly. email help@nym.alias.net or help@anon.efga.org to get a rundown on how you can send and receive email on the Internet and still remain out of site. In the message body just type the word help. Searching The Web With Email: Not many users know that it is possible to search the World Wide Web and get the results of your query by return mail. To limit the amount of text in the results, try to be as specific as possible when choosing a subject to search. Some search queries can produce huge returns. Send an email message to: getweb@unganisha.idrc.ca You can also query a Web search engine manually such as: http://www.lycos.com/cgi-bin/Pursuit?query=baseball Web Browsing You can even use email to browse the Web and even send a copy of a Web site to another individual. To browse web pages via email send a message to: agora@www.eng.dmu.ac.uk or agora@dna.affrc.go.jp In the body of your message type: Or if you would like to send a copy of a Web site to a friend: www Some other Web via email servers you might want to try should the ones mentioned above be offline: (These may not work all the time) Note: these use GET instead of SEND, example: www Newsgroups via Email Lets not forget those newsgroups. They are a valuable repository of information you can take advantage of even if you don't have a newsreader on your computer. To find newsgroup articles you might want to retrieve email to: liszter@bluemarble.net and in the body of the message type: news subject To browse newsgroups email mail-server@rtfm.mit.edu Note: some newsgroups may not be available via your access. Retrieving all the sub newsgroups: Subject: leave this line blank Newsgroup posting Some other servers you can use to post to newsgroups are: Follow all the usual newsgroup rules when submitting an article. For more information about newsgroups see the WebNovice Newsgroup Tutorial Exploring Usenet Newsgroups.
Ed Gagle is a UNIX/NT security consultant for USCities.net and programmer. He has caffeinated candies available at http://uscities.net/candy |