CS102 - Introduction to Computing laboratory
Lab #3
Last Modified: 09/08/97 11:41:47 AM
The purpose of this lab is to introduce you to using electronic mail on the Rockhurst campus.
1. Introduction to Electronic mail
Electronic mail (e-mail) has proven to be one of
the most used communication innovations in business today. It
is printed like a regular letter, so there is some permanence
that one doesn't get with a phone call, though the message travels
to its destination seconds rather than days, as with the postal
service. It is also more convenient than trying to play phone
tag with another person. The sender leaves the note at his/her
leisure and the recipient reads it at her/his leisure. Both parties
don't have to be on the computer (or phone) at the same time.
E-mail can also connect people across the country or across the
world.
To get started with e-mail at Rockhurst, you need
to access another computer system. This system is called the Rockhurst
Academic VAX. Sometimes this computer is called ACAD
or VAX1 for short. You can gain access to this computer
from any micro-computer on campus, or from home if you have a
computer and a modem. You will also need the card which has your
account name and initial password on it.
2. Accessing the VAX
When connecting to the VAX, you must type accurately
and reasonably quickly (6 characters in 15 seconds). If you don't,
the VAX will chastise you by making you repeat the entire login
process again. This is frustrating at first, but be calm and patient.
Once you get the hang of logging in, you shouldn't have these
problems in the future.
When you login to the VAX, you will be prompted to
enter your username and a password. The username will be something
like ST012345 and the initial password, printed on your card,
is 6 characters of nonsense. Note that your username contains
a zero (0), not the letter O. When you type your password, it
will NOT appear on the screen for security reasons. Once you successfully
login, you will immediately be asked to change your password.
The one on the card is public knowledge and hard to remember.
The password you pick must have at least 8 characters. It may
not be a common word like "calendar" or "dictionary".
It should not contain any spaces. You will probably have to try
a few times before you succeed. You must enter your new password,
then enter it again to verify that you typed it correctly. It
will not appear on the screen in either case. When this is done,
you will get the dollar sign ($) as your prompt. Follow the pattern
in the next box to get started. Ask the instructor for help if
you get confused.
Enter Windows, then do the steps shown in the following
box to get to the VAX.
From the Program Manager window
Once you have connected to the ACAD VAX using the
telnet program, you will see a screen like the following one,
and you can proceed to enter your username and password.
Rockhurst College VAX 4000-100 (VMS 5.5-2)
Username: (type your username) (for example ST012345)
Password: (type your password, but you won't see
it) (for example XYZZY)
3. Reading and replying to a mail message
At the $ prompt you will start the mail program,
get a list of mail messages, read your mail message, then send
a response to the sender. As you type your response, type fairly
carefully. You can only make corrections on the current line you
are typing. Go ahead and send a response back to the instructor.
As you type your reply, be sure to press ENTER at the end of each
line.
(You have 1 new mail message)
MAIL> DIR
1 ACAD::W_HSIN Welcome to electronic mail
MAIL> READ 1
Lots of text here.....
MAIL> REPLY
Enter your message below. Press CTRL/Z when complete or CTRL/C to quit
Enter a message to the instructor here
CTRL/Z
MAIL> EXIT
$
Each of the mail commands is outlined below:
4. Sending a message to a friend
Often you will want to initiate a message to another
person. Ask your friend or the person sitting next to you for
their username and send them a message using the steps in the
next box. The same rules as in step 3 apply - type carefully for
now, you can only correct mistakes on the current line. You will
see a notice on your screen when you receive the new mail message.
MAIL> SEND
To: (type your friend's username here) (for example ST012345)
Subject: This is my first e-mail message
Enter your message below. Press CTRL/Z when complete or CTRL/C to quit
Enter a message to your friend here
CTRL/Z
MAIL> EXIT
$
5. Reading another mail message
Just as in step 3, read the message that your friend
sent and send him/her a reply.
6. Changing your personal name
Have you noticed that the name that gets sent with
all your messages is your username? This isn't very personal,
since people don't really want to just be treated as an account
identifier. You can't alter your username, but you can have your
real name attached to your mail messages if your want. When you
are inside the mail program, following the directions in the next
box.
MAIL> SET PERSONAL
_Name: First-name Last -name (your first name
and last name)
Send a message to yourself and see how your name
appears.
7. Exiting the VAX
When you are finished with using mail, you must log
off the VAX computer. Failure to do so may mean that other people
can use your account, and send nasty messages with your name on
them or worse, read your personal mail! You must at the $ prompt,
then type:
$ LOGOFF
To return to Window, click on the File menu and then
click on the Exit option.
8. Deleting mail messages
After a while, you will accumulate a long list of
mail messages. Most of these you will want to discard after reading
them. The command to do this is DELETE. By using the command
DIR, you get a numbered list of your messages, then you
can delete each message by its number. Delete the message from
the instructor with a subject of "Delete Me" as shown
in the next box.
MAIL> DIR
1 ST012345 Time to rebel!
2 W_HSIN Delete Me
MAIL> DELETE 2
MAIL> DIR
1 ST012345 Time to rebel!
2 (Deleted)
MAIL>
It is important that you keep your e-mail folder
cleaned out. You have been given a limited amount of space in
which to store your messages and, just like a filing cabinet,
your e-mail folder will get full unless you throw things out from
time to time.
9. Printing a message
If you get a really interesting message, you can
get a printout of it to cherish forever. After reading a message,
in mail, type PRINT /queue=r205_laser at the MAIL>
prompt. Note that nothing will get printed until you EXIT from
mail. This is so that all the messages you want to print are grouped
together on the same printout.
10. Looking up someone's e-mail address
On the Rockhurst campus, there is an e-mail directory
just like the phone directory. To find out someone's e-mail address,
at the $ prompt, use the LOOKUP command and supply your
friend's name. Ask your neighbor for his/her name right now, look
up his/her e-mail address and send a "hello" message
to him/her.
11. Sending e-mail off campus
You can also try to send an e-mail message across
the country. It is almost like sending e-mail to another student
in this class, only the address is different. Suppose the address
were Jwalker@vax23.void.edu. At the prompt To:, you would need
to type the following:
To: IN%"Jwalker@vax23.void.edu"
The IN%" " tells the mail program that
it needs to send this message across the nationwide network instead
of trying to deliver it to someone here at Rockhurst.
Try sending a message to an automated dictionary
program using e-mail. Follow the instructions below to ask for
a definition.
MAIL> SEND
To: IN%"wsmith@wordsmith.org"
Subject: define university
Enter your message below. Press CTRL/Z when complete or CTRL/C to quit
(there is no real message to send, just press CTRL/Z to end)
CTRL/Z
MAIL>
You should get a reply in a minute or two if the
network and the computer that contains the dictionary program
are all working. You will get a short message on your screen indicating
that you have a new mail message. If you are still in the MAIL
program, follow the instructions below to get a list of all the
new messages that have arrived while you were reading your mail.
MAIL> DIR/NEW
Read the reply that you got. Most of the first part
of the message contains routing information about how the message
got delivered to you. You can just ignore this for now. The university
definition will be near the bottom of the first screen, or on
the second screen of the message.