The article provides an overview of the tools that are available to perform various network tasks. This article also assumes some knowledge of Internet services. Most of these programs are available on a no or low cost basis, and a source for each program is generally provided with each description. If you require assistance in acquiring any of these programs or would like more information, contact Sean McMains (mcmains@unt.edu; 565-2039), Eriq Neale ( neale@unt.edu; 565-4808), Mark Thacker (thacker@unt.edu; 565-2568), or Philip Baczewski (ac12@unt.edu; 565-3886)at the UNT Computing Center (ISB 119).
MacTCP- MacTCP is an addition to your Macintosh's operating system. MacTCP supports a transcparent interface between the various networking programs and the TCP/IP network (in this case, the Internet). Once MacTCP is installed, you will probably not ever use it directly, however, a number of the programs discussed below will use it as their access point to the Internet. Academic Computing Services currently maintains a site license for version 1.11 of MacTCP. If you wish it to be installed on your Macintosh, contact Sean McMains (mcmains@unt.edu; 565-2039) at the UNT Computing Center.
Telnet- The Computing Center supports NCSA Telnet version 2.5 for the Macintosh as the Internet VT100 remote login solution. No only will this program provide access to our on-campus host and card catalog systems, but it will also let you connect to remote library card catalog systems and a number of other Internet services. If your Macintosh is connected to the Campus Ethernet network, you can copy NCSA Telnet from Academic Computing Services' AppleShare server named Mimas. Use Chooser to select the AppleShare services in the ISB ACS zone and then connect to Mimas as Guest. You'll find the NCSA Telnet self-extracting archive on the "Best of Macintosh" volume in the "Mac Internet Tools/Telnet" folder. If this procedure won't work for you, contact the Computing Center for assistance.
TN3270- TN3270 is the Telnet equivalent for accessing IBM mainframes. It will allow you to establish a remote-login connection over the Internet to mainframe systems and do the apropriate terminal emulation. The version of TN3270 for the Macintosh that is available was written at Brown University. BrownTN3270 is also handy if you use the UNT's Academic mainframe system. Like Telnet, this program is available on Mimas, on "Best of Macintosh" in the "Mac Internet Tools/TN3270" folder.
Fetch- Fetch is a very nicely written program to perform ftp file transfers to and from remote sites. Fetch was written by at Dartmouth College, a campus that makes extensive use of Macintosh computers, and Fetch is free of charge to educational users. Fetch offers a Macintosh-style interface for connecting to anonymous ftp sites and retrieving files. It will also automatically decode files of various compression and text encoding types. For example, if a file you fetch from a remote site is in Binhex format, Fetch will perfom the file transfer and then open a window for you to specify where to save the decoded version of the file. Fetch can also do the same for the popular public domain compression program formats. Another nice feature of Fetch is its ability to analyze a file and determine what type it is. The program lets you specify whether the file transferred will be text or binary. There is also an "Automatic" selection which causes Fetch to attempt to determine the file type, in almost all cases successfully. This ability, combined with the automatic conversion features, makes Fetch one of the easiest Internet tools to use. Fetch is available on Mimas on "Best of Macintosh" in "Mac Internet Tools/FTP/Client."
TurboGopher- TurboGopher is one of the best ways to gain access to the Gopher system that UNT is using as the basis for its campus-wide information system. TurboGopher makes use of the Macintosh's graphical interface tools, or as some put it, "Mac things," to create an intuitive interface to the resources available from Gopher services. When using TurboGopher, it is also necessary to have NCSA Telnet abd Brown TN3270 installed in order to have full access to the resources available via Gopher. You can find TurboGopher on Mimas on "Best of Macintosh" in "Mac Internet Tools/Gopher/Client." For more information about Gopher, see the November/December 1993 issue of Benchmarks or contact Mark Thacker (thacker@unt.edu); 565-2568).
News Readers- Several USENet news readers are available for the Macintosh, and there has yet to be a standard set for supporting one here at UNT. Each of the following has some good features, but none has yet been identified as being best suited for our needs on this camppus.
NewsWatcher:NewsWatcher is another freeware program for reading Network News on a Macintosh. It has one advantage over Nuntius in being able to reply to a message via E-mail. Like Nuntius, forwarding messages to other mail addresses is not possible. While it has a graphical user interface, it is not as hierarchic as that of Nuntius.
InterNews:Internews is a news reader written at Dartmouth College and is free for use at Educational institutions. In addition to its news reading capability, InterNEws has some built-in mailing functionality for forwarding news messages or replying directly to a news message's author. Unfortunately, the InterNews user interface is not as "Mac-like" as the previous two programs, however, its functionality makes it a candidate for a supported package here at UNT.
MacX- MacX is a software product from Apple Computer Inc. which implements X Window server software on the Macintosh. MacX can use the Macintosh's graphical interface as its window manager. The Computing Center currently maintains a site license for MacX version 1.1 which will work with Macintoshes running System 6. For those using System 7, you will need to purchase a right to update license for $17.00 which will entitle you to have version 1.2 installed. For more information, contact Sean McMains (mcmains@unt.edu; 565-2039) at the UNT Computing Center.
Mosaic- Mosaic is the newest entry to the suite of Internet tools. Mosaic is a free program written by the National Center for Supercomputer Applications (NCSA, also the Telnet folks). Mosaic provides access to diverse Internet resources including World Wide Web servers, Gophers servers, ftp sites, and WAIS databases. Mosaic uses a graphical interface as its navigational tool and its conecpt is quite suited to the Macintosh environment. Mosaic requires that MacTCP be installed on your machine. Be forearned that the Macintosh version is still a bit buggy and tends to be a memory hog. If you are interested in trying it out, you can retrieve it via anonymous ftp (or via Fetch) from ftp.ncsa.uiuc.edu in the "/pub/mosaic/macintosh" directory
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