From: ghod@drycas.club.cc.cmu.edu
Newsgroups: comp.os.linux
Subject: Re: Conner Crash
Date: 27 Dec 92 18:31:41 GMT
Article-I.D.: drycas.1992Dec27.233141.2800
Organization: Carnegie Mellon Computer Club

In article <725445640.AA27703@remote.halcyon.com>, Gary.Pfeffer@f1161.n261.z1.fidonet.org (Gary Pfeffer) writes:
> On Christmas Eve my $400.00 Conner decided to die.  As a result I lost
> any messages that were sent to me in the last 2 days.  Just in case I
> missed some replies, the last 2 concerns I had are as follows:
> 
> 
>         TAYLOR UUCP BINARIES WITH 98.5SLS:
> 
>         When attempting to use uucp with a normal syntax, everything
>         after the '!' mark is reported on an error message line as
>         follows:
> 
>         EXAMPLE:
>                         uucp filename btsci!/usr/spool/uucppublic
> 
>         RESULTING MESSAGE:
> 
>                         /usr/spool/uucppublic:  Event not found.
> 
>        I tried compiling the sources for Taylor 1.03a but ran in to
>        snags.  Upon finally getting a successful compile, the same
>        message resulted.  To find out what binary was generating this
>        message I looked at each binary involved with a binary editor
>        (uucp uucico and bin/sh) and found that this message comes from
>        /bin/sh.  I don't know what 'Event not found' refers to and I
> don't
>        know why it is treating the string after the '!' as this
>        so-called event.
> 
> 
I can help you with this one. What's happening is that Bash (/bin/bash or
/bin/sh) is processing the '!' as a request to recall a previous command.
For instance, let's say I typed the following series of commands:

skynet{1}% ls -l
skynet{2}% cd ..

Now supposing I want to do an 'ls -l' again. I could just type 'ls -l' again,
or I could do this:

skynet{3}% !l

This tells the shall to re-execute the last command I typed that began with the
letter 'l'. So what's happening is that Bash sees '!/usr/spool/uucppublic'
and says 'Aha! He wants me to search my history database for a command
beginning with '/usr/spool/uucppublic' and execute it again! Whoops: no such
command exists!' and then you get the 'event not found' error because such
an event (read: command) was never given. How do you fix this? Easy: instead
of typing

uucp filename  btsci!/usr/spool/uucppublic

type

uucp filename btsci\!/usr/spool/uucppublic

The backslash before the '!' tells the shell to stop treating it as a special
character. I hate to say it, but you re-compiled the binaries for nothing. :(
Now, technically, I don't think the real /bin/sh (The Bourne shell) should
give you this kind of trouble since I don't think it has history/command recall
features in it, but /bin/bash does and in Linux, /bin/sh is just a link to
/bin/bash.


> 
>        INTERNET:
> 
>        I would like some info on accessing internet systems via uucp or
>        ftp.  I have no phone numbers and no contacts so I have no idea
>        how to get into this network which has incredible resources.
>        Could anyone let me know what is necessary to gain access?
> 
> 
> Any help on either or both of these questions would be greatly
> appreciated.  Thank you in advance.
> 
> Gary
> 
> -/> YaleBBS v1.09c [Nov 17, 1992]
> ---- Yecho v1.07a
>  * Origin: The Exchange BBS - (410) 529-1716 - Baltimore, MD  USA
> (1:261/1161)
>

Yich. This is the kind of question it takes hours to answer. There's lots
of places to go, but you gotta spend money. Get out the phone book and start
calling the computer centers of the universities in your area and ask them
if they have some sort of policy for allowing non-students on their system.
Be warned: some of the bigger schools allow access for reasearch purposes
but they charge a mint. (I found this out by trolling around the schools in
NYC.) If that fails, look for a public-access Unix/Internet system in your
area. Post a few messages on local BBSes and see what materializes. 

I myself have access via two resources: the Carnegie Mellon Computer Club
and PSI's global dialup telnet/rlogin service. I need the latter to access
the former, since I live in Manhattan and I'm not going to dial Pennsylvania
long distance. PSI has a terminal server in the 212 area code, so all I have
to do is make one local call, then telnet to the CMCC machine. The account
on the machine costs only about $30 a year, but the PSI telnet/rlogin access
is about $40 a month. That turns a lot of people off, but it's cheaper than
a long distance phone bill, especially since that's a flat rate fee: whether
you're on for 24 hours a day, or just one, it's still just $40 a month. 
I happen to still have an account back at school, so this works out fine for
me: I can reach either site via a local call. Anyway,the CMCC machine machine
offers FTP, NEWS (all 1800 topics), IRC... just about everything in fact except
for outgoing TELNET access, which off-campus club members aren't allowed to
use (a policy meant to discourage using the site for network hacking). In
my case, I can already telnet with PSI, so I don't care. Caveats: the CMCC
machine is a VAX and runs VMS (all together kids: 'Eeeeeeeeewwwww!'); and
there's a chance that PSI may not have a terminal server withing your local
area. They have them in most major cities, but without knowing where you
live it's hard to say... anyway, here's how to get some info:

For PSI:

send an e-mail message to: all-info@psi.com
You can leave the body of the message blank if you like: this is a mail server
which will reply to you automatically. The message it sends back will tell you
about the addresses for other mail servers covering more specific topics. 
Some interesting ones are: gds-info@psi.com and numbers-info@psi.com

For the Carnegie Mellon Computer Club:

Send and e-mail message to Marc Shannon at SYNFUL@DRYCAS.CLUB.CC.CMU.EDU
and ask him nicely to send you an info sheet about the club. Marc is the
sysop, and he's not a mail server so be polite. :)

Hope all this nonsense helps, and happy holidays to all.

-Bill Paul

ghod@drycas.club.cc.cmu.edu    or  ghod@drycas.bitnet
(Or, in a real emergency, wpaul@uhasun.hartford.edu)
Newsgroups: comp.os.linux