Re: Apple II Email (Network Connections)

[pubpc1@library.ucla.edu]

derek@slab.cisco.com (Derek Taubert) wrote:
>In <544e4o$acl@login.freenet.columbus.oh.us> Dave Althoff wrote:
>> At the other end, this becomes a potentially useful system, since writing
>> a mail client program for a ][e...to log into the network, pull down the
>> user's mail, process the mail files, and upload outgoing messages...could
>> be an almost trivial task, compared with the Herculean task of trying to
>> write drivers to speak Appletalk via SSC, or fake an Ethernet connection,
>> or whatever...on the ][e side, really the whole problem would be with
>> developing the client software.  And the best part of it is that if
>> current Internet mail standards are adopted, then the client program (with
>> modifications...remove the log-on and capture feature) would be useful to
>> users not connected to the sort of network your project describes.
>
>I agree 100% with the above evaulation of the situation.  It would be so much 
>easier to write a mail client to use simple ASCII transfers over a serial 
>line and a corresponding server on the Unix end than to try to coax an Apple 
>][ to speak TCP/IP.

This has already been done.  Take a look at the Proline bulletin board system.
It can be programmed to periodically send and retrieve email and usenet from
a UNIX box.

The best solution is to have a SSC on every ][e, running copies of Proline.
The software can be set to retrieve mail/news every hour.  Each ][e would
have a serial connection to the server.

If there are too many Apples for simultaneous connection, you can even set
some Apples to log on at one part of the hour and others to log on when they
log off.

We are talking about a simple null-modem system here using an already robust
email/news program on the ][ side.  It is not instantaneous like a TCP/IP
connection, but hourly update should be good enough for most.