To open a groups server other than your primary server, select the groups server and open its control.
Netscape Collabra enables you to participate in Collabra discussion groups. To participate in a discussion group, you must:
When you list discussion groups available to you, you can subscribe to them, or you can browse without subscribing. Click one of the following topics to learn about:
To open your groups server:
When you open your groups server:
Before the Message Center window can display your primary groups server's name, you must have your Groups Server preferences set. If you do not have your Groups Server preferences set, the Mail & Discussion Groups Wizard (Windows only), or the Groups Server panel of the preferences dialog comes up automatically. Use the Mail & Discussion Groups Wizard or the Groups Server panel to help you set required preferences.
If an invalid groups server name appears for your primary server in your Message Center's list of servers, provide the correct server name by using the Groups Server panel of Mail & Groups preferences.
If an invalid groups server name appears for a server that is not your primary server, use groups server properties to correct the name of the server.
If you can't access a server using a dial-up connection with auto-connect, check your network software, such as PPP and TCP/IP, and modem settings to see if they're correctly configured to access the server's site. Enable configurations for the server's site, then try opening the server.
To easily access and organize discussion groups you are interested in, keep a list of discussion groups to which you are subscribed. When you open your groups server, Netscape Collabra automatically updates groups to which you subscribe on that server.
Use the Subscribe to Discussion Groups dialog box to list discussion groups available on from your current groups server. To open the Subscribe to Discussion Groups dialog box:
The Subscribe to Discussions dialog box enables you to list:
Click on one of the following to learn more about:
Use the List All Groups dialog to:
To use the List All Groups panel:
To use the Search for a Discussion dialog to list available discussion groups whose descriptions contain a keyword you specify:
Use the List All Newsgroups dialog to:
To remove a discussion group from your subscription list:
To browse discussion groups with Netscape Collabra:
To open your Subscription list and update its discussion groups:
Discussion group properties are:
Set or change discussion group properties by using the Discussion Group Properties dialog box. To open the Discussion Group Properties dialog box:
Use the General panel to obtain status information about the selected discussion group and to select whether the discussion group accepts HTML messages.
When when you uncheck the HTML messages checkbox, you cannot post HTML messages to the selected discussion group nor any groups that contain it. For example, if you uncheck HTML messages for the discussion group mcom.jellybeans.lime, you cannot post HTML messages to mcom.jellybeans.
Collabra converts to plain-text any HTML messages you post to groups that do not accept HTML.
Use the Download Options panel to:
If you select to use default settings from preferences, Collabra uses settings in the Groups Server panel of Mail & Groups Preferences.
When you download discussion groups to work offline, your local disk can fill up quickly. Use the Disk Space panel to help you keep disk usage at a manageable level.
When you remove message bodies, you still retain the message headers that appear in the Message List window. However, you can only retrieve the message when you connect to your groups server and if the message still resides on your groups server.
You can contribute to a discussion in the following ways:
To post a new message to a discussion:
To contribute to a Collabra thread or to post a response to a Collabra messages:
When you reply or respond to a Collabra message:
In either case, ensure your reply is correctly addressed. Check the addresses in the address list and delete addresses and names of discussions that are not familiar to you. Use the Address Area to add or edit addresses, if you need to.
To include the original message in your reply, click Quote, which is on the Compose window toolbar. When you include the original message, it is included as an attachment, so you can see an entry in the attachments area, but you do not see the message in the composition area.
Compose your response in the composition area. If you are composing in HTML, use the Composer application tools.
To send the message, click Send Now,which is on the Composition window toolbar.
To select discussion groups to download:
Use the Discussion Groups dialog to select groups you want to download and browse offline.
When you open your Message Center and have preferences set for your groups server, the Message Center displays this server as your primary groups server. Because not all groups servers offer identical lists of discussion groups, you may have access to more than one groups server. If you have access to more than one groups server, your Message Center can list them all, so you can easily switch servers by clicking on a server name.
Click one of the following topics to learn about:
To open the Groups Server preferences panel:
Use the Groups Server preferences panel to provide information necessary to list, subscribe to, and update discussion groups:
Ensure you have the correct host name supplied for news (NNTP) host. Your NNTP host is the computer that handles your news feed. If you do not know the name of your groups server, contact your system administrator or your Internet Service Provider, and ask for the name. Example: news
If you are using Netscape Communicator on a PC or Unix workstation, provide the path name of a local directory where your news server can download news updates. Example: C:\Program Files\Netscape\Communicator\News
If you are using Netscape Communicator on a Macintosh, you do not need to provide the name of a news directory.
To add a groups server to your selection of groups servers, use the Add Groups Server dialog box. There are two ways to open the New Groups Server dialog:
Use the New Groups Server dialog to add a groups server to your selection of servers you can use to subscribe to and browse discussion groups.
If you do not know the name of the server, obtain from your system administrator or help desk the name as well as the port number of the server. Use the New Groups Server dialog to provide this information.
Groups server properties are:
To change properties associated with a groups server use the Groups Server Properties dialog box. To open the Groups Server Properties dialog box:
Use the Discussion Groups Server Properties dialog to gather information about the current server, to set access options, and to record whether the server accepts HTML messages.
Require your user name and password to add an extra level of security when accessing your discussion groups. When you set this option, Collabra requires your user name and password when you first open the selected server.
To make it more difficult for unauthorized persons to interfere with your day-to-day communications and access your system, follow these steps:
Click one of the following topics to learn more about:
Concepts and Terms Concerning
Encryption, Digital Signatures, and More
This section describes terms and concepts you must know in order to make your system and correspondence more secure.
Electronic security requires that
While you cannot always ensure your communications are secure, you can use certificates, encryption, and the Security Info window to make it less likely you or others compromise security.
A certificate is an tamper-resistant file that identifies the individual to whom it is issued and that provides you with tools so you can better secure communications with others.
A certificate's contents depend on level of certificate it is. A basic certificate contains:
You collect and distribute certificates when you send and receive signed messages.
Encryption is scrambling information through the use of a public key, which is included in a certificate you collect from a correspondent.
When you encrypt an outgoing message, you use your recipient's public key to scramble the message in such a way that only your intended recipients, can unscramble the message. Specifically, a recipient's certificate contains a public key.
A correspondent uses your certificate in the same way when encrypting messages to you. You cannot read an encrypted message or display an encrypted web page without decrypting it.
To encrypt a message, you must have a valid certificate from each and every recipient in the message's address list. You cannot encrypt the message for only selected recipients.
Decryption is unscrambling encrypted information transmitted to you.
When you open an encrypted message or connect to an encrypted web page, you use your private key to decrypt and display the message or web page contents.
You cannot read an encrypted message or display an encrypted web page without decrypting it. You cannot decrypt messages or web pages:
Keep your certificates and computer safe. Anyone accessing your certificates or key database on your computer can decrypt your messages and sign outgoing messages.
When you obtain your certificate for a signing authority, you generate public and private keys:
Certificate signers are the companies or organizations that issue and authorize certificates. You can use the Security Info window to contact signers of certificates you hold. You can contact signers when you need to obtain a certificate for yourself, update certificates, and validate certificates.
Use the Signers,Certificate panel to view a list of certificate issuers you can contact.
A server can encrypt a web page when transmitting the page data to your browser. Your browser decrypts the message just before displaying it for you. After receiving, decrypting, and viewing the page, it resides on your computer in its unencrypted form.
Use the Navigator panel to configure your defaults for accessing encrypted web pages.
Use the Security Info panel to display information about an encrypted web page you are connecting to.
Use the Web Sites Certificates panel to display information about certificates you have already accepted from Web sites.
Your Inbox receives and stores encrypted messages in their encrypted state. You decrypt messages only when you open them.
Follow these rules in order to keep access to your messages uninterrupted:
Use the Messenger panel to configure your defaults for digitally signing and encrypting outgoing messages.
Some web pages make available a special type of program called a Java Applet. You may need to use a Java Applet in order to make use of an online service. Java Applets, like email messages and web pages, can carry and deliver a certificate, which can help you in deciding whether you want to use an applet and give it access to your computer.
Use the Java Applets panel to set levels of access you are willing to grant Java Applets.
Use the Software Developers Certificates panel to display certificates you have already collected from Java Applets.
Use the Security Info panel to display information about an applet when it requests access to your computer.
Check the security status of your current task by using the Security Info window:
The Security Info panel displays the status of a certificate-based task that is currently in progress. Certificate-based tasks are:
Some Security Information panel messages require you to make a decision and provide input, while other panel messages report the success or failure of a task.
The status of your outgoing message can be only one of the following:
In most cases, you probably want your outgoing message to be both encrypted and signed:
You cannot encrypt nor digitally sign messages on any computer but the one to which your certificates were issued. If you are using a computer other than the one you used when you obtained your certificates, you must contact your certificate issuer and obtain a new certificate for the computer you are now using, or use export and import certificate features, which are available through the Security Info window.
Check your address list. You cannot encrypt your message to any of your recipients if even one recipient has failed to distribute a valid certificate.
Update recipients' certificates. To update certificates you've collected from others, use the Certificates panel. Under Certificates, click People.
You can also use the Signers panel to update your recipients' certificates. Your recipients may all have valid certificates, but may not have distributed them recently. signers can update all certificates of the types they distribute, and do so upon request.
Check your own certificates and update them with their signers. You cannot add your digital signature unless you have a valid certificate.
You cannot decrypt messages on any computer but the one to which your certificates were issued, unless you export your certificates. If you are using a computer other than the one you used when you obtained your certificates, you must import the certificates you've exported from the original computer.
Update your personal certificate. If you are using the original computer on which your expired certificate was issued, after contacting the certificate issuer, you can regenerate a valid private key and can then decrypt your current messages.
Warning: Once the Browser Window displays an encrypted page, your disk cache retains an unencrypted copy of the page in an unencrypted form. Anyone having access to your Netscape disk cache can view the contents of the page.
You cannot decrypt messages on any computer but the one to which your certificates were issued. If you are using a computer other than the one you used when you obtained your certificates, you must contact your certificate issuer and obtain a new certificate for the computer you are now using.
To decrypt your current messages, you must use your original computer, or use certificate export and import features of the Security Info window.
Update your personal certificate. If you are using the original computer on which your expired certificate was issued, after contacting the certificate issuer, you can regenerate a valid private key and can then decrypt the web page.
You can set a password that Netscape Communicator requires before enabling access to your collection of certificates.
To set or alter your password:
Set a password for access to your certificates. This helps to ensure that others using this computer and software installation cannot use your certificates without your knowledge.
When choosing a password follow these guidelines, which make it difficult for your password to be guessed by a password-cracking program:
The software installation on this computer already has password-protected certificates for your user name. You cannot set a new password, if you do not know your existing password.
If someone set up your account for you, you must obtain your password from that person.
If you set your own password and have forgotten it, you cannot access your certificates or decrypt your messages. Your certificate issuer cannot provide you a replacement certificate, so you must obtain new certificates. Because you cannot access your certificates without your password, any encrypted messages you saved in your Inbox and other message folder cannot be decrypted.
If you attempt to forward a decrypted message without first encrypting it, Messenger reminds you to encrypt it, unless you have explicitly turned off encryption from the composition window.
A warning about message tampering comes up only when an incoming message has been altered in some way after it was sent. Alteration of the original message content can be due to corruption due to mishandling or to interception and forgery.
Return the tampered message to its sender. Contact the sender to let them know you are having problems with encrypted or signed messages they are sending.
Contact your system administrator or help desk to report the incident and to inquire about procedures they may have in place.
A warning about messages with mixed encryption only comes up when you access a document that is encrypted, but contains unencrypted parts. If you do not feel that your system is secure, you may not want to open a document that contains unencrypted parts.
Check your address list. You cannot encrypt your message to any of your recipients if even one recipient has failed to distribute a valid certificate.
Update recipients' certificates. To update certificates you've collected from others, use the Certificates panel. Under Certificates, click People.
You can also use the Signers panel to update your recipients' certificates. Your recipients may all have valid certificates, but may not have distributed them recently. signers can update all certificates of the types they distribute, and do so upon request.
Warning: Once the Browser Window displays an encrypted page, your disk cache retains an unencrypted copy of the page in an unencrypted form. Anyone having access to your Netscape disk cache can view the contents of the page.
The following sections detail why you might want to enable warnings from Navigator:
You need to be aware that the pages you are accessing are encrypted. Because the pages are decrypted without your intervention, you may want notification to remind you that you must clean up or secure downloaded files upon completion of your session.
You may want this as a reminder when to remove decrypted files left on your local drive. Web pages are only encrypted during transmission from the web page server to your browser. Files in your cache or file you may have saved to disk are not encrypted.
You may want this as a reminder to consult the Security Info panel, which identifies files encrypted during transmission.
You may want this as a reminder to help to prevent you from submitting unencrypted forms or information that you may not realize is submitted through email.
This includes your digital signature. If you have multiple certificates of your own, you can choose which you want to send to a web server. Some web sites may only accept certificates from specific signers or certificates exceeding particular grade. If you frequently transact with multiple sites that have conflicting requirements, set Ask Every Time.
The following sections detail why you might want to enable warnings from Messenger:
You may not always need to encrypt replies. Because replies often contain contents from the original message, and because it is easy to overlook message decryption, it's advisable to set this option.
You can prevent the unfortunate event of overlooking encryption by setting this option. Even though you take the chance that your recipient may not be able to decrypt your message (in the event your recipient neglects to remember a password, import certificates when using a computer infrequently used, or keep certificates updated), the repercussions of neglecting encryption can be much more severe.
Unless attaching your digital signature is causing problems for your recipients, it is highly recommended that you set this option. When you attach your digital signature, it enables your recipients to encrypt replies to you.
Because readers and administrators of Usenet news are often concerned about posting extraneous material, such as adding your certificate when you digitally sign a posting, you may not want to set this option.
Set Always sign discussion messages if you post to Intranet discussions, such as discussions hosted by your site. Signing discussion messages is an effective way to distribute your certificate.
This contains your digital signature. If you own multiple certificates, you can choose which you want to send to recipients when you sign messages. Some recipients may only accept certificates from specific signers or certificates exceeding particular grade. If recipients are not particular concerning which certificate you use when signing messages, you may want to use a certificate having the longest period of validity.
Click Select S/MIME Ciphers to indicate types of ciphers you prefer a correspondent uses when encrypting and sending a message to you. Your enabled ciphers are included in signed, outgoing messages. However, this does not prevent a correspondent from encrypting a message to you with a type of cipher you have disabled.
Use the Java Applets panel to view, remove, and edit access privileges for Java applets signed with a certificate issued by the signer listed in the list box.
To use the Java Applets panel:
Use the Java Security dialog box to grant or deny the access it describes:
The Java Security dialog box provides information to help you make your decision:
Netscape provides risk level categories High, Medium, and Low as guidelines only. You may have a different opinion about the degree of risk access entails. Be sure to click Details and exactly what types of access are involved and make your own decision.
Use the Java Security Target Details Dialog Box to get detailed information about the kind of access a Java applet or JavaScript script is requesting:
The risk level categories High, Medium, and Low are provided by Netscape as guidelines only. You may have a different opinion about the level of risk this kind of access entails. Be sure to read the description of the access requested and make your own decision.
Netscape's current classification system is based on these categories:
You can obtain your own certificate by contacting a signing authority. You obtain certificates from others by opening a message from them, by accessing their web pages, and by allowing their Java applets access to your computer.
To obtain a certificate for yourself, click Get Certificate. When you click Get Certificate Netscape Navigator connects to a signing authority. Through the signing authority, you obtain a certificate and generate keys.
To use your certificate on a computer other than the one you used to obtain the certificate, you must export the certificate. To export a certificate, select it in the certificates list, then click Export.
The People certificates panel lists certificates you've collected from email messages. All the certificates listed in the certificate list were sent to you in email messages. Use this list to verify, view, or delete certificates in the list.
Verifing a certificate is when you ensure it was issued by signing authority the certificate claims. Select the certificate you want to verify, then click Verify.
When you connect to a web site offering an encrypted web page, you collect a certificate from the site. This is a list of all the site certificates you've collected.
When you accept the use of a signed Java applet, you collect a certificate from the applet requesting access. This is a list of all the certificates you've collected.
This is a list of all the organizations who have issued certificates you've either collected or own. Click on the name of the organization in order to select it. You can then verify all certificates by the selected issuer or obtain more information about the selected issuer.
Cryptographic Modules are loadable pieces of software that provide a function of cryptographic services, such as: