BBS in a Box 12/BBS in a box XII-1.iso/Files/Tele/Internet/TurboGopher 1.0.5.sit/TurboGopher 1.0.5/TurboGopher 1.0.5.rsrc/TEXT_5000_HeLp.txt

Text File | 1993-04-01 | 18.8 KB | 376 lines

    Gopher  n.  1. Any of various short tailed, burrowing mammals of the
    family Geomyidae, of North America.  2. (Amer. colloq.) Native or
    inhabitant of Minnesota: the Gopher State.   3.  (Amer. colloq.) One
    who runs errands, does odd-jobs, fetches or delivers documents for
    office staff.  4. (Computer tech.) software following a simple
    protocol for tunneling through a TCP/IP internet.

    TurboGopher  n.  1. A small rodent with a turbocharger strapped on
    its back to increase the its speed and ferocity.  2. (Amer. colloq.)
    Native or inhabitant of Minnesota after consuming three double
    espressos. 3. (Amer. colloq.) An Olympic sprinter who runs errands,
    does odd-jobs, fetches or delivers documents for office staff.  4.
    (computer tech.) Speed-optimized Macintosh software following a
    simple protocol for tunneling through a TCP/IP internet; network
    speed is achieved by using turbocharged software; incoming bits spin
    the turbine that pumps out the outgoing bits.


Overview
---------

TurboGopher is a Macintosh application that we believe is the  fastest Mac
Gopher client currently available. Beyond optimizing  TurboGopher for
raw speed while fetching documents and directories, we turbocharged the
user interface by displaying information as soon as possible... you can read
the first part of  a document or directory while the rest is being fetched

In spite of the design goal to run fast as possible, TurboGopher is a good
Mac citizen: it shares time with other applications. You can put
TurboGopher in the background to fetch lengthy items in the background
while you work in another application in the foreground.



What is Gopher?
--------------

The internet Gopher protocol and the first Gopher software was designed
by the Gopher Team at the University of Minnesota. Gopher was
originally created as a fast, simple, distributed, campus-wide information
search and retrieval system. Ease of use and implementation has made
Gopher increasingly popular on the Internet. Since its original release,
many folks on the Internet have contributed to its growth, submitting
patches, servers, clients, and linking their local servers into the worldwide
network of Gopher servers. Now there are even gateways to seamlessly
access a variety of non-Gopher services such as FTP,  WAIS, USENET
news, whois servers, etc. This network of Gopher servers is at your
disposal from a Mac, PC, or workstation  connected to the Internet. The
Internet Gopher protocol and name  is copyright © 1991-1992 by the
University of Minnesota.

The software may be retrieved from numerous Gopher or FTP archive
sites, including the University of Minnesota Gopher server, the Info-Mac
Archive Gopher server, and by anonymous FTP from
boombox.micro.umn.edu and sumex-aim.stanford.edu.   The most recent
release of TurboGopher is always available from the University of
Minnesota Gopher server (or by anonymous ftp from
boombox.micro.umn.edu).  If you discover a bug or just want to know if
you have the newest version, read the file called “ReadMe-Versions-
Bugs”.  The version number of your TurboGopher may be found by
choosing “About TurboGopher” from the Apple Menu or by clicking on
the application’s icon in Finder and choosing “Get Info” from the Finder’s
File menu.


How does it work?
-----------------

Information accessible via Gopher is stored on many computers all over
the Internet. These computers are called Gopher servers (although a lot of
information that is not directly on Gopher servers is indirectly accessible
via special Gopher servers). Virtually any popular computer (Mac, Unix
box, PC, or larger computer) can be used as a server. Servers do not just
contain files, directories and searchable databases; they can also contain
references to other servers. To retrieve and search this information, you
need to run a Gopher client application on your computer. TurboGopher is
a Gopher client application. You can set it up to remember how to connect
to one server; from here you can effortlessly traverse the web of all
interlinked servers.


Getting Help with TurboGopher
---------------------------

In addition to this information you are reading right now, if you are using
System 7 (and we strongly recommend that you do), some Balloon Help is
available in TurboGopher. See your Macintosh  System 7 documentation
for information on using Balloon Help.


Using TurboGopher
-----------------

TurboGopher uses the MacTCP software to communicate with gopher
servers on a network. Assuming your Mac has correctly configured
MacTCP software installed in the System Folder, TurboGopher is all  set to
go. Launching TurboGopher will connect you to one of the default Gopher
servers from which you can explore the rest of networked gopherspace.


Navigating Gopherspace
---------------------

To navigate through gopherspace, double-click on any interesting items to
open (fetch) them. If you double-click on a file, TurboGopher will fetch
and display the file. Opening a folder will let you view its contents.
Double-clicking on the question-mark (Search) icons will let you search a
database. On most gopher servers these databases are full-text indexes of a
collection of information. Full-text index means that every word in every
document is considered a keyword. So the best way to search a gopher
database is specify words for which to search when TurboGopher presents
you with a dialog box. The results of the search are returned as a list of
documents containing those words.

If you Double-click on the phone-book icons you can search electronic
phone books. Phone book databases are structured in the sense that they
have fields (i.e. a name field, an address field, and a phone number field).
The simple phone-book lookup dialog assumes that you want to search for
someone by name.  Click on the “More Choices” button if you wish to
specify exactly which fields to search in, when you formulate a query. The
result of the query is displayed in a document.

Disk icons represent archived Mac software or documents that you can
fetch; these items will be saved to your hard disk.  Such items are often
stored in compressed form to save space.  You need to have certain Mac
utilities to “uncompress” such items.  The most common such utilities are
StuffIt and Compactor.  Both may be obtained from the Info-Mac archives
gopher.  If you are running System 7 and TurboGopher retrieves an item
that needs to be “unstuffed” or “uncompacted”, it will ask you if it should
launch StuffIt or Compactor.

Items that are specific to MS-DOS are seen as documents with a tiny “PC”
emblazoned on them; similarly items specific to UNIX show up as
documents with a tiny “UX” on them.  You can retrieve either of these
kinds of items if you like.  TurboGopher will ask you if you wish to save
them to your disk.  You may not “view” these items as text.  In fact it will
probably make very little sense to fetch such items unless you intend to
further transfer them later from your Mac to another kind of computer, or
if you have some special tools on your Mac that will allow you to use
these kinds of items.

Items appearing as documents with a starburst on them are probably
graphics or picture files (typically in GIF or PICT format).  TurboGopher
will transfer such files, save them on your disk, and optionally launch
Giffer (a shareware picture viewing application) if you wish to view the
picture.

Opening the "terminal" icons will make TurboGopher launch NCSA
Telnet (or TN3270 if appropriate) and start a terminal session to a
terminal-based information system. Typically these are library catalogs or
other such services. Note that for this to work, you need to have Telnet or
TN3270 installed on your Macintosh. If you are still running System 6,
TurboGopher will only save a Telnet session file rather than launch
Telnet; another good reason to run System 7 on your Mac.

You may change the Font used by TurboGopher via the Font menu; this changes
fonts for documents and lists.  You may only change the font size for
document windows (and not for lists).  TurboGopher will attempt to display
phonebook lookup results in a monospaced font (Monaco), effectively ignoring
your font selection.  It IS possible to change the font of a phonebook
results lookup window after it has been opened; however things will not
line up correctly and generally look icky.


Advanced Navigation Features
----------------------------

If you double-click on a folder while holding down the Option key,
TurboGopher will close the current window as it opens a new one on top
of it. Some folks like to do this to prevent screen clutter and keep from
having too many open windows.

You may use the up and down arrow keys on your keyboard to move up
and down lists in windows. The Enter or Return key opens an item (and is
equivalent to double-clicking on an item).  Because we are too lazy or too
tired, we don’t support use of the arrow keys on the Mac Plus.

You may also type the first letter (or first few letters) of an item name in a
list and TurboGopher will hilight the first item it finds that matches (sort
of like the Finder does in list views).  The Find menu item is also
available to locate an item in a list: just type a string in the Find dialog.

If you close a window by clicking in its close box while holding down the
Option key, then (like Finder) TurboGopher will close all open windows.
If you click in the close box while holding down the Shift key, then the
cache will be released for that window.  Of course if you hold down both
Option and Shift keys then all windows are closed and all caches released.
Caches are explained below.

TurboGopher remembers the last full-text index search (item with
question-mark icon) you used. If now you hold down the Option key and
double-click on a word in a document window, TurboGopher will query
that search service for all documents containing the word you selected.
You must use a search service before this hypertext capability is accessible
(TurboGopher needs to know which search service to use in your
hypertext query).

Save or print documents using the Save or Print menu items under the
File menu. The Recent menu lets you go back instantly to any directory
window you have viewed during your Gopher session. The left and right
arrow keys may be used to go to previous or next windows; they are
equivalent to traversing the recent menu upwards or downwards.  Note
that the Recent menu only remembers and lists directory windows you
visit. Document or Phone-book lookup windows are not listed.


Bookmarks
----------

If you formulate a search or find a folder you would like to come back to
quickly later, you can use the Set Bookmark menu item to save your place.
Set Bookmark saves a reference to folder, file, search, terminal session... in
fact any Gopher item. Choosing Set Bookmark with any item selected
(hilighted) lets you make a bookmark for that item. If nothing is selected
in the front list window, a bookmark is made for a folder representing the
window. Try it, it's easier to do than to say.

Bookmarks are placed in a special Bookmarks window. Use the Show
Bookmarks menu item to open the Bookmarks window. Bookmarks are
remembered even after you quit TurboGopher; contents of the Recent
menu are however forgotten.

To delete a bookmark, click once on a bookmark item (in the Bookmarks
window) to select it. Then choose the Delete Bookmarks menu item.

The Import and Export Bookmarks menu items let you bring in or write
out files containing your bookmark information. You may exchange these
Gopher Bookmark files with other Gopher users if you wish. Double-
clicking a Gopher Bookmark file will launch TurboGopher as you might
expect, however TurboGopher will not connect to the default Home
Gopher server immediately in this case.

It might be useful to consider the Bookmarks window to be a special kind
of “worksheet” or “construction area” for you to construct your own
personal list of useful gopher resources. You may double-click (open)
Gopher Bookmark files from the Finder. If you launch TurboGopher by
double-clicking on a Bookmark file, it will not immediately connect to the
Home Gopher server, but will open the Bookmark file instead.  So you
may use Bookmark files as custom Home Gopher servers.


Canceling Slow Network Operations
--------------------------------

TurboGopher executes most requests in a few seconds. A document or
directory is displayed as it is received. However if a server is especially
slow or busy or if you have started to fetch what appears to be a very long
and uninteresting document or directory, you may cancel the fetching
process by choosing the Cancel All Requests menu item (or by holding
down the command key and typing a period). This is especially useful if
you are using a slow speed SLIP link and you've seen the top lines of a
long directory or file and decided that you are not interested in having
TurboGopher finish fetching the item. If you open a file or folder by
double-clicking while holding down the Option key (to conserve screen
space as described earlier), TurboGopher will also cancel the running
network transaction if one is outstanding; and this is in fact exactly what
you want under SLIP. Both these features make TurboGopher seem faster
and more responsive over SLIP links.

TurboGopher runs happily in the background (if you wish to fetch
something very large or from a very slow server). You may also fetch an
item (file or directory) while another one is still being fetched, since
TurboGopher supports multiple concurrent streams.  Command-Period
will cancel all active streams.


Starting, Configuring, Gopher Options
----------------------------------

The Start Gopher menu item opens a window containing the initial
directory fetched by connecting to your "primary" or "home" Gopher
server. TurboGopher is pre-configured to connect on startup to one of the
University of Minnesota's Gopher servers. You may change your "home"
or primary Gopher server by using the "Configure" menu item under the
Setup menu. To do this you need the full Internet domain name and port
of the desired primary server. It is now possible to configure TurboGopher
to use one of two alternate primary servers. This distributes the load for a
campus over two different (but equivalent) primary servers and it
prevents a single point of failure. TurboGopher will randomly try one of
the two and then try the other if the first is down.  If you don't understand
this, you don't have to bother with it or with the Another Gopher menu
item.

Use the Another Gopher menu item to connect directly to a Gopher server
if you know its full domain name and port. If you wish to find out more
about Gopher in's-and-out's visit the University of Minnesota's Gopher
server and look in the Information About Gopher folder.

The Open Gopher Bookmarks File menu item opens a Bookmark file.
This is equivalent to double clicking a Bookmark file in the Finder.  It is
however different from the Import Bookmarks menu item; the former
places the contents of the Bookmarks file in their own window, the latter
places them in the Bookmarks window.

Use the Options menu item (Setup menu) to customize some behaviors of
TurboGopher. The Single Directory Window checkbox makes
TurboGopher recycle its windows whenever you open a new directory
(and not just when you hold down the Option key).

Checking the "Cache Everything in Recent Menu" box will retain all
visited directory lists (even when windows are closed).  Since these lists
don't ever have to be fetched from the server again, this dramatically
increases speed when choosing any item from the Recent menu.  We
strongly recommend that you leave this item checked.  To be sure this uses
more memory.  However if TurboGopher runs out of memory it will first
inform you and then automatically release the caches.  This means there is
really no penalty and very great benefits to using the Caching option.  As
mentioned earlier, you may selectively release a directory’s cache by
closing the window while holding down the Shift key if you wish more
control over memory.

When you save documents, TurboGopher normally saves them as
MacWrite II TEXT documents (we like MacWrite II).  If you’d rather save
them as TEXT documents of your favorite word processor or editor, use
the appropriate button in the Options dialog to select the word processor of
your choice.  If you choose Word, we don’t really want to know!

Use the ISO Latin-1 button if you need to use Latin/Romance language
characters. Many sites in Europe have a need for this to display their
national characters. If you visit European gopher servers and the accented
characters don't display correctly, you may want to choose this option.  If
you visit Gopher servers with Japanese documents, and you are running a
Japanese system under System 7.1 or better, click on the Japanese SJIS (MS
Kanji) button to enable the display of Japanese (Kanji) characters.
Similarly you may enable the display of Classical Chinese characters if you
are running a Chinese system.


Miscellaneous.
-------------

The Get Attribute Info and Get Alternate Forms menu items are part of
the Gopher+ protocol extensions. At the time of this release of
TurboGopher, there are no real Gopher+ server implementations and
these items need to be tested further both for user interface and bugs.
Consequently they are disabled in this release. You'll also notice a disabled
Gopher+ checkbox in the Configuration dialog. These features will be
alive in the next major release...

TurboGopher stores what it needs in a file called TurboGopher Settings;
this lives in the Preferences folder, which is found in your System Folder.


For Experts
-----------

For folks wondering about Gopher+ protocol features, they've been
excluded from this release. We'll turn them all on in the next major
release after we've done some more local testing with them. We will also
do an overall tuning for yet more speed.

If you are a campus or department network administrator, and you would
like information about pre-configuring internal defaults, read the short
Inside TurboGopher document.  This is available in the Gopher software
distribution from the University of Minnesota’s Gopher server, along with
with the current version of TurboGopher itself.  You may send e-mail to
the Gopher Team at:

             [e-mail]

Please write to the development team (at the above address) with bugs,
suggestions, or (of course!) praise. To be informed by e-mail of new
developments in the Gopher world, or of new versions of Gopher
software, you may subscribe to "gopher-news"; Send your request to:

       [e-mail].


Have fun surfing the Internet...


 - The Internet Gopher Team at the University of Minnesota

   November 7, 1992