Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!ames!lll-winken!uunet!conch!steve
From: steve@conch.uunet (Steve Froeschke)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.ibm.pc
Subject: Re: software for sending mail XENIX to DOS pc's
Message-ID: <192@conch.uunet>
Date: 19 Jul 89 20:09:00 GMT
References: <186@zorin.UUCP> <56.UUL1.3#5131@mvac23.UUCP>
Reply-To: steve@conch.UUCP (PUT YOUR NAME HERE)
Organization: KEY's Paradise, Key West, FL
Lines: 25

In article <56.UUL1.3#5131@mvac23.UUCP> mvac23!thomas@udel.edu writes:
>> J. Brooke King asked 'what's a fido'... Well I don't know much about it, 
>> but it is something similar to usenet, but much smaller scale.. I think it
>> comes out of bbs systems.
>
>You are right that it comes out of BBS's.  It is a network of PC-BBSs which
>exchange mail somewhat like UUCP does.  However, rather than being any-to-
>any the way UUCP is, FidoNet is more like a hirearchical structure.  Individual
>nodes communicate with hub nodes which communicate with 'super-hub' nodes,
>(they may be called regional nodes).  They are sort of like backbone nodes.
>
Tom, you're partially correct.  :-)   Fidonet systems are run under PC/MSDOS
machines, running quite a variety of BBS software.  They can however either
send mail direct to the receipient (spelling?!?) or via the 'host'.  If they
send to their host, that host will send to the receipient's host, who will
in turn send it to the destination machine.  Echomail (something like the
newsgroups here), is sent from local > hub > regional hub > backbone ....
and so on down the line (or up the line!)  I just left Fidonet and joined
uunet.  When I left Fido, there where quite a few systems around the world.
(I'd hate to even put a number count!)  But, to sum up, Fido is to MS/PCDOS
what Unix/Xenix (and the others!) are to usenet.

Steve Froeschke		|	uunet!conch!steve
1408D Rickett Circle
Key West FL  33040