Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!lll-winken!lll-tis!ames!mailrus!cornell!lauri
From: lauri@svax.cs.cornell.edu (Georges Lauri)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac
Subject: Re: Looking for Background Communications
Keywords: macintosh, communications, background, multifinder
Message-ID: <19472@cornell.UUCP>
Date: 21 Jul 88 19:21:17 GMT
Sender: nobody@cornell.UUCP
Reply-To: lauri@svax.cs.cornell.edu (Georges Lauri)
Organization: Cornell Univ. CS Dept, Ithaca NY
Lines: 69


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The Quest for Background communications:

A while ago, I posted a message asking for information about a comm program 
that could
-run in the background
-provide unattended remote access to my files from any computer, i.e. in
pure ASCII terminal form; something like a remote login
-upload/download, unattended, with or without error correction (Kermit or 
Xmodem); this
is not indispensible, as we are using secure (MNP) modems most of the time.
-password protection (please!)
-support generic hayes-compatible modems (I own a Microcom AX/9600+, which 
crashes
Smartcomm //)


Basically, the responses have indicated three possibilities, but without going
into details.

jfbrule@cmx.npac.syr.edu (Jim Brule) writes:

>I'd strongly recommend Microphone II, especially since it has the nicest
>'scripting' (ie, programmability) I've seen, but is extremely simple to
>use. It supports kermit, macbinary, etc., etc. I am a very happy user of it...

hodas@eniac.seas.upenn.edu (Josh Hodas) writes:

>IN response to this and another poster who asked about differences between 
>Versaterm 3.1 and 3.2, one of the things Versaterm added in 3.2 is a very
>nice upload/download driver.  THe remote machine can request directories, and
>tell the mac to send or recieve, in any given protocol.  SInce Versaterm
>already supports backgrounding in general, this ought to do it.  All commands
>are simple ascii control strings.

beloin@tcgould.TN.CORNELL.EDU writes:

>Red Ryder will do what you want through its scripting language. A
>little bit a programming to set it up, but not much diffuculty, I
>believe. It has a "host mode". I'm not sure if the mac can be used
>for anything else while this is running, however. (...)

schoaff@cs.cornell.edu (Peter Schoaff) told me about a shareware BBS system,
WWIV, which runs on the Mac. However, it would need a significant reworking
to be suitable for this task, and the sources are not available.

Hence, the three possibilities of Microphone //, RR, and Versaterm 3.2 are 
open.
Has anyone out there actually used these programs as I suggest, and can you 
report
on the "holes" in those postings; specifically
-Has someone written Microphone scripts for this? given the cost, I'm a bit 
leery
to just buy it and try it
-Any comments about Versaterm 3.2? Backgrounding? So far it looks like the 
winner.
-Does RR work in the background (MF)? Is it reliable? Could you, for instance,
remotely display a directory?

Please Email any reponses to me, i'll make a summary and tell you about my own
experiences with setting up the system.

                                              Georges Lauri
                                              lauri@svax.cs.cornell.edu