Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!triceratops.cis.ohio-state.edu!karl From: karl@triceratops.cis.ohio-state.edu (Karl Kleinpaste) Newsgroups: comp.mail.misc Subject: Re: Email to CompuServe? Message-ID: Date: 7 Feb 89 14:00:20 GMT References: <114800001@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu> Sender: news@tut.cis.ohio-state.edu Organization: OSU Lines: 36 In-reply-to: iahg0490@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu's message of 6 Feb 89 02:19:00 GMT iahg0490@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu writes: Does anyone know if it is possible to send email to users of the commercial computer services, such as CompuServe, from internet? (*exasperated sigh*) CompuServe: There is not, but there will be Real Soon Now. Yes, I know, it's been delayed and delayed and delayed. Tell me about it, folks - we've been fitfully hammering on the CServe folks to get their end of the beastie finished, and I had hoped we'd get it done before the end of January, but alas it didn't come to pass. I'm hoping to get them to finish dealing with it by the end of next week. We are very, very close - but don't hold your breath. Nameservers for compuserve.com have been alive since late September and pathalias data was published at that time as well, so whenever it is finished it can go to work immediately. Please do NOT "try it out" or "test" it at this time - there is a (somewhat unreliable) heuristic in the current alpha gateway which prevents mail from passing not between CServe and Ohio State, and if you manage to fool it and get through (a couple of people have, and my level of tolerance for such shenanigans is dropping *really* fast), you'll seriously irritate some people inside CServe. I'll also guarantee unconditionally that CServe users *cannot* get back out right now without knowing some deliberately obscure magic cookies, and the people who know them know not to advertise what they are. Others: Rick Adams mentioned at the UUNET/Usenet BOF last week at Usenix that he is working on getting some of the other commercial providers to gateway through UUNET. In large part, he is running into parochial attitudes demanding X.400 mailers, which he doesn't run. He did mention that he has recently had surprising success in discussions with (I think) Genie, where both his side and the other will provide some simple headers for each other. --Karl Kleinpaste acting postmaster@compuserve.com