From: gibbsm@ll.mit.edu (MargAret D Gibbs) Date: 11 Dec 93 05:00:22 GMT Newsgroups: rec.arts.tv.soaps,rec.answers,news.answers Subject: ALL: rec.arts.tv.soaps Monthly FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions) Archive-name: tv/soaps/faq Last changed - 11/03/93 Changes since last posting - MAJOR: new info regarding "NetNews on CD's" in section 16 - Section 15 now includes AW actress Robyn Griggs and BB actor Brent Jasmer's brother as readers of r.a.t.s. Following is a list of helpful hints and posting information. All new readers of rec.arts.tv.soaps are encouraged to read this. If you are already familiar with these subjects, just hit "n" to go to the next article. These instructions will be posted once per month. They are also available through anonymous ftp from rtfm.mit.edu under /pub/usenet/news.answers/tv/soaps/faq, or send email to mail-server@rtfm.mit.edu with "send usenet/news.answers/tv/soaps/faq" in the body of the message. Send comments, corrections, additions to me, questions to the newsgroup (I don't know everything and can't answer everything). THANKS. These instructions/questions are broken up into the following sections: 1. The Subject Line 2. Special Abbreviations 3. KILL Files 4. readnews Information 5. vn Information 6. vnews Information 7. netnews Information 8. How to post via email 9. Signature files 10. Spoiler protection (Ctrl-L usage) 11. Retrieving lost articles/replies 12. What does [acronym] stand for? 13. Where's such-and-such an update? 14. Why don't we split up this newsgroup? 15. Do the soap writers/actors read rec.arts.tv.soaps? 16. Is there an ftp archive for rec.arts.tv.soaps from which I can retrieve past posts? 17. Pointers to more information for new posters (and old!) First major hint - if you use rn to read your news, type h for help. Read the instructions. They really do help. 1. The Subject Line: (this applies to everyone who posts in this group) Whenever you post about a specific soap, please put the standard soap abbreviation in the beginning of the subject line. Be sure that if you are replying to another post, you check the subject line. If the original poster has inadvertently omitted the abbreviation - add it! The complete list of soap abbreviations can be found in Melissa Wauford's posting *** REC.ARTS.TV.SOAPS POSTING GUIDELINES ***. If it is no longer available on your system, you can retrieve it from the archives by sending mail to mail-server@rtfm.mit.edu with "send usenet/news.answers/tv/soaps/abbrevs" in the body of the message. If you have a general comment (not specific to one soap, like the soap opera awards or the soap opera magazine) you can just indicate the subject in the subject line (or use "ALL", "ABC", etc. in the subject line). If you reply to a post which is a general comment, don't change the subject line for no reason. For example: some one posts: ~Subject: ALL: Soap Opera Digest - comments ...and some one will reply: ~Subject: ALL: More Comments on Soap Opera Digest Don't do this! The reason for all these rules has to do with the way the KILL file works. (Sorry! I only know how to do this if you use rn to read your news.) In the rn news program, you can set up a KILL file to automatically delete articles of a given Subject. The KILL file is explained in section 3 below. 2. Special Abbreviations - to be used after the soap abbreviation in the Subject line. AMC: SPOILER The AMC group has adopted this abbreviation to indicate that the article contains spoilers that may have been obtained from the soap magazines or elsewhere. Make sure you use this if you reply to articles with spoilers, or if you mention spoilers you have heard on the net! [Soap-Abbreviation]: TAN Many of the soap subgroups have adopted the TAN abbreviation (short for TANgent) to indicate that the article contains personal comments, not necessarily related to the soap. This way if you are not interested in hearing about how many cats a person has, etc., you can put this subject in your kill file (explained below). 3. KILL Files: - for rn and trn users The easiest way to start a KILL file is, whenever you see an article that you aren't interested in, to type [Shift] K The subject will then automatically go into a local KILL file. If the KILL file doesn't already exist, one will be created. Then any time an article with that subject comes up, it will automatically be deleted. Here is a complete KILL file: WARNING!! This will delete all soaps! You will want to make sure you DON'T include the abbreviations for the soaps that you want to see articles about. NOTE - the description in () should NOT be included in the KILL file. It is only for your reference. /: *30/:j (Thirty Something) /alt.flame/h:j (in response to a rash of posts that came from alt.flame) /: *AMC/:j (All My Children) /: *ATWT/:j (As the World Turns) /: *AW/:j (Another World) /: *B&B/:j (Bold and Beautiful) /: *BB/:j (sometimes used for Bold and Beautiful) /: *B & B/:j (sometimes used for Bold and Beautiful) /: *BH/:j (Beverly Hills 90210) /: *DAL/:j (Dallas) /: *Dark/:j (Dark Shadows) /: *DOOL/:j (Days of Our Lives) /: *DAYS/:j (sometimes used for Days of Our Lives) /: *EE/:j (East Enders) /: *GEN/:j (Generations) /: *GH/:j (General Hospital) /: *GL/:j (Guiding Light) /: *HF/:j (Home Front) /: *KL/:j (Knots Landing) /: *LA/:j (LA Law) /: *LGO/:j (Life Goes On) /: *LOV/:j (Loving) /: *LUV/:j (sometimes used for Loving) /: *OLTL/:j (One Life to Live) /: *SANDS/:j (Shifting Sands - the net.soap.) /: *SB/:j (Santa Barbara - now cancelled) /: *SC/c:j (Swan's Crossing) /: *SIS/c:j (Sisters) /: *SOAP/:j (Soap) /: *Y&R/:j (Young and Restless) /: *Y & R/:j (sometimes used for Young and Restless) You can edit the KILL file by typing: [Ctrl] k while you are in the news. If the file gets too big it will take too long to go through. You will want to keep only the first word in the KILL file. For example, if an article with the Subject "GH - Tuesday's Update" appears and you are not interested in General Hospital, type [Shift] K, and: /: *GH - Tuesday's Update/:j will be put in the KILL file. Then type [Ctrl] k, and edit the file to say: /: *GH/:j Then all the General Hospital articles will be deleted the next time you read news. To learn more about KILL files, send email to mail-server@rtfm.mit.edu with "send usenet/news.answers/killfile-faq" in the body of the message. 4. readnews Information On my particular system, I have both "rn" and "readnews" available. You might want it see if you have "rn" available. I like "rn" much better; I will explain why in the following paragraphs. To find out what is available, look at the man pages. Type: "man readnews" and "man rn" This will also give you a lot of interesting information. If "rn" is not available, or if you like "readnews" better, there is a function that is similar to the KILL file in "readnews". Instead of KILLing articles of a given subject, you read only articles with a given subject(s). For example, on my system, if you read All My Children, One Life to Live, and Generations, type: readnews -t OLTL AMC GEN Rita sent email to me (thanks Rita) indicating that her system works slightly differently from mine. She would have to type: readnews -n rec.arts.tv.soaps -t OLTL AMC GEN This way you would not have to go through all the articles about the other soaps. The only problem is, if someone doesn't use the standard soap abbreviation, or if there is a different subject, like "Soap Opera Digest Awards" then you would miss the article. That's why I like "rn" better. In "rn", I KILL all the standard soap abbreviations except for those I read (AMC and GEN). That way, I get everything except the other soaps, instead of only my soaps. Try reading the man page and experimenting. If you figure anything else out, let me know, and I will share the info with everyone else when I post the "FAQ" info each month. [The above section was probably written by Sandra Macika. If you positively know who wrote it, please email me: gibbsm@ll.mit.edu. Rita Prisco (roxy@cbnewsj.cb.att.com) also contributed to the above section.] 5. vn Information Hi, I am Dorothy. I thought I was the only person who was using VN instead of RN. Nothing anybody ever said on the NET about using RN made any sense to me because VN is -different- -- KILL FILES meant nothing to me, at least how to get them to work. So I read through the pitifully inadequate DOC that came with the VISUAL NEWS READER (2/1/85) to see if I could find something that would make reading the news easier and more fun and most of all FASTER. I found the "marker method" which took a long time to figure out, but I use it all the time now and it has made VN a pleasure instead of a pain. I will try to describe it so will make sense to you. It isn't easy putting things like this into words. Say you are in rec.arts.tv.soaps with your cursor at the beginning article. If you are like me, you only care about two or three soaps -- mine are AMC, OLTL, and GH. I also like to read through the misc. ramblings -- they are fun, too. Use the small j to run through the group of articles. When you come to one you want to read, hit the small x. This will put a * beside the article. Keep doing this until you have everything you want to read marked with the *. Next step is to press [Ctrl] r -- the program will prompt you with words like string to search? Type in an * and hit Return. Your VN reader will only present you with the articles you have selected, one by one in order. If you make a boo-boo and mark the wrong article simply hit small x again and it will unmark it. A capital X will unmark all articles. I suppose you know this already but if you do a small k, it will move the cursor backwards to an article you may have missed marking the first time. You do *not* have to unmark to update the entire page. It took me awhile to "get into the rhythm" of the process, but it is second nature now and gets me through the reading in a fraction of time it used to take. I hope this works for you as well. I am sure as hell no computer programmer so I didn't understand KILL files or any of that stuff, but this works just great for me. Don't hesitate to E-mail me back. I am sure no expert, but if I can help at all, I would be glad to hear from you. Dorothy |```````````````````````````| | Dorothy (Dot) | | ken@csufres.csufresno.edu | ````````````````````````````` 6. vnews Information Hi. Are you using VNEWS? If so, this is what you have to do to filter out soaps in which you aren't interested. (I find it easiest to do a "d" first, and get the directory of the whole group. It makes the rest of it run faster.) At the command prompt, type: k/whatever subject you do not want to read. It must be a lower case k. Do this for each soap in which you are not interested. For me, that means I do: k/amc (where means I hit the return key. NOT THE ENTER KEY) k/y&r k/oltl, etc., etc. noonan@sonata.enet.dec.com (E Grace Noonan) 7. netnews Information Hello! I've been a lurker and occasional poster on RATS for a few months now. I've read the FAQ's and found some of the info quite helpful (I now know what A&Dw/SOM means!) However, I use netnews to read RATS and, as far as I know, I can't use a Kill file. I can create something called an ignore file, but this just excludes posts from certain people, not posts about certain subjects. What does help is a function key called "SortSubj". (It's F14 on my keyboard.) This sorts all the articles by subject and makes it a lot easier to find the articles I want to read (mostly AMC, and the ALL, ABC, etc. articles.) Also on netnews I can search for articles I want to read by typing a slash followed by a word that might appear in the subject heading of articles that I would want to read, for example: /AMC. I'm not sure if everyone using netnews is offered these features. I would suggest checking the help screens to find out if you do have the "SortSubj." function. I'm no expert, but if anyone has any questions, I'd gladly help out. DKIEL@vma.cc.nd.edu (Diana Kiel) 8. How to post via email: Usenet News MailServers exist at pws.bull.com, cs.utexas.edu, decwrl.dec.com, and news.cs.indiana.edu. These servers allow you to post to a Usenet newsgroup via email, and can be useful if you have read-only access to Usenet news. To use them, mail your post to rec-arts-tv-soaps@cs.utexas.edu; or to rec.arts.tv.soaps.usenet@decwrl.dec.com; or to rec.arts.tv.soaps@host, where "host" is either news.cs.indiana.edu or pws.bull.com. There is also a mailserver especially set up for the rec.arts.tv.soaps group. To use it, mail your post to soaps@grafex.sbay.org. Please do not use these services if you have other posting access to the Usenet, and please remember to put the Soap Abbreviation in your subject line. 9. Signature files How do I get the news software to include a signature with my postings? [from Gene Spafford's postings in news.announce.newusers with info on Waffle systems from Steve Harding] This is a question that is best answered by examining the documentation for the software you're using, as the answer varies depending on the software. However, if you're reading news on a Unix machine, then you can probably get a signature to appear on your outgoing messages by creating a file called ".signature" in your home directory. Two important things to remember are: a. Many article-posting programs will restrict the length of the signature. For example, the "inews" program will often only include the first four lines. This is not something you should be trying to find a way to defeat; it is there for a reason. If your signature is too long, according to the software, then shorten it. b. Under some news configurations, your .signature file must be world-readable, and your home directory world-executable, for your signature to be included correctly in your articles. If your .signature does not get included, try running these commands: chmod a+x $HOME chmod a+r $HOME/.signature If you are posting from a MS-DOS machine running Waffle, create a file called "newssig" in your home directory. Leave FEEDBACK to your sysop if you have problems. Signatures are nice, but don't overdo it. Signatures can tell the world something about you, but keep them short. A signature that is longer than the message itself is considered to be in bad taste. The main purpose of a signature is to help people locate you, not to tell your life story. Every signature should include at least your return address relative to a major, known site on the network and a proper domain-format address. Your system administrator can give this information to you. 10. Spoiler protection: How to use a Ctrl-L Sometimes people get advance notice of what's going to happen on a soap. Some people like reading these spoilers; others would rather be surprised. If you're going to post a spoiler, it's a good idea to protect the information with a Ctrl-L, as well as by putting "spoiler" in the subject line. The Ctrl-L will allow some newsreaders to stop displaying text in the post, until the reader intervenes. Be sure to use the Ctrl-L as the FIRST character on a line, otherwise it can't do its job. Likewise, if you're following up to a post with a Ctrl-L, remember to REMOVE any previous characters on the line which your news software inserts. If your editor is emacs or uemacs, you type first Ctrl-Q and then the control character you want to appear. (So for Ctrl-L the entire sequence would be Ctrl-Q Ctrl-L). (By Ctrl-Q I mean hold down the control key and press q at the same time, then release both) If you use vi, you have to be in insert mode (where you can type directly into the file rather than move around) and then you can just press Ctrl-L. (thanks to Ellen Sasse: sasse@netcom.com) 11. Retrieving lost articles/replies Have you ever typed a long summary or reply and somehow blew it (hit the wrong key, system went down, aborted accidentally, etc)? There is a way to retrieve your file! Look in any one of the following files - located in your home directory (if you are on a Unix machine): dead.letter dead.article .article .letter Note that the latter two files will not be seen if you do a regular "ls". To see files the begin with a ".", you must type "ls -a". 12. Acronyms commonly used by posters: A&DwSOM: Armed and Dangerous with Soap Opera Magazine BH: Butt-Head or Better Half BTW: By The Way CUL: See You Later FAQ: Frequently Asked Question FF: Fast Forward FWIW: For What It's Worth FYI: For Your Information IDTS: I Don't Think So IMHO: In My Humble (or Honest) Opinion IMNSHO: In My Not So Humble Opinion IOAS: It's Only A Soap... IOASOG: It's Only A Soap Opera Group JTYLTK: Just thought you'd like to know JTYMLTK: Just thought you might like to know OTF: On The Floor OTFL: On The Floor Laughing RATS: Rec.Arts.TV.Soaps ROTFL: Rolling On The Floor Laughing RSN: Real Soon Now SO: Significant Other TIIC: The Idiots in Charge TPTB: The Powers That Be TTFN: Ta-Ta For Now TTYL: Talk To You Later 13. Where's such-and-such an update? (For soaps which have regular updaters, ie AMC) Remember that the updaters are real people with real jobs and real school work just like you. Let's put it this way -- if someone works 8-5 and watches a soap opera episode after work, it might be difficult for them to have the update done by early the next morning. Also, there is often a bit of lag time between the time an article is posted and when the article reaches your news site. So *please* don't post an article on Tuesday asking where Monday's update is... you might upset the Monday updater enough that he or she will stop doing the updates altogether! 14. Why don't we split up this newsgroup? Approximately once every three months or so (sometimes more often), someone brings up the idea of splitting rec.arts.tv.soaps (RATS) into several smaller, easier to read newsgroups -- you can be assured that the idea will be brought up at the beginning of each and every school semester as new people get access to RATS. While this may seem like a very good idea, it is really quite impractical for at least the following two reasons (we're sure there are more): a. Creating new newsgroups is very difficult and is a very long and drawn out process. In order to create a new group, the proposal has to be discussed on news.groups and be voted on and approved by the net-world at large -- that means everybody, not just us RATSers. For a new group to be created it must receive at least 100 more "yes" votes than "no" votes *and* at least 2/3 of the votes must be "yes". b. How to split the group? People in RATS are quite divided on this issue. Do we split by each soap? Obviously there aren't enough people discussing some soaps for them to warrant their own group. Do we split by network? Some people watch soaps from more than one network so they don't want a split -- and what about posts that are meant for everyone? Where would they get posted? Do we split by volume? Different soaps generate varying amounts of conversation depending on what's happening in the show -- it's hard to anticipate where to make such a split. While we might come to some sort of agreement on the split, there will be several RATSers who are against that particular split so they'd vote "no" -- add those "no" votes to the votes of the people against the creation of any new groups and the people who don't think a discussion of soaps is warranted on USENET and the split just won't pass. Basically, the point is, this issue has been discussed over and over and over here in RATS and the consensus is to just leave things the way they are. We've yet to find anyone willing to do all the work to separate the group. We recommend that anyone who wishes to attempt a split of RATS read news.groups for at least two weeks (and we mean read *every* article) and then decide if you really want to go to the effort. In addition to the difficulties involved in getting a new group created, we'd have the added difficulty in trying to convince the net-world at large that soap operas are important enough to even warrant the existence of RATS -- let alone the creation of several new groups. Simply announcing the idea in news.groups would create an incredible amount of "nasty" anti-soap talk which would be very unpleasant. One last thing, check out the part of rec.arts.tv.soaps FAQ which explains the use of kill files to weed out articles you are not interested in. We realize everyone doesn't have access to a kill file but there's nothing we can do about that. If you are such a person, you might consider speaking with your system administrator about upgrading your news reading software. [Thanks to Joanna Castillo (pefv702@humble.pe.utexas.edu) and Cindy Camp (snoopy@spacemanspiff.den.mmc.com)] 15. Do the soap writers/actors read rec.arts.tv.soaps? Many readers of this newsgroup have wondered if the writers of their soap opera(s) read r.a.t.s. James Kiberd [Trevor Dillon] told an AMC fan that the writers read both the UNIX and Prodigy newsgroups. It also appears that Robyn Griggs, an actress on AW, has access to r.a.t.s through her boyfriend, Thede's, account, as well as having an account of her own. Bryce Jasmer, actor Brent Jasmer's (of B&B) brother, reads r.a.t.s and has given Brent some of our comments. If anyone else has proof that the writers (or actors!) of their soap reads r.a.t.s., please email me (gibbsm@ll.mit.edu). 16. Is there an ftp archive for rec.arts.tv.soaps from which I can retrieve past posts? Not that I'm aware of. Most news sites expire articles after a week or two, and some even more quickly. The only two posts which I *know* are archived are the soaps-faq and the soaps-abbrevs, as mentioned in the soaps-faq. However, since January 1992, the entire Usenet newsfeed has been made available on CD-ROM, so you may be able to find what you want that way. You can get more information on "NetNews on CD's" from CD Publishing Corporation, 4824 Fraser Street, Vancouver, BC, Canada V5V 4H4, phone numbers: 604-874-1430, 800-333-7565 (USA), 604-874-1431 (FAX), or email: info@CDPublishing.com. In the near future, their product information will also be available via Gopher at gopher.CDPublishing.com(TCP/70). I contacted them in October of 1993, and they said that for those who would like just a rec.arts.tv.soaps archive CD, they could make custom one-off for them. DISCLAIMER: I have no association with CD Publishing Corporation, and don't even have a CD-ROM player. 17. Pointers to more information for new posters (and old!) There is a lot more useful information available on the usenet network which is not contained in the scope of this FAQ. The news.announce.newusers newsgroup contains explanatory postings for new users. Its purpose is to provide a base set of information with which all participants in the USENET should be familiar in order to make the USENET (and r.a.t.s.!) a better place for all of us. If you have not already done so, you are strongly encouraged to read these postings before posting any messages. In particular, the following postings in news.announce.newusers are especially useful for new users: A Primer on How to Work With the Usenet Community Answers to Frequently Asked Questions Emily Postnews Answers Your Questions on Netiquette Hints on writing style for Usenet Rules for posting to Usenet What is Usenet? The articles in news.announce.newusers are posted in such a way that each version should stay around at each site until the new version is posted. However, some sites are configured incorrectly so that this does not occur. If the articles listed above do not appear in the news.announce.newusers newsgroup at your site, you can get copies of them using email. Simply send an email message to mail-server@rtfm.mit.edu containing any or all of: send usenet/news.answers/usenet-primer/part1 send usenet/news.answers/usenet-faq/part1 send usenet/news.answers/emily-postnews/part1 send usenet/news.answers/usenet-writing-style/part1 send usenet/news.answers/posting-rules/part1 send usenet/news.answers/what-is-usenet/part1 Other good sources of information on the USENET network are the newsgroups news.newusers.questions (be sure to read its weekly FAQ before posting a question yourself), and news.software.readers (for newsreader-specific questions). Also, news.answers contains most of the FAQ's posted to each newsgroup, including the soaps-faq and soaps-abbrevs postings. Happy hunting! -- Margaret D. Gibbs "Practice random kindness and Assistant Staff senseless acts of beauty" MIT Lincoln Laboratory gibbsm@ll.mit.edu