RIME POSTLINK R/O and PRIVATE MAIL - Revised: 09-09-1996


TYPES OF MESSAGES

The following pertains to BBSs using POSTLINK.  Both your BBS and
the BBS you are sending a message to must support POSTLINK.  At
the time of this writing, the vast majority of RIME BBSs use
POSTLINK.  However, as POSTLINK is no longer supported or
available, this percentage will be come less and less.

In reading the messages on the RIME network, you have probably
come across some relay terms that you are unfamiliar with.  
Phrases such as "R/O", "Routed",  etc. refer to the different
ways of sending a message.

While no message placed on the network can legally be considered
private, you can direct a message to a single individual by
making it R/O, i.e. Receiver Only. The BBS software in use on the
BBS that you access RIME through will determine how you mark a
message as R/O. On PCBoard systems, it is actually termed
Receiver Only. On other systems, it may be called "private". By
marking the message as private or R/O on the BBS, you are making
the message R/O in respect to RIME as well.

There is a consideration to be made before sending someone an R/O
message.  Plain, unrouted R/O mail is usually not exported from a
BBS that is on a PostLink network.  If you send an unrouted R/O
message, and your board does not allow the export of this type of
mail, you will receive a message from PostLink telling you that
the message was not sent into the network and that you should
send the message routed as well as private.

We strongly recommend that you do not leave UNROUTED private
messages to other users in the network. Private, unrouted mail is
delivered to every system in the network and is readable by any
person with sufficient security to read private mail.  We
recommend that any message you wish to be sent private, be sent
via ROUTED MAIL only.  Always remember, there is no mail in the
network that cannot be read by the sending and receiving SYSOPs,
and while we do not guarantee real private mail, the software
facility for sending routed messages, which limits the sending of
messages to just the boards to which the message is routed, helps
save each and every SYSOP money and disk space.

                           Routed messages

A routed message is a message meant to be delivered to only
specific board(s) mentioned in the routing information of a
message. It may be either public or private.

To send a routed message you must know either the SITE number or
the IDCODE of the board you wish to reach. The IDCODE, which is a
group of up to 12 letters including some numbers, appears
immediately after the words POSTLINK version number in every
tagline.  The site number then immediately follows the IDCODE and
is preceded by the # symbol. The # symbol is NOT part of the site
number.  You should ignore it, it is just a signal that the site
number follows directly. If the board you wish to route to does
not have a PostLink site number or ID Code, you may not
be able to route your message.  If you are not sure, ask the
Conference Host of the conference you are Messaging in.

Here is a typical tagline:

* Collector's EDITION, Dallas, TX (214)351-9859/9871 14.4 <ASP>
* PostLink(tm) v1.20  EDITION (#79) : RelayNet(tm)
                     /^^^^^^^   ^^ \
                    /               \
                   /                 \
         This is the IDCODE     This is the Site Number
              EDITION                    79

As you can see, the information you need in order to route
appears after the word "PostLink(tm) vX.XX in the tagline area.
The IDCODE immediately follows the PostLink version number and
the SITE number is preceded by the # symbol. Do NOT use the #
symbol in your routing information.

The symbol for routing is -> This is a hyphen immediately
followed by a greater than symbol or arrow pointing to the right.
This routing symbol must then be immediately followed by the site
number or the IDCODE.  You do not need both the IDCODE and the
site number. This routing symbol must be placed in the extreme
upper left hand corner of the message, on the very first line. 
Do not start the text of your message immediately after your
routing symbol.  Skip a line before you start the body of your
message.

Either ->MOONDOG   or   ->35

If you want to know when the routed message arrived and thereby
receive a "return receipt", place a backward routing symbol <-
immediately after
the site number or the IDCODE.  It might look like this:

->35<-

You may route a message to more than one site at the same time by
stacking the site number or IDCODE on the routing line, each
route separate by a space.  This is called multicasting.  You may
mix site numbers and IDCODES and you may mix upper and lower
cases for the IDCODES. The IDCODE does not need to be in upper
case. You may also request a return receipts when multicasting,
but realize you will receive a return receipt from every system
you have on your routing line.

Here is an example of a multicasted message asking for a return
receipt:

->MOONDOG 547 modemzone 1121 687 5 1421 Earthzone<-

Multicasted messages all are addressed to the same person and are
most useful when trying to reach SYSOPs, a particular user that
frequents more boards than one, or ALL the users of a few select
boards. You may multicast either public or private messages.

Routed messages may of course be either public or R/O.

NOTE:  The directional arrow is nothing more than a hyphen
("minus key") followed by a greater than key (>).  It is not the
right arrow key on your keyboard.

NOTE:  There is no space between the arrow and the IDCODE or Site
Number of the destination node.

NOTE:  PostLink will read the occurrence of the symbol ->WORD if
it is the first thing on the first line as an attempt on your
part to route a message.  Do not use -> as a quoting symbol in
your reader unless you leave a space between the '->' and the
first letter of the following word. BE CAREFUL!

NOTE:  To successfully route, the routing symbol and site you are
routing to must be the very first thing on the very first
line in the extreme left hand corner of the message.  Do NOT skip
a line if you wish to have your routing symbol honored by the
software.

By using the Routing function, you can help decrease the traffic
of messages that clutter conferences and actually lower the
operating cost of many nodes.
