FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTION: How can I search and retrieve old messages 
posted to the Forum?


RESPONSE:  You can find all the messages posted to the Forum by searching 
the message archives at Rootsweb.  Or, you can find some of the material at 
the SCRoots Forum web site.  Try these pages.

http://scroots.org/

http://www.rootsweb.com/

http://archiver.rootsweb.com/

http://archiver.rootsweb.com/archives/COKER-L/

http://archiver.rootsweb.com/archives/DUBOSE-L/

http://archiver.rootsweb.com/archives/SCROOTS-L/

http://www.rootsweb.com/rootsweb/searches/

http://searches.rootsweb.com/cgi-bin/listsearch.pl

-=-=-=-=-

You can also retrieve Forum digests by:

Retrieving Archived Messages

BEFORE YOU ATTEMPT ANYTHING DESCRIBED IN THESE INSTRUCTIONS BE SURE THAT 
YOU HAVE READ ALL THE INSTRUCTIONS AND ALL THE NOTES GIVEN AT THE 
BOTTOM.  DO NOT ABUSE THIS SERVICE.  KEEP ARCHIVE RETRIEVALS TO THE MINIMUM 
NECESSARY.  THEY PUT AN EXTRA LOAD ON THE SERVERS.

A. THE DIRECTORY OF DIGEST FILES.


To find out which 1998 SCRoots digests are available send a message like this.


        To: SCRoots-D-request@rootsweb.com
   Subject: archive


            dir volume98
            quit

This will return a directory listing for all the 1998 SCRoots digests.  The 
digests may have been zipped (gz) or they may be in raw text (rw) 
format.  A typical listing reported might be as follows.

   -rw-rw----  1 slist  slist  30432 Mar 11 05:22 77

This tells you that digest Issue #77 was sent out using Smartlist on March 11th
at 05:22, the archived digest is only available in raw format and the file is
about 30,432 (30k) in size.


B. RETRIEVING A DIGEST.


To get digest Issue #77 in raw text form send a message like this.


        To: SCRoots-D-request@rootsweb.com
   Subject: archive


            get volume98/77
            quit


If available in gz format, use "get volume98/77.gz" to get the gz version.


C. NOTE WELL THE FOLLOWING.


* If you haven't read ALL of these instructions, then don't try any of this.

* If you do not understand these instructions, then don't try any of this.

* Turn your signature off.  If you must append a signature, include the 
"quit" command to prevent the archive server from interpreting the 
signature.  If the archive server tries to interpret the signature as 
commands, the results may be something you really don't want to happen and 
both you and the service may regret it.

* Turn off all "card" attachments.  If the archive server tries to 
interpret the card as commands, the results may be something you really 
don't want to happen.

* Do not use capitals, directories and files are case sensitive.

* It may take from a few minutes to several hours or more before the server 
sends the requested file.  Be patient.  Do not resend the request.  Wait 
until you get a response from the request before you try something 
else.  If you don't get a reply within 24 hours then the request probably 
failed and you may want to try again.

* Don't send a lot of requests for archives.  Use this utility 
sparingly.  It adds significantly to the server's workload.

* For zipped files you will need to know how to unzip the file using a 
utility like WinZip (shareware).  You can download and install unzipping 
utility programs from many shareware sites on the Internet such as 
http://www.download.com.  If you don't know how to do this, then you should 
learn before you try to retrieve the archives.

* DO NOT SEND /* COMMANDS TO RETRIEVE ARCHIVES!  Retrieving all of the 
messages in a list archive at once using a /* command will typically double 
the load on the list server, and possibly worse.  On a high volume list 
this may be a request for thousands of messages, which is too much for the 
list server to handle, and will probably kill your own mailbox.  This is at 
best reverse spamming and at worst is malicious hacking and may be a 
punishable offense.  Instead of flooding the list server with messages, 
you're asking the list server to flood you with messages.  Either action is 
unwise and may cause damage to both the server and you.  DO NOT USE THE /* 
COMMAND!

* The Forum began in 1998.  There are no archived messages before 1998.

* Please don't ask me to explain any of this.  I can't explain it better 
than what I just did.  If you can't figure it out from what I've written in 
these instructions, then you probably should not be using this special 
utility service, yet.

Hope that helps,

Steven J. Coker
Coker Forum Manager, http://cokers.org/
DuBose Forum Manager, http://dubose.org/
SCRoots Forum Manager, http://scroots.org/

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