From bobrankin@MHV.NET Sun Aug 31 20:53:09 1997 Date: Wed, 27 Aug 1997 01:27:29 -0400 From: Bob Rankin Reply-To: TOURBUS-Request@LISTSERV.AOL.COM To: TOURBUS@LISTSERV.AOL.COM Subject: TOURBUS - 26 Aug 1997 - Fun With E-Mail _________ ____________ ________ __________ _____________ ___ _ / | / | | / | \ | "Why | Surf When / You Can | Ride The | Bus?" / | \ |__________|__________/__________|__________|___________/ | \ / /______|----\ | Visit the TOURBUS website to see the Archives, |//////| | | FAQ, and Subscription Information! |//////| | | http://www.TOURBUS.com |//////| | \________________________________________________________|______|____| / \ / \ / \ \___/ \___/ T h e I n t e r n e t T o u r B u s \___/ TODAY'S TOURBUS TOPIC: Fun With E-Mail In most Tourbus issues, we highlight an interesting web site, but today I'm going to do something different. I've picked out ten things you can do with e-mail that are fun, useful or educational. All you have to do is send an e-mail message to the addresses shown here to join the party - there's no need for a Web browser or any other software. After composing your e-mail message as instructed, send it off and you should get the goodies delivered to your inbox in a jiffy! But before we get to the e-mail goodies, I have a correction to make. Several astute readers pointed out that the address for the free animated birthday cards was incorrect. Indeed, it should be this: http://www.mediasyn.com/bday.htm 1. REMINDERS BY E-MAIL Are you constantly in the dog house because you keep forgetting your anniversary? If you need a little help remembering important events, try the E-minder service. Tell it about your important meetings, birthdays, anniversaries, and when the date of your event approaches, you will receive an automatically generated electronic mail message as a reminder. You can specify how early you would like to get the reminder message, and you can register as many reminders as you like. For directions on setting e-minder appointments by e-mail, send a message like this: TO: e-minder@netmind.com SUBJECT: e-minder help BODY: 2. GERMAN/ENGLISH TRANSLATION SERVICE The LEO translation service, which will translate German to English, and vice versa, is available by e-mail. Put the words you want to have translated in the message body and you'll get the translation in reply. Note that this service doesn't translate sentences--just individual words and phrases. Input is restricted to ten lines, each line consisting of up to 80 characters. Try it out "nur zum Spass" (just for the fun of it)! TO: translate@leo.org SUBJECT: BODY: (words to translate) 3. VIRTUAL PIZZA Order an electronic pizza by e-mail! Using this service, you can create an image of a pizza, choosing from a very interesting list of toppings which includes pepperoni, kittens, mushrooms, footballs, peppers and bolts. Your pizza will be delivered as an encoded image, so you'll have to save it as a text file and decode it before viewing. Digital pizza might not taste so great, but it's definitely less filling. Send a message like this to get instructions: TO: pizza@ecst.csuchico.edu SUBJECT: pizza help BODY: 4. WORD FUN WITH THE WORDSERVER The Wordserver will serve up A Word A Day (subscribe and receive a new vocabulary word each day in your inbox), Thesaurus-by-Mail (find the synonyms of a word), Acronym-by-Mail (get the meaning of an acronym), and Anagram-by-Mail (figure the anagrams of a word). Anagrams are formed by rearranging the letters of a word into other words or phrases. For example, "partial men" is an anagram of "parliament". To get usage instructions, send e-mail like this: TO: wsmith@wordsmith.org SUBJECT: BODY: 5. GAMES BY E-MAIL You can also play games via the PBeM (Play By e-Mail) Server. Some of the games currently supported are: Chess, Backgammon, Connect4, Dots and Boxes, Othello, Reversi and Pente. Games are played by e-mail against one or more e-mail correspondents. Each time a player makes a move, a copy of the game board is sent to each of the players in that game, and you can even tell the PBeM server to send mail to all the players of a given game so you can make comments (or taunts) to your opponents. To find out how to play these and other games, send e-mail like so: TO: pbmserv@gamerz.net SUBJECT: help BODY: 6. BIBLE SEARCH Can e-mail reveal the meaning of life? Search the King James version of the Bible vicariously and find out. Substitute your own search words in the examples below, and shed a little light on your inbox. Use a "+" sign to specify multiple words, prefix proper names with "%23", and add "&PHRASE=ON" to find a phrase (consecutive words) in the KJV text. TO: getweb@usa.healthnet.org SUBJECT: BODY: send http://estragon.uchicago.edu/cgi-bin/KJV?title=&word=angel+%23Mary send http://estragon.uchicago.edu/cgi-bin/KJV?title=&word=fig+tree&PHRASE=ON 7. SEND A FAX BY E-MAIL Free faxing by e-mail? You bet. Get a copy of this helpful document which shows how to send free faxes all over the world using e-mail. For details, send e-mail as follows: TO: mail-server@rtfm.mit.edu SUBJECT: BODY: send usenet/news.answers/internet-services/fax-faq 8. MOVIE INFO Are you a cinema buff? Learn how to access a free database with information on movies, actors, & directors. The Internet Movie Database contains data on over 115,000 movie titles and over 450,000 cinema personalities. Find out how to access these screen gems by sending e-mail: TO: movie@imdb.com SUBJECT: HELP BODY: 9. CURRENCY CONVERSION If you've got a yen to know how many rupees are in a ruble, this one's for you. You can get foreign exchange rates for the U.S. dollar and other currencies by sending one (or both) of the lines shown below to a webmail server. TO: getweb@usa.healthnet.org SUBJECT: BODY: send http://cnnfn.com/markets/currencies.html send http://www.dna.lth.se/cgi-bin/kurt/rates/rates?USD+ALL 10. WORLD NEWS REVIEW This free news digest is summarised daily from international press and broadcast sources. It is provided by the Broadcast Monitoring Company in the U.K., and can be had by sending e-mail thusly: TO: inbox@netserve.FT.com SUBJECT: BODY: info nr-world *----------------------[ BREAK SOME WINDOWS ]-----------------------* Switch to Linux, the free version of Unix for ordinary PC's. Get your copy of the NO B.S. GUIDE TO LINUX today and learn how. Companion CD-ROM includes Linux Pro, Apache web server and tons of free software. New York Newsday says it's "the most accessible guide to getting started with Linux". Order before August 31st and save $5 on your copy! *------------------- --------------------* LOTS MORE E-MAIL TRICKS If you don't have direct access to the Net, you can still explore the wonders of the Web. Get my free guide "Accessing The Internet By E-Mail" and learn how to access almost anything on the Net even if you have only e-mail at your disposal. The "Accessing" guide is available in over 30 languages. To get the latest edition (and a list of translations) send e-mail like this: TO: mail-server@rtfm.mit.edu BODY: send usenet/news.answers/internet-services/access-via-email See you next time! --Bob =====================[ Tourbus Rider Information ]=================== The Internet Tourbus - U.S. Library of Congress ISSN #1094-2238 Copyright 1995-97, Rankin & Crispen - All rights reserved Archives on the Web at http://www.TOURBUS.com Join: Send SUBSCRIBE TOURBUS Your Name to LISTSERV@LISTSERV.AOL.COM Leave: Send SIGNOFF TOURBUS to LISTSERV@LISTSERV.AOL.COM PROMOTE your business on the Internet Tourbus. Reach over 80,000 people in a Net-friendly way. Our sponsors say "It works!" Make it work for you - contact BobRankin@MHV.net for details. Editors: Reprint TOURBUS in your publication for free - Ask me how. Send this copy to 3 friends and tell them to hop on the Bus! =====================================================================