FIT 100: Fluency with Information Technology

Pre-Lab Workshop: UW NetID, Email, Student Web Pages

Autumn 2001

Introduction:

This is the pre-course workshop for “Fluency with Information Technology” or CSE/INFO 100 as you know it. The goals of this workshop are to assure that every student entering the course has a certain comfort level with two of the tools used for communication and lab work in this course: Email and Personal Web Page accessibility.

Objectives:

To get all students entering the course up to speed on:

1. Activating a UW Net ID

2. Email with the UW WebPine and the PINE email system

3. An initial understanding of email server space

4. Enabling student web pages

To Do:

Obtain a UW Net ID (your email / web page identity):

The first priority is to make sure that you have created a UserID from the UW.

Your User ID, or UW Net ID, is the way that the University computer system identifies you.
Your password, that you create, is the way the system makes sure that you are who you say you are.

This allows you to save files in the memory space of a computer that is not physically located in front of you. [See Diagram on last page] At the University of Washington, that computer memory space for students is called Dante.

In order to insure that you and only you have access to your account space, your password should be something easy to remember, but not easily guessed. You should never give your password out to others.

The University of Washington Department of Computing and Communication (C&C) has provided a series of help pages to establish and manage your UW account.

Getting your account set up

If you do not have an account, or you just aren’t sure, open up Internet Explorer or Netscape Navigator to the following URL:

http://www.washington.edu/computing/

This will be the page that links to all other resource pages regarding your account.

Click the Get your UW NetID link:

· This will let you enter your student information and find out if you have an ID.

· If you don’t have one, and are a registered student, you can create one at that time.

· Follow the directions and fill in the needed information. You will need to know your STAR access code for class registration.

A UW NetID is not optional!

You must have one in order to proceed in this course.

1. Once your account is established, go to your UW portal.

Portal:

· Also known as a Gateway

· A portal is a web page that is considered a starting point for users when then first enter a web site.

· At the UW, your UW portal contains information and links that the University considers relevant and important to you as a student.

A major example of a portal that you may have used is UW Libraries Information Gateway. Another is Yahoo!

Enter this URL in the address bar of a Web Browser to go to your portal:

http://myuw.washington.edu/

and login with your UW Net ID and password.

Explore the MyUW portal. Look at the text called WebPine Prerelease for students (on the right side, midway down the page).

This text acts as a hyperlink [a direct jump to a particular web page, image or other file on the web] and will take you to the login to access your email account through a web page.

What is Email?

Email is the exchange of electronic messages through telecommunication. Email was one of the first uses of the Internet. Originally all messages sent by email were encoded in simple ASCII text. Now it is possible to send non-text files, such as images, as attachments. These non-text files are sent in binary streams across the Internet.

Email has become a fast and easy way to communicate with others regardless of their physical location. It can be faster than a telephone at times. Email, however, is considered asynchronous communication. This means that you are not communicating with the person “live”, the way you do when you talk to someone in person or on the phone.

There are many ways to send email. This workshop will focus on ways

to send to and from your UW Account.

Method 1: WebPine

(a way to send email from your UW account)

There are many different forms of web email you can use. To send mail from your UW Account using a web browser, you can use WebPine. This email interface will require some time spent on the computer to become familiar with how it works.

Many of you have used web email before (e.g. Hotmail, Yahoo Mail). For your account at the UW, one of the easier ways to access your email from a browser is through WebPine. You can link to WebPine from the MyUW portal, or simply go to the following link and log on (remember why you have a user id AND a password):

http://webpine.washington.edu/

1. To send a message to someone, click on Compose.

2. Send yourself an email. Make sure you enter in your email address a subject (“TEST EMAIL”), and some text in the body of the message. Remember that your email is Your_UW_NETID@u.washington.edu.

NOTE: It is not necessary to add the @u.washington.edu when sending mail to students, faculty or staff at the UW. The id will be looked up in the UW Directory. You will then choose the correct email address:

3. Click Send.

This is the email access you will probably be most comfortable using. It is not the only way to access your UW email, however, so let us introduce you to the Pine environment.

Click here for more help on other WebPine features.

Other functions of WebPine:

4. Creating folders using WebPine

· Go to your inbox

· Save the test message sent earlier by placing your mouse over the Action Envelope and clicking on “Save” from the menu that pops up

· Type in a name for the folder in the place of the one listed

Replace with a new folder name, like Personal

Method 2: Pine (the UW text-based email client)

Why Pine?

WebPine is the web browser based version of Pine, also developed by the Department of Computing and Communications.

To access your Pine account when Web browsers are not available, you will need to establish a secure connection to the system.

SSH and Telnet are protocols that allow you to access your UW email account, or any host computer [a computer that has an account for you and space for your information in its memory] that you have been given permission to enter.

Through this protocol you can login to your account from any computer that has an Internet connection. You log on as a regular user with all the same permissions regardless of where you are located.

Pine is the text version of WebPine. It is known as a command line environment.

One of the pieces of software used on the UW campus to telnet and ftp is called TeraTerm and is usually an option on the desktop or in the start menu. The location of this program depends on the lab. Ask your TA for the location of the Dante login [Dante is the name of the host computer for student accounts here at the UW].

To log onto Pine

Go to the Student Email (Dante) icon on the Start Menu. Start>Student Mail (Dante)

Student email (Dante)

[Your TA will let you know if it is located elsewhere on the machines in this lab]

Your login screen will look similar to the one below, and you’ll need to enter your UW ID and password.

Once you log on you will be shown the following menu:

This environment doesn’t allow use of a mouse for most selections.

· This is a command line interface; so in order to move from screen to screen you need to type the correct command.

· For the screen above, you will be typing “e” for email.

NOTE: You do not need to press the return button.

Now you are in your UW email account at the Main Menu.

· Often Pine does not require you to hit the return or Enter button after you pressed the letter that corresponds to a menu selection.

· However, you can use the arrows to move up and down the menu selections. Press <Enter> when you have highlighted your menu choice.

To send yourself a test email

(See: http://www.washington.edu/computing/email/pinedoc/ for detailed information on using Pine to send mail)

Your email address is yourUWNetID@u.washington.edu where yourUWNetID is the name you use when you log in.

Press C (Compose) to see the Compose Message screen.
In the To field, type your UWNetID and press <Enter>.

Note that the rest of the address is filled in for you.

Use your arrow buttons or the tab button to move through the other fields to the body of the message
Type “This is a test” in the body of the message.
Send your message:

Type <Control>X (Send). NOTE: The control button is indicated by the ^ character in the commands, so ^X is the send command.
You are asked: Send message?

Press y (yes) or press < Enter >.
The message is sent and a copy is saved to your sent-mail folder. (If you press n (no) the message is not sent, and you can continue to work on it.)

Directories (Folders)

What is a directory?

A directory, or folder, is a container for files. Just like the folders in an office file cabinet holds documents, a directory on your computer or any other, can hold files of all types. A directory is a way to organize related files in a manner that allows for quick retrieval. If you have your work divided into the various areas they pertain to, you can use folders to hold them in a logical manner.

A directory can also be a collection of users, their passwords and information about what they have the right to use on a particular computer system. It is still a container holding related files. You will make directories in this lab to hold your work this quarter, but you are also part of a directory of the users of email and web pages at the UW.

Create a directory in your email account:

Press L (List folders) to see the Folders Collection.

8. There are two main folders. One is your account space, called “Mail on your_UW_NetID.deskmail” and the other holds newsgroup information. Your mail folder is highlighted by default. Press <Enter> to view the contents.

Three folders will be provided automatically by Pine:

· The INBOX folder--messages sent to you are listed in this folder. When you first start Pine and go to the Message Index screen, you are looking at the list of messages in your INBOX folder. Every incoming message remains in your INBOX until you delete it or save it in another folder.

· The saved-messages folder--copies of messages you save are stored in this folder unless you save them to other folders you create yourself.

· The sent-mail folder--copies of messages you send are stored in this folder. This is convenient if you cannot remember whether you actually sent a message and want to check, or if you want to send a message again.

10. Press A to Add (create) a folder, give it a useful name (like FIT100). Press Enter to add the folder to your collection.

To Move Messages to other Folders

11. If you aren’t in the Main Menu, press M (Main Menu) to return to it.

12. Press I (Message Index) to go to your current folder. The current folder is your Inbox.

13. Using the arrows, move to the test message you sent to yourself.

14. Type O (Other Commands). The bottom menu will change slightly. You now have other commands to select from.

15. Press S (Save). The prompt at the bottom of the screen now asks for the folder you want to save the message in.

16. Press ^T (To Folders). A list of the folders in your account will come up. Use the arrow buttons to highlight the folder you created today.

17. Press S (Select). The folder you highlighted now appears as the selected folder to save your message to. Press <Enter> to move the message from your Inbox to the folder you created.

Be aware that the same keys you press in one screen may refer to different commands in another screen. Always read the command menu at the bottom of the screen to be sure.

Spend time outside of the Workshop getting to know the commands available and familiarize yourself with the environment.

Go to the Main Menu (M)

Press Q to quit Pine

You are asked: “Really quit Pine?”

Press y for “Yes”

You will be taken to the main screen for Dante.

Press (L) to “Logout”

Enabling Student Web Pages

What is a web page?

A web page is simply a glorified text file that includes Hyper Text Markup Language (HTML) tags for formatting and display. These pages are placed on computers called servers that allow people to view the content of those pages. The Internet is really just a huge collection of billions of web pages.

A web site is a collection of web pages usually under the care of a single person or company. The pages may have a purpose related to a business or might just be the self-published interests of a student, such as yourself.

Every student at the University of Washington is provided a space for a web site. Pages that you create and wish to make available to the public in the future will be placed in a special folder that only you have access to. The first step in establishing your website is to enable your web publishing.

1. Using a browser (IE or Netscape), go to the following URL: http://www.washington.edu/computing/

2. Click on the “Manage Your UW NetID Resources” link.

3. You will be required to log in with your UW NetID and password.

4. Scroll down to inactive services.

5. Click on Student Web Publishing

6. Ask your TA for help if you are unsure of any of the directions.

7. You will be going through a login screen and following a series of directions, so pay attention to the explanations on the screen.

8. When you are finished, you are shown the URL for your web page.

· http://students.washington.edu/yourUWNetid/

This workshop will not be going into the details of your public_html. The folder is created in your Dante account when you activate your web page. You will cover the details of public_html in upcoming labs. For today, you can verify that that your page is activated by visiting the web page address. Your URL address depends on your UW NetID: