Here is an update to Part II of the Greetings/Guidelines message that is sent to all new members of BLANCHARD-L. This summarizes some of the current procedures for obtaining information about Mailing Lists, how to retrieve List information/messages from the RootsWeb Archives using e-mail, and how to use the Web Search/Retrieval page for BLANCHARD-L (or other lists served at RootsWeb). There are many other procedures that will 'work' but these should allow you to perform basic tasks. I will also prepare some specific recommendations for how to retrieve messages that are referenced in our Index-Line Database. Fletch _ _ _ _ _ _ II. Information available from RootsWeb on Mailing Lists and BLANCHARD-L ( -D) (as of 27 June 1998) A. List of Lists All the User Mailing Lists hosted by RootsWeb can be found at the following website: http://www.rootsweb.com/~maillist/ To determine if there is a particular surname list at RootsWeb, select the Surname/Family Lists link, then select the first letter of the surname and scroll through the names. You can subscribe or unsubscribe to any list by clicking on the list and using the "mail-to" window to enter your request; just follow the simple directions given in the 'fixed' header at the top of the page. The main Mailing Lists page has general information about mail lists and links to other types of Mailing Lists at RootsWeb. You can also scroll through the 'other' lists on that page. Another source of Mail List information is John Fuller's page, Genealogy Resources on the Internet at: http://users.aol.com/johnf14246/gen_mail.html Scroll to item #5 for Surname Lists and use the Index to locate the name of interest. B. Subscriber List for BLANCHARD-L (or other Lists at RootsWeb) Send an e-mail message to: BLANCHARD-L-request@rootsweb.com with the word "archive" in the Subject line and the words "get dist" in the body of the message. (don't use "quotes" and substitute LISTNAME above for BLANCHARD to obtain the 'dist file' for any other surname list). For Digest subscribers, send to BLANCHARD-D. Note: The listowner must have arranged for this feature to be enabled since the default mode is that subscribers cannot request the subscriber list. C. Archived Files 1. File Numbering System Messages posted to BLANCHARD-L are numbered consecutively for both Mail and Digest Modes. For example, in a message posted on June 8, l997, and received in Mail Mode, the following lines appear in the header: From: Fletcher Blanchard<fab@Klink.Net> Subject: Robert Blanshard (from David Blanchard) X-Mailing List: <BLANCHARD-L@rootsweb.com>archives/latest/10 In the last line, [archives/latest/10] indicates that this is message #10 in the BLANCHARD-L Archives of Mail Mode (individual) messages. This message should be one of several messages included in Digest #3 (June 14,), and the X-Mailing List line should have included archives/volume97/3 Note: Messages that were originally archived at RmGate and later transferred to RootsWeb, were not numbered consecutively and can only be identified by the date they were posted. 2. E-mail Retrieval of Archived Files Please Note: Since RootsWeb upgraded its web-based Archives Search Engine, archive access via e-mail has been greatly curtailed. In a 21 Jun 1998 memo to the Listowners-L Mail List, Tim Pierce at RootsWeb, stated, "We've been having to move the e-mail archives for a lot of lists offline in order to free space on the list servers. The rule of thumb is that you shouldn't count on having more than about a month's worth of posts in the e-mail archives, and it may be as small as a couple of days if we've just moved some more offline." With this in mind, if you want to retrieve a <recent> BLANCHARD-L message, say, latest/684 that was posted on 23 June 1998, Send to: BLANCHARD-L-request@rootsweb.com Subject: archive body: get latest/684 To retrieve Volume 98: Issue 90, recently sent to subscribers, Send to: BLANCHARD-D-request@rootsweb.com Subject: archive body: get volume98/90 For a summary of messages included in a Digest (abbreviated Subject: and name of sender), use the same D-request address with body: get latest/digest.header. A typical return would be: >Content-Type: text/plain >BLANCHARD-D Digest Volume 98 : Issue 98 >Today's Topics: > #1 Re: Fwd: Blanchards in colonial Ma ["John F. Chandler" > <JCHBN@CUVMB.CC] > #2 Psalter Sylvester Blanchard & fami ["J.Light" <jblight@redshift.com>] > #3 Benjamin BLANCHARD of VA [DBlanchNC@aol.com] In all cases, do not include additional text in the message body. 3. Lists of Archived Files To obtain a list of archived files: For individual messages Send to: BLANCHARD-L-request@rootsweb.com Subject: archive body: dir latest [or, ls latest] Be advised that you will not be able to get a list of <all> messages posted since the software returns only the first 512 lines. This limit has probably been set due to the size of the archives for some of the larger lists served by RootsWeb; ex. Roots-L. The lines appear as > -rw-rw---- 1 slist slist 1571 Dec 24 1997 365 > -rw-rw---- 1 slist slist 1395 Dec 26 21:35 366 Note that before Dec 25, 1997 the year (1997) appears in the line but after that date, the year is dropped and replaced with the time the message was posted. I have no explanation for this, but it might be useful to note that the first message posted to BLANCHARD-L in 1998 was /375 . To get around the '512' limit, you can use a wild card in the command. For example, "dir latest/6*" will return all message numbers starting with the number "6". For a list of message digests (1998) Send to: BLANCHARD-D-request@rootsweb.com Subject: archive body: dir volume98 [or, ls volume98] [You may find that 'get' commands take as long as 10-12 hours to be returned while 'dir' commands are processed almost immediately.] 4. Web Search/Retrieval of Archived Files Since e-mail access to the Archives is severely limited and may soon be phased out, you should use the RootsWeb Interactive Search Page at: http://searches.rootsweb.com/cgi-bin/listsearch.pl for all Archive search and retrieval. All BLANCHARD-L messages, including those that were transferred from RmGate (BLANCHARD Family Discussion List, in 1996) appear to have been archived. Enter BLANCHARD-L in the "Name of List" box and then Submit. On the Search page, select the database to search (1998/1997/1996), enter the 'search string' in the Query box and then Search. a. Single-Word Search. If you would like to search for all messages that contain the word 'Lemuel', anywhere in the message, enter the single word (no quotes) and Submit. All fields of the message, including Subject:, To:, Date:, Message-Body, etc. are searched. All searches are case insensitive, therefore 'Lemuel' and 'lemuel' are treated the same. b. Multiple-Word Search To search for Lemuel Blanchard, enter "Lemuel Blanchard" (quotes required) as a search string. Alternately, you may use Lemuel&Blanchard or Lemuel+Blanchard and all messages containing <both> words in the given order, will be retrieved. Using Lemuel AND Blanchard, however, will return all messages where the name Lemuel <and> the name Blanchard appear somewhere in the message, but not necessarily as consecutive words! Using Lemuel OR Blanchard will return messages where <either> name appears. These examples can, of course, be extended to other word combinations; place names, events, etc., etc. c. Header Line Searches You may search certain lines (fields) in a message header. For example, you can search on the Subject: field by entering the search string subject/Lemuel and it will return all messages that contained 'Lemuel' in the Subject: line. However, entering date/"6 May 1998" will not return messages posted on that date. You will have to use "6 May 1998" as your query (without date/) but be aware that this will return all messages with 6 May, 16 May or 26 May appearing <anyplace> in the message, not only in the Date: field! ********** Note: These are just a few examples of how to perform searches in the RootsWeb Archives. CNIDR's ISEARCH software is used by the RootsWeb search engine and for more information about its capabilities, you might want to visit the page that John Robertson has prepared at: http://www.shelby.net/shelby/jr/robertsn/rwsearch.htm List members will be notified of changes in the RootsWeb Search procedures and you are encouraged to post any questions or suggest additions/corrections to this summary, on the BLANCHARD-L.