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<< | FAQ Index | UNIX System Mail Mini-FAQ >>

These are mostly "about" questions, for common problems see the Common Problems page.

1.  Meta-questions

"Meta" means "Beyond, of its own kind, or transcending.

1.1  What is The Vistua Network?

The Vistua Network Organization is a private, non-profit, computing organization mainly located in the State of New York. More about this. The technologies thereof are collectively referred to by terms like "Vistua Network System", "the System", etc.

1.2  I have a Complaint or Comment

If this is a technical support request please see the article Reporting a Problem.

If you are a member of the general public and you have a complaint or comment about our web-site or public services please use the "contact" form linked at the bottom of most pages.

2.  Technical/Engineering

2.1  What does this Word/phrase/error mean?

For words, here are the ones people ask most about:

• Browser
• Internet
• URL/URI

For others consult the Knowledge Base or search this site. There is also a List Of Abbreviations.

For errors, see List of Error Messages & Their Meanings.

See Google if your's isn't listed.

2.2  Why are Some Machines Said to have Names?

Because Humans have a hard time remembering complex sequences of numbers. Machines in the LAN and elsewhere in the Vistua Network are given names to make it easier to network and administer them and in some cases the names are required to make them usable. Almost all these machines are given names in the domain vistua.net.

2.3  Why vistua.com and vistua.net?

Vistua.com is the Vistua web-site and web applications such as groupware. Vistua.net is used internally by VNS to help distinguish internal functions (not all of which are available on the public Internet) from external functions and for taxonomic purposes.

2.4  What are the Outgoing Nameserver IPs?

• 208.67.222.222 (primary)
• 208.67.220.220 (secondary)

2.5  What should I do about lightning?

See main article about lightning.

3.  E-Mail

3.1  How can I Check my Email From a Remote Location?

You can check your email as well as other groupware applications such as calender by going to www.vistua.com, in almost any browser and clicking "Mail Login" in the top right quadrant.

3.2  I've Heard That Checking Email in a Public Hot-Spot is a bad idea, is this true?

No.

3.3  How does the Groupware Handle Spam?

Very well.

3.4  Is there an Email "Cheat-sheet"?

Yes.

4.  Services

4.1  Can I SSH into my account?

You can shell into the main WLAN host only. Theoretically you could continue in a "sub-shell" from there to any other machine on the WLAN but this assumes that SSH daemon is running on that host.

4.2  Can I tunnel services over SSH?

Yes, you can tunnel arbitrary services over SSH, technical support for this is not provided though, you are on your own (although PuTTY can do that semi-automatically, hint, hint).

4.3  How can I send/retrieve files from my account at a remote location?

There are two ways. The easy way and the hard way.

In the easy way, upload and download from which syncs to your account. If you do not know your dropbox account password check your email.

The hard way is to use SFTP/SCP. It is very difficult to do this on Windows but basically you connect to tty.frontios.vistua.net in your SFTP software and use its functions to upload or download files directly to your account.

4.4  Can I use my USB Device?

You can generally use all mice, keyboards, speakers and flash-drives Almost all music players work (follow Mp3 Player instructions). For everything else, it's best to ask the administrator

5.  Software

5.1  I Need to Export a Word-Processing Document to MS Windows/The Web.

5.2  Why does Firefox Say "You have been Updated to the Latest Version", Periodically?

6.  Other

6.1  Where can I get the Sarcastic Troubleshooting Flowchart?

It was reprinted from the web comic XKCD and is available on its website "Tech Support Cheat Sheet"

6.2  Why is the analogue clock widget (or other circles) oval instead of round?

Because of a physical property of the monitor. If you see circular objects look "oval" you have a monitor with a non 1:1 pixel aspect ratio see that article for explanation.

6.3  Why does the "System Idle Process" consume so much CPU and why can't I kill it?

The System Idle Process on Windows is not a real process. It is simply a way that Windows represents Cpu capacity that is not being used. You cannot 'kill' it because it isn't a process.

6.4  Why is the Sky Blue?

Because gas molecules are smaller than the wave-length of visible light, they tend to absorb and diffuse it, rather than absorb and reflect it in the manner of a solid or liquid. The highest frequencies (violet, indigo, blue, green) are scattered more easily this way, and therefore the sky is blue because the dominant factor of solar light in these frequencies is blue.

This phenomenon also causes the sunset to be red. As the earth rotates your point of view, relative to the sun, the suns rays pass for long distances close to the ground, which has thicker atmosphere, as a result of this, the moderate to high frequencies (which are scattered more easily) are lost, leaving mainly the lowest frequencies, yellow, orange and red.

Large volcanic eruptions can enhance the blueness of the sky by flinging much terrestrial rubbish into the atmosphere, and intensifying this phenomenon.

Moonlight is too weak to be affected by this phenomenon, which is called Rayleigh Scattering

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