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	Notesfiles support computer managed discussion
forums.  Discussions can have many different purposes and scopes: the
notesfile system has been designed to be flexible enough to handle differing
requirements.

	Each notesfile discusses a single
topic.
The depth of discussion within a notesfile is ideally held constant.
While some users may require a general discussion of personal workstations,
a different group may desire detailed discussions about the I/O bus
structure of the WICAT 68000 (a particular workstation).  These discussions
might well be separated into two different notesfiles.

	Each notesfile contains a list of logically
independent notes (called base notes).
A note is a block of text with a comment or question intended to be seen by members
of the notesfile community.  The note display shows the text,
its creation time, its title, the notesfile's title,
the author's name (some notesfiles allow anonymous notes), the number of ``responses'',
and optionally a ``director message''.
Each base note can have a number of ``responses'': replies, retorts, further
comments, criticism, or related questions concerning the base note.
Thus, a notesfile contains an ordered list of ordered lists.  This arrangement
has historically been more convenient than other proposals (e.g., trees
were studied on the PLATO (trademark of CDC) system).

	The concept of a notesfile was originally implemented at
the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign,
on the PLATO system (trademark of Control
Data Corporation). 
The UNIX (trademark of Western Electric) 
notesfile system
includes these ideas with
adaptations
and enhancements
made possible by the UNIX environment.

	The UNIX notesfile system was
designed and
implemented by Ray Essick at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign.
It provides users with the abilities to
read notes and responses, write notes and responses, forward note text to
other users (via mail) or other notesfiles, save note text in their own files,
and sequence through a set of notesfiles seeing just new text.
Each notesfile has a set of ``directors'' who manage the notesfile:
they delete old notes, compress the file when needed, grant and restrict
access to the notesfile, and set different notesfile parameters (e.g.,
title, ``director message'', policy note, whether notes' authors can be
anonymous).
Some notesfiles contain correspondence from other computers.
Like the UNIX ``USENET'', notes and responses are exchanged (often over phone lines)
with remote machines.
The notesfile system provides automatic exchange and updating of notes in an
arbitrarily connected network.

	This document details the use of notesfiles from invocation through
intersystem notes exchanges.  The last chapter summarizes the entire set of
commands for easy reference.
An appendix contains detailed checklists for the
installation of a notesfile system.