[ROVERNET - UK] What is the Rovernet?

[Glen Wilson]

Every once in a while, someone asks these questions:

> What is Rovernet UK?
> Is this something different from Eric's Canadian Rovernet?

As I understand it, the actual, physical server for Rovernet is in the
UK. Eric Russell administers the Rovernet for the Rover Car Club of
Canada from Vancouver, BC by going to a certain web address and logging
in. Only Eric is able to log in there.

The Rovernet list is "run" by Ruperte at nipltd.com which is registered
to a company in Crowthorne, Berkshire in the UK. I think Ruperte keeps
the hardware ticking while Eric does the day-to-day housekeeping.

Thanks, Ruperte! rovernet-owner at lyris.ccdata.com

To send a message to Rovernet (UK), we use the following address:
rovernet at lyris.ccdata.com

List members like you and me are able to set certain preferences
concerning how the Rovernet sends messages to us. To do this, each
member can to go to the Rovernet Administrative Interface at
http://mailman.nipltd.com/mailman/admin/rovernet and select certain
settings. For example, you can select the digest mode which sends you
one email per day containing all of the new postings, or you can direct
Rovernet to forward each new message to you as individual emails. You
need to have your Rovernet username (email address) and password to gain
access to these controls. 

The page at http://mailman.nipltd.com/mailman/listinfo/rovernet is also
the place you go to if you want to subscribe to or unsubscribe from the
Rovernet.

The page at http://mailman.nipltd.com/mailman/listinfo/rovernet also has
a link to the Rovernet Archives. Again, you need your Rovernet username
(email address) and password to gain access.

Eric also maintains a user group at Yahoo.com called Rover_net. My
understanding is that the Yahoo group is there to serve primarily as a
back-up system in case the Rovernet (UK) server at nipltd.com goes down
for some reason. I only recall one major failure of the main server over
the past ten years, but the Yahoo group gives us a place to get back in
touch in case a catastrophic failure occurs.

The second benefit of the Yahoo Rover_net Group is that list members can
post HTML messages and image files there to be shared between people on
the list. For security and bandwidth reasons, we cannot post HTML
messages or graphics to the Rovernet (UK) list at nipltd.com (which is
typical of most email mailing lists and is a good thing). If you want to
share a diagram or a picture of your car, post it to Rover_net at Yahoo
Groups and post a message to Rovernet (UK) at nipltd.com to let people
know the file is there. You gain access to the Yahoo Rover_net Group by
going to http://autos.groups.yahoo.com/group/Rover_net/ and signing in.

To gain access to the Yahoo Group, you need to register with Yahoo,
request membership in the Rover_net Group, and allow Eric time to
process your Yahoo Rover_net application. 

We normally have around 300 people who subscribe to the Rovernet (UK)
mailing list. Right now, only 64 people are registered members of the
Yahoo Rover_net Group. There are many reasons why the primary Rovernet
mailing list is the Rovernet (UK) list. These include simplicity of
administration, excellent reliability, superior privacy and a total
absence of pop-ups and advertisements. Also, individuals with
practically any operating system and the simplest hardware can
participate fully using the nipltd.com Rovernet (UK) system.

This, in my typically wordy fashion, is what I think I know about how
the Rovernet works. Eric can correct me as necessary, but I think that's
the gist of it. Once again, thanks to Eric Russell and the Rover Car
Club of Canada for providing us with this wonderful service.

Glen Wilson