New User Information

If you are a new MEnet user please take a moment to read through the following items. We feel that this is the bare minimum information you need to know to successfully use the MEnet systems and software.

First change your initial password. See the Choosing Good Passwords page before selecting a new password. Use the yppasswd command to actually change your password.
Warning: If you do not change your password immediately after your account is created, your account will be closed and you will have to come talk to us.
Read the MEnet Policies page for some general guidelines to keep in mind when using the MEnet systems.
Read the Submitting Background Jobs page. Remember, these workstations are shared by many other users. You must be courteous and considerate of their needs.
News: You are responsible for reading MEnet system news. (Note, this is not usenet news.) If you log in on a workstation console, you will automatically be presented with this news via the "xmotd" program. If you remotely log into a machine, you will see the message "you have news: article1 article2 ...". In this case run the command news | more to read the news.
Remember, this is the primary way we communicate system news to our users. We expect that you have read and understood these messages. A typical "news" article might contain information about scheduled server down time, software upgrades, or other things that could directly affect you.
Additionally, many systems-related and security issued are handled by emailing the user. As an MEnet account holder, you are expected to periodically read the email on your account.
Here is a list of Software available on the MEnet system.
If you would like to create a web page for yourself, read the How to create a home page for yourself page.
Forwarding E-mail
If you would like to forward your MEnet mail to another address (such as your university email account) enter the email address you would like to forward it to in:

/my/$USER:mail/.forward

The format is one email address per line.
If you want to keep a copy here as well - add an additional entry with just your email name preceeded by a backslash (\).
Example (assuming my user name is "paulfm"):
I add the following lines to /my/paulfm:mail/.forward

\paulfm paulfm@umn.edu

This would save one copy for me here (paulfm@enet.umn.edu)
and send a copy to my University account.
Problems? If you run into problems, here is a list of the MEnet support services.