Reliance on the mouse??? It is Windows...< bg >. With respect to CT, I thought keyboarding in a non-ergonomically correct manner - (ergonomically correct of course being anything that works for oneself) - was the primary cause. I have never heard of a mouse adding to the problem. You must find the whole Windows OS Platform a challenge then...


>First, I should make it clear that I'm referring to Classic CompuServe, not the web-based interface. I've never found any web-based forum interface that I consider the equal of what I have on CompuServe. Second, I have to add that I use an offline reader and have since approximately 1989. If I were using CompuServe's software, I'd probably feel differently about it.
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UT does have an off-line reader. As I explained to Andre Payette, the argument centers around the CIS feature set Vs. the UT feature set. OzWin is not CIS. If you like it, great. That said, your statements regarding prefering the CIS interface as opposed to the UT interface should be qualified. In reality, you like the ergonomics of the OzWin off-line reader.

However, even the classic CIS interface, WinCim I believe it was called, could not compare to what is available on the UT based on the reasons I put forth in my previous reply. That response was couched both in the context of the WinCim and the web-based CIS interfaces.

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Now why do I think it's better? I start TapCIS in the morning and I push one key combination. It goes online and downloads all my waiting messages (including email) in the forums I've configured. I read those offline (using only the keyboard if I choose - a big deal since I have carpal tunnel and using the mouse exacerbates it), write my replies and they sit in TapCIS's outbox until my next pass. I can edit them if I want since they don't get sent until I tell them to. Several times a day, I repeat this process, sending out the messages I've written and retrieving what's waiting for me.
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Once again, I think the UT off-line reader has these features as well.

>Once a day generally during the week, I use a single key combination to go online and retrieve the headers of all threads that have activity since I last did this. Offline, I mark those threads I want to download. (The ones I've previously downloaded or otherwise been involved in are already marked for me.) With one keystroke, I go online again and download all the marked messages. Offline, I read them, writing replies. Again, I can choose not to touch my mouse. I can configure Tap so I can see the current message and the thread structure (much as I do here). When I'm done, I go online again to post my replies.
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Offline/OnLine, I think many of these lines are getting blurred. More and more folks are always connected, either through a T-1 Line, Cable Modems, or DSL Lines. Personally, I have a 1.6mb DSL and am always connected. The beauty of the UT is that you don't have to archive a thing. It is all there all the time. No matter where I am, I can get on the UT. If I need to borrow somebody's machine, I can get here, with access to everything from day 1.

>I have TapCIS configured so that all the messages I get are saved offline, though I could choose to discard them once I've read them. That means that when I'm offline, all those messages are available to me to look up the information I vaguely remember reading. I guess this isn't really interface, though.
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>What drives me nuts here the most is that I'm constantly having to go to the mouse and the whole day-at-a-time orientation of the message base. I know I can use the Map of the thread, but it appears in place of the message. When I read my CompuServe messages, I hit the spacebar to get to the next message, not click on a Next button.
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If you have a PUTM, your search capabilities are greatly expanded. A basic UT membership does not make a good basis for concluding how good/bad the interface is. That would be like me bashing the CIS interface when I don't pay for the CIS service. At least with the UT, folks that don't/cant pay, can still post messages

IMO, your issues rest with the fact that you have been using the same piece of software for 11 years and that if you were going to use the UT as your primary online forum, it would require significant change on your part. In other words, your critisims with the UT have more to do with how the UT does not fit into your established way of doing things as opposed to capabilities of the UT itself. It is neither a good or bad thing, it just is... We all get used to routines. You happen to have a well-honed time-tested routine here..< bg >.. I think it is important to note that at no time have you ever implied the quality of the UT content is less than what is available on CIS. Others have implied this. I think it is good that you have not made such a claim....