Free Agent

Forté's Free Agent is one of the best newsreaders for those who use newsgroups frequently and/or use Windows 3.1. It is the scaled down, free version of their commercial product Agent. It can be a little counter-intuitive at first, but use of the excellent help file usually corrects the fault quickly.

It is also easy to set up, as seen below...

1. Open Free Agent.

2. Go to Options--General Preferences. A window like the one below should appear.

User Setttings

3. In that window the following settings should be set:

Email Address

should be username@azstarnet.com, where username should be replaced with your username--the three to seven letter name you selected when you set up the account. It must be entered in all lower case letters and without the capital "P".

Full Name

can be anything you want. This will appear along with the email address in your posts to show who sent it.

Organization

can be anything you want. This field goes in on a line, typically used to denote where the post came from in the early days of USENET; not seriously used much anymore.

Server requires authorization login

must be left unchecked. If this is checked, the program will not work.

4. Click on the System tab. A window like the one below should appear.

System Settings

5. In that window the following settings:

News Server

should be news.azstarnet.com.

Mail Server

should be mail.azstarnet.com.

Time Zone

should be set to Arizona

Automatically adjust for daylight...

should be unchecked. Arizona doesn't adjust for Daylight Savings.

6. Click on Ok and you're set.

Setting Up Free Agent