In order to determine what conferences you want to scan or read mail in, you must select the conference. This command will enable you to select the conferences that you want to select.
| [Conf. Num(s)] | Conference number(s) to select. You may specify a single conference or multiple conferences. If you want to specify multiple conferences, you must do so by specify a range (e.g., 32-53) or by separating each conference by a space or semicolon. You can even combine ranges and individual conferences. See the example section of this command for more details. |
| S | Select all conferences. This subcommand selects all conferences for scanning or reading. |
| D | De-select all conferences. This subcommand de-selects all conferences for scanning or reading. |
If you do not specify any subcommands when you run the SELECT command then you will be running it in interactive mode. The only thing you need to remember about interactive mode is that it is slightly different than specifying everything when you use the command with subcommands. The following lists the differences between the various subcommands when you are using the command in interactive mode.
| [Conf.#] | Conference number(s) to select. | In interactive mode When you select a conference you toggle its status. If you select conference 1 and it was already selected (had an X in the FLAGS column), you will deselect that particular conference. If you select a conference that was not already selected, you will be asked what you wish to set your last message read pointer to. You may set the last message read pointer to any value that is within the range of messages in the conference. To find the range of messages in the conference look to the left of the conference name on the prompt where it is asking you to enter your last message read. You will see a range of numbers that will look something like 3005-8292. The first number is the lowest message in the conference and the second number is the highest. In addition, you can add a D to the right of the conference number(s) to de-select the conference(s) that you specify. |
| S | Select all conferences. | This subcommand selects all conferences for scanning and all conferences will have an “X” placed in its flags field. |
| D | De-select all conferences. | This subcommand de-selects all conferences for scanning and removes the “X” if there was one in this conference's flags field. |
| Q | Quit. | This subcommand quits the Select command. Control is returned to the main menu. |
Quite often, there will be conferences on a bulletin board that you do not want to participate in. This command enables you to choose which conferences to automatically scan for messages both at login and when you use the A subcommand with a message read or scan command (e.g., the R, TS, and Q commands). A two-column listing of conferences that you are able to join is displayed. In the list, PCBoard includes the conference number, description, last message read, highest message in the conference, and an “X” if you have marked this conference for scanning. Only the conferences that you have access to will be listed. If you find that a conference is not listed, it is because you do not have access to it. The following is an example of the screen that is displayed to you:
| Num | Conference | Last | High | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Read | Num | |||
| 1 | Main Board | 8548 | 7978 | X |
| 2 | SysOps Talk | 1018 | 1001 | X |
| 3 | For Sale | 6289 | 4301 | X |
| 5 | Programming | 2106 | 1839 | |
| 6 | Operating Systems | 5119 | 4768 | X |
| 7 | Chit Chat | 7831 | 7659 | X |
| 8 | BBS Ads | 6711 | 6584 | |
| 9 | Modem Info | 2478 | 2178 | X |
Enter Conference Numbers, (S)elect All, (D)eselect All, or (Q)uit?
If you want to make sure that conferences 1 through 9 and conference number 12 were selected, you could do this right from the command line by typing the following:
SELECT 1-9;12
Now, if you wanted to deselect just those conferences, you should do that by running the SELECT command interactively by typing SELECT on the command line. At the next prompt, type 1-9;12 and you will see that the conferences will be deselcted.