Services Available on the Network
Robert J. Hanisch, STScI; Chair, AAS Working Group on Astronomical
Software

Although the primary usage of the electronic networks has been
e-mail, there are a wide variety of other services and resources
available via the Internet.  The new tools and capabilties made
possible by electronic networks are changing how we operate,
freeing us from our traditional, limited approach to the storage,
recovery and exchange of knowledge.  I have compiled a review of
these services and how to access them.  This report is available
via anonymous FTP on blackhole.aas.org in the info/net directory. 
This article provides a brief summary of the information contained
in the full report.
     Network services consist of on-line databases and catalogs,
listservers (automated e-mail servers and distribution lists),
anonymous FTP archives, indices to published papers in astronomy
and astrophysics, and abstracts for both published papers and
preprints.  Several observatories provide on-line information
services that describe the telescopes and instruments they support
and procedures for submitting proposals.  Most of the major
astronomical software packages are available via the network, as
are libraries of numerical algorithms and information concerning
the FITS data format standard. 
     The on-line catalogs and database services available to
astronomers include SIMBAD (Set of Identifications, Measurements,
and Bibliography for Astronomical Data), NED (NASA Extragalactic
Database), NODIS (NASA On-line Data and Information Service), NDADS
(NASA Data Archive and Distribution Service), Einline (Einstein
X-ray data on-line service), HEASARC (High Energy Astrophysics
Science Archive Research Center), STEIS (Space Telescope Electronic
Information Service), DIRA2 (Distributed Information Retrieval from
Astronomical files), and ADS (NASA's Astrophysics Data
System).Titles and authors of papers published in ApJ, AJ, and PASP
are stored on-line at the CfA.  Preprints are available on-line via
a listserver operated by the International School for Advanced
Studies in Trieste, Italy.  Project STELAR is now providing on-line
abstract search and retrieval and soon will provide full-text
search and retrieval.
     Also of interest to astronomers are several newsgroups in 
the Usenet news, such as sci.astro, sci.astro.fits,
sci.astro.hubble,  alt.sci.astro.aips, and alt.sci.astro.figaro. 
The on-line service Archie can be used to locate software and
documentation in anonymous FTP archives throughout the world. 
     To retrieve the complete article which describes how to use
these services, FTP to blackhole.aas.org (192.102.234.112), login
as user "anonymous" (give your e-mail address as the password),
`cd' to the directory info/net, and `get' the file called
`net_resources.mem'.