Stamp Column Archives

The Glassine Surfer Column Archive

This column originally appeared in the American Philatelic Society's monthly magazine, "The American Philatelist." Since then some of the information may be out-of-date depending on how far back you're reading.

August 1999

On Horses Wings

E-mail programs are on the front line of the 'Net ---  the killer app, as they say.  Enough has been written about e-mail to fill quite a few hard drives, but here's a program you ought to be familiar with.

Pegasus v1.0 came out in the misty past of 1989, a Windows version was released in '93, and they've always been free for the download.  Pegasus Mail v3.0 is the latest version and represents a huge upgrade with new features, capavilities and bug fixes.    

In Pegasus' own words it's described as a program that grew up at a time when the 'Net was a community instead of the commercial highway. David Harris wrote an email program for his New Zealand university and soon was sending it around the world to help people communicate better.  He plans to keep Pegasus free and help people exchange ideas as long as the original ideals are still relevant.

That said, you'll be pleased to know that Pegasus is every bit as powerful as other programs from a box.  It has filters, options and a host of menu items to choose from.  It's really valuable heavyweight freeware.

Language versions include Catalan, Dwedish, Dutch and Hungarian and of course, the majors. The program has a full Help menu, though printed and bound manuals are available to anyone who wishes to contribute to the Pegasus concept.

E-mail has become a necessity to many people that they can't envision being without it, and if your current e-mail program leaves you flat, try out Pegasus Mail.

Pegasus Mail at
http://www.pegasus.usa.com

Useful Sites

A few really interesting sites have cropped up recently that I tend to think of as just really useful stamp sites.  They deserve a catchy name, but they're strength is that they are just really useful.

The Collectors Club of Chicago sponsors a great site called "Ask Phil," "Phil" being short for "philatley."  This unassuming URL was set up to help answer general questions about stamp collecting.  The first stop for the curious is the resource library, and if they're still in the dark they can e-mail their question.

The Resource Library is a collection of "How to" articles and a very deep set of reference lists.

Ask Phil
http://www.askphil.org/

If you're still stumped with a question, try "Lee's Illustrated Stamp Listopedia."  It's a directory of resources for studying, finding, classifying and understanding the world of stamp collecting.  

The Listopedia isn't every small stamp site created since 1994, but only those that the webmaster feels does a good job of covering the topic at hand. The sites are grouped in topcial lists and many of the site's listed are illustrated with screen shots.

Simply locate the area your investigating, go to one of the sites listed and should you need more, you'll find scads of other links at the listed sites.

Lee's Illustrated Stamp Listopedia
http://www.filbert.com/StampListopedia/

Incidentially, Lee made up the word.

Free Mem!

Some readers may want this utility, but others will be cross-eyed reading about it.

FreeMem Pro is nifty shareware program that frees up your PC's memory by throwing out programs and other things that you have already closed.  It helps your PC run more efficiently and helps stop those amazingly long disk swaps.  You see, just because you close a program, it doesn't mean the program has left and freed up your RAM.  

FreeMem can also be set up to automatically check memory and clean out the deadwood, using memory level thresholds or a time scheduler.  It's by Meikel Weber and available in English and German versions.  

FreeMem at
http://www.sysopt.com/freemem/
http://www.meikel.com/freemem/fmempro.htm