Date: Mon, 16 Jan 1995 23:41:09 -0800 (PST) From: "Janet E. Harrison" Subject: FEDERAL: Databases of House and Senate To: firearms-alert@shell.portal.com I located several text files that have contact info for the 104th, but it's a wee bit frustrating that these files tend to have *either* snailmail addressses *or* fax numbers. For my needs, I want all the info in one place. OTOH, it can be convenient to have just the names and fax numbers for importing into fax software. So I have pulled together all the data from all the files I could find, and have it in four groups: All members of the Senate (voice and fax; no mail yet) Only names and fax numbers of Senate who have fax numbers All members of the House (includes mail, voice and fax) Only names and fax numbers of House who have fax numbers The fax-only files are available in ascii comma-delimited format only. The lists of complete member info are available in ascii comma-delimited, WordPerfect 5.1 secondary merge file, and WordPerfect Office Notebook. I will be zipping these and sending them to Jeff Chan to do with what he will. ;-) I will also respond to email requests to tat@well.com. Please specify whether you have access to unzip (Unix) or pkunzip (DOS). Also if you know whether your email reader is capable of decoding attached binary files, that would help me to know the best method of sending it to you. __ [regarding 1/22/95 corrections:] I'm about to send an announcement to f-a and rkba-dems explaining the details regarding these files. Suffice it to say that you should delete all the House-related files in your ftp directory that I sent you, and the one that Dennis created that was based on my list, with my apologies for the inaccuracies. The attached are accurate (or at least as accurate as the source lists are) and have been hand-proofread against the source lists. I admit that I got a bit cross-eyed and I hope I didn't miss anything. The Judiciary list always was accurate; this is just an update with more fax numbers and a few adjustments to make it nicer. I am also attaching INTRO.TXT which explains to the end user what the fields are, etc. __ Date: Sun, 22 Jan 1995 21:51:33 -0800 (PST) From: "Janet E. Harrison" Subject: UPDATE: Corrections to House database To: firearms-alert@shell.portal.com Sorry for long message but I think I need to be precise -- Updated 1/22/95 This message is being posted to firearms-alert@shell.portal.com and rkba-dems@netcom.com Regarding the Congressional databases I did last week: 1) HOUSEALL.* LISTS: First of all, no wonder nothing works right in Washington: What the House gopher labels "All Members - Alphabetical" is only sorted on LastName, without taking FirstName into account. Consequently, it is not *really* in alphabetical order. Where I went wrong was in assuming that the House knows the alphabet..... So when I ran macros to pull together several different files into the "alpha" list, some fields lined up with the wrong people. Which of course threw everything off. I have fixed that, and I have also: - corrected a few typos - added several voice numbers I didn't have before - added one member who was left off the original list - added nine-digit zipcodes where available - deleted some fax numbers that don't work. (My definition of "don't work" is that I tried to send a fax to the number and got a recording saying it was an invalid number. I didn't delete any numbers that simply didn't answer. And I only tested the numbers of the Judiciary Committee members, not every member of the House.) SO, PLEASE REPLACE LAST WEEK'S HOUSE DATABASES WITH THE NEW ONES THAT I FINISHED TODAY (1/22/95). THE OLD ONES ARE TOO INACCURATE TO RELY ON. I apologize for the inconvenience. I promise never to assume anyone knows the alphabet in the future. 2) HOUSEFAX.TXT LIST: The fax numbers were correct when compared to the NRA's master list; however, as noted above, a few were out of service, so I've deleted those. This file contains LName, FName, and Fax fields only, and is only available in ascii comma-delimited format. 3) SENATALL.* AND SENATFAX LISTS: I have received a file which differs from mine in some respects. I am in the process of determining which is the more correct list. I am not uploading any Senate lists tonight. Watch this space for further announcements. 4) JUDICIAR.* LISTS: The House Judiciary Committee lists were also correct, but I have improved them by adding some working fax numbers that the NRA alert didn't have, and making the fields match the master HOUSEALL.* fields. 5) A NOTE RE FIELDS AND FORMATS: I have added a field for Chamber so that those who wish to combine both HOUSEALL.* and SENATALL.* into one big database can do so. "H" in the Chamber field means House; "S" means Senate. I have included a field for Zip. Before, all zips were 20515, so I didn't go to the trouble of putting it in, but now that I have some nine-digit zipcodes I've included that field. 6) LAST BUT NOT LEAST: The HOUSEALL.* and JUDICIAR.* files are available in ascii comma- delimited format (TXT), WordPerfect 5.1 secondary merge file format (SF), and WordPerfect Notebook format (NB). The HOUSEFAX.TXT list is available only in ascii comma-delimited format. All of the House-related files are ready to go and I'm uploading them this evening. I am holding off on sending any Senate files until I can verify my information. As before, please forward corrections to tat@well.com. If you would like a copy via email, send email to tat@well.com, and please indicate: - whether you want Judiciary only, the master House list, the House fax list, or any combination of the above - which format you want (TXT, SF, NB) - whether you have access to either unzip (Unix) or pkunzip (DOS) - whether your mail reader is capable of decoding attached binary files. I will also be sending all House and Judiciary Committee files to Jeff Chan for his ftp directory. I'll be contacting those who requested the files by email before, to send the corrected list. If you mailed me and you don't hear from me, please drop me a line. Again, I apologize for the inaccuracies and inconvenience. __ Date: Sat, 28 Jan 1995 16:25:09 -0800 (PST) From: "Janet E. Harrison" Subject: Update to House & Senate lists To: Jeff Chan Jeff -- I have attached the file congall.zip which contains the following files: houseall.txt senatall.txt housefax.txt senatfax.txt houseall.sf senatall.sf houseall.nb senatall.nb I forgot to check your ftp site for the exact names of the files to be deleted prior to starting this email to you. I'll go to your site after I send this and will give you a list of the outdated filenames in next mail. There are minor changes to the House lists, and major additions to the Senate ones, which did not have USMail addresses in the older versions. I am not sending the Judiciary committee lists because they have not changed. I will be emailing Dennis this evening to tell him about the updates. Regarding the long lines, I'm not sure what the solution is. I'll work with Dennis to come up with something in Unix-ese, since I don't speak that language very well. ;-) Lastly, I plan to standardize on the filename patterns shown above so that all you will have to do in future updates is let unzip overwrite the files as it decompresses the new ones. I don't anticipate that there will be *major* revisions in the future -- more like changing a number here or adding a number there from time to time. Of course, these could be famous last words. - Regards, Janet __ Date: Sat, 28 Jan 1995 17:06:15 -0800 (PST) From: "Janet E. Harrison" Subject: Old Files to Delete To: Jeff Chan The following files in your ftp directory should be deleted: HOUSEALL.NB HOUSEALL.SF HOUSEALL.TXT SENANB.ZIP SENATALL.NB SENATALL.TXT SENATE.SF SENATEXT.ZIP SENFAX.TXT All the JUDI* files are still *good*. I have told Dennis about the changes. Thanks! - Regards, Janet __ Date: Sat, 28 Jan 1995 19:21:59 -0800 (PST) From: "Janet E. Harrison" Subject: UPDATE: Congressional Contact Info To: firearms-alert@shell.portal.com I have sent to Jeff Chan (tho I'm sure he hasn't had a chance to put the files up yet -- he probably Has A Life ;-) ) updated files of contact info for the House and Senate. The House lists have just minor changes. The Senate lists are significantly improved, now that they have USMail addresses, which were not in there before. The Judiciary Committee lists have not changed since last update. Please note that those of you who net-surf may have accessed the databases kept by Grace York at U.Mich. Her USMail addresses are okay, but her fax numbers are not very complete. I have used the fax numbers provided by the NRA update of 1/18/95, and I have sent the info to Ms. York so that she can update her files. Because LCMARVEL is perceived to be one of the "definitive" sources of data on the net, and because LCMARVEL points to Ms. York's files, a lot of people are probably assuming hers are the latest-greatest, so that's why I'm pointing out that her info is incomplete. As before, if you don't have access to ftp you can email me (tat@well.com) and I'll send them to you. Please specify which files you want, which format you want them in, whether you have access to unzip or pkunzip, and whether your mail reader can read attached files. Sorry that I don't have an robot-mailer, so the human being called Janet will be reading your mail and responding. Filenames that end in .txt or .TXT are ascii comma-delimited files. Filenames that end in .sf or .SF are WordPerfect 5.1 secondary merge formatted files. Filenames that end in .nb or .NB are WordPerfect Office Notebook formatted files. Notebook files have an additional field for Notes. Here are the filenames: houseall.txt - All representatives, complete info houseall.sf houseall.nb senatall.txt - All senators, complete info senatall.sf senatall.nb housefax.txt - Representatives for whom I have fax numbers, names and fax numbers only. (Available in ascii format only.) senatfax.txt - Senators for whom I have fax numbers, names and fax numbers only. (Available in ascii format only.) JUDICIAR.TXT - House Judiciary Committee members, complete info. JUDICIAR.SF Note upper-case filenames. These have not changed JUDICIAR.NB since last update (last week). JUDICFAX.TXT - House Judiciary Cmte members for whom I have fax numbers. Note upper-case filename. Has not changed since last update (last week). Corrections to tat@well.com, please. __ Date: Mon, 30 Jan 1995 19:03:23 -0800 From: Jeff Chan To: firearms-alert Subject: INFO: Congressional Contact Info updated I've saved tat@well.com's updated Congressional contact files in my ftp/WWW dir under federal/104: http://www.portal.com/~chan/federal/104/ or ftp://ftp.shell.portal.com/pub/chan/federal/104/ Note that file names are forced to upper case. __ >Filenames that end in .txt or .TXT are ascii comma-delimited files. >Filenames that end in .sf or .SF are WordPerfect 5.1 secondary merge >formatted files. >Filenames that end in .nb or .NB are WordPerfect Office Notebook formatted >files. Notebook files have an additional field for Notes. > >Here are the filenames: HOUSEALL.TXT - All representatives, complete info HOUSEALL.SF HOUSEALL.NB SENATALL.TXT - All senators, complete info SENATALL.SF SENATALL.NB HOUSEFAX.TXT - Representatives for whom I have fax numbers, names and fax numbers only. (Available in ascii format only.) SENATFAX.TXT - Senators for whom I have fax numbers, names and fax numbers only. (Available in ascii format only.) [The above files are available in CONGALL.ZIP and CONGALL.tar.Z] >JUDICIAR.TXT - House Judiciary Committee members, complete info. >JUDICIAR.SF Note upper-case filenames. These have not changed >JUDICIAR.NB since last update (last week). > >JUDICFAX.TXT - House Judiciary Cmte members for whom I have fax > numbers. Note upper-case filename. Has not changed > since last update (last week). > >Corrections to tat@well.com, please. -- Jeff Chan Internet: chan@shell.portal.com __ [From tat@well.com, re updated database, 4/9/95] Attached is a zipped file that contains: houseall.txt, senatall.txt, housefax.txt, senatfax.txt (all of above are ascii comma-delimited files) houseall.sf, senatall.sf (WordPerfect 5.1 secondary merge files) houseall.nb, senatall.nb (WordPerfect Office Notebook files) I zipped them while in DOS, and so they may unzip as ALL-CAPS filenames; I dunno. I will not mention anything in f-a so as to give you time to place them in your directory before people start going there to get them. Otherwise I fear they'll just download the old ones thinking they're getting the new ones.