Thesaurus

Why....
It is a wise thing to perform your own remailer-xxx queries.
But it might be a threat to your anonymity and time-consuming.
Performing daily automated remailer-xxx queries, Thesaurus allows broader  questions:
    which remailers allow "From"?
    which NewsGroups are blocked?
    how (comparatively) big are remailers?
And why not, as suggested:
    global load of the remailing network
    ...
For the time being, you get this page with all which goes behind each X, or this graph
My programs are written for Windows.
Similar techique could be used to write something in *NIX, so I go into details.

Tricks

Remailer-xxx queries are answered different ways
    by various remailing softwares
    depending on middleman or non-middleman
As a human, I found it sometimes difficult or impossible to know which remailer answered....
The trick I found is to ask the question a different way to each remailer,
    to put "something" in the question which I would find in the answer and would identify the answering remailer.
It could not be the "Subject:" nor the "To:", it had to be the "From:"
My remailer-conf query to widow would look like:

The trick lies in the (conf_widow) thing.
While all answers from all remailers are sent to the same dedicated E-Mail@: frogtest@mageos.com,
    the answer from each will bear a specific To: (here: To: <frogtest@mageos.com>(conf_widow))
    which makes identifying the type+ origin of answer trivial

A minor trick is to add a random something in the body of the message to defeat MD5 rejection (while testing.......)

General organisation
I use a dedicated E-Mail @, 1+ 3 + 1 +1 VB programs, Pegasus, Reliable, Excel and FTP Voyager Scheduler
    TimerWizard.exe looks like this ScreenShot from TimerWizard
           reads its Timer.ini file
                     there are maintenance functions for Timer.ini too
           submits b_Thesaurus_Snd.exe (say every 24 hours)
           submits b_Thesaurus_Rcv.exe (say every 30 minutes)
    b_Thesaurus_Snd.exe
           reads information about remailers from Reliable configuration files
           creates the query messages as .q0 and .q1 files in Reliable\Mail\Mailout
                       they are the typical Reliable spool files, except for a characteristic prefix
    Reliable
            sends those messages when it pleases, and other remailers answer
   Pegasus
            regularly scans that special @ (say every 30 minutes)
            downloads messages in a special work folder (1 .cnm file per message)
    b_Thesaurus_Rcv.exe
            scans the work folder for .cnm files
            analyses each .cnm (the "To: " line) to rename it as the corresponding remailer-xxx_yyyyy.txt
                    xxx = conf or help or key or stats
                    yyyyyy = remailer nickname  
            (file is also moved into the Thesaurus folder)
            calls GenHTML.exe
    GenHTML.exe
            scans the thesaurus folder for remailer-stats_yyyyy.txt files
            merges the Thesaurus.html from the info collected there, and Thesaurus1.html and Thesaurus2.html models
    Excel
           (I use it manually because of memory leaks issues)
           generates a nice piechart or whatever you like
    FTP Voyager Scheduler
            has its own built-in timer
            uploads modified files (.html .txt .gif) to the web site(s) at least every 24 hours
   i_Thesaurus_AnaCS.exe  looks like this ScreenShot from i_Thesaurus_AnaCS
            allows to detect differences between Reliable's Cap Strings and those from the Thesaurus
   i_Thesaurus_Qry.exe  looks like this ScreenShot from i_Thesaurus_Qry
            allows manual operations + exploring

FTP Voyager Scheduler starts with Windows
   shortcut in \Windows\Start Menu\Start\
TimerWizard.exe  starts with Windows
    shortcut in \Windows\Start Menu\Start\ (install proggie and friends wherever pleases you)
    you might have to modify the leading constants in the source to reflect your own folders' organization.
    (TimerWizard also handles daily postings of stats to apas, and hourly FTP uploading of stats to mirror sites))
The programs share many modules with each others and their family (dont be afraid to overwrite them).
DownLoad VB Application (Sources + .exe)

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