# SIPB Documentation The Student Information Processing Board is devoted to helping the MIT community utilize the Institute's computer facilities with ease and efficiency. Since we know how dry and badly written the average user's manual is, we write and maintain many documents on our own. This documentation is freely provided to users in the form of online and printed manuals, UNIX man pages, and emacs info files, in addition to the documentation available in our office. The source for almost all of this documentation is available online under the directory /afs/sipb.mit.edu/project/doc, and is redistributable under certain conditions; all these documents are copyright by the SIPB. Although the following guides are mainly of use to Athena users, SIPB documents are known to be used at universities other than MIT. Hardcopies of these documents are available for free in the SIPB Office, W20-557, and online versions are also available via Athena's online "help" facility, by selecting the main-menu item "Documentation Archives". ## The Inessential Guide Series The SIPB Inessential Guide series contain useful information about a variety of computing topics. Explore! * [An Inessential Guide to Athena](http://stuff.mit.edu/afs/sipb/project/doc/quickref/quick.html) ([DVI](http://stuff.mit.edu/afs/sipb/project/doc/current/iAthena.dvi))([PDF](http://stuff.mit.edu/afs/sipb.mit.edu/project/doc/guide/guide.pdf))([PS](http://stuff.mit.edu/afs/sipb.mit.edu/project/doc/guide/guide.ps))
A large guide on how to get the most out of your Athena account, from reading mail, to using AFS, to sending zephyrs. * [An Inessential Quick Reference to Athena](http://stuff.mit.edu/afs/sipb/project/doc/quickref/quick.html)([DVI](http://stuff.mit.edu/afs/sipb/project/doc/current/quickref.dvi))
A one-page reference to the most basic information about Athena, including logging in, reading email, and getting help. * [Inessential AFS](http://stuff.mit.edu/afs/sipb.mit.edu/project/doc/afs/html/afs-new.html) ([DVI](http://stuff.mit.edu/afs/sipb/project/doc/current/iAFS.dvi))([PDF](http://stuff.mit.edu/afs/sipb/project/doc/current/iAFS.pdf))([PS](http://stuff.mit.edu/afs/sipb/project/doc/current/iAFS.ps)) A guide to AFS (Andrew File System) - the system used to store your files on Athena. * [Inessential LaTeX (PDF)](http://stuff.mit.edu/sipb/ilatex) ([DVI](http://stuff.mit.edu/afs/sipb/project/doc/current/iLaTeX.dvi)) ([HTML, but somewhat dated](http://stuff.mit.edu/afs/sipb.mit.edu/project/www/latex/guide/guide.html))
A very helpful guide to LaTeX, a typesetting program commonly used for doing PSets, writing papers, theses, books, etc. * [Inessential MATLAB](http://stuff.mit.edu/afs/sipb/project/www/matlab/imatlab/imatlab.html) ([DVI](http://stuff.mit.edu/afs/sipb/project/doc/imatlab/imatlab.dvi)) ([PDF](http://stuff.mit.edu/afs/sipb/project/doc/current/imatlab.pdf))
A guide to using MATLAB on Athena. * [Inessential Zephyr](http://stuff.mit.edu/afs/sipb/project/doc/izephyr/html/izephyr.html) ([DVI](http://stuff.mit.edu/afs/sipb/project/doc/izephyr/izephyr.dvi))([PDF](http://stuff.mit.edu/afs/sipb/project/doc/izephyr/izephyr.pdf))
A guide to using the MIT instant-messenging system, Zephyr.