| NOW about Internet Software | 01/25/2000 by John Ver Voorn | ||
| Now Here: Main > NOW Computer : Software : >Internet Software< | |||
This document was written either to be printed or for viewing on the Web (Internet) So if you see a lot of stuff that is underlined, this is to make it eaiser to jump to the topic of interest. The Underlined with parentesis is for jumping to a diffrent spot on the same page. Just underlined is for a diffrent page. Underlined with ~ on both sides of a word or phrase means the word is defined in the Glossery. And a Underline with a ! or followed by (http://...) means it is a Web Page created by someone else with information you may be interested in. If you are looking at a printed version of this document, you can try to get a more up to date version from the internet from my main page at (http://www.suba.com/~discov/john/john.htm)!
The Internet is an agreement between computers all across the world on how they can and will talk to each other. Like the telephone system, no one owns or controls the whole thing but it is connected in such a way that people all around the world can talk to each other. Unlike the phone system, you don't get charged by how far the message travels, you just get charged a hourly or flat monthly rate.
IN, in + TERra, earth + NETwork, conections! Conections of computers all across the earth.
30 to 40 Million people have Internet access today, and the number is growing daily.
You can access the internet through an on-line service such as
AOL (America on Line) (800) 827-6364,
Prodigy (800) 776-3449,
Compusuerve (800) 848-8199,
MSN (Micosoft Network) (800) 386-5550.
Most of them I believe are charging about $2.95 an hour & more for special services.
Any of which are good for people just starting out. I think a Much cheeper way is through an Internet Provider. Insted of an hourly rate, you can get unlimited access for a whole month for a very low fee. The average for most providers is about 19.95 to $24.95 a month, flat rate no extra charges.
You can think of the On-line services like a Bus that can take you anywhere you want to go, that is on it's route. The On-Line service you choose is your way onto the Information superhighway. Most On-line services can take you on the entire World Wide Web, and let you e-mail anywhere also (Some charge per message or extra for outside mail like the internet, so watch out) & most I belive let you access some newsgroups & FTP (incoming only). The On-Line Services also have stops that no other bus stops at, like travel reservations or certain magazines & unique chat rooms, so you pay the extra hourly rate to get access to these extra services. While an internet provider is an local bus just to the Internet, no extra stops to pay extra for. Most Internet providers let you get IRC, outgoing ftp and Telnet, really most people don't need these things anyway. But if you do you want to, use an internet provider, because you are likly to find them missing from your On-Line service.
If the On-Line service is the Bus that gets you there, then the browser you are using is your Bus driver/tour guide. The browser you use will decide how well you see a particular site, and some sites were designed with a particular browser in mind. A browser understands diffrent languages like HTML 2.0 or HTML 3.0 or the Netscape extensions or java or ActiveX, and if a site was designed using those languages it is in order to take advantage of the advanced features that these languages offer. This basicly means if you use a browser that only knows a little of that language or none at all you are not going to be able to see the same thing as with a browser that does understand that language. A Diffrent browser won't look as pretty or may be missing a lot.
And the browser won't just take you somewhere, you must give it the exact address. You can get a lot of Internet addresses from books & magazines. But if you just want to explore or find information you still need addresses so a search engin might be usefull, this is like the map at the side of the road. Some maps you look at show diffrent points of intrest, and some maps are more detailed then others. The search engin you use, decides how many stops you make along the way to you required destination.
The speed of the connections decides how fast the bus gets information from your destination. 28.8bps is about twice as fast as 14.4. ISDN is very fast but very expensive, and cabel modems are just coming out in a few choice test markets. Right now on the information super highway it's like the speed limit for most of us is 1 or 2 miles per hour, when we really want to go 50 to 80mps or really even faster if we could.
Another problem is if you try to visit a site, there may be too many buses in the parking lot already, or the site may have limited hours (very rare, but it does happen) or the site is torn down and doesn't exist any more. Most sites if they move will leave a forwarding address, but if you try too long after they have moved then you are likly to get a forwarding order expired. Any of those problems give you the same busy signal (or error message). So keep circling the parking lot and see if a spot opens up by someone else leaving. We try again by just clicking OK to get rid of the error message and then click again on the site name. If you keep circling and nothing opens up with in the first 10 trys or so, then go somewhere else and try again in a few minutes. If you still can't get through after a few more trys then try again in a few hours when the site might be open again or less busy. If you can never get through then the site might no longer exist. Usually once you get to a site you shouldn't have problems. This really-really is a problem when you try to ftp something (get or download a file, like a game or a utility). All the good stores parking lots are full.
Comparison of Services!
There is a good article comparing the major online services called
the Online Superguide!
(http://www.zdnet.com/~pccomp/content/960119/feature1/main.html)
To find a local provider in the 312 area
try THE LIST!
(http://thelist.com/areacode/312.html)
If you don't have any internet access yet and don't want to start with AOL
try either NETCOM (800) 353-6600 or NETWave (800) 961-WAVE.
Once you have access to the internet be curious and
see if you can get a better deal with another provider.
Try and find a service with a phone number in the same area code as you and preferably in your calling area,
which you only get charged to connect --not per conect time-- (if the exchange is the same ie. the first three digits
match, then it is most likely in your calling area) but watch your phone bills.
The Internet has:
Connect to the Internet with a dial-up, T1 to T4, using TCP/IP
Ways to save money:
What is a MUD, MOO?
A MUD is a Multi User Dungeon, used mostly for several players to play a
Dungeon & Dragons game against each other. A MOO is Multi Object Oriented, this
is a world where you can do things to objects and they respond, so you can listen
to a tape player, or read the blackboard, ect. These worlds aren't all just games
some of them are learning environments. Most of these require a telnet conection.
You need to know how to send a simple e-mail but you may want to know how to send a carbon copy (CC:) to someone else, how to send a file along with or attached to the message, hense the name attacments, or adding an address to you address book.
Sending a simple e-mail is easy, just type in an e-mail address, a short description describing the subject and then the actual message, you can usually move bettween these fields by pressing the tab key.
NEWSGROUPS
Then you can just add the newsgroup by typing in the address.
Or you can browse all the newsgroups and try to find the one you are intrested in.
With newsgroups you mark in your newsgroup reader as subsribed,
this is just adding it to the list of subscribed newsgroups.
With some advanced newsgroup readers they can sometimes download
everthing new which can waste a lot of space on your hard-drive rather quickly.
MAILING LISTS
You subscribe to a mailing list by e-mailing a mail-server, which serves several lists. The e-mail message
must be in a certain exact form. Usually the body of the message say "subscribe maillist Your Name"
and it is addresed to the mail server. But when you want to post a question or respond to a question, you e-mail to
a diffrent address. Finally when you want to cancel your subscription, you need to e-mail the mail server again giving
it the command to "unsubscribe maillist". If you subscribe to at least one mail-list
seriously consider getting a mail program that can filter your mail, this way you can move all of the stuff
from the mailing list to it's own folder.
NOW What was Important? -
CREATE = Type (Backspace to correct imediate mistakes).
EDIT = DELETE (Selecting and press Delete) or ADD (Type).
Select = Hold down Shift and Move to end.
FORMAT = Selecting then Choose Menu or Toolbars.
SAVE = File Save=Record;
File Open=Play;
File Save As=Record to a New Tape;
File Close=Put Away & Pop out Tape;
File Exit=Put away Tool (Typewriter or Tape Recorder)
PRINT = File Print.
NOW What? -
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LearnWare
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- ©John Ver Voorn -