As we noted in previous Traveling in Cyberspace columns, the driving forces behind the Internet and World-Wide Web (WWW) are facilitating communication unhampered by geographical distance and rapid access to information. As a personal example, we've used the World-Wide Web recently to track down the work of a colleague in Poland. Before the Internet was developed, doing so would have cost hundreds of dollars in telephone calls, postage, and lost hours of productivity. We also used the Internet and WWW extensively in creating this column, dramatically decreasing the amount of time needed to gather the pertinent information we will be passing along to you, the reader.

Although the WWW is mainly responsible for the explosion of interest in the Internet, most of its capabilities have been long available. In this column, we will discuss some of the other Internet tools and services that, based on our own experiences, we have found useful, and you might find useful too. We will discuss classic tools and introduce a few newcomers that make Internet communication similar to a chat with your neighbor over the backyard fence.

Because the Internet and WWW are based on the theme of communication, we have divided this discussion into two major sections. The first half is devoted to communicating with people, which we will discuss in this issue. The second half is devoted to communicating solely with computers, particularly discuss various Internet tools and services that can be used to find information, software, and so on, over the Internet which we will discuss in the July issue of TIP.

E-mail

Undoubtedly the most used Internet service is e-mail (short for electronic mail). E-mail allows a user to send an electronic message to anyone else in the world who is also connected to the Internet. E-mail offers numerous advantages over regular post-office mail (often called "snail mail" by Internet users. No offense to the US Postal Service, we're just passing along information!). A primary advantage is speed of communication. A letter sent from Omaha to Tampa via regular mail takes three to five days for delivery, whereas I can send a message via e-mail to Mike Coovert (TIP editor, at the University of South Florida in Tampa) and he will receive it almost instantaneously. Another advantage is that you can simultaneously send a message to any number of people. Figure 1 shows the header information of an e-mail message sent to Mike Campion at Purdue University, the primary recipient, and Mike Coovert at the University of South Florida and John Boudreau at Cornell University, secondary recipients. Each received the same message an instant after it was sent (or mailed), and if memory serves, I (JPC) received a reply from each within a few minutes from each of the original recipients!

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A second advantage is cost. If you have a direct connection to the Internet you can send an unlimited number of messages at no cost to you. If you are connecting to the Internet via an access provider, you can also send unlimited messages, although a monthly fee still applies. If you are connecting via a content provider it becomes tricky. Some providers allow unlimited messages to be sent and received. Others charge for messages sent only, some charge for messages received only, and some charge for both over and above your monthly access free. Unlike regular mail services, the size of the message doesn't affect the cost, so a one-line "hi" would cost that same as a message containing 500 pages of text. (See the last issue of TIP for an explanation of direct connections vs. Internet content and Internet access providers).

We have found e-mail to also be a powerful method for organizing and filing communications. For example, most, if not all, e-mail software programs have an inbox for incoming mail, and an outbox for mail that you have sent. Each time you send or receive mail the respective box is updated and saved. Figure 2 shows a tiny portion of my outbox. Each line is a separate e-mail message I've sent, including information on the name of the recipient, the time and date the message was sent, a brief description of the subject of the message, and the actual message (not shown in the figure, but which can be seen by clicking on one of the e-mail messages).

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E-mail does have its disadvantages. A major disadvantage is that you can only send messages to people who have access to the Internet and an e-mail account. Also, similar to regular mail, you can receive unwanted junk mail. Because e-mail messages can be sent easily and cheaply, junk e-mail will undoubtedly continue to proliferate in the future.

E-mail Software

There are dozens of commercial and shareware e-mail software packages for various computer platforms (PC, Apple, or a UNIX workstation) and operating systems (variants of Windows, System 7.5, OS/2, UNIX, etc.). There are also e-mail freeware (free software) available. Qualcomm's Eudora Light, my (JPC) personal favorite, is a "reduced functionality" version of their Eudora Pro. There are versions for Windows and Apple's System 7.5. Elm is an e-mail software package that was originally developed for UNIX workstations and which has been ported to the OS/2 operating system and the Window's operating environment. Pine is another freeware e-mail software package originally developed for UNIX and which has now been ported to the DOS operating system and Windows operating environment.

Usenet News

Perhaps our favorite Internet service is Usenet newsgroups. Usenet consists of a collection of thousands of electronic newsgroups. A newsgroup is a collection of messages that are defined by a common theme. Figure 3 shows a very small subset of newsgroups involving computer language themes. The "comp.lang" prefix indicates that these newsgroups involve discussions of computer languages. Figure 4 shows "posts" (i.e., newsgroup messages) in the comp.lang.lisp.mcl newsgroup (for Macintosh Common Lisp). Selecting one of the posts (via mouse or keyboard) reveals the content of the message, which can then be read, replied to, deleted, or saved for future reference.

Prefixes of some of the popular newsgroups include "alt" for newsgroups involving "alternative" themes (for instance alt.elvis.king for Elvis Presley fans) and "rec" for topics involving "recreation" themes (for instance, rec.pets.cats for cat fans). Newsgroup themes range from the banal (e.g., alt.politics) to the bizarre (e.g., alt.fan.tonya-harding.whack.whack.whack) , so no matter what your interest, you are likely to find it on the Usenet.

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A great advantage of the Usenet is you can be as proactive as you want; you can read what has been "posted" in a newsgroup, or you yourself can post a message. We've found that newsgroups provide nearly instant access to information and sources of information. For example, when something goes awry with our software or hardware, an easy and quick method of dealing with a problem is to post an article requesting help to a relevant newsgroup. Invariably, someone who does have an answer to the problem posts a "follow-up" article which helps us rectify the problem. It's like having thousands of experts at your fingertips.

FAQs: Frequently Asked Questions

Many, if not most, newsgroups have developed compilations of information associated with the newsgroup topic. FAQs, short for frequently asked questions, are generally an excellent source of information about the topic of the newsgroup, and are usually quite extensive. Many FAQs are written by experts in the topic, so the information (at least what we've found) is accurate. Most FAQs contain guidelines on the what should be posted to the newsgroup, therefore it is a good idea to read a FAQ for a newsgroup before posting for two reasons. First, posting inappropriate material can lead to a flame (an e-mail message or post to a newsgroup in which someone questions someone's thoughts, beliefs, and even intelligence. An electronic insult!). Second, FAQs contain just that, frequently asked questions about a topic. If you post a question to a newsgroup, and the answer is already in the FAQ for that newsgroup, you are likely to be flamed. Most newsgroup post FAQs on a regular basis so they are easily accessed. You can also use ftp (which we will discuss in our next column) to download the FAQ from MIT at the following address:

rtfm.mit.edu/pub/usenet-by-group

Usenet Software Packages

Although not as widely available as e-mail software packages, software packages that allow you to access newsgroups, called a newsreader, are readily available. For example, if the host computer which you are using to connecting to the Internet runs the UNIX operating system, you are likely to have at your disposal at least one if not two freeware newsreaders, including rn (short for read news) and tin (we have no idea if this is an acronym, and if so, what it stands for). Each of these newsreaders allows you to "subscribe" to newsgroups of interest. Subscribing to a few newsgroup of interests obviates the need for wading through the 5000 or so newsgroups every time you want to read something. There are a number of free and shareware newsreaders for other operating systems. Contact your system administrator to find out what is available for your computer's operating system.

Note that the system administrator of the network you are using may limit the number and types of newsgroup available at your location. So if you know a newsgroup exists, and it doesn't show up in the full list of newsgroups at your site, contact your system administrator.

Internet Relay Chat, Internet Voice Chat

People have long sought ways to communicate quickly across great distances. Air mail, the long distance telephone, fax machines-all have helped people to work together despite geographical separation. Electronic mail and the Usenet are great ways to communicate with one or many people, but are hampered by the time lag between when you send a message and when it gets picked up by the other person. A simple conversation conducted via e-mail could take days. For quicker interpersonal communication, the Internet has evolved Internet Relay Chat (IRC) and Internet Voice Chat (IVC).

Internet Relay Chat is similar to the chat rooms in CompuServe, Prodigy, and America Online. There is a choice of channels to join, each named after its topic of discussion. Many of the channels are of quite frivolous, but some are scholarly interest, and others are topical. This was handy during last year's referendum in Qubec, when one of the present authors (RJW, born in Montral) followed the results on the #Referendum channel. If you don't see a channel that piques your interest, you can create your own and invite others to join you. People communicate by typing in messages for all people in the channel to see. You can also send private comments to individuals. In this manner, it's just like a meeting in a conference room, in which you can talk out loud to the group or whisper to your neighbor. The difference is, your neighbor might be in Singapore!

Windows users wanting to try IRC should give WS IRC a look. Like Eudora, it comes in both freeware and commercial/shareware versions. Apple Macintosh users tend to work with Homer and ircle. For OS/2, there are several inexpensive shareware packages, IRC/2, and GammaTech IRC, as well as a freeware port of UNIX IRC.

Internet Voice Chat is a very recent development, since it has become broadly accessible only within the past year. The basic idea is that, with a sound card, an Internet connection, and special software, you can conduct person-to-person conversations over the 'net! The especially exciting thing is that most of the software is free. (On the other hand, the average computer still costs upward of USD$2000.) Wouldn't it be great to discuss a joint research project with a colleague in France? Five minutes worth of discussion could be more productive than a week's worth of E-mail.

We have recently tried IVC and found it to be all but identical to a normal telephone call, although, interestingly, the sound quality was better. As you talk into the microphone attached to your sound card, your computer compresses your speech into binary files which are sent off to your conversation partner's computer. When they reach their destination, the files are decompressed and played through the sound card. With the speed of the Internet, there is very little delay as the files are transmitted. Most exciting of all, the charge for your "call" is simply what you pay for access to the Internet. If your 'net access is free, so is your call!

IRC and IVC Software

Since the technology is so new, IVC programs are far from perfect. Some, like CU-SeeMe, transmit both voice and image (if you have a camera attached to your computer), but both are grainy. Others use proprietary transmission protocols, meaning that both parties must use the same software. Windows users should check out CU-SeeMe, Internet Phone, and Speak Freely. CU-SeeMe is available for Macintosh, and Mac users can also use Maven and NetPhone. OS/2 users can try VoiceChat/2, and InterCom for OS/2.

Conclusion

This ends our overview of Internet services involving communicating with people. It is impossible to do justice to the myriad of Internet services and tools in a few short pages. We do hope we have provided you, the reader, with enough information so that you can make an informed decision as to whether any of the Internet services or tools would make you more productive, or happy! There are numerous other services that are available; however, space constraints limit us to providing descriptions of the Internet services we feel will be most beneficial. In the next issue of TIP we will discuss Internet services and tools that allow users to communicate with other (remote) computers as a means of gathering information. In the mean time, happy surfing.