What is "accessing the World Wide Web"?
By "accessing the World Wide Web" I mean using the global Internet for four specific purposes, which I call the four FUNCTIONS for connectivity:One can connect to the Internet in two ways, which I call the two PATHS to connectivity:
- To send and receive email
- To move files to and from other computers (FTP)
- To engage in "real-time" discussion across the network (MOO/MUD, IRC)
- To "browse" world wide web pages (MOSIAC, NETSCAPE, etc.)
Confused? Option 1 above means that your computer acts as a "dumb terminal" (nothing much more than a keyboard and monitor) for another computer (VAX, UNIX, AOL). And option 2 means that your personal computer runs "client" software that moves files, email, and comments directly from your machine through your IP address into the Internet.
- Through a "shell" such as a miniframe computer running the UNIX or Vax/VMS operating system. This is what you do when you "log into" your campus computer, or AOL, Prodigy, or a school system provider such as TENET in Texas, and send email, run Telnet or FTP, or run LYNX on that computer. If you access the World Wide Web through a shell, you will only have a "text browsing" capabilities, which means you cannot get images (with the exception of running TIA or Slipknot in UNIX -- more about that later). You can do this through a
- campus ethernet connection or
- through a modem and a telephone connection.
- Through a direct connection to the Internet. This happens when you use ethernet on campus or dial in through a SLIP ("Serial Line Interface Protocol") or PPP ("Point-to-Point Protocol") server, and run a "client" program on your own computer such as EUDORA, MOSAIC, NETSCAPE, FETCH, MUDWELLER, etc. If you connect to the World Wide Web through a direct connection to the Internet and a client browser, you will have a "graphics browsing" capability, which means that you can access images, sound, and motion pictures.
To have a direct connection you need TCP/IP connection software and an IP ("Internet Protocol") address. Every computer with a direct access to the Internet must either have a unique IP address or be connecting through a SLIP/PPP modem telephone connection. As with a shell connection, you can access the Internet directly through a
- campus ethernet connection or
- through a modem and a telephone connection.
If you use either a shell connection or a direct connection, and you are not one of those lucky souls whose institution or company provide you free Internet service, you can log on using a modem and a telephone line in one of four ways, each with serious cost considerations. Mainly you will need an ISP (Internet Service Provider, more about them later), which is a company that provides you a telephone number and a patch into the Internet. There are many of these in the world, and more starting up all the time.
Commercial Internet Service Providers go a long way to disguise the real costs of logging onto the Internet, so read the ads carefully to see which of the above four cost structures they depend on.
- If the ISP is located in your same area code, then you simply make a local telephone call to connect directly (and this is true for most major urban areas in the country). The total cost here can be as low as $39 a month, no long distance or connect charges.
- If the ISP does not share your area code but uses a PDN (Public Data Network), then you can still connect by making a local call, and your signal is carried over the PDN to the provider. You don't have to pay long distance, but somebody has to pay the PDN, so the provider charges you connect time, anywhere from $5 to $15 an hour. If you do much web browsing, this can get very expensive very quickly.
- If the ISP does not share your area code but provides a 1-800 number, then you don't have to pay long distance but the same situation as the PDN occurs. Connect charges can accumulate rapidly.
- If the ISP does not share your area code, you can still acquire a direct connection to the Internet by simply calling long distance. This means that every connection to the Internet is a long distance call, but if you manage your long distance carrier carefully, and discipline the times that you call, this can be a cheaper option than 2 or 3 above.
What is the best way to go?
My opinion (maybe not shared by others) suggests the following options, from best to worst:
- Best by far
To be affiliated with a campus or company that provides you both an on-site ethernet connection and an off-site modem SLIP/PPP connection. This allows you to connect from office or home directly to the Internet, for free, and perform the four FUNCTIONS through fast, easily configured, client software running on your own computer.
- Pretty good
To be affiliated with a campus or company that provides you an on-site ethernet connection and an off-site modem shell connection. This allows you to run client software on campus and log onto a miniframe computer from off-site.
- Not bad
To be connected through an "Internet provider" that allows you modem access to a SLIP/PPP server for a cost. The cost can be as low at $39 a month and as high as.... well, you don't want to know, all according to how urbanized your neighborhood is. Expensive, but you get to surf the net without paying connect time charges.
- Rough
To be connected through an online service like AOL, Compuserve, or Prodigy that charges for time connected and has only limited email and other services to the Internet, and won't let you browse or MOO.
- Irritating
To get to the Internet only through a shell and a terminal located somewhere outside your office, or worse, in another building.
- Excruciating
To keep hearing from others and reading in magazines how fascinating the Internet is, and not knowing what people are talking about.Internet Providers If you want to have a graphics browsing capability of the Internet running client software like MOSAIC or NETSCAPE from home, you will need buy the services of an Internet Service Provider. ISPs in major urban areas connect through a local telephone call and therefore you are not charged a long distance fee or for connect time, something important to consider as you browse the web over a telephone line.
Click here to read a fuller explanation of ISPs and how you can use one. To access a directory of ISPs that provide local service by area code, click here
Those who do not have local telephone access to an Internet Service Provider can access some ISPs through a Public Data Network, or PDN. This is a local telephone number that is directed to a national service such as CompuServe, Prodigy, and AOL. ISPs that use public data networks are Delphi, Holonet, Hookup.net, IGC, Michnet, Millennium, Novalink, Portal, PSI-world-dial, PSIlink, TMN, Well, World.
You can access a directory of all ISPs by clicking here. You can access YAHOO's index of ISP WWW links by clicking here.
A Well Known Example: "Internet in a Box."
Lubbock, Texas, does not have a local Internet Service Provider (Dallas-Fort Worth, Houston, and Austin do). Although I am an employee of Texas Tech University and have the "pretty good" option mentioned above (direct connection from campus, shell connection from home), I decided to see how difficult it would be for an individual without a campus or company providing a connection and who lived ouside the cheap services of a local ISP to get onto the Internet.Accordingly, I purchased a 28,800 bps modem (USR Sportster's V.34) for about $240 and Spry's "Internet in a Box" (I'll call it "Box" for short), billed as "The Complete Internet Solution" for about $100, both from Depot Office Supply Warehouse here in Lubbock. My son's Dell 486 had the required configuration (4 megs of RAM, 4 megs of harddisk storage, Windows 3.1 or later).
With "Box" you get all the software you need to connect directly to an ISP, either to Box's own national provider, "Sprintlink/Interserv," or to most other ISPs described above. Also, with Box, you get client software to allow you to perform what I called the "four functions" earlier (Air Mosaic, Air Mail, Air Telnet, etc.).
If you go with the Box's provider, "Sprintlink/Interserv," a nifty little device allows you to acquire an account automatically and begin using the Internet as soon as you get the software running, for a price (which is only given, of course, inside the shrink-wrapped package): $8.95 per month and $8.95 per hour (as of March, 1995), so that 10 hours of direct connection to the Internet in a month will cost about $100. For some people 10 hours may be a lot; on a good day I can do that before breakfast.
If you go with another ISP (and if you have a local provider, you'd be a fool not to), then you have to get an account with that ISP, and that could take a few days or a week or so. Box provides an extensive appendix with names of over 100 US providers with their telephone numbers and email/snail addresses, and with a well thought out desciption of the variables to take into consideration when choosing one. I didn't get the feeling that the Box was hiding or distorting information in order to push the user into their own ISP.
Configuring the software is not quite as easy as the promo on the package suggested, but not so very difficult (for Windows-compatible software). I would estimate that the average Windows-familar person who chose the Box's own ISP could be on the Internet in forty minutes after opening the package. It took me an hour-and-a-half, but I tend to blow up at Windows a lot.
Oh, and you get a copy of Ed Krol's The Whole Internet User's Guide, which means I now have two, both rapidly going out of date.
And, oh yes. TIA and Skipknot. These are programs that can run on UNIX miniframe computers that fool the shell into thinking it's a direct connection, and thereby give the dial-in user the ability to receive web graphics without a SLIP/PPP connection, and are not allowed by many sysops because they encourage dallying on their systems, but that's a another article.