Members send tips for accessing the Web

By now, many of you are aware that The Institute is now available electronically. If you can send e-mail to the Internet, you can get the text of the articles via e-mail. If you can log on to a server that offers the Lynx program, you can browse the text of the articles in an on-line mode. If you can run Mosaic or Netscape on your PC or Mac, you can browse text, graphics (and sound clips) in an on-line mode.

The same IEEE server that hosts The Institute also hosts material provided by IEEE societies, sections, chapters, student branches, and the IEEE Operations Center_more about these in future issues.

What is member reaction to IEEE's use of Web technology? It seems that most folks like it! Here are some of our members' reactions and tips for accessing the Web.

GETTING CONNECTED.   Don Williams writes: "I just read your article on 'Traveling the Information Highway.' I would just like to say it was short and sweet. I would also like to say that your article had just enough inertia to push me onto the information highway. I already had a SLIP connection set up with the university I attend, so I ftp'ed Mosaic and Win32s with OLE over to my PC and I was on the Internet in no time. After a little practice, I plan to catch some major waves (surf's up).

"I write to voice my opinion about the need to maintain a printed publication. Although I know I will be surfing over to The Institute using Mosaic, there are many of us who do not have access to the Internet for electronic access to The Institute and other publications. So let's not limit the breadth of our scientific environment by pushing fully electronic publications just yet. Although electronic publication would be great for me, I would like to stand up for those who don't and will not have access to this technology for a few years yet.

"Keep writing those articles. Additionally, I know I wouldn't have responded to your article if it were not for e-mail. So let us push the technological aids, but at the same time, let us not forget about those who live far from the beach and don't own surfboards. I don't know anyone on the [IEEE] Board of Directors, so I would appreciate it if you forward this message appropriately."

Al Scalone writes: "I thoroughly enjoy your column in The Institute regarding Internet issues. I might say that it was your column that made me take the plunge and sign on. I know that occasionally you mention some of your readers' experiences so I thought I would pass mine along. I signed on to the Netcom service and am very happy I did. Netcom really is a painless way to get full Internet access with virtually no headaches. The great part to a new user is that the service includes Windows-based software (Netcruiser) which makes all Internet services a point-and-click experience. I had read about the need to download software to get this level of convenience and was turned off at the prospect of having to do too much experimenting in order to accomplish the simple task of learning my way around the Internet.

"Another great aspect of Netcom is their fee policy. Although their basic fee is US$20 a month (which sounds a bit high), this includes 40 hours of prime time usage and unlimited off-peak usage. At first I thought this would not be sufficient but my experience is that I never use anywhere near this amount of time. Again, this all adds up to a really hassle-free service. The only negative that I have found has been a lack of local access numbers (although in my case they have now started up a local number in my area). Now that I have learned some of the finer points of what the Internet is all about I may at some point try another service. In the meantime, Netcom surely appears to be a nearly ideal way for a new user without access to an Internet server to log on. (Note that I am in no way associated with Netcom and that this purely a commentary for your benefit and that of your readers.)" [Bob Alden's note: Don has university access, but Al did not and has found an Internet access provider that made it easy for him. The number of companies with Internet access is growing rapidly_the Internet Society reports that about 50 percent of Fortune 500 companies are on the Internet and that two thirds of Internet users work for major corporations!]

WEB BROWSERS.   Blake Wood writes: "Bob_I've enjoyed your articles in The Institute. In the January edition, you say "Lynx is much faster than Mosaic because it does not transfer the large files needed to display graphics or produce sound ... True, but you can get the same effect on Mosaic by simply turning off 'Display In-line Images.' Although I've not used Lynx, I suspect that with in-line images turned off, Mosaic and Lynx would run at the same speed.

"I checked out the Mosaic version of The Institute. Very nice. I like having an on-line version of it, but am not sure I want to give up my hard copy, for two reasons. First, I get and read the hard copy at home, typically with my morning bowl of Cheerios. Kind of hard to do that with a computer, and I have enough things to read at work already. Second, I can browse a hard copy much faster than I can an on-line version. It takes me about 30 seconds to make a first pass through The Institute to determine if there's anything I want to look at more closely. It would take, perhaps, 10 minutes to do the same with an on-line version.

"If the decision is made to go exclusively to an on-line version, I have a recommendation: IEEE members should be notified via e-mail when each new issue is available. Out of sight, out of mind. I'm not likely to check every day to see if a new issue is out, and if it only comes to mind to look every other week or so, I've lost the "timeliness" advantage of on-line access that you mention in your column."

Mark Stout writes: "I thought you might like to clarify a couple points about WWW browsers in your next column.

The implied requirement of a 486/33 with 8MB is grossly overstated. I have tested the 32-bit version of NCSA Windows Mosaic on a 4MB machine with no problems. According to the user documentation, it has been tested on a 386/16 with 4MB, yielding reasonable performance. This makes perfect sense, since with a 14.4 kb/s modem, the SLIP connection is by far the biggest bottleneck. Some of the earlier 32-bit versions of NCSA Windows Mosaic were real memory hogs, with poor performance on 4MB machines, but they have addressed this in later versions.

For best overall performance for SLIP connection browsing, Mosaic Communications' Netscape is really the way to go. It boasts background downloads of images after the text and links have already been made available. It is freeware for academic users, and shareware for commercial users, available from "http://www.-mcom.com". I have tested this on a 386/16 4MB PC with fine performance, far faster than NCSA Windows Mosaic on a 486/33 with 8MB. Netscape is also available for Mac and X-Windows.

If users want higher performance over low-speed connections while using NCSA Windows Mosaic, they can always disable "Display In-line Images" for Lynx-like speed with far superior ease of use. There are similar options for the Mac and X-Windows version. Users who have access to both but choose Lynx are not very knowledgeable about Mosaic configuration. Web browsing gives new life to "low-powered" 386's that most people would just as soon write off."

Bill Evans writes: "As always, I enjoy your articles on e-mail and the Internet. Regarding the most recent one in the January 1995 issue of The Institute, I have a comment on Lynx. I agree that it has some advantages over Mosaic. I thought you might be interested in a program which gives graphical capability to Lynx users. I made this discovery recently with a program called Slipknot. Slipknot allows someone with a Lynx capability (but no Mosaic, SLIP, PPP, etc.) to get displays of much of the material in the images on Lynx. It really works with a normal shell Unix account over modem connections and you do not need PPP or SLIP. The place to write to for SlipKnot info is "slipknot@micromind.com"; "slpstaff@micromind.com" is the technical support address. The actual file can be retrieved from: "ftp://oak.oakland.edu/SimTel/-win3/internet/slnot100.zip" and the cost is US$29.95."

E-MAIL ACCESS.   Jim Bassett writes: "For people with only e-mail access (like me), WWW home pages are available via e-mail. Send a message to "listproc@www0.cern.ch" with "www " in the body of the message. Replace with the URL of the home page you want to read, for example: "www http://www.ieee.org/". Obviously, graphics are not sent, but the links are numbered at the end of the file, so going to the hypertext links of interest is straightforward. I've tried it several times and response time is usually less than five minutes."

I tried it. It works. It is as simple and fast as Jim suggests. If you put only "www" in the message, omitting a URL, you will get a three-page help file. I recommend you do just that.

This means that everyone who sends e-mail to the Internet can read the text of The Institute as soon as it is posted. Don't forget, our URL is "http://www.-ieee.org/ti.html".

Since many of you have asked, the text of my columns prior to 1995 are available via e-mail and Gopher (see accompanying box) and via the Web since January '95.