PART 2: APPLICATIONS

            "Imagination is more important than knowledge" 
                             - Albert Einstein

This part of the book is the core of the matter. Here, we want to give you an idea of what is out there.

The bad news is that the online world has too much. We have been forced to make a selection. So, if there are important pointers you feel have been left out, please drop me a line. Maybe it can be included in a future release of the handbook.

Terms used in this book

While references to offerings with terms like "on CompuServe," and "on TWICS" may be easily understood, you may not be used to our terms referring to resources on the Internet. These include the following:

• anonymous ftp
• gopher
• telnet
• RFC, FYI, FAQ
• archie
• WWW
• WAIS

Do not despair. Explanation is given in appendix 6. You can also search the book for additional information.

Throughout the book, we will use the URL (Uniform Resource Locator) format when referring to Internet resources. These codes are basically in the format

method://site.name/filepath

The "method" part tells if the URL points to a hypertext document (http), a gopher menu (gopher), an anonymous ftp host for file transfers (ftp), etc.. Examples:

• Web addresses
  URL: http://home.eunet.no/~presno/index.html
  This means: "Connect me to the site login.eunet.no, and show me the hypertext ~presno/index.html file." This URL will give you the Online World resources handbook's World Wide Web home page. The tilde character (~) in the directory name "~presno" is a special notation used on Unix systems.

  Read under WWW in Appendix 6 for more, including how to get Web pages by electronic mail!

• Usenet Newsgroups (conferences)
  Newsgroup: news.newusers.questions.
  If you have a special Usenet news reader, you may enter this newsgroup's name to get a list of recent discussion items. Using Web browsers, you must often prefix the name with the code "news:" to tell them that you want a given newsgroup. Example: "news:newusers.questions" Your browser program must be set to connect you to an NNTP server (Appendix 6).

  Note: Few NNTP servers carry all available newsgroups, so newusers.questions may not be on yours. To read messages posted to unavailable newsgroups, visit DejaNews (Chapter 10).

• Transfer of files
  URL: ftp://ftp.eunet.no/pub/text/online.txt
  This means when given to a Web browser: "Do anonymous ftp to site ftp.eunet.no, and get the file /pub/text/online.txt." This URL links to the text version of this handbook.

  You can also use the contents of this address for retrieval by email, when using Internet's ftp command ('anonymous FTP), or special ftp retrieval programs.

• Gopher information resource
  URL: gopher://home.eunet.no
  This URL is an Internet Gopher address given in a form that can be used directly by World Wide Web browser programs. You can also use the contents of this address in other ways, like for retrieval by email, or by using Internet's gopher command. Read under Gopher in Appendix 6 for more.