Wiley The Internet For Dummies, 13th Edition
Contents
1. 10 Part I Welcome to the Internet So What Is the Internet The Internet also known as the Net is the world s largest computer net work What is a network you may ask Even if you already know you may want to read the next couple of paragraphs to make sure that we re speaking the same language A computer network is a bunch of computers that communicate with each other sort of like a radio or TV network connects a bunch of radio or TV sta tions so that they can share the latest episode of American Idol Don t take the analogy too far In broadcast networking TV networks send the same information to all stations at the same time in computer networking each particular message is routed to a particular computer so different com puters can display different things Unlike TV networks computer networks are two way When computer A sends a message to computer B B can senda reply back to A Some computer networks consist of a central computer and a bunch of remote stations that report to it for example a central airline reservation computer with thousands of screens and keyboards in airports and travel agencies Other networks including the Internet are more egalitarian and permit any computer on the network to communicate with any other com puter Many wireless devices the cellphone Palm handheld BlackBerry iPhone and their ilk expand the reach of the Internet right into our pock ets Han2. On networks size counts a great deal The larger a network is the more stuff it has to offer Because the Internet is the world s largest interconnected group of computer networks it has an amazing array of information to offer When people talk about the Internet they usually talk about what they can do what they have found and whom they have met The number of available services is too huge to list in this chapter but here are the Big Three Electronic mail e mail This service is certainly the most widely used you can exchange e mail with millions of people all over the world People use e mail for anything for which they might use paper mail faxes spe cial delivery of documents or the telephone gossip recipes love letters to communicate you name it We hear that some people even use it for stuff related to work Electronic mailing lists enable you to join group dis cussions with people who have similar interests and to meet people over the Net Part IV of this book has all the details 1 The World Wide Web When people talk these days about surfing the Net they often mean checking out sites on this buzzword alert global multimedia hyperlinked database In fact people are talking more about the web and less about the Net Are they the same thing Technically the answer is No But practically speaking the answer for many people is Pretty close We tell you the truth the whole truth and nothing b
3. Chapter 1 What s So Great about the Internet In This Chapter What really is the Internet For that matter what is a network What is the Internet good for t s huge it s sprawling it s globe spanning and it has become part of our lives It must be the Internet We all know something about it and most of us have tried to use it with more or less success If you ve had less you ve come to the right place In this chapter we look at what the Internet is and can do before we dive into details in the rest of this book If you re new to the Internet and especially if you don t have much computer experience be patient with yourself Many of the ideas here are completely new Allow yourself some time to read and reread The Internet is a different world with its own language and it takes some getting used to Even experienced computer users can find using the Internet more complex than other tasks they ve tackled The Internet isn t a single software package and doesn t easily lend itself to the kind of step by step instructions we d provide for a single fixed program This book is as step by step as we can make it but the Internet resembles a living organism mutating at an astonish ing rate more than it resembles Microsoft Word and Excel which sit quietly on your computer After you get set up and practice a little using the Internet seems like second nature in the beginning however it can be daunting
4. ah it quickly grew to span the continent and via radio link Europe In the early 1980s the ARPANET grew into the early Internet a group of interlinked networks connecting many educational and research sites funded by the National Science Foundation NSF along with the original mili tary sites By 1990 it was clear that the Internet was here to stay and DARPA and the NSF bowed out in favor of the commercially run net works that make up today s Internet And yes although Al Gore didn t invent the Internet he was instrumental in keeping it funded so that it could turn into the Internet we know now Familiar companies such as AT amp T Comcast Sprint and Verizon run some networks others belong to specialty companies such as Level3 and Cogent No matter which one you re attached to they all interconnect so it s all one giant Internet For more information read our web page at http net gurus org history 16 Part I Welcome to the Internet Okay What Next If you re ready to jump on the Internet first read Chapter 2 for some safety tips If you have children or grandchildren read Chapter 3 about what kids should and shouldn t do online Done Chapter 4 tells you how to get connected Turn off the computer now and then We can tell you from experience that when you re on the Net the hands on the clock slow down and stop and you can spend more time online than you can imagin
5. ause it has nothing better to do between keystrokes Computer servers turn out to have the same problem it takes a large website to keep a server busy and servers are often idle for most of the day It also turns out that it s much more efficient to run many computer servers in one place where they can share mounting racks power air conditioning and fast network connec tions so for many years the standard way to run a web server has been to rent space for it in a data center But those servers are still idle most of the time The advanced cutting edge virtualization technology allows one superfast server to operate as though it were many inde pendent reasonably fast virtual servers and more importantly to start and stop virtual serv ers as needed So now someone who before would have owned or rented a few physical computers can now ask a data center to start up virtual servers when they re needed and stop them when they aren t Because different virtual servers are busy at different times this situation tends to even out the load particularly when a company is big enough to have data centers in several parts of the world people in Europe are using their virtual servers while Californians are asleep and vice versa Aname such as demand allocated geographically dis tributed virtual servers isn t snappy enough so they call it cloud computing instead From a user s point of view no difference exists between a webs
6. d from anywhere in the world Special tools known as search engines and directories help you find information and people on the web See Chapter 13 to find out how to search for the information you need Stay in touch Weblogs or blogs let people and organizations distribute current information about themselves rapidly and easily Microblogs such as Twitter combine the Net with mobile phone text messages to let people stay up to date anywhere at any time Get an education Schoolteachers coordinate projects with classrooms all over the globe College students and their families exchange e mail to facilitate letter writing and keep down the cost of phone calls Students do research from their home computers The latest encyclopedias are online y Buy and sell stuff On the Internet you can buy anything from books about beermaking to stock in microbreweries And you can make some cash by cleaning out your closets and selling your old junk on eBay Software companies sell software and provide updates on the Net Most software distribution is migrating to the Internet where a customer can download and install programs without waiting for a CD to arrive We talk about the relevant issues in Chapter 15 1 Travel Cities towns states and countries are using the web to put up or pos tourist and event information Travelers find weather informa tion maps and museum hours as well as plane train and bus schedules and tickets Whil
7. ds off our wallets The Internet isn t simply one network it s a network of networks all freely exchanging information The networks range from the big corporate net works to tiny ones such as the one John built in his back bedroom made from a couple of old PCs he bought at an electronics parts store and every thing in between College and university networks have long been part of the Internet and now high schools and elementary schools are joining in Lately the Internet has become so popular that many households have more than one computer and are creating their own little networks that they connect to the Internet What s All the Hoopla Everywhere you turn you can find traces of the Internet Household prod ucts business cards radio shows and movie credits list their website addresses usually starting with www and ending with dot com and their e mail addresses New people you meet would rather give you an e mail address than a phone number Everyone seems to be going online and googling it Chapter 1 What s So Great about the Internet The Internet affects our lives on a scale as significant as the telephone and television When it comes to spreading information the Internet is the most significant invention since the printing press If you use a telephone write let ters read a newspaper or magazine or do business or any kind of research the Internet can radically alter your worldview
8. e For some people it s impossible to go ten minutes without check ing e mail dirty dishes are ignored while visit ing just one more web page and they reach the point of possibly having an Internet addic tion Remember that the Net is a fine adjunct to real life not a substitute As our friend and longtime Net user Jean Polly regularly says The Internet is closing Go out side and play
9. e you re at it you can buy your airplane tickets rent a car and make hotel reservations Y Use intranets Businesses have figured out that this Internet concept is truly useful and they create their own private networks like mini Internets On these intranets companies use web pages for posting company information such as benefits filing expense reports and time sheets and ordering supplies An intranet helps an organization provide information that employees can see from inside the company that folks on the outside can t see including manuals forms videos of boring meetings and of course endless memos In some organizations e mail and intranets reduce the amount of paper wasted on this stuff 1 Play games Internet based multiuser games can easily absorb all your waking hours and an alarming number of what would otherwise be your 15 Chapter 1 What s So Great about the Internet sleeping hours You can challenge other players who can be anywhere in the world Many kinds of games are available on the web including such traditionally addictive games as bridge hearts chess checkers and go In Chapter 20 we tell you where to find these games 1 Find love People are finding romance on the Net Singles ads and matchmaking sites vie for users The Internet long ago grew beyond the original bunch of socially challenged 22 year old nerdy guys and now has turned into the world s biggest matchmaker for people o
10. f all ages genders preferences and life situations Y Heal Patients and doctors keep up to date with the latest medical find ings share treatment experience and support one another around medi cal problems We even know of some practitioners who exchange e mail directly with their patients 1 Invest People research financial information buy stock and invest money online as we tell you about in Chapter 16 Some online compa nies trade their own shares Investors are finding new ventures and new ventures are finding capital Participate in nonprofits Churches synagogues mosques schools clubs teen centers and other community organizations post pages tell ing web users about themselves and inviting new people The online church newsletter always arrives before Sunday Where did the Internet come from The ancestor of the Internet is the ARPANET a project funded by the Department of Defense DoD in 1969 as an experiment in reliable net working and to link DoD and military research contractors including many universities doing military funded research ARPA stands for Advanced Research Projects Administration the branch of the DoD in charge of handing out grant money For enhanced confusion the agency is now known as DARPA the added D is for Defense in case anyone wondered where the money came from Although the ARPANET started small connecting three computers in California with one in Ut
11. ite run in cloud and one run any other way but cloud computing enables web site operators to run a substantial web operation and not have to buy server equipment or even know the exact locations of the servers they re using Cloud providers tend to be big compa nies that already have big data centers notably Amazon and Microsoft John uses the Amazon cloud service and believes that his data is probably somewhere near Seattle The website Margy manages www uua org lives in a cloud over Virginia Fun historical fact Virtualization was invented by IBM researchers in 1967 and mainframe computers have used it for four decades so maybe it s not all that cutting edge But don t tell cloud enthusiasts or else you ll hurt their feelings 13 4 Part I Welcome to the Internet Here are some of the ways people use the Internet 1 Find information Many websites have information free for the taking It ranges from IRS tax forms that you can print and use to help wanted ads real estate listings and recipes From U S Supreme Court decisions and library card catalogs to the text of old books digitized pictures many suitable for family audiences and an enormous variety of software from games to operating systems you can find virtually anything on the Net You can check the weather forecast view movie listings find your childhood sweetheart browse catalogs and see school closings for anywhere in the worl
12. k to New to the United States See the polar webcam at www usap gov At the time we wrote this book the largest Internet free land mass in the world was prob ably an uninhabited island in the Canadian arctic Devon Island perhaps You can look itup on the Internet Even there a satellite con nection can provide an Internet connection so perhaps nowhere on the surface of the earth is Zealand The base at the South Pole has a link truly Internet free Anybody can access it One great thing about the Internet is that it s the most open network in the world Thousands of computers provide facilities that are available to anyone who has Internet access Although pay services exist and more are added every day most Internet services are free for the taking after you re online If you don t already have access to the Internet by way of your company your school your library or a friend you can pay for access by using an Internet service provider ISP We talk about some ISPs in Chapter 4 One significant change in Net use in the past few years has been the move to ever smaller lighter and cheaper equipment to connect to it A netbook is a small inexpensive computer about the size and weight of this book that s intended mainly for connecting to the Net If a netbook is too big for you a smartphone such as the Apple iPhone or one using Google Android puts a computer and the Internet in your pocket with an alwa
13. ut the truth in Part III of this book Websites can provide you with information ranging from travel infor mation to how to raise chickens You can also look at videos listen to music buy stuff sell stuff and play video games The software used to navigate the web is a browser The most popular browsers now are Firefox Google Chrome and Internet Explorer We tell you all about them in Chapter 6 Instant messaging IM ing Programs such as Windows Live Messenger Yahoo Messenger and AOL Instant Messenger let you send messages that pop up on the recipient s screen We hear tales of nimble fingered youth carrying on upward of 13 IM sessions simultaneously Some websites also provide messaging services We tell you about IM programs in Chapter 12 The Internet is unlike any other communications media we ve ever encoun tered People of all ages colors creeds and countries freely share ideas sto ries data opinions and products 11 Part I Welcome to the Internet Does the Internet truly reach every continent Some skeptical readers after reading the claim that the Internet spans every continent may point out that Antarctica is a continent even though its population consists largely of penguins who as far as we know aren t inter ested in computer networks Does the Internet go there It does A few machines at the Scott Base on McMurdo Sound in Antarctica are on the Internet connected by radio lin
14. ys on connection It s politically socially and religiously correct Another great thing about the Internet is that it is what one may call socially unstratified That is one computer is no better than any other and no person is any better than any other Who you are on the Internet depends solely on how you present yourself when you re using your com puter If what you say makes you sound like an intelligent interesting person that s who you are It doesn t matter how old you are or what you look like or whether you re a student business executive or construction Chapter 1 What s So Great about the Internet worker Physical disabilities don t matter we correspond with deaf and blind people If they hadn t felt like telling us we never would have known People become famous and infamous in the Internet community as a result of their own efforts The Net advantage The Internet has become totally mainstream and you re falling further behind the curve and at a faster rate if you haven t yet gotten started Increasingly news gets out on the Internet before it s available any other way and the cyberdeprived are losing ground Cloudy with a chance of servers Computers these days are very very fast so fast that they have far more processor power than they can use Your computer is drawing shimmery semitranslucent animated borders around the windows on your screen bec
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