The language of e-mail

SERVICES

World Wide Web

The World Wide Web makes up a very large percentage of the Internet. Nearly seventy percent of all information searches are handled through the World Wide Web. Information is quickly found in the World Wide Web through typing in key words. The key words are searched through different searches engines, such as Infoseek and Lycos, or through search directories, such as Yahoo and Magellan. These search engines look for key words in their databases. The search results from the search engine are then listed and the user can choose from the titles found. WWW is often also simply mentioned as Web. Web Pages can include texts, pictures, sound-files, animation’s, videos and so on. With the new language “Java”, which is used for programming Web-pages, there are several more possibilities to design a Webpage. Most people, who are not as well informed about the Internet as you might be after this speech, think that the WWW is, besides E-mail, the only service in the Internet. But there are several other services.

File Transfer Protocol

The second service which can be used is FTP. FTP stands for File Transfer Protocol, and not surprisingly, it’s only good for transferring files between machines. In the past, you could only use an FTP client to access files stored on FTP servers. Today enough additional services such as Gopher and the World Wide Web, have implemented the FTP protocols so that you can often FTP files no matter what service you are using. You can even FTP files via E-mail. If you access a FTP-Server with a regular FTP-Client, you see the files listed, as they are listed in a normal UNIX System. You can also navigate by using UNIX-Commands. Or you can use a graphical FTP-Client, which shows directory-information in Windows-Style.

The language of e-mail

E-mail is the simplest and most immediate function of the Internet for many people. Run through a list of questions that new e-mail users ask most and some snappy answers to them. What is electronic mail? Electronic mail, or e-mail as it’s normally shortened to, is just a message that is composed, sent and read electronically (hence the name). With regular mail you write out your message (letter, postcard, whatever) and drop it off at the post office. The postal service then delivers the message and the recipient reads it. E-mail operates basically the same-way except that everything happens electronically. You compose your message using e-mail software, send it over the lines that connect the Internet’s networks and the recipient uses an e-mail program to read the message.

How does e-mail know to get where it’s going? Everybody who’s connected to the Internet is assigned a unique e-mail address. In a way, this address is a lot like the address of your house or apartment because it tells everyone else your exact location on the Net. So anyone who wants to send you an e-mail message just tells the e-mail program the appropriate address and runs the Send command. The Internet takes over from there and makes sure the missive arrives safely.

Date: 2016-01-14; view: 309