Book details of 'Internet Passport: The Northwestnet's Guide to Our World Online'

Title	Internet Passport: The Northwestnet's Guide to Our World Online
Author(s)	Northwestnet, David F. W. Robison
ISBN	013194200X
Language	English
Published	January 1995
Publisher	Prentice Hall Computer Books

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The Virtual Bookcase Reviews of 'Internet Passport: The Northwestnet's Guide to Our World Online':

Reviewer Rob Slade wrote:
Until recently, this was only available from NorthWestNet or a very select group of specialty bookstores. With the involvement of Prentice Hall in this edition, the work may see a wider distribution. This work is a fairly bare bones and no nonsense guide to the Internet. The book is orderly, and the explanations and illustrations are clear. Each chapter covers a single topic. Most chapters end with additional references, most often online materials or sources. The work is well researched and highly competent in most cases. There is, in the early chapters, a gracelessness to it which lacks any kind of appeal. What humour there is tends to seem somewhat contrived and sanitized: a topic on the hardware that connects computers on the Internet is subtitled "Router Rooters: 'Go Internet Go!'" Nevertheless, it is a thoroughly researched and valuable reference for those interested in using the resources of the Internet. Section one, which is also chapter one, is a brief introduction to the Internet. There is minor mention of the technologies and organizations involved in the Internet, as well as brief mention of Fidonet and UUCP. The bibliography is a very solid list of valuable titles, but would have had significantly more value with some annotation. Section two covers the basic tools and functions of the Internet. The topics are well chosen, starting with email, mail servers, mail gateways to other networks and systems, telnet and ftp. Chapter four discusses mail etiquette. This section, I am happy to note, gives more space to the topic than is usual. In the end, though, it comes down to a list of rules that reduce to "keep it short, keep on topic, be complete and don't mess up." It would be nice to see one of these essays tell people how and why flame wars start, which might help to avoid them. Chapter eight, following ftp, deals with file compression and archiving. Section three moves into the next level of sophistication, in terms of communications, with group discussions. As the book puts it, these are the "Community Forums" of the net. Chapters nine, ten and eleven deal very clearly, completely and usefully with Usenet, BITNET LISTSERVs and Internet mailing lists. I am noted for highly critical reviews: I find nothing of any substance wrong with this section, and recommend it highly and without reservation. Once again, the end of each chapter gives useful directions on how to find out further information, particularly the specifics of various LISTSERVs and mailing lists. Section four starts to look at the resources of the Internet as a library, with electronic journals, books, catalogues and data bases. Chapter fifteen is very similar to the catalog section of various works with listings of sites and resources by topic. Section five deals with exploration and retrieval tools, such as archie, gopher, WAIS, WWW and directory services. The final section contains specialized interests, becoming an information provider on the net, the use of the Internet in public education, health related issues and access to supercomputing facilities. The chapter on providing information is excellent, giving, very briefly, a background and detailed overview which is more reliable than those in works dedicated to "doing business" on the Internet. (A concise introduction to HTML would be a valuable addition.) The book concludes with several appendices. The most interesting are likely Appendix A, which gives suggestions of online sources of information about the Internet, and, B, which gives a short list of Internet access providers and methods. The glossary is very well done: not overblown with imposing numbers of entries, but good explanations of the important terms. The unprepossessing beginning of this work hides a very carefully researched and well organized reference for those wishing to get into the Internet and its resources. Unfortunately, this most recent edition does not show much development from the previous one. I am sorry to see the same weaknesses, and recnet references which could have covered some shortcomings ignored. Less flashy than some, it should nevertheless have a place on the desk of every serious Internet user. copyright Robert M. Slade, 1993
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