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Is there an old computer gathering dust in the back of your closet? Now's the time to dig it out: guest writer Charles Fleishman looks at ways to donate, reuse, and recycle older machines. Also this week, we examine the injunction preventing Microsoft from requiring manufacturers to bundle Internet Explorer, ponder HTML file suffixes and the potential lifetime of WebTV set-top units, and look at ways to both steal and protect your email address.
Contents:
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How Microsoft Spent Its Winter Vacation -- We're back, and we feel like we spent our entire winter hiatus reading stories about Microsoft. Perhaps the most intriguing part of the Microsoft versus United States Justice Department antitrust case so far is that the judge has done a little experimentation on his own.
The Justice Department several weeks ago won a preliminary injunction in which the judge hearing the case barred Microsoft from requiring companies that bundle its Windows 95 operating system to also ship Internet Explorer pre-installed. This was only a preliminary order until the case can be heard, but it carries the full weight of judicial power behind it.
Microsoft's response to the order was to offer manufacturers three choices: the original version of Windows 95 as it shipped back in August 1995; a revised version stripped of all components related to Internet Explorer (many of which are shared libraries that Windows and other applications refer to), rendering the OS virtually unbootable; or the version Microsoft had been shipping until the court order.
No source we've read so far pointed out that, although the original version of Windows 95 is now "out of date," Microsoft has shipped remarkably few updates to it, and most people who either bought the software by itself or as part of a new PC system in the first year or so that it was shipping received this first version. The Rev. B version of Windows 95 has significant improvements built in, but you can only get this version when you buy a new machine - so millions of people are still running the original flavor of Windows 95, seemingly without any difficulty.
In any case, the judge performed a simple test after the Justice Department filed additional papers arguing Microsoft was in contempt of the order. The judge used the Add/Remove Software utility in Windows 95 to remove Internet Explorer - and quickly saw all vestiges erased. He then asked both Microsoft and the Justice Department to comment on what he'd found.
Microsoft has argued that this procedure merely hides Internet Explorer, leaving all the Internet-related components, DLLs, etc., intact. That may be true, but the question is whether the judge intends that Microsoft should physically remove everything related to Internet Explorer from the machine, remove the minimum number of files to prevent a user from launching Internet Explorer, or perhaps even just pull out the Internet Explorer icon from the desktop.
The next week will reveal whether the judge throws a $1 million per day contempt fine on Microsoft, or clarifies his original order. [GF]
The Fat Lady Doesn't Drink Coffee -- In the review of the Opera Web browser in NetBITS-012 we said that it supported Java. Unfortunately, as David Rugge <davidrugge@mindspring.com> pointed out to us, the current 3.0 release does not - although it does handle JavaScript. The Opera Software folks plan on adding support for Java, Cascading Style Sheets, and Dynamic HTML in future releases. [GF]
<http://db.netbits.net/getbits.acgi?nbart=04593>
<http://www.operasoftware.com/>
by Charles Fleishman <charlesf@cyberis.net>
Ponder these facts: A Carnegie Mellon University study estimates that 55 million computers will wallow in U.S. landfills by the year 2005. For every four computers purchased, three others are stuffed away in storage. The ratio of computers to people in the U.S. has grown to 40 per 100 people, with an anticipated growth rate of 3.5 per 100 per year, according to the Computer Industry Almanac.
Fortunately, federal and state agencies, as well as educational and not-for-profit organizations, are recognizing the need to provide channels for reusing and recycling computers as the number of outdated and idle units grows. You do have some options today, though, for sending your unused machines on to their next life.
Hand It Down -- The first place to check is your local school district, as cutbacks in school funding have hampered purchases of new computers. But, don't drop off an old 8088 or Apple IIe without checking the school's needs, or you may be donating a large paperweight. Also, find out if your school maintains a program where students refurbish donated electronics equipment to be used throughout the district. These programs may be able to cannibalize non-working computers for parts, or repair them for further use.
Another area for donations is local, not-for-profit organizations, which usually work with tight budgets and older equipment. Your 386, 486, or Macintosh IIsi could be a step up - especially if it's upgradable. Lists of these organizations should be available through your local newspaper or United Way. In addition, many Goodwill Industries locations are accepting and rehabilitating computers and peripherals for resale.
A recent U.S. law may spur the donation of newer machines, too. A bill introduced by Rep. Randy Cunningham (R-CA), and enacted in August 1997, allows U.S. corporations to deduct the full purchase price of any computer they donate to a school within two years of the initial purchase.
<http://www.detwiler.org/deduct.html>
<http://www.house.gov/cunningham/>
Web Ideas -- Using the Internet can expand the horizon of your donation possibilities. An excellent site to start with is Parents, Educators, and Publishers, where state, national, and international sources to facilitate donations are listed.
<http://www.microweb.com/pepsite/Recycle/recycle_index.html>
A visit to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) site yields an Electronics Reuse and Recycling Directory, with extensive contact information on various programs and companies in the U.S. (but no Web links) that deal with reuse and recycling of electronic items.
<http://www.epa.gov/epaoswer/non-hw/recycle/direlec.htm>
Compute Locally -- You can contribute to the reuse side without actually donating equipment.
Volunteer: Help out an existing donation program if you have the skills or are willing to learn.
Buy used: Instead of that 100 MB, 300 MHz blockbuster that the manufacturers are pushing, purchase a refurbished or still-usable machine, if all you need is word processing, minor number-crunching, or a reasonable way to connect to the Internet.
Start a Program: If no program exists in your area to deal with unwanted equipment, gather up like-minded people and start one. Schools, not-for-profits, and shelter workshops could all be potential partners for this worthwhile effort.
Network Device: Some older computers may not be the best thing for your daily work, but NetBITS staff members and many others have taken their old machines and stuck them on networks for dedicated functions. An old Mac SE/30 or 386 PC with a network card and a modem can act as a dial-in system, a print spooler, or even a mail server.
Scavenging -- If your computer equipment and related items are just not reusable, there are some limited opportunities to recycle items or components. Although several national companies accept bulk quantities from business sources, they generally do not want small quantities from individuals. Look in your Yellow Pages under headings "recycling services," "computers - used" or "scrap metal" to determine if any local sources exist for recycling your expired computer and peripherals.
One national effort to watch for recycling is the EPA Common Sense Initiative Computer Recycling demonstration program in California. In conjunction with state agencies, environmental organizations, and local computer retailers, the EPA wants to make it convenient to drop off unusable computers and computer components like motherboards, monitors, and printers. If this project is a success, it could be the future of computer reclamation.
<http://www.1800cleanup.org/frames/states/California/sanjose.htm>
Devolution -- Another area with long-term potential depends on the original equipment manufacturers (OEMs). Many attempt to produce computers easy to "demanufacture" by marking plastic parts for recycling, and designing units to be easily taken apart. Since there is a trend to hold companies responsible for the eventual disposal of their machines, they have a vested interest in promoting responsible recycling of non-usable computers.
The bottom line, as in all reuse and recycling, is the effort individuals and companies are willing to expend to do more than throw away or store obsolete computers. Your slow, low-memory machine can be someone else's speed demon, and it can help put computer ownership within the reach of a wider range of people and organizations who cannot now afford it.
[Charles Fleishman is an Oregonian who formerly worked for BRING Recycling in Eugene. He now works as an intelligent searching agent on the Internet, doing research for others using search engines.]
Question: Could WebTV become obsolete? Beatrice Real <sweet_bea@prodigy.com> writes: "I'm considering purchasing a WebTV unit. Any idea how long it might be around? I bought a CD-Interactive player a couple of years ago and now I can't find customer support or CD-I titles. I want to avoid the same thing with WebTV, but I do like the idea of being online in my living room."
Answer: None of us wants to be stuck with a beta videotape player, a floptical drive, or a Photo CD player, but fortunately, WebTV uses industry-standard protocols that could keep it useful even if companies stop driving the product. WebTV consists of a box containing the computer, modem, and related electronics, plus a set of services. All the electronics are standard: you can hook the unit up to any television and phone line.
If you buy the plain vanilla box, the services include up to six email addresses, some content Web pages, and unlimited Internet access for $19.95 per month. The new WebTV Plus box and service also provide picture-in-a-picture tuning, where you can browse a page and view a television channel at the same time; some stations are linking their broadcasts and content, so a single click takes you to related pages. The Plus box also includes a hard drive, a tuner, and a 56K modem.
However, if WebTV services went away, the hardware would still work because the box uses standard PPP dial-up service. WebTV's Web site explains how "rural" customers can connect to other ISPs - it just involves configuring PPP correctly. However, because Microsoft bought WebTV, and paid quite a lot of money for it proportionate to its current sales and customer base, it's extremely unlikely that WebTV will disappear overnight.
The greater concern will be whether existing units will need to be upgraded or scrapped when new Internet software is introduced - like audio and video players or Java applets that work. [GF]
Question: What's the difference between .htm and .html? Chuck Heath <sunpwr@inreach.com> asks, "Does the difference imply a different OS? Many Macintosh-related URLs end with .html, but other .html URLs are clearly non-Macintosh. Does .htm mean it's a Windows or Unix system?"
Answer: The suffix on a file doesn't tell you anything about the operating system. Macintosh, Unix, and Windows operating systems each treat filenames somewhat differently. And, with the release of Windows 95 over two years ago, the old DOS-style 8-dot-3 naming convention went out the window - sort of.
In the old days, before Windows 95, Windows 3.1 and its predecessors could only name files with up to eight characters, a dot, and then up to three characters. Macs have always been able to handle 31 characters, and Unix's limit varies, but it's at least 64 characters in most versions. Windows 95 added long filenames, allowing up to 250 characters.
However, even Windows 95 rewrites filenames down to 8-dot-3 when you copy files to a floppy disk or over certain kinds of networks. Many people working in multi-platform environments choose to name their files with 8-dot-3 filenames to make sure the names don't change as they pass from machine to machine.
Fortunately, as with everything these days, there's a utility that can help you manage cross-platform file conventions called HTML Rename.<http://www.visiontec.com/rename/>
So seeing .HTML means the server isn't a Windows 3.1 machine, but seeing .HTM doesn't necessarily tell you anything. [GF]
Question: What's the word on dual-line modems? Don Wendel <donwendel@mindspring.com> wrote in wondering about dual-line modem technology.
Answer: Dual-line modems use two phone lines and two internal modems to double the speed of your connection, theoretically approaching that of ISDN service. Both Boca Research and Diamond Multimedia have shipping products, but few ISPs have set pricing yet on how they'll support this new hardware.
<http://www.bocaresearch.com/docs/mddl56i.htm>
<http://www.diamondmm.com/shotgun/>
Because these modems use two phone lines, you wind up paying the phone company twice. But when you compare residential phone line costs - which are usually unmetered in the U.S., meaning you pay a fixed monthly rate - to ISDN costs, two residential phone lines are usually cheaper. In Seattle, for instance, two phone lines are about $55 per month with tax, while unlimited ISDN is about $80 per month with tax. (In some areas, ISDN service is metered, so costs can be even higher; in others, ISDN is as little as $25 per month for unlimited use.)
Both Diamond and Boca's devices allow you to subscribe to call waiting so that if you're connected on both lines, an incoming call will be passed through on one without disturbing your Internet connection. Diamond's technology can be set to add the second phone line automatically when traffic becomes heavy instead of using both lines at all times.
Diamond's Web site notes that they are building dual-modem technology into the entire Supra line so that you'll be able to buy any two Supra modems and get dual-line functionality.
Pricing for service will be interesting, because the cost to an ISP could be double, and it seems likely that someone with one of these devices will spend more time online. [GF]
[Please send us any and all Internet questions whose answers have evaded you to <faqtoids@netbits.net>, and include your full name and email address. Questions may be edited for content and length. We cannot guarantee publication or a reply.]
FTP Snatching -- In response to our FAQtoid that mentioned how spammers might capture your email address when you visit a Web page, Peter N Lewis <peter@stairways.com.au> noted a sneaky technique involving FTP:
Another way I've heard to snatch an email address when visiting a Web page is by coding an inline image with an FTP URL. The browser then automatically FTPs the file for you to show you the image - but when it anonymously FTPs the file, the browser typically uses your email address as the password (as anonymous FTP should - sending your email address is taken as a signature to abide by the usage guidelines). Thus an unscrupulous FTP server (or Web server using the anonymous FTP inline image) can capture your email address as well.
Imaging an Address -- Brandon Munday <mundayrb%am4@mr.nawcad.navy.mil> offers a suggestion for displaying your email address on a Web page in a manner that prevents automated spiders from sucking it down:
I used an image editing program to create a graphic image of my email address, in a font and size similar to that used by most browsers. I saved it as a GIF with a transparent background. Then I placed that image on the Web page anywhere I needed the email address, and used something like "Email address" as the alternate text for the image. Further, I removed all "mailto:" links, and added an apology that there was no clickable link, and asked for the reader's understanding. This way, anyone looking at the Web page with a browser with images enabled sees my email address in clear text. But the address does not exist as part of the page's text, so no spider or robot can glean the information automatically.
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