Evolving from the ARPAnet, a university-federally supported research tool, to the basis of a national information infrastructure, the Internet has become a necessity of professional and educational life. Originally, Internet access was available for no cost to members of DARPA and then NSF supported research institutions including CUNY, with relatively unlimited telnet and ftp service level access through hard wired "on campus" computing hosts. Remote dial-up access, with low speed character based services, was available to a relatively small subset of users.
Since 1985, the number of users accessing the Internet through dial-up services has grown exponentially, with current estimates numbering over tens of millions of users. In addition, in the past 5 years, services have expanded to include dial-up host services with SLIP and PPP protocols. Four factors promise to fuel the growth in this area to the point that the dial-up Internet community will vastly, and inevitably, outnumber the original "hard wired" Internet community. The factors include:
* increased modem speeds, estimated to double every 18 months;
* the wider availability of both Switched/56 and ISDN service;
* the offering of Internet access service to customers by a number of the regional Bell operating companies (RBOCs); and
* experiments in Internet service by cable television and wireless network providers.
At the City University, the student population is diverse and many students lead complex lives in which they often balance a family and a job with academic responsibilities. Faculty are equally busy, often having appointments at both a home institution and the Graduate Center and affiliate appointments at other institutions throughout the City. In this setting dial-up access, permitting 7/24 access (7 days a week, 24 hours a day) to e-mail, the CUNY+ library catalog and the Internet, is critical.
At Hunter, we have begun to provide 7/24 dial-up service which both augments existing dial-up facilities at CUNY/CIS and serves as an interim step until dial-up services are available through NYNEX, the local RBOC. To accomplish this, we have installed a small rack of high speed modems connected to the Hunter campus internet backbone. These modems support a range of dial up protocols including:
* character level access with Procomm for i86 (IBM PC-type computers) and TinCan for Macintosh systems;
* PPP access for both Mac an i86 systems;
* MacARA for Macintosh and Remote Access/IPX for i86 machines; and
* Remote Control/IPX for i86 systems.
Each type of dial up access is supported with a different software package as indicated in the paragraphs below.
The most rudimentary access level is character based. Character level access is provided by Procomm Plus or Procomm Plus for Windows for i86 systems and TinCan for Macintosh systems. Character level access will allows users to logon to a host from a remote system and then telnet to other Internet hosts. Character level access can be used with a 9.6 (9600 baud) modem. With a "14.4" modem, character level access is fast. And character level access is familiar to most users as it is the traditional way of connecting to systems including the dial-up services offered at CUNY/CIS and commercial providers such as MCIMail, America On-Line, etc.
The Point to Point Protocol (PPP) is provided with Chameleon for i86 Windows systems and MacTCP, InterPPP and the particular shareware software for the Macintosh. PPP enables your computer to be a host on the Internet with all Internet services. You may choose any of the following services to run over a PPP level connection: ftp, telnet, Netnews, gopher, the POP mail protocol and a WWW client such as Mosaic, Cello or Netscape. You may also access CUNYVM with PPP using TN3270 (a specially configured version of telnet). PPP requires the fastest modem your budget can afford. Even with a 14.4 modem, Mosaic services will feel modestly slow, particularly if you are accessing graphics or sound files.
Serial line IP (SLIP) access is provided with Chameleon for i86 systems running Windows and MacTCP and InterSLIP for the Macintosh. We do not currently support SLIP and suggest using PPP, as described above and in the sidebar. PPP is a more developed and robust protocol and many places are moving to it from SLIP.
Macintosh Apple Remote Access Protocol (MacARA) enables your Macintosh to become a node on an Apple network. This will enable you to access file servers and printers at the College from your remote system as well as the general Internet applications: telnet, TN3270, ftp, Mosaic, etc.
Remote Access/IPX makes your remote system a node on a Novell based LAN at the College. Properly configured, your remote system will be able to have the same look and feel as the system on your Novell network with the same CD-ROM, software and print resources. Remote Access/IPX is similar to MacARA. This access level requires a 14.4 modem or faster.
Remote Control/IPX is available through PC/Anywhere or Carbon Copy for i86 systems and enables you to control a system at the College from your remote machine. Remote control allows you to work on your remote system as if you were working on your office system. The CD-ROM database resources in the Wexler Library are also available through a specially configured version of PC/Anywhere. Remote Control can be used with a 9.6 modem, but will benefit from a 14.4 modem.
Dial-up on a 7/24 basis both extends the Hunter community beyond the limitations of a crowded urban campus and makes the information resources of the campus available when they can be used most effectively - at the convenience of both students and faculty. In a City that "never sleeps" it is more than fitting that resources for learning are available on a 7/24 basis, without so much as a nap.
-- Marc Eichen, Director of Academic Computing Services, Hunter College
Editor's Note
As the newsletter goes to press, Hunter College has announced that Hunter faculty, staff and students who currently have CUNYVM e-mail will be migrated to local, UNIX-based e-mail service by September 1. Hunter is the first CUNY college ready to take on complete responsibility for e-mail and Internet service, and CUNY/CIS staff wish to congratulate them on the accomplishment and to wish them well. We continue to work with Hunter in providing CUNYVM and MVS service where needed, and to forward mail addressed to Hunter constituents at CUNYVM to their new postal address.
To understand PPP level access, let's use the telephone as an analogy. PPP establishes the connection between your local system and the Internet, in the same way a connection is established between 2 telephones. You then run a particular application "over" the PPP connection. You can run Telnet over PPP. Or you can run ftp or Netnews or Mosaic, etc., over PPP. These applications are bundled within Chameleon for Windows -- but even here, if you examine the Chameleon directory (usually x:\netmanag) you will see that the applications are separate ".exe" files. On the Macintosh they are separate shareware programs. This is analogous to the language spoken by people "over" the telephone connection. A successful conversation requires that both conversants speak the same language. The information transferred in a Telnet or ftp or Mosaic connection is analogous to the content of a telephone conversation.
Both SLIP and PPP have some problems. SLIP is, on the whole, a fragile protocol, which doesn't support error-correction. When it goes down, you can't predict when it will come back up. PPP requires a very fast modem -- we recommend nothing slower than a 14.4 -- which is incompatible with a lot of older computers.
The beauty of the Point to Point protocol, though, is in its independence from both the speed of the physical network beneath it and the applications running on top of it. As the physical media increase in speed, PPP should be able to take advantage of these advances. As more network applications are developed, PPP should be able to make these applications available to a great number of potential 'remote' users.