In a prior column, I talked about the issues of data portability. I would like to pick up that thread again, specifically to talk about e-mail and how to access it when you are not home. This is an important issue for many people who have second homes here in the Southport area, or people who like to hit the road in their motor home or trailer.
First a little bit of technical stuff (just a little, I promise). The key issue in e-mail is that you as an individual Internet user are not normally connected at all times to the 'net; most of us use dial-in accounts. If someone attempts to send e-mail to you and you were not logged on, what happens? Well, it turns out, your e-mail never goes to your computer directly. It always goes to a server (usually called a POP server) that acts as your agent. It accepts the e-mail for you, and later allows you to access it when you dial in.
POP is the acronym for Post Office Protocol. The POP server is almost always a service provided by your ISP (Internet Service Provider). The POP server is used for e-mail coming to you; when you send e-mail, it goes through another server called an SMTP (Simple Mail Transfer Protocol) server, also provided by your ISP. You access POP and SMTP via the e-mail program on your PC, such as Eudora or Outlook Express.
So, to access your e-mail on the road, it's just a simple matter of dialing into your ISP and retrieving your e-mail just like you always did - right? Well, perhaps not. Dialing into your ISP may be a toll call and that could run up significant phone line charges. This problem is made worse by the fact that POP is an old protocol and rather dumb by today's standards. Your only option to read e-mail is to read the entire thing - you can't just get the name of the sender or the subject. So, if someone sends you a huge e-mail file, you have to wait until you download it entirely before you can get 'around' it and receive your other e-mail.
The answer to this problem is IMAP4. This is a new type of e-mail server to replace POP. IMAP is the acronym for Internet Mail Access Protocol. IMAP4 enabled systems allow you to see the subject and sender prior to actually reading the mail, making it easier to reject spam or to hold large files until you return.
How do you use IMAP4? Most IMAP4 implementations I have seen use your standard web browser (Netscape, Internet Explorer, etc.) instead of an e-mail program. To access your mail, you go to a specific page provided by your ISP, log in, and you will see a list of pending e-mail that you can selectively read. If your ISP does not provide an IMAP4 interface, there are other mail services that you can use, such as Yahoo Mail or Hotmail. If you use these services, however, your e-mail ID would change, so you need to think this out and pick one system for your primary e-mail use. It may also be possible to get your mail forwarded from your ISP to another mail system while you are away - check with your ISP on this.
Now, how about the issue to phone line charges on the road? Using a national ISP instead of a local one may solve this problem, but unfortunately not here in the Southport area, as they do not have local phone dial-in numbers. Another possibility is to use available Internet services at your local library. The Barbee library, for example, allows access to the Internet for free if you are a member, and for a nominal fee if not. Since you are going to be using just a web browser to access your e-mail via IMAP4, there is no special e-mail program or customization required.
(Bob Seidel is a local computer consultant in the Southport / Oak Island area. You can visit his website at www.bobseidel.com or e-mail him at bsc@bobseidel.com).