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It remains true that the best guide to the Internet is the Internet itself. The best software for navigating the Internet is freely available on the Internet.
The anonymous FTP sites that I list throughout this document as sources for programs are the sites designated by the software authors as their home sites. These sites will always have the latest version of the software.
In addition, copies of Winsock software may usually be obtained from the software archive maintained by the Winsite Group on its WinSite Web server or at its anonymous ftp site. This software archive was formerly known as CICA (Center for Innovative Computer Applications).
It is the case that the collection at WinSite will NOT always contain the latest versions of software. The most recent version may still be in the uploads directory, which is not accessible for downloading. Note that software files at WinSite may not have the same file dates as the files have at their home sites.
There are several other Internet sites that provide mirror copies of the WinSite collection. The mirror locations are displayed automatically when an FTP connection to Winsite fails.
When using FTP to access WinSite, Windows 3.1x users will find it helpful to download the file INDEX (ascii | 172,000 bytes) or INDEX.ZIP (about 55,000 bytes) from /pub/pc/win3. Windows 95 users should get INDEX (ascii, about 688,000 bytes) or INDEX.ZIP (about 242,000 bytes) from /pub/pc/win95.
INDEX contains one-line descriptions of each file in the collection. There are also individual index files in the various directories. These index files are not included in the list displayed on the Winsite Web page's Browse Archive selection.
Stroud's Consummate Winsock Applications maintained by Forrest H. Stroud is a colorful, and even famous, list of Winsock apps that includes a five star rating system. There are links to the home sites for the apps, as well as links for some of the helper utilities needed by some Web browsers to support graphics and multimedia.
TUCOWS (The Ultimate Collection of Winsock Software) is another excellent source of Winsock software. The collection is maintained at 250 affiliate sites around the world, almost guaranteeing that there will be a fast location near you for downloading.
WinSock-L bills itself as the complete source for Windows Internet Applications since 1994. The concise display of available software is easy to browse when you are looking for a particular title or for a list of packages with a particular function.
The news groups alt.winsock, and comp.protocols.tcp-ip.ibmpc carry discussions of the Winsock specification and Winsock compliant applications, as do the groups in the comp.os.ms-windows.networking and the comp.os.ms-windows.apps.winsock hierarchies. Trumpet Winsock and related clients are discussed in several news groups in the trumpet hierarchy. Windows 95 is discussed in the comp.os.ms-windows.win95 hierarchy, among others.
Information about specific clients may be found in groups devoted to that class of client. For instance, gopher clients are discussed in alt.gopher and in comp.infosystems.gopher. Web browsers Mosaic and Netscape are discussed in the several sections of the comp.infosystems.www hierarchy.
Frequently Asked Questions about TCP/IP on PC-compatible computers are answered in a FAQ written by Bernard D. Adoba. At one time the text was being posted monthly in the news group comp.protocols.tcp-ip.ibmpc. The FAQ remains available by anonymous ftp as a single file named ibmtcp.zip (March 27, 1995 | 86,772 bytes), or as several separate ASCII files named tcpip*.faq that total 243,845 bytes.
The Crynwr packet drivers collection is available as part of the well-known Simtel20 collection, now known as the Simtel.Net collection. There are mirrors for this collection all over the world, and the files are sold as a collection on CD-ROM. The best place to find these files today is in the MS-DOS collection at the Simtel.Net Web site. The packet driver directory includes the Crynwr packet drivers under the following filenames:
The files are dated 1996 in that directory, but they actually go back to 1993. This is now old, obsolescent technology.
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Revised: December 28, 1999
Harry_M_Kriz , [hmkriz@vt.edu]