The main communication tool on the Web is e-mail. Each user has an address like firstname.lastname@subdomain.dom.
The protocol used on the web to send an e-mail is SMTP (Simple Mail Transfer Protocol). Your e-mail utility sends the e-mail to a SMTP server you had to declare and this server forwards it to the recipient's mail server (trough different steps). The destination server stores it till you come and read it. You are able to read directly on this computer (if Unix computer, for example) or to use an utility which will get the e-mail using a POP (Post Office Protocol) or IMAP (Internet Message Access Protocol). In such a case you have to declare in your e-mail utility the name of your POP (or IMAP) server.
You can sent one e-mail to multiple recipients, you also can make lists of e-mail addresses and send an e-mail to all the members of this list using one alias.
Some providers offer list utilities. You send your e-mail to the list server who sends back the message to all members of the list. These servers use Mailing List Managers (MLM). The two most frequently used MLM are Listserv and Majordomo. You have to use distinct addresses when writing to the members of the list and when writing to the MLM. First you have to subscribe to the list (and generally you receive an e-mail so that you confirm you really want to subscribe).
A list may be moderated or not. When it's the case your e-mail is first read by the moderator who accepts it or not according to the rules of the list.
To be able to send more than text in an e-mail, it's possible to use attachment files. Different encoding systems exist, like MIME or UUENCODE. You will be able to send by this way photos, sound, video, and any file. Of course this is a way for viruses to be sent.
Attachments shouldn't be used in an e-mail sent to a discussion list. The right way is to put your file on an ftp server or on a Web server and to send everybody the URL.
Security : Example of Virus in an e-mail
To participate a news group you have to own a specific reader (both I.E. and netscape have built-in news reader programs). You have to connect to the news server; this is the main difference with e-mail lists which send you the messages without your having to do anything.
To participate, you first have to subscribe to the group. Like mailing lists, some are moderated, others are not.
Talk is probably the oldest tool to chat in real-time on the Web between two persons, first used on Unix systems, but now available. Each participant writes his text and reads his own contribution and the text written by the other one.
FTP is a way to share documents. You just have to put your files on an ftp server and the persons you want to share it with can retrieve it.
Live chat conferencing can be used on the World Wide Web with your browser to conduct online chat sessions with other users.
Some specific softwares also exist to access live chat, like ICQ (I Seek You).
IRC - (Internet Relay Chat) provides a way of communicating in real time with people from all over the world. It consists of various separate networks of IRC servers, machines that allow users to connect to IRC. The largest nets are EFnet, Undernet, IRCnet, DALnet, and NewNet.
Generally, the user (such as you) runs a program (called a "client") to connect to a server on one of the IRC nets. The server relays information to and
from other servers on the same net. Once connected to an IRC server on an IRC network, you will usually join one or more "channels" and converse with others there.You can use commands (like /join #onechannel or /who #onechannel) to join, disconnect or know who is there. Then the text your enters is displayed on the servers of the nets. Very often the problem is the delay between your entering your text and the time when it's read by the others participants.
Video conferencing
Subject of a specific Workshop : (Workshop E: Video conferencing)
Telephone conferencing
It's now possible to have very good audio connexions on the Web, even with a 28.8 Kbps modem.
Multimedia conferencing : numerous products allows the sharing of documents, white boards, Slide Player, etc. Virtual Meeting and Microsoft NetMeeting are two main examples.
People finders are also useful tools to communicate when first you have to find the person you want to speak to :-)
Basic rules are expected to be observed on the Net, they constitute the Netiquette.
One important thing is not to practice spamming which consists in posting advertisements to a newsgroup or a list.
