Your Internet Consultant - The FAQs of Life Online

6.20. I don't have access to FTP! Am I cut off from the world of software archives?

No! Anonymous FTP isn't the only way to browse and retrieve software from the Internet's archives. Many sites allow retrieval of their software using Gopher, WWW, and WAIS. These services make searching much easier, but require special client software to be installed on your host machine. You can also get files using electronic mail, which everyone on the Internet can do.

For more information on using Gopher, WWW, and WAIS, read the Usenet newsgroup comp.infosystems.gopher, comp.infosystems.www, or comp.infosystems.wais.

There are plenty of Usenet newsgroups dedicated to postings of software binaries (ready-to-run programs) and source code. These groups are great ways to find the most recent versions of popular programs with a minimum of fuss, but they aren't useful as long-term archives. After the messages expire, the software is gone from the Usenet until the next time it is posted (if there is a next time).

The easiest way to find them is to look for Usenet groups that begin with comp.sources or comp.binaries. For example, the group comp.binaries.mac contains new versions of a variety of shareware programs, in BinHex format.

Table of Contents | Previous Section | Next Section