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000169_news@columbia.edu_Wed Aug 16 17:44:18 1995.msg
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From: fdc@watsun.cc.columbia.edu (Frank da Cruz)
Newsgroups: comp.protocols.kermit.misc
Subject: What are you using Kermit for?
Date: 16 Aug 1995 17:44:18 GMT
Organization: Columbia University
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It is a time-worn truism that the maker of a product (like Kermit)
never hears back from its users unless something is wrong.
I would like to get a different kind of feedback at this point, of
a rather specific nature:
In this world that is rapidly changing from text-based online access to
graphical browsers and such, where, specifically, is a text-based
communications program still useful? When I say "text based", I'm
speaking not about the user interface, but the intrinsically text-based
nature of the terminal emulator ( Tektronix graphics aside :-). In other
words, when the world is divided up between Web browsers and terminal
emulators, what is the place of the terminal emulator (either serial or
telnet based)? I would guess in at least the following areas and
applications:
. Organizations that have any kind of central computing facility --
timesharing systems, text-based online library catalogs, etc.
Especially when telecommuting is a possibility.
. For accessing BBS's.
. For accessing text-based Internet service providers, where the customer
basically gets a UNIX prompt (can people provide me with specific
examples -- company names and locations, etc?)
. For accessing commercial data services that are text based. I believe
the following fall into this category. Please correct me if I am
wrong, and please let me know about others I might have forgotten:
Dow Jones News Retrieval
MCI Mail
Genie
Delphi
Discipline-specific services like Lexis, Nexis, Westlaw, Medline
. Text-based information services on the Internet like:
Library of Congress (dra.com)
Weather (madlab.sprl.umich.edu:3000)
Geography (martini.eecs.umich.edu:3000)
Others... ???
. What else???
The Web is a wonderful thing, but everybody can't run a Web browser, at
least not today, and Web browsers do have certain limitations (e.g.
regarding character sets). AOL and MSN are wonderful things too, but they
lock you in to a proprietary world. I like to think that products like
Kermit stand for freedom of choice. What do you think?
Please, if you will, just reply to kermit@columbia.edu by email rather
than posting, so as to keep the newsgroup free for its primary purpose,
which is (I think) tech support.
Thanks!
- Frank