June Macintosh Shareware

This month's collection of Internet applications and tools include something for everyone. Our selection of Internet applications includes a couple of Internet based groupware applications (a standard ICQ application for text-based Internet group meetings and a videoconference utility for complete audio-visual communication) and a classic and FTP and HTTP file transfer client that is under continual development. Our collection of Internet tools will allow you to optimise your Web siteÆs HTML and images, add 128-bit encryption to Netscape and organise your URL collection.

By Steve Cooper

When used as an FTP client, Anarchie displays remote servers in a window modelled on the Mac OS FinderÆs list view. Files may be dragged between this window and the Finder in either direction. Anarchie's intelligent Web site folder mirroring feature is safe and efficient. It ensures that only modified files are uploaded to the server and it will only remove files from the server if they have been deleted locally. You can even modify HTML and CGI files on the remote server directly, using BBEdit.

Anarchie provides full support for resumption of file transfer operations in either direction -- a very useful feature for those with slow modems and/or unreliable connections.

The Fortify application can detect which level of encryption you currently have, and if required, fortify your version of Netscape (Navigator or Communicator) using a one-step installation process.

The status of friends and associates on your contact list is updated dynamically, so that you will know as soon as one becomes present on the network (online). Typically, an ICQ user will allow information such as their name and email address to be associated with their unique ICQ number. This makes it possible to search for friends and associates based on these attributes if you don't know their ICQ numbers specifically. The ICQ home page also provides a link to help you contact with strangers who share your interests, hobbies or curiosities.

ICQÆs multiuser mode allows groups to conference, and ICQ can also support a range of peer-to-peer applications such as NetMeeting, CoolTalk and Internet games. The program runs in the background, demanding little processor time or bandwidth.

Like ICQ, iVisit provides users with a unique identity (which can be organised through a bookmark system) and the availability of conferences is announced in real time. Like ICQ, its possible to extend connection invitations to, or accept them from, multiuser rooms or individuals. The rooms can be made public for general chat or private for business conferencing. Personal security is easy to set up and maintain, and conferences are password protected.

iVisit is compatible with all ISPs and there are versions for Windows 95 and NT. It's compression technology was originally designed to work with older 28.8K connections, so it works very effectively with the higher speed 57.6K connections more widely available today.

If necessary, you can compare the optimised page with its original, generate a report of outlining changes, and view the page in a browser, before saving any changes that the stripping operation has made.

The program also allows you to optimise your JPEG and GIF images by stripping their Macintosh resource forks -- a task that is often overlooked during Web site construction. We conducted an informal test on a small site created using Claris Home Page, and found that we were able to reduce its size from 500K to 344K. There was no discernible effect on the presentation of the site, and it remained editable in Home Page.