Graphics on the Internet: So What? by Gregory B. Newby During 1995, according to The Internet Society, the number of World Wide Web Internet sites has been doubling about every 53 days. You can visit hundreds o f thousands of different collections of hypertext, images, and sounds on the Web. But ask an expert what the first thing she does when navigating the World Wide Web and she'll probably say that she turns off automatic image loading. "Automatic image loading" is an option in Mosaic and Netscape, the most popular programs for getting at the Web's data (America Online, Compuserve, and other services have their own programs which are similar). What it means is simple: Whenever you select a new location on the Web, all of the location's content (usually called a "page," like a page in a hypertext book) is displayed on your computer. When you turn automatic image loading off, your browser only shows you the textual parts of the page (we call programs like Netscape and Mosaic browsers, since they let you browse the World Wide Web by following hyperlinks). This is good, because images often take too long. How long is too long? Long enough that people started to think that WWW stands for the "World Wide Wait." When a Web author decides to include an image in their page, he is making a judgment that the image is informative, useful, interesting, or otherwise a good thing to include in the page. Unfortunately, there's often too much of a good thing! The neat thing about text is it doesn't take too much time to get it across the Internet to your computer via modem or any other sort of Internet connection. The saying about "a picture is worth 1000 words" is about right on the Web, too : it's easy to make a full-color image that takes hundreds of kilobytes. By comparison, this paragraph is less than 400 bytes. So when someone includes an impressive graphic, sound, or even a movie in their Web page, it takes a whole lot longer to appear on your screen. Experts know this, and so turn off automatic image loading so that only the text part is retrieved, with an icon or other indicator of where the graphics (or sound, or movie...) would be. They can click again to load the images for the full effec t. On Prairienet, C-U's own community computing system, there are lots of graphics on the Web pages (thousands of Web pages are available on Prairienet, produced by many of the 350 or so Information Providers). People who use Netscape, Mosaic, or another graphics-capable browser can view the graphics and choose whether or not to display the images, sounds, or other data. The many people who use Prairienet's modems to login to Prairienet don't get to see the graphics, though. Instead, there is a text-only browser called Lynx (L ynx is one of several text-only browsers). Lynx, like Mosaic and Netscape, is used to navigate the World Wide Web. But Lynx doesn't require that your home computer be connected to the Internet. With Prairienet's modems, your computer emulates a plain-text terminal (usually a "vt100," which is a terminal standard invented by Digital Equipment Corporation). Even though the Prairienet computers are connected to the Internet, your home computer isn't. You can get your same computer and modem connected to the Internet using programs that run SLIP or PPP software. Unlike vt100 emulation, SLIP and PPP let your computer act as though it has its own Internet connection over a regular modem. Several companies in C-U will sell you a SLIP or PPP connection for under $30. per month ("go modems" on Prairienet for a listing). With SLIP or PPP your computer will be connected to the Internet at your modem's speed (14.4 or 28.8Kbaud is best). This is only about 1/1000th of Prairienet's connection speed, but enables you to see all the fancy graphics, sounds, and movies -- provided you're willing to wait. Why doesn't Prairienet allow SLIP and PPP connections? The first reason is that the University of Illinois, which provides Prairienet's Internet connectivity, doesn't want Prairienet to appear to compete with local Internet service provid ers (the people who sell SLIP, PPP, and other forms of Internet connectivity). The second is that SLIP, PPP, and other programs that they enable like telnet, FTP, Gopher, and of course Netscape or Mosaic are difficult to configure and get running. They won't run on older computers, and don't work well with slower modems. Since Prairienet is committed to being accessible to people with minimal technology, it has a plain-text vt100-compatible menu system. The good news is that most Web authors are sensitive to people with non- graphical browsers, and make sure that their pages look and work great regardless of what browser you use. (The topic of incompatibilities between Netscape and Mosaic is another topic, best left for a different discussion.) P eople using Prairienet's modems can get just about the full benefit of the Web, witho ut seeing any graphics at all. On the Web, you can find pages on just about any topic. Some of what you find is far more attractively presented than any encyclopedia, newspaper, or televis ion show can offer. But most of what you find is put together by average people with a strong interest in the area they are authoring about. This means that y ou can find typos, missing information, or outdated information. It also means th at a Web author may select a beautiful image, but place it so that you need to spe nd minutes waiting for it to appear on your screen. By all means, check out the Web using a graphical browser. You'll be impressed , amazed, and inspired by what you see. Everything from the "Great Fish Cam" to the "Cool Web Site of the Week" awaits your perusal. After you've been around the virtual world a few times, and start seeing beyond the neat interface to th e data on the other side, you might find yourself doing what I do, and turning o f those darned graphics.