Module 1: Telnet, FTP and Internet Tools

This task was exciting for me as I had never heard of any of the applications, and therefore never used any of the applications. I found educating myself from scratch on these subjects very rewarding, and enjoyable. What I discovered by doing this task, and probably most importantly, was that I was absolutely capable. I had previously feared many things concerning the Internet and I don't think that is uncommon. I am ultimately happy that being a novice didn't mean that I was going to be lost in the task. I have new found confidence.


Telnet


Being a Windows Vista user meant that I had to install telnet. It was a very straight forward operation and was completed in no time at all. However, typing telnet:/// into my URL didn't work, so I went to my start button and typed "telnet" in the search area. That seemed to do it, and immediately I was looking at what appeared to be the screen I learnt to type on in 7th grade! I was attracted to its simplicity, but maybe I have been spoilt by the www, as I was frustrated by the lack of choice and rudimentary layout. Imagine my surprise when I wasn't presented with any advertising, bright colours, and the ability to "click" on something.

Telnet's opening page


Upon completion of Task A, it was my opinion that Telnet was useful as a medium with which to reach remote area computers. A no fuss way to use the Internet and is reliable. I think it has all but become obsolete for the everyday user like myself. I can appreciate the speed with which telnet served me as it was quite quick, but I found it to be much less "user friendly" than the www that I am used to. That is not to say I would not use it again in the future, just that it would not be my choice to. The outcome was of course, the the following email in my inbox.

An email form Deakin Library appearing in my inbox.

Then I decided I would "do myself a favour" as suggested for Task B, and take in the cute little Star Wars animation. While it obviously took a lot of skill, and is to be admired for the amount of work gone into it, I was left wanting more. I fear I will be unpopular here, but give me sound, the ability to Stop/Pause/Fast Forward, a timer to see how long it goes for. Gee, we really have come a long way haven't we. But I think C3PO said it best in this scene:

C3PO "What a desolate place this is"

Not content to box up Telnet and send it off just yet, I wanted to see if anyone still used it, and why they would choose to over the web.

I found a site that informed me of many, many positives to using Telnet. The overwhelming positive response to Telnet's speed was expected. To discover others found it easier to control, and that they thought the web was "bloatware" was surpising to me, but I understood the reason behind it. Telnet is anything but bloated. Another great positive I thought, and an application I would indeed use was, and I quote, "when the web is 'down', Telnet is 'up'". Here is a great aspect to Telnet and now when my connection fails me, I will turn to my new friend for help.

The telnet graph with speed listed as the best reason for using it.



FTP

So after getting halfway through the WS FTP download provided, I visited the discussion forum and changed my mind. I too went with to Filezilla to download my client. Once again, very easy and fast and I was soon looking at this screen.

Filezilla's FTP page

Very easy task really, type the address, search the files and there it is, the readme.txt file I was looking for. I did, however, have difficulty opening it but with a right click, I was there. The outcome? Capitalisation matters. It would seem that "THIS" isn't the same as "this". Overall, it's a useful way to file transfer I would say.

Internet Tools

This, I really liked. I found myself pinging and tracerouting far longer than I needed to. I tracerouted from a university in Athens, a router in Hong Kong and even good old Telstra. Here is what I found out.

My traceroute results using centralops.net

My traceroute results using network-tools.com

Above are the results of the traceroute using centralops.net and network-tools.com respectively. I typed the curtin.edu.au address and I found out the IP is 134.7.179.53. The number of hops from centralops was 20, and it was done in 249 ms. At network-tools it was 18 hops in 268 ms.



I found the whole concept of the traceroute fascinating. That I can see where the connections are made and where they are really appealed to me. It made clear the path that the message travels and helped me to better understand the workings on the Internet at a deeper level.



After paying a visit to Telstra, I was informed that they could reach Curtin in just 14 short hops and in 44.071 ms. Better than either centralops or network-tools. Impressive. I wonder if they could now please just amend my phone bill like promised all those months ago.

My traceroute results using Telstra

So in my attempt to analyse all of the information I gathered I have come up with the following. If a router based in Hong Kong (http://stat.qwest.net/looking_glass_asia.html ) can reach Curtin in 14 hops and 191.306 ms and a U.S server (http://all-nettools.com/) can reach it in 19 hops and 301.03 ms, does it make a difference where you are geographically? Well, our Aussie Telstra managed a substantially faster connection (44.071 ms), but was in 14 hops, same as Hong Kong, so no for the hops but a definite yes for the time frame.

I will have to investigate further as to whether on not the size of the server makes a difference to the speed of the connection. I think at this point it must because of the results, but further reading and trying some more pings and traceroute may be required. Or maybe I just like doing it...