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23 Oct 2000, South Africa
Dear Dr eCommerce,
- I have a customer and PC in Germany.
- This customer's business is in Capetown South Africa.
- The customer wants to access his business computer from Germany. (He is undergoing treatment for cancer and will be unfit to return home for some months yet).
- Microsoft DUN Server works fine but the cost of approximately USD1.00 per minute is prohibitive.
- Both computers run Windows95/98
- Both have Internet access through their ISPs
- The actions to be performed include interrogation and update of files at the Capetown end using his tailored software.
I am looking for a solution where I can make connection using TCP/IP as if these computers were on a LAN.
I realize that this might be a stupid question but in spite of my 30 years in software development I have had little experience with the Internet.
The techniques in use by Napster, Gnutella, Freenet seem to me to hold out possibilities in this regard.
Yours faithfully,
Rob
Dear Rob:
That's no stupid question. In fact, it stumped me. So I put it to Internet wizard Geoff Thompson of Erin who replies:
"This question could be viewed a standard policy issue in information processing. The choices are basic, and restricted to two:
1. Batch processing
- This option is appropriate when the (new information in the) files does not have to be accessible during the entire process
- You could FTP download the files from the South African server, close the Internet connection, process the files on you local PC (or whatever) environment, re-open the Internet connection, and then FTP upload the files again once fully updated
- As an aside, you could adopt the concept of site mirroring, whereby you have one site on a server in Germany, or wherever, and mirrored to a server in South Africa
2. Real-time processing
- You could build a series of scripts to support Content Management requirements, and use these to update your files remotely, although this would require a continuous Internet connection
Unfortunately, without knowing the exact nature of the files and their use, it is not possible at this juncture to indicate which of the above two options are the most appropriate.
One other (third) possibility would be to change the DNS settings and actually host the site in Germany - this can be done even though there may be a .ZA 1st level domain. Then the site could be freely accessible locally (to you) and globally (to the visitors)."
Good luck,
Dr. Ecommerce