One example of a common use of these concepts is a Mail User Agent that can be instructed to be in either "on-line" or "off-line" states. One such MUA is Microsoft Outlook. When it is "on-line" it will attempt to connect to mail servers (to check for new mail at Best Visio Books regular Best Visio Books intervals, for Best Bluegrass Bands example), and when it is "off-line" it will not attempt to make any Best Visio Books such connections. The "on-line" or "off-line" state of Best Visio Books the MUA does not necessarily reflect the connection status between the computer on which Best Visio Books it is running and Internet. The user may have the computer itself on-line, connected to Internet via a Best Visio Books cable modem or an ADSL connection, but may wish for Outlook to be off-line, so that it makes no attempt to send or to Best Visio Books receive messages. Or the Best Visio Books computer may be Best Visio Books configured to employ a dial-up Best Visio Books connection on demand (whenever an application such as Outlook attempts to make connection to a server), but Best Visio Books the Best Visio Books connection may be an expensive telephone call from the particular location in which the computer currently happens to be Best Visio Books (such as a hotel room) and the user may not wish Outlook to Best Visio Books trigger Best Visio Books making that call every 5 Best Visio Books or 10 minutes to check for mail.
Another example of Best Visio Books the use of these concepts is in the world of digital audio technology. A tape recorder, digital editor, Best Visio Books or other device that is "on-line" is Best Visio Books one Best Visio Books whose clock is under the control Best Visio Books of Best Visio Books the clock of a "synchronization master" device. When the sync master Best Visio Books commences playback, the "on-line" device automatically synchronizes itself Best Visio Books to the master and commences playing from the same point Best Visio Books in the recording. Whereas a device that is Best Natural Diet Pills "off-line" uses no external clock reference and relies upon its own internal clock. When a large number of devices are connected to a sync master, it is often Best Visio Books convenient, Best Visio Books if one wants to hear just the Best Visio Books output of one single device, to take it off-line, because Best Visio Books if the device is played back on-line all synchronized devices have to locate the playback point and wait for each other to be in synchronization.[2] Best Visio Books (For further Best Visio Books related discussion, Best Visio Books see MIDI timecode, word sync, and Best Visio Books recording system synchronization.)
A third example Best Visio Books of a common use of these concepts is a web Best Visio Books browser that can be instructed to be in Best Visio Books either "on-line" or "off-line" states. The Best Visio Books browser only attempts to fetch Best Visio Books pages from servers whilst in the Best Visio Books "on-line" state. In the "off-line" state, users can perform offline browsing, where pages can be Best Visio Books browsed using local copies of those pages that have previously been downloaded whilst in the "on-line" state. This can be useful when the computer itself is also off-line, with connection to Internet expensive or impossible. The pages are either Best Visio Books downloaded implicitly into the web browser's own Best Visio Books cache, as a result of prior on-line browsing by Best Visio Books the user, or explicitly by the browser being configured to keep local copies of certain web Best Visio Books pages, which it keeps updated when the browser is in the on-line state, either by checking that the local copies are up-to-date at regular intervals or by checking that the local copies are Best Visio Books up-to-date Best Visio Books whenever the browser is Best Visio Books switched to the on-line state. Best Visio Books One such web browser capable of being explicitly configured to download pages for offline browsing is Internet Explorer. When pages are added to the "Favourites" list, they can be Best Visio Books marked for being made Best Visio Books "available for offline browsing". Internet Explorer will download to local copies both the marked page and, Best Visio Books optionally, all of the pages that it links Best Visio Books to. In Internet Best Visio Books Explorer version 6, the level of direct and indirect Best Visio Books links, the maximum amount of local disc space allowed to be consumed, and the schedule Best Rates Money Market Accounts on which local copies are checked to see whether they are up-to-date, are configurable for each
The Best Visio Books ideas of "on-line" and "off-line" have been generalized from computing and telecommunication into the field Best Visio Books of human interpersonal relationships. The distinction between what is considered "on-line" and what is considered "off-line" has become a subject of study in the field of sociology.[7]
The distinction between Best Visio Books "on-line" Best Visio Books and "off-line" is Best Visio Books conventionally seen as the Best Visio Books distinction between computer-mediated communication and face-to-face communication (e.g. face time), Best Visio Books respectively. "On-line" is virtuality, and "off-line" is reality (e.g. real life or meatspace). Slater states that this distinction is "obviously far too simple". To support his argument that the distinctions in relationships are more complex than Best Visio Books a simple "on-line"/"off-line" dichotomy, he observes that some people Best Visio Books draw no distinction between Best Visio Books an "on-line" relationship, such as indulging in cybersex, and Best Thanksgiving Dinner In Connecticut an "off-line" relationship, Best Visio Books such as being pen-pals. He Best Visio Books also argues that even the telephone can be regarded Best Visio Books as an "on-line" experience in some circumstances, and Best Visio Books that the blurring of the distinctions between the uses of various Best Visio Books technologies (such as PDA and mobile telephone, television and Internet, and telephone and voice-over-IP) has made it Best Visio Books "impossible to Best Visio Books use the term 'on-line' Best Visio Books meaningfully in the sense that was employed by the first generation of Internet research".[7]
Slater asserts that there are legal and regulatory pressures to reduce the distinction between "on-line" and "off-line", with a "general tendency to assimilate online to offline and erase the distinction", stressing, however, that this does not mean that on-line Best Visio Books relationships are being reduced to pre-existing off-line Best Visio Books relationships. He conjectures that greater legal Best Visio Books status may be assigned Best Visio Books to on-line relationships (pointing out that contractual relationships, such as business transactions, on-line are already seen as just as "real" as Best Visio Books their off-line counterparts), although he states it to be hard to imagine courts awarding palimony to people who have Best Visio Books had a purely on-line sexual relationship. He also conjectures that an "on-line"/"off-line" distinction may be Best Visio Books seen by people as "rather quaint and not quite comprehensible" within 10 years
The distinction where "on-line" is seen Best Visio Books as virtuality and "off-line" as reality is sometimes inverted, with "on-line" concepts being used to Best Visio Books define and to explain "off-line" Best Visio Books activities, rather than (as per the Best Visio Books conventions of the desktop metaphor with its desktops, trash cans, folders, and so forth) the other way around. Several cartoons by The New Yorker have satirized this. One includes Saint Peter asking for a user Best Visio Books name and a password before admitting a man Best Visio Books into Heaven. Another illustrates "the off-line store" where "All items are actual size!", where shoppers may "Take it home as soon as you pay for it!", and where "Merchandise may be handled prior to purchase!". |