o You can always disconnect from a remote service by using your communications software to "hang up".
o If the computer gives you a strange symbol like a percent sign or a dollar sign and just sits and stares at you, you can try "help" or "?" to try to find out what the computer expects, or else try "exit", "quit", "bye", "logoff", or something similar, to return to where you were before.
o Many times, when you log on to a system, you will get instructions on how to get further help or how to "escape" back to your own system. You should remember these or write them down!
o As a last resort, exit the communications program (and all other active programs) and shut off your computer, turn off your modem, and disconnect it from the phone line. Be sure to do these steps in the order prescribed. It is unwise (though tempting) to simply turn your computer off and on, or to pull the plug on your modem with your computer running.
More suggestions for the inexperienced are given in Appendix A.
The final hurdle to using the Internet is that the world, even the world of the Internet, is indeed a very large place. When using the Internet you have to decide:
o where to go;
o what information you want (and where it might be); and
o how to get to it (and get it back home intact).
For a system as vast as the Internet, these are hard decisions. Often, the only strategy that works is to explore and try different things. This course is designed to get you over the initial hurdles, give you a fair grounding in methods that work, and point you in the right direction. The exploration is up to you. As an initial orientation, we describe the "three worlds of the known Internet" in the next section.