Writer Finds

Writer Finds Terminator "Essential"

Working On The Road!

Long-time AOL subscriber Jeff Berger, who heads JMB Communications, his own New England-based marketing communications / web / PR company, frequently finds Terminator "an indispensable asset" when traveling on business.

"When I bought my current desktop in early 1994, it had AOL preinstalled. For a few months I just let it sit there, untouched. Then a client in Manhattan asked if I had email, so I set up AOL and have been using it for email, file transfers, and much more ever since."

When AOL encountered capacity problems early in 1996, Jeff signed on to TIAC, The Internet Access Company, a Massachusetts-based ISP serving the area from Maine to Washington, D. C. and Virginia. Coincidentally, he later started doing some magazine writing for TIAC, which now houses his virtual domain, www.jmbcommunications.com.

As he travels, Jeff needs access not only to his AOL and TIAC accounts, but also to clients’ Intranet product databases, to which he has access via Virtual Private Networking, or tunneling. During a trip to California, Jeff says, "Terminator made all the difference. I couldn’t have worked without it.

"I had several days’ work to do on a major client’s product promotional database. Calling TIAC’s POP in Massachusetts from my California hotel room to access the database would have been prohibitively expensive.

"AOL in its shrink-wrap incarnation would also have been problematic because of its obnoxious disconnects," Jeff added. "When I'm tunneling on the Internet I never see AOL's little logoff notes. Without Terminator, AOL would repeatedly disconnect me for being 'idle' and I never would have known it until my tunnel collapsed, crashing my connection to the database and wasting a lot of time and effort.

"With all of AOL’s built-in nagging devices, I would have constantly been re-establishing contact and starting up, not producing. Fortunately, I had heard about Terminator and it worked perfectly."

To use "tunneling" via AOL, Jeff signs on to a local AOL POP in California, accesses his TIAC mail via the Internet with Eudora, fires up his Internet tunnel, starts Lotus Notes, which houses the database, and works uninterrupted. "Terminator detects every AOL attempt to log me off due to 'inactivity' and responds to each, ensuring that I can work. That makes a huge difference. I have it on my desktop and my laptop. I wouldn’t be without it."

Jeff emphasizes that he does not use Terminator to waste time online. "I'm not in this for fun. Even though I've had my own domain for several years, I keep AOL because it has features I can use, like News Profiles and Travel channels. Although most of my clients use me for technology-related communications, I do travel writing as well, and I research prospective clients through AOL."

For information on TPA Software’s "Terminator" product -- which sells for a mere $5 -- check their website, www.tpasoft.com. For more on JMB, click www.jmbcommunications.com.

Updated May 29, 2001