Reviews Netheimar, Iceland

Morgunbladid, Reykjavik, January 3, 1996

"Roving about in The Online World"

NETHEIMAR

Netheimar by Odd de Presno, Lars H. Andersen and Lara Stefansdottir. Odd is the author of the basic text and Lara and Lars translated, localized and enhanced. Published by the authors. 288 pp.
The Alnet (Morgunbladid prefers this term in Icelandic) or Internet is constantly on the lips of computer users and those interested in computers, and moreover it has become a very popular subject matter for journalists. Although a lot has been missed the discussion emphasizes that the Internet is one of the main trends of future computerization, it has already had and will have en enormous influence in different areas, such as multimedia, journalism, science, entertainment and education.
Icelanders have quickly understood the qualities of the Internet which is of great importance to a nation in a sparsely populated country and will grow in importance as fibre optics become more widespread. In correspondence with this interest it is not surprising that already a number of books have been published about the Internet and the qualities of it, among them is the book which is told of here and was published in mid December. In this book Odd de Presno, one of the main Internet specialists in the world, tells about the Internet, the possibilities and their utilization.
Odd de Presno lives in a small town in Norway and from there he administrates a comprehensive Internet service while also spending a lot of time travelling around the world as a consultant and lecturer. Netheimar is mostly based on a text to which everybody wishing so has access on the Internet on URL: http://home.eunet.no/~presno/bok/index.html and as a matter of fact quite many people who have roved about on the net recognize the book or Odd de Presno as he is very widely referred to. Netheimar is however a quite more weighty work than that on the net and handier, because although the Internet is an inexhaustible source of information the fact is that for those who are brought up with book based education it is easier to adopt information from a printed source. Netheimar also suits as a reference book as there is a good index in it.
The main drawback of the book is that it is too similar to the net and information searching on it; the text is very mixed up and the layout of the book is obscure and difficult to get at. Those who toil through the book altogether benefit from their pains because in the book an unbelievable amount of information has been gathered and the book offers a holistic and clear image of the Internet after all. There is a little too much of information on CompuServe which Icelandic computer users have hardly utilized, but there is also a lot of information on mailing lists, ftp, Usenet which normally seem complicated to newcomers. The large amount of examples on how to search for and utilize information are an advantage to benefit from not least for experienced net users.
The danger when publishing a book like this is that the information becomes old very quickly as the development is so fast. As a reaction to this a homepage has been put up for the book at http:www.ismennt.is/n/netheimar/ . Readers can also subscribe to a mailing list netheimar@ismennt.is and more information on that topic is included in the homepage.
In Netheimar the authors and translators make use of the English word Internet and no attempt is made translate it into Icelandic by declining it according to Icelandic grammar.This is however not valid in all instances, e.g. in p. 121 it says "A Interneti"and in p. 122 it says "a Internet". The general rule however should be to use either the English word or some Icelandic and it does not conform to Icelandic language to speak of internetid, whatever meaning people have about "alnet".
This book by Odd de Presno, Lars H. Andersen and Lara Stefansdottir is a huge source of information about the Internet and the utilization of it and it is useful to most people whether they are newcomers or advanced users. As mentioned earlier it is not painless to go through the book but it truly pays.

Arni Matthiasson

Reader feedback

Date: Thu, 29 Feb 96 14:41:39 -0800
From: Jon Bjarni Gudsteinsson <jonbi@eldhorn.is>
Subject: Feedback on "NETHEIMAR".

Hornafirdi 1.Mars.1996

Hi !

I am currently reading your book NETHEIMAR the Icelandic version. I am very found of its material, and I am absolutely sure about that I will be more comfortable when I start cruising the Internet after reading it.

Thanks, and thanks again for writing this book.

jonbi@eldhorn.is