IBox (Internet in a Box) was one of the first commercially available Internet connection software packages available for sale to the public. O'Reilly & Associates (now O'Reilly Media) created and produced the package, in collaboration with Spry, Inc. Spry, Inc. also started up a commercial Internet service provider (ISP) called InterServ.[1][2]

The IBox software included the Winsock program and TCP/IP stack that were needed to connect a computer running Microsoft Windows to the Internet in 1994.[3] The IBox package also included a licensed copy of the NCSA Mosaic web browser called AIR Mosaic,[4][5] AIR Mail (an email client), AIR News (an NNTP news client), AIR Telnet, AIR Gopher, and an FTP Network File Manager.

Combined with InterServ's dial-up access, Internet in a Box provided a complete solution for members of the general public to access the Internet, a network previously available almost exclusively to government and collegiate users, or to the public only indirectly through e-mail gateways provided by hosted systems such as BBSes and CompuServe. The inclusion of a web browser further gave access to the then-nascent World Wide Web.

The pioneering Internet book from O'Reilly, Ed Krol's 'Whole Internet User's Guide and Catalog' (US-1993) was included in the US product. The European edition of the product also included Sue Schofield's 'UK Internet Book' (UK 1994).

Spry, Inc.

Spry, Inc. was a small software company headed up by David Pool in Seattle, Washington. Spry was the first company licensing the Mosaic Web browser source code.[6] In 1995 CompuServe bought Spry, Inc. for $100 million in cash and stock of H&R Block (the parent company of CompuServe).

References

  1. ↑ Goldberg, Steven (October 24, 1994). "Internet access? It's in the box". Network World. IDG Network World. 11 (43): 43–44. ISSN 0887-7661.
  2. ↑ Peschel, Joe (November 7, 1994). "Spry's Internet In A Box package brings the Iway on-ramp to your computer". InfoWorld. Vol. 16, no. 45. San Mateo, CA: InfoWorld Media Group. p. 118. ISSN 0199-6649.
  3. ↑ Stewart, Bill. "Web Browser History". Retrieved 16 August 2010.
  4. ↑ Sink, Eric (15 April 2003). "Memoirs From the Browser Wars". Retrieved 16 February 2011.
  5. ↑ Cockburn, Andy; Jones, Steve (6 December 2000). "Which Way Now? Analysing and Easing Inadequacies in WWW Navigation". CiteSeerX. CiteSeerX 10.1.1.25.8504. {{cite web}}: Missing or empty |url= (help)
  6. ↑ December, John; Randall, Neil (1994). World Wide Web Unleashed. Sams Publishing. ISBN 0-672-30617-4.
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