Technology has made the world look like a small place. From communicating to shopping, it has become our strongest tool. Faxing too, has come under it’s realm and it isn’t a complex, hair-raising experience anymore. While earlier it was a long wait behind a queue to get your job done, it has become amazingly simplified. Due to internet, faxing has reached to another level. Sending and receiving the faxes can now be done if one is enabled with an internet connection only. While conventional faxing involved transferring of a scanned copy (a facsimile) from one Fax machine to another over the phone network, Internet faxing is a broad term that can refer to one of numerous ways of achieving this over the Internet.
Internet faxing or ‘online faxing’ thus, is about reduced costs and better functionality over conventional faxing. To answer some pertinent questions it should be remembered that specific usages of this procedure have some definite advantages. Such as, one won’t require any extra telephone connection, it would be ensured a paperless transaction that is combined with email, sending and receiving numerous faxes takes place simultaneously and a definite reduction in phone costs.
In conventional system of faxing a Fax machine is considered to be an electronic instrument that comprises of scanner, modem and printer. While working it passes on data in the form of pulses through a telephone line to a recipient which is another Fax machine. The second machine, the receiver then passes these impulses into images while printing them on paper.
Here, a phone line is required and only one fax can be communicated at a time. As the use of modems became more and more widespread the idea of utilizing computers for communicating faxes gained more popularity. While earlier it was a ‘printing a document’ and then putting it in a fax machine, the computer software enabled users to print directly to the software meant for fax and then send the fax using the modem. The procedure was similar while receiving faxes.
With the help of Internet one can indulge in faxing in several other ways. One which has become more popular is the extension of computer-based faxing. It involves using a fax server or gateway to the Internet to alternate between faxes and emails. This is known as "fax to mail" or "mail to fax". Since this procedure offers the advantage of dispensing with the machine and additional telephone line too, it’s substituting traditional fax machine in a major way.
While receiving, a fax is sent through the Public Switched Telephone Network (PSTN) on the Fax server. It obtains the fax and transfers it into PDF or TIFF format as per the user’s instructions. Then the fax is passed on to the web server which posts it in the web interface on subscriber’s account. Subscriber is then alerted by an email of the reception containing the fax as an attached document. While sending too, it follows the reverse order.
In detail, from subscriber’s computer the supplier Web site, the user decides the documents for sending and recipient’s fax number. While sending, the document is converted to PDF format in most cases and sent by the Web server to the fax server. The latter then passes on this to the recipient Fax machine through the Standard Telephone Network.
Later the user obtains a verification that the sending procedure was carried out in his web interface by email. Internet Fax service enables one to send faxes from a computer through an internet connection. While doing so it makes full use of a web interface available on the supplier's web site in most cases. The notable advantages that are attached with this technology, are as follows
- No fax machine - no maintenance, no paper, toner expenditure, possible repairs, etc.
- Mobility - All actions are done on the Web interface; the service is thus available from any computer connected to Internet, everywhere in the world.
- Confidentiality - The faxes are received directly on the account of the user; he is the only one who can access it. The received faxes are not likely to be lost any more or read by the wrong people.
- No installation of software or hardware - All actions are done on the Web interface of the supplier, on the account of the user.
- No telephone subscription for an additional line dedicated to the fax.
- Many faxes can be sent or received simultaneously, and faxes can be received while the computer is switched off.
Not only Faxing, managing phone call systems too has become another important aspect of the internet. Making phone calls over the internet is known as Voice over Internet Protocol or VoIP. Since compressing Fax signals and compressing voice signals aren’t akin, an effort has been mounted recently to make them compliant so that most fax machines can be plugged into the VoIP adapter of a regular phone line.
