To receive faxes without having to own a fax machine

Demon provide a service for receiving faxes via email, known as DFAX. It is available for a one year free trial offer, after which there is a small set-up fee to continue. To apply, fill in the form at

http://www.dfax.uk.demon.net/

You will be allocated a phone number to which faxes to you can be sent. Faxes received at this number are then converted to emails in the form of TIFF images, which are then downloaded like any other email. You will need an application capable of viewing the images.

There are several different variants of TIFF, and some image-viewing applications do not support the one used by DFAX. For Windows 3 users the 16-bit version of the shareware viewer DocView should be suitable:

http://www.informatik.com/docview.html

For Windows 95 users, versions of Turnpike from 4.00 onwards provide in-built viewing facilities; one possible alternative is to use the program Imaging for Windows - this is an installable Accessory in more recent versions of Windows. The above is suggested in Demon's FAQ (see below).

http://www.pathogen.demon.co.uk/TIFF/

Full details of the DFAX service can be found at http://www.demon.net/helpdesk/producthelp/dfax/dfax/

To send faxes without having to own a fax machine

There is an international consortium which will convert an email message to a fax and deliver it via the Internet to many places around the world at no charge. Demon are a member of the consortium. If you need to send a fax to Widgets on their fax number 01234-123456, you would address your email to:

remote-printer.Widgets@441234123456.iddd.tpc.int

Note:

1. no spaces or dots are allowed in the name of the addressee
2. the proper international telephone code must be used. For a UK number, this means replacing the initial 0 with the country code 44. You do not need to give the 00 international code.

For more details send a blank email to support@demon.net with the subject send tpc

It is not necessary to sign-up for DFAX in order to use this service.