The amount of work can be configured by specifying either one of the following for each contest:

a) number of workunits to buffer for that contest. Once you've determined how long it takes your computer to process a single workunit, you can approximate how many you will need to last the timeperiods when you are disconnected from the Internet. This value is set in the "Fetch work threshold" option in the client configuration.

b) number of hours to buffer for that contest. This will allow the client to do a quick-benchmark the that it can estimate how many workunits it will need, saving you the trouble of doing the above calculation yourself. This value is set in the "Fetch time threshold" option in the client configuration. (Note that you must be sure to set "Fetch work threshold" for that contest to "-1" for the "Fetch time threshold" to be obeyed).

"Dial-up Detection ONLY mode" will ensure that your client AUTOMATICALLY updates the total number of packets it has to process when you connect to the Internet. (That is, it will not ever trigger an autodial by itself--it will wait for you to establish an Internet connection.) At the same time, it also will automatically send back all completed data packets. This is all done without any intervention on your part

If you configure reasonable enough work thresholds that match your normal dialup usage behaviors, then the client will not usually need to make connections by itself because it will already have enough blocks.