Student Resources

Using Computers and Internet Resources

Internet Basics

The World Wide Web, often refered to as "The Web" or "WWW," is only one part of the Internet, but it is perhaps the most effective and aesthetic method of disseminating information on the Net. Created in 1990 at CERN (European Particle Physics Laboratory) in Geneva as a means of making complex research reports accessible for researchers' collaboration, the World Wide Web (now available publicly) is capable of disseminating documents containing any or all of the following features: images (even animated ones), illustrations, charts, photos, video, and sound. If you've ever used a Gopher server (an internet protocol that supports only text) to access information on-line, you're sure to appreciate the colorful and dynamic information of the World Wide Web.

The World Wide Web is a document-driven medium in which information is organized in segments, or nodes, called Web pages. (A collection of Web pages is called a Web site.)

For instance, the document you are now reading is a Web page that is contained within the larger Nelson Education Web site.

Web pages, or documents, are called hypertext documents because they allow the integration of so many types of files (graphics, sound, video) and because they contain hypertext links, highlighted or underlined words that the user clicks on to access another document. The integration of these media and links are created with HTML (HyperText Mark-up Language). HTML is a coding language that indicates how text, images, and links should appear and function within the document when it is interpreted by a World Wide Web browser.

ACCESSING THE WORLD WIDE WEB
To access the World Wide Web, or display a WWW document, you must have a Web browser--a program that translates HTML files so that they can be viewed as the author intended. Two of the most popular graphical browsers are Netscape Navigator and Microsoft Internet Explorer. You may be able to access one of these programs on a computer on campus by simply clicking on the icon on the desktop or by looking for the browser's folder in the Program Manager of a Windows machine or in the Hard Drive of a Macintosh. If you want to connect from home via modem, and your university offers a SLIP (Serial Line Internet Protocol) or PPP (Point to Point) connection, you will need to install software on your computer. You may be able to obtain Netscape and other Internet programs free from the computer help desk at your university.

Once you have opened the browser by clicking on its icon, you will be able to begin searching the Web. To do so, you may begin by clicking the OPEN button in the Netscape toolbar or by clicking OPEN in the pull-down FILE menu in Internet Explorer. In the open box, merely type the address of a search engine or Internet directory, to look for pages by topic, or enter the address of a another page you have handy.

Each Web page, or Web document, is given a unique address, or URL (Universal Remote Locator), on the WWW so that it can be easily located on and retrieved from the WWW.

The URL of a Web page consists of a defined number of elements:

protocol://computername.institutionname.ending/nameoffile.htm

http://www.harcourcanada.com/harbrace/student/computer.htm

The protocol for the World Wide Web is HTTP (HyperText Transfer Protocol). Thus, all Web page URLs begin with http, which is followed by :// indicating the beginning of the actual address. The elements that follow (computer name, institute name, and ending) make up the domain name, and each of these elements must be separated by a period. At the end of the domain name, you will notice that a forward slash (/) separates each file directory in which the final document file (ending in .html) is embedded.

The computer name may be www or another machine name; the institution name may be that of a company (such as nytimes or microsoft or aol) or the name of a university (such as uottawa). The ending of this first section, called the domain name, depends upon the location or type of institution housing the hosting computer. Domain names for universities sometimes end in .edu, but you should be familiar with other endings as well:

.ca Canada

.com commercial

.net network

.org organization

.gov government

.jp Japan

.us United States

As mentioned earlier, the folders, or directories, of files available through the Web on the computer are separated from the domain name, and from each other, by a forward slash (/). For instance, the URL for our Business and Technical Writing page in On the Net indicates that the document bustech.htm is embedded in the /net/ folder.

http://www.harcourtcanada/harbrace/net/bustech.htm

USING THE WORLD WIDE WEB

The Web is an enormous resource for researching any number of topics. And knowing how to use it can enhance your ability to locate information you need for your classes. You will find it especially useful for finding:

• Timely data (news, research findings, legislation, stock market quotes)

• Non-print sources (information published by individuals, companies, and institutions that cannot be found in print)

• Electronic editions of periodicals (newspapers, magazines, newletters)

• Online library catalogs and indexes of printed periodicals

TIPS FOR USING A WEB BROWSER
The best way to learn how to use your chosen Web browser is to play with it. But below are a few tips that can help you get started.

1. To return to the previous page, click the back arrow button in your browser toolbar. The forward arrow will, in many cases, allow you to return to the page you have "backed" out of.
2. If a page is taking too long to load, and you would like to leave, click on the stop button (a stop sign icon) in your toolbar.
3. If a page is taking too long to load and you suspect that your connection is slow, click the reload button button on your toolbar. This will again access the page and hopefully load it more quickly.
4. In Netscape, a page with a domain name beginning with www. and ending with .com can be entered into the Open box or into the URL display box using only the institution name (harbrace). For instance, to quickly go to the Yahoo! home page, you can merely type in yahoo.
5. Remember that URLs are case sensitive.
6. Be aware that the default color for hyperlinks is blue, but they can be any color (including black), and they are not always underlined.
7. Note that some pages contain only an image (as in some home pages for sites), try clicking on the image to enter the site.