References to the World Wide Web are everywhere--companies, businesses, public services, hospitals, and the media advertise with "See our home page on the World Wide Web." Web site addresses appear in billboard, newspaper, and TV ads. If you have seen something the symbols "http://www news.com," it's an Internet/ World Wide Web address. The White House, the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA), and the Smithsonian all have home pages on the Web. The Sunday comics are full of references to the information superhighway.
Never been on the Internet? Can't imagine what it all means? Here's a short course about the Web to bring you up to speed.
THE INTERNET
The Internet began in the 1970's when the U.S. Department of Defense created a way to route messages in a national emergency even if part of the network was shut down. Near the end of the 1980's, the National Science Foundation added five research-center computers to this network to share information. In the early 1990's, commercial sites joined the Net, the World Wide Web was created, and several browsers became available. (More on browsers later.
Approximately 50,000 mainframe and work-station computers make up the Internet. When you use your computer and modem to gather information or communicate with others, you may be sitting in your bedroom, but you're operating in cyberspace.
Cyberspace is an intellectual or mental environment. You represent yourself in that community according to what you type into the computer, not how you look physically. Cyberspace has a culture with rules and etiquette. A 65-year-old West Indian woman and a white male with C2 quadriplegia look the same online. If you want to make an impression on the Internet, exercise your mind and buff up the way you express yourself; no one looks at your body.
To get a picture of the Internet, think of the Earth with 50,000 computers as dots scattered around the globe. Connect the dots between each computer to "see" he Internet, a network of communication. Each computer can connect with every other one and transmit information along those pathways. Most of the host computers on the Internet were UNIX work-stations that required users be fluent in UNIX operating-systems commands. I took several workshops on the Internet, but I never seemed to feel the effort was worth it until the Web came along.
Tim Berners-Lee, at the European Laboratory for Particle Physics (currently with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology), started the World Wide Web in 1992. The Web offers point-and-click access to the most colorful and interesting information on the Internet. Originally designed to distribute scientific research, the Web allows computer users to view information by pointing and clicking on icons.
Creation of the Web made information easier to access and more interesting to view. In addition to text, Web sites present their public faces as documents containing photographs, drawings, diagrams, sounds (including music), and video sequences. Having a home page on the Web, a Web home page, or a World Wide Web site is the equivalent of opening a storefront in cyberspace. Now we are listed in telephone directories; someday we will have home pages.
SURFING THE WEB
In order to surf the Web, you need an Internet connection and browser software. Browsers include Mosaic, Lynx, and Netscape. Next month's column will contain technical information on the different kinds of Internet connections, but for now we are just going to assume you have a connection and are using Netscape, one of the most popular Web browsers.
To get on the Net, double click on the Netscape icon. It opens to a master page with buttons to "print," "stop," and "search," in addition to the regular menu-bar commands. Now I do all my research for Computer Bits on the Web. For this column, I typed in the word "Web" and printed out 25 pages of information from different sources, mostly from Georgetown University's "Guide to the Web" page.
To browse, type in the exact address or a general category. For example, the San Francisco Giants baseball team has a Web page called "Virtual Dugout." To get there, you key in "virtual dugout" or "Giants baseball." A menu of buttons appears on your screen so you can choose more information such as photographs, biographies, statistics, game schedules, conference standings, directions to the ballpark, the latest on the proposed new field, an opportunity to buy a sweatshirt from the online color catalog, or tickets to today's game.
Some Web sites are interactive and allow you to leave messages or order products, but many only let you view the contents. Not only can you visit a Web site, you can also publish your own or help others create home pages. Wherever you go on the Internet, you are traveling on the cutting edge of the information age. Next month's column will review some of the technical aspects of the Web and suggest some sites worth visiting.
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