World Wide Web Basics

World Wide Web Basics


The World Wide Web is a linked universe, and it's easy to learn the basics of moving around in it. It is (within limits) orderly and organized, but there is no single central structure or rule that governs it. Here are the essentials of structure and navigation:

  1. HOME is where you start, and most browsers permit an easy return to HOME. Netscape has a HOME button. HOME is wherever you'd like it to be.

  2. Each WWW document has a URL, a Universal Resource Locator, which has all the information a browser needs to locate and retrieve it.
    This document's URL is http://witcombe.bcpw.sbc.edu/wwwbasics.html
    • http:// says 'use the HyperText Transfer Protocol'
    • witcombe.bcpw.sbc.edu identifies the principal file (or server) on which this document is found
    • WWWbasics.html is the name of the document in that file

  3. The server for this document is located at Sweet Briar College in Virginia, USA

  4. You use links (which are highlighted, and/or underlined, or have a different color from the rest of the text) to move from one document (or location or site) to another
    • you can "go back" to a previous link using the BACK button in Netscape
    • you can see a list of the links you've followed using the GO menu on the Netscape menu bar.

  5. You can see the URL of a document in the Location box in Netscape

  6. You can "bookmark" links you think you'll want to revisit using the green Bookmark image in the Netscape Menubar ("Add Bookmark"), or by clicking on the Bookmark image next to Location

  7. You can see the HTML code of a document by choosing 'Page Source' in the View menu in Netscape

  8. You can get information about the document by chossing 'Page Info' in the View menu in Netscape

  9. You can e-mail documents using the 'Send Page..' feature in the File menu, if the mail server has been set up



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