Introduction to the Internet

Editor's Notes

• #2 (READ TOP OF SCREEN) At Warren Township Library, in Adult Services, patrons have access to six pcs with word processing capabilities and internet access as well as four terminals designated for OPAC use that also provide internet access. Patrons must sign for computer time using either their library card or a guest pass they obtain at the reference desk and the pcs can be used for an hour. It is 10 cents a page to print documents from the Internet.
• #3 Sometime during the Cold War, it became clear that there was a need for a bombproof communications system. A concept was devised to link computers together throughout the United States. With such a system in place large sections of the country could be attacked by nuclear weapons yet communications would stay intact. In the beginning, only government “think tanks” and a few universities were linked.
• #4 Wireless broadband, also know as WiFi, is the ability to connect to the Internet without the use of wires. The most common way of accessing wireless broadband is via a wireless router attached to an Internet Service Provider modem. If you are not very familiar with computers and computer hardware, I would recomenned that an expert set up your router.
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• #6 I am bringing this to your attention because I ran into this when I was checking on an herbal supplement for one of my children. I googled a dietary supplement to determine if the supplement would be safe to give to a child under the age of 13. I found pages after pages all basically sayin the same thing, that it was safe, it had these benefits, and it made many promises. It wasn’t until I had been perusing a website for an hour that I realized that the one website I was using for informational purposes was a vendor of the supplement so of course, they were going to state all the things that a consumer would want to hear. That is why when surfing the web and coming across unfamiliar websites you should evaluate them with a cautious eye and keep these questions in your mind as you do so.
• #7 a web address always begins with “ http:// ” which stands for hypertext transfer protocol and refers to the manner (also know as the “scheme”) in which web pages are sent over the Internet. In current versions of Internet Explorer, the http:// is automatically inserted for you, so you don’t need to struggle with typing it in. a web address typically includes “www” which is short for World Wide Web. However, some web addresses (including those that allow you to access your e-mail over the web) do not have the www as part of their address. If you’re not sure whether the web site you’d like to visit has a www as part of its address, try it both ways. One of the two is bound to work. a web address includes a site name . In the example above, the site name is “nypl”, which stands for New York Public Library. a web address includes a domain name . In the example above the category is “.org”. There is occasionally a slash (“/”) and some text following the domain name. This typically represents a specific web page within the web site. a web address always begins with “ http:// ” which stands for hypertext transfer protocol and refers to the manner (also know as the “scheme”) in which web pages are sent over the Internet. In current versions of Internet Explorer, the http:// is automatically inserted for you, so you don’t need to struggle with typing it in. Also, be careful not to confuse a web address with an e-mail address. An e-mail address always has an “@” symbol in it and is very unlikely to ever have a " www. ” sequence.
• #8 For many people, the Internet has become a necessary part of life. You can keep in touch with the people you care about, get daily news,find recipes, maps, health advice, watch movies, check your library’s catalog, handle your finances, make travel arrangements, find a new job, check the times for movies, shop for everything from food to footwear or simply just surf the net.
• #9 An Internet Browser is a software program for displaying and viewing pages on the Web .Your web browser is the key part of the your internet toolkit. It is not only the window through which you look at web pages but it also contains the software that allows you to download files, view newsfeeds and read your email. Internet Explorer is very popular because it comes installed with Windows. Also most web site designers design their websites to work best with Internet Explorer. Other browsers include Firefox, Netscape, Safari and Opera.
• #10 Generally the first page retrieved when accessing a Web Site is the Home Page. Usually a home page acts as the starting point for a user to access information on the site. The home page usually has some type of table of contents for the rest of the site information or other materials. This is an example of the home page of the Philadelphia Zoo. At the library, the homepage defaults to the library’s home page. At home, your computer could default to a number of home pages including aol, yahoo or google.
• #11 The Title Bar is the colored bar at the very top of the browser window. It shows the web page that you are viewing and an icon identifying the browser you are using. The address bar is near the top of the browser window. It shows the URL (or web site address) of the page you are looking at. Toolbar icons (which we will cover more in depth in a few minutes) are located under th title bar and may also be under the address bar. Toolbars include such buttons as the back button, the refresh button and the home button. Display window is the space containing the web page. Scroll bars are found at the bottom and right side of the Display window. They allow you to see the information that may be too long or too wide for the display window.
• #12 By clicking on the file key, you will see a drop down menu with a list of choices that can be performed using the various options in the drop down mentino. I am only going to talk about a few basic ones which are enough for any internet user. You can use new window to open up a new browser window if you don’t want to close the old one you are currently using. For example, perhaps I am booking airline tickets but I don’t want to close the window but I need to check my son’s school calendar. Open allows you to open a new web page but you need to know the address plus it closes the old webpage. Print is obvious. It will print what is on the screen. Print preview you allows you to look at whats gong to be printed before you actually print
• #13 The two arrow keys in the upper left hand corner allow you to go back to previous pages viewed or forward to get back to the page you were currently on. Most web browsers include a refresh or reload button to refresh the page that is currently being displayed. Sometimes when it seems to be stalling it is good to presh the refresh button. The x button is the stop buttoning. If a page is currently loading and you decide to stop the process because it is either taking too long or you have decided against looking at it,you can press the x button to stop it. Home icon will take you back to your default home page. So for example if you have looked at several different websites and would just like to go back to your pre set home page you click on the home button. The history arrow which is to the right of the address bar will show you the websites you had recently visited. If you want to go back to one of these websites you can click on the arrow and then click on the website. The search box and icon is located next to the stop button. Here if you wanted to look something up on the internet you would type in the word or word phrase you are looking for and then click on the icon that looks like a magnifying glass. The minimize button makes the entire screen disappear. But to make it reappear you can click on the square box next to it. To close out the entire thing you can click on the X. The arrow key next to the magnifying glass gives you other search engine options. The print icon allows you to print what is currently on your screen.
• #14 Internet links are usually text in blue and underlined. Web designers can change the color of links so be alert to any text in a different color. A few Web designers will even remove the underline, which sometimes makes it difficult for the Internet user to identify a link. A link is literally a pointer to a different Web site or even to a different portion of the existing site. By clicking on a link, the browser will go to the linked Web site or spon on the web page. First we are going to look at the Somerset county library’s home page to answer a few questions about the library system and then move on to The Philadelphia zoo’s library system to answer a few more. With my help, you are going to direct me to where I should access certain information about these websites and with the simple effort of moving, pointing and clicking a mouse you will be able to discover a wealth of information.