Well, that sounded pretty simple, didn't it? It wasn't---for the people who developed it. But for you, it's just a matter of clicking on an icon and, to borrow a phrase from Microsoft's advertising, figuring out "Where do you want to go today?"

A Web browser contains the basic software you need in order to find, retrieve, view, and send information over the Internet. In essence, all it does is read a computer program and show you the results, kind of like adding 2 + 2 on a calculator and having it display "4." Browser software lets you:

• Browse the World Wide Web (or Web) where you can find a rich variety of text, graphics, and interactive information.
• Send and receive electronic mail, or e-mail or email, messages worldwide nearly instantaneously.
• Read messages from newsgroups, chat messages, forums about thousands of topics in which users share information and opinions.

Browsers display web pages as any combination of text, pictures, audio files, and video files. In addition, browsers recognize hypertext links (remember hypertext from Unit 1?), which will take you to another website on the Web. Hypertext links are generally blue and underlined, although there are many exceptions. For example, the Back buttons on this page--the page, not the browser toolbar--are picture links, and hence neither blue nor underlined. Folder 1 (that you clicked on to get here) is a link--it took you to another page, this one in fact! Browsers read HTML (Hypertext Markup Language) programs, which are written by individuals (or software) to display information on the Web. More about HTML in the section below on URLs.

A browser has a menu bar, a tool bar, an address pane, and a display pane. You are looking at this course in the display pane. Just above that is the address pane. The address pane displays an URL, or Uniform Resource Locator, which is the address of the page where you are on the Web right now. It also has a drop-down arrow (Internet Explorer) or Go button (Netscape) that displays previous addresses you have visited. This list display is a function of the program's history, which is a record of the web sites you've visited. This is the thing that makes people wary of the Web---that people can tell where you've been. But for beginners and advanced users alike, it also tells you where YOU'VE been. So if you want to go back a number of pages, use the history to help you--it's better than hitting the Back button a hundred times! For instructions on how to delete the history (if it bothers you that others can see it), please see your browser's Help.

What are the parts of the URL? What does it mean? Well, an URL tells you the address of an Internet file. Usually it consists of four parts: protocol, server (or domain), path, and filename. Sometimes there's no path or file name. Here's an example:

http://www.microsoft.com/magazine/tips/default.htm

• http is the protocol. (Hypertext Transfer Protocol)
• www.microsoft.com is the server, or domain. (The name chosen by the person or company that pays for the page)
• magazine/tips is the path. (Shows what part of the website you're in--like the file hierarchy in Windows)
• default.htm is the filename.

There are six main principal domain name extensions: .com, for commercial or personal domains, .gov for government domains, .edu for educational institutions, .net for people who provide web services (like your ISP, although they may have a .com domain too), .org, for non-profit organizations, and .mil, for military websites. The general public usually won't usually be able to access pages with .mil extensions.

There are soon going to be seven more available, but at this writing they are not available yet.

On the toolbar there are several buttons you'll use frequently:

• Back, which takes you back one web page from where you are now.
• Forward, which takes you forward one web page from where you are now.
• Stop, which is what you press if you don't want to wait for a website to load.
• Refresh or Reload, which is what you press if the page didn't load correctly, or you think it might have new information.
• Print, which is what you press to print a web page (which may in actuality be much more than one page's worth of information!).
• Search, which takes you to your browser's main search page.

There are more buttons, depending on your browser, but sometimes one or more of these buttons is grayed out. If that happens, it means that service or option is not available. For example, if the Back button is grayed out, then your browser thinks there are no more pages in history. Same thing with the forward button. Sometimes an improperly constructed website can cause your immediate history to be lost, in which case your browser button will gray out even though you know you have been to other places that session. Don't worry, it's not fatal. The most inexplicable gray-out is the Print button. If that happens, it means that the page you are looking at is in sections, or frames, and it thinks there is nothing to print. Just click in the area you want to print, and the button should become available. Sometimes you have to be a bit tricky, and click around in several places before this happens, but it will happen. You can also right-click to get a print command.

The last function of browsers I want to talk about is bookmarks (Netscape) or favorites (Explorer). When you find a website you like, just click on that button or menu item to add that address, and the browser will store the URL for you for future reference. It's a very handy feature---the only problem is that when you first explore the Web, you'll accumulate so many of these that you can't find anything. When that happens, just remember that the bookmarks/favorites are just another directory hierarchy, which can be managed with folders. See your browser's Help to find out how to edit bookmarks (Netscape) or organize favorites (Explorer).

Browsers actually have many other features, but I've covered enough of the basics to allow you to get around on the Web. Since you are just looking at the information, you can't break it or affect it in any way. Sometimes your browser may have a "fatal error" or crash (just stop working), but it's nothing you did. Just take a deep breath, start your browser up again, and go on with your surfing. Remember this--it's nothing you did! It's just the way the Net is--it's a very complex environment, and sometimes it trips over itself.

Please click on Back, then click Unit 2 Part III - Searching the Web to learn about how to find things on the Web.