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Internet
Internet The internet is a network of networks connected by gateways. To access the Internet a user needs to subscribe to an ISP (Internet Service Provider) whose computer provides the link to the Internet.

 

A user can access pages of data stored on any computer on the Internet using a web browser.
Eg Internet Explorer, Netscape

All web pages are written using a special language called HTML (HyperText Markup Language). Pages can include text, graphics, sounds, video clips.

The language uses special tags which instruct the browser how to display the page. The tags appear in pairs at the start and end of the section to which they refer.

Small programs written using Javascript (or VBScript) may be included and run.

Executable programs written in a language called Java may also be embedded and run on a web page. These are called applets.(small applications).

 

Things you can do on the Internet :
  • find up-to-date information
  • buy goods - usually with a credit card ...eg books, CDs, clothes...
  • on-line banking
  • leave messages in news groups or bulletin boards for people with similar interests.
  • download software or data eg music, videos...
  • on-line chat rooms
  • interactive games
Web page
design		 There are two main sections on a web page:
  • the head - which contains information about the page
  • the body - which contains the information to be displayed.

You can use tags to set -

  • the colours of background and text
  • the font and isize of text
  • alignment of text
  • lists and bullets
  • tables - used for arranging blocks of text and graphics on a page.
  • details of graphics to be displayed
  • links to other pages

Tags must be 'nested' eg

<tag1><tag2>........</tag2></tag1>

<html>

<head>
  Info about the page
</head>

<body>
  Data to be displayed.
</body>

</html>
 

This paragraph of text would look like this in HTML :

<p><font face="Arial" color="blue">This paragraph of text would look like this in HTML:</font></p>

There are many programs which allow users to create web pages without knowing about the tags. Eg Microsoft Frontpage.
FTP Links on a web page may be to files which can be downloaded. These use FTP (File Transfer Protocol)

When you create your own web page you will need an FTP program to upload your pages to a web site.