Internet & Web Pages
Aims & Objectives
Brief Intro and History of the Internet Creating A Web Site Introduction to HTML Introduction to Information Architecture
History of the Internet
ARPANET - the US department of defence wanted to develop a computer network that could withstand nuclear attack Unintended consequences: huge use of Email Soon became the tissue of a huge network and networks
Early Arpanet
TCP/IP (unifying protocol)
Transmission Control Protocol (how data is broken up into packets and reassembled at the end) Internet Protocol (how packets reach their destination)
FTP Email Telnet
The 7 Layers of the OSI Model
OSI (Open System Interconnection) Model consists of 7 layers
Layer 1 (Physical): hardware Layer 2 (Data Link): handling errors of layer 1, flow control, synchronisation Layer 3 (Network): switching and routing, logical paths, virtual circuits Layer 4 (Transport): end-to-end system services, ensures complete data transfer Layer 5 (Session): connections between applications Layer 6 (Presentation): independence from difference in representation (syntax layer) Layer 7 (Application): end user processes (telnet, ftp)
Hypertext
Vannevar Bush As We May Think 1945
Director of the Office of Scientific Research and Development
The Memex
http://www.theatlantic.com/unbound/flashbks/computer/bushf.htm
Ted Nelson Literary Machines 1965
Xanadu
Led to Software such as Hypercard
The World Wide Web
Created by Tim Berners Lee, a researcher for CERN, in 1989 Originally to aid researchers find information through a linked texts Used HTTP for protocol and HTML for content of pages Still no images at this point
Early Browsers
1993 only 100 web servers First Browser well known called Mosaic Could view images as well as text Marc Andreesen one of the early developers of Mosaic left to form Netscape
Early HTML
Early HTML - only text, links and images Netscape 2.0 - could use tables and embed 3rd party applications (through plug-ins)
shockwave, video (mpeg), real audio
In 1996 Netscape 3.0 could see JAVA and developed the scripting language javascript
Internet Explorer Catches Up
Up till version 4.0 Internet Explorer inferior to Netscape Then makes quantum leap through use of
DHTML (Dynamic HTML) Style Sheets Java performance
Netscape remains the only true cross platform Browser
The Current Browsers
Once upon a time, big separation of browser/email/ftp Emacs: unified development environment Now browsers also can do it all (monolithic)
Internet Explorer Browser Email (Outlook Express) HTML Editor (Front Page Express) News Reader Net Meeting Netscape Communicator Browser (Navigator) Email (Messenger) HTML Editor (Composer) News Reader Conference
Latest Developments
File Sharing
Napster, Gnutella, Morpheus
Dot Net
XML based Web Services Semantic Net
Broadband
Media Delivery over the Web
Create a Web Page
Open MS Word Create new document or open existing one Save as HTML
Page Edited
The Page in HTML
<HTML> <HEAD> <META HTTP-EQUIV="Content-Type" CONTENT="text/html; charset=windows-1252"> <META NAME="Generator" CONTENT="Microsoft Word 97"> <TITLE>Steve's HTML Page</TITLE> </HEAD> <BODY> <P><FONT SIZE=6><P>Steve's HTML Page </FONT> </P> </BODY> </HTML>
Tags
HTML is a markup language Tags are items surrounded by angle brackets containing codes indicating how text should be displayed E.G. <B>Hello</B> appears Hello <B> is the start-tag and </B> is the end tag
Editor vs Handwritten HTML
Using Editor is imprecise but easier Writing HTML code by hand is laborious but more powerful
More HTML
Classic HTML works on a principle of semantic coding - markup is based on meaning (e.g this is emphasised, this is a heading, this is a subheading) rather than look (this is font size 16) However pure HTML doesnt really exist any more
Headings
H1 to H6 used to indicate importance of topic In practice we rarely use less than H3 Using <font> tag to emphasize severely frowned on
users cannot control the display of the text speech browsers cannot register the importance of the section
Emphasis
The tags <em> and <I> are identical in as much as they produce italics, but the <em> is more classical and better style (semantics!) The tags <strong> and <b> are identical in as much as they produce bold text but again the <strong> is more classical
Lists
Two types:
<OL> ordered list, which numbers the items of the list <UL> unordered list, which separates items with bullet points
List items are enclosed with the tags
<li> and </li>
Paragraphs
Used with the <P></P> tags Also the <BR> tag is used to create simple line breaks within the same paragraph
Hyperlinks
What makes the web the web - a document can link to another document Links can be either absolute or relative Absolute specifies a full URL e.g.
http://www.microsoft.com
Relative specifies a file relative to the current file e.g
index2.htm
Structure of a Hyperlink
Hyperlink uses the following syntax
<A HREF=index2.htm>My second page</A>
Where HREF = hypertext reference i.e. The file to link to My second page is the text being clicked
Tags with Attributes
The <A> (anchor) tag is interesting in that it has an attribute (HREF) which has to be specified The <FONT> tag is similar as is The <IMG> tag The <BODY> tag
Font Tag
<FONT SIZE=16 FACE=Times New Roman COLOR=00FFFF> Remember that the use of the FONT tag is frowned upon and so should be used sparingly
IMG Tag
<IMG SRC=next.gif WIDTH=200 HEIGHT=360 BORDER=0 ALT=Go to Next Page>
width and height specify the size the image will take up within the page (not constrained by the original size of the image) border is not normally used except when the image is to be a hyperlink itself ALT a very important tag meaning alternative text I.E when the browser cannot display the image
Images for Hyperlinking
Used all the time in navigation bars You must specify the border to be 0 otherwise an unpleasant blue border will appear around the image
The Body Tag
Very important tag which determines the background of the page <BODY BGCOLOR=#ff00ff BACKGROUND=waves.gif> If a colour is specified, that becomes the background colour, but if a background image is also specified this will override the colour
The META Tag
Technically relevant tag controlling the behaviour of browsers and robots Two possible attributes <META HTTP-EQUIV="name" CONTENT="content"> controls browser display (equivalent to http header) <META NAME="name" CONTENT="content"> controls other aspects; not clearly separated
Distribution
Each HTML file exists only as a node within a vast network Each image that appears on it comes from a separate file which is not part of it
Back To Word
Adding a picture using Insert>Object>Microsoft Word Picture
Look at the HTML now
<FONT SIZE=6><P>Steve's HTML Page</P> <P><IMG SRC="Image16.gif" WIDTH=288 HEIGHT=192> </P></FONT></BODY> Image now automatically generated by Word
Adding a second HTML file
Create a new file in word Save that has HTML in the same directory as the first file Make a link to it from the first file
(write some text, select it, click on the globe+link icon, then select the file youve just created as being the linked file)
What is a web site?
A lot of linked documents, a heterogeneous information space A machine of meaning for a variety of users It therefore requires thought regarding
Intended Audience Design Motifs Information Architecture
How To Structure a Web Site
Hierarchical
tree structure, categories, sub categories
Data Driven
database with pages dynamically created
Hypertextual
pages with random, content driven links to other pages
Hierarchical
Simple Hierarchical Model Plants Flowers Trees
Annuals
Perennials
Conifers
Deciduous
Hierarchical
The most common form of web site because mental model can be easily created by human beings Problematical because of items which cross categories (tomato in fruit/vegetable schemas) Design challenges (narrow and deep or broad and shallow) Maintenance might not be easy
Data Driven (see FEIS site)
Usually for subsections of web sites
e.g staff directories, telephone numbers, knowledge bases
Advantage is separation of content and form
visual appearance of site can be redesigned at will
Often rigid and bland
Hypertextual
Links pages in web sites Or whole sites (academic) Good for serendipitous searching (we want to find something but were not sure what it is) Can be disorienting (we dont know where we or or how to get back to where we came from)
Hybrid Sites
Simple Hierarchical Model Plants
Flowers
Trees
Searchable Plant Database
Links Page
Annuals
Perennials
Conifers
Deciduous
Database
What Next
Read Parker
Module Networks (Chapter 8 and 9) pp 295-388
Read Unit 6 on the Web Site
