Handout 1 - The World Wide Web and the Internet

The World Wide Web and the Internet

The word internet is derived from the fact that it is a set of separate but interconnected networks. The internet is a global (worldwide) network that links thousands of computer networks and millions of individual users, and supports commercial communications and information exchange. The internet today consists of:

• Users: These are people like you and me who use the internet to access information, send and receive email, do online shopping and for other recreational purposes.
• Service Providers: These are companies that provide internet service or internet access to the general public. They operate like the phone company, which charges a monthly fee for the use of its line and then charges for the calls you make. Service providers are the public's link to the internet.
• Content Providers: These are the people or companies or organisations that put information up on the internet.
• Infrastructure companies: These are the companies that own or provide the infrastructure of the internet. They own and/or operate the paths along which the internet data travels.
• Software and Hardware Companies: These are companies that sell or distribute internet related hardware and software. Examples include companies like Netscape, who distribute and sell browsers.
• Other Organizations and Groups: These are organisations and groups involved in managing the use of the internet. These include governments, who decide what information can and will be accessed by a country, and other organisations responsible for registering and maintaining internet names and addresses.

Contrary to popular belief the Internet and the World Wide Web are not the same thing. The World Wide Web is just part of the Internet; it is a feature of the Internet. It is an information retrieval system based on web pages or web documents, where information is stored and organised into pages or documents. These pages or documents have special features called hyperlinks, which link these documents together. Each hyperlink points to another web document, or another part of the same document and clicking on these hyperlinks takes you directly to that document.

One or more related web pages belonging to an individual or organisation is called a web site. A web site can contain anywhere from one to hundreds or even thousands of pages. The World Wide Web (web for short) lets you navigate through these pages by selecting hyperlinks on these pages. The first page that you see when you go to a web site is usually the home page. The home page usually has hyperlinks (links for short) to all the other pages on the site.

You need a special program, or piece of software to see pages on the World Wide Web and navigate between all the different web sites; this piece of software is called a web browser. A web browser is a computer program that enables you to display web pages, navigate the World Wide Web and work with the Internet.

Setting up a website

In order that you, or anyone, successfully set up a website that is available on the Internet for the entire world to see and visit, there are several steps that are involved:

1. Decide what the purpose or goal of the web site will be, and who the audience will be. This is very important as it will impact the structure, design and layout of your website.
2. Register your domain name. This is not absolutely necessary, but if you want a professional ring to your website's address it is advisable. If registered, your website's address can be as simple as www.mywebsite.com; on the other hand, if you choose to use free web hosting from somewhere like Yahoo!, your website's address will look like www.geocities.com/youryahooname/index.html.
3. Decide whether you will host your website yourself or get an ISP or web hosting company to host if for you. Hosting a website with your own computers and servers is not a trivial matter, and usually involves more than one person who is qualified, competent and capable. On the other hand paying an ISP or web hosting company to host your website can cost as little as US$10 per month and this takes the stress of having to manage and maintain the network and servers off of your shoulder.
4. Design your website. This involves creating the structure and layout of your website and creating the structure and layout of the web pages that will make up your website. Depending on the complexity of the website that is being designed this task may involve only yourself, or many individuals - web designers.
5. Build your website. This involves implementing the structure and layout of your website - the directory and folder structure; and the creating the individual web pages and scripts that will occupy the directories and folders.
6. Upload the web pages, scripts, files and images for your website to the Server that is going to host the website. If you are hosting the website yourself this is simply copying the files from one computer to the Web Server. Otherwise, it involves transferring the files (via the internet) to the host Server (often using FTP).
7. Manage and maintain the website. This step is often over looked, but is one of the most important steps in having a successful website; this is because it involves monitoring the visitors to your website and making updates, changes and corrections to your website as necessary.

Reasons for having a website

The reason for having a website is also as its purpose or its goal, and many websites have dual or multiple purpose. There are five main purposes or goals of websites:

• To Inform
• To Educate
• To Entertain
• To Market
• To Make Money

Persons involved in website design and development

There are several persons that will be involved in the development of a website, and they would fall into one or more of the following categories:

• Marketing/Sales Managers
• Accounts/Finance Managers
• Systems Analysts
• Database Designers/Developers
• Web Designers/Developers
• Network Administrators
• Webmasters