Center for Rural Studies

 

UVM Extension Service

207 Morrill Hall

 

RR 4, Box 2298

University of Vermont

 

Comstock Road (Berlin)

Burlington, VT 05405-0106

 

Montpelier, VT 05602-8927

E-Mail me

 

 

 

January 2001

 

Lesson 10: Browser Use and Tools

Before you can begin exploring the World Wide Web (WWW), you need to learn a few things about using a browser. A browser is the software that allows you to navigate the Web by communicating with the server that stores the page that you want to see. A browser can read documents, fetch documents, access files by FTP, read Usenet newsgroups, and more. Browsers (or Clients) enable you to use your computer to look at WWW documents. Because different computers have different capabilities and different people have different tastes, there are many browsers to choose from. Two of the most popular browsers are Netscape Navigator and Microsoft's Internet Explorer (IE), both of which are available free of charge.

Disclaimer: This lesson will focus on Internet Explorer 5.0 and Netscape Communicator 4.7. Different browsers and different versions of these two browsers may use different conventions.

Basic Browser Features

Before you can use a browser to navigate the Web, you first need to establish your Internet connection and start the browser software. Then you can begin to explore your browser's features. These features include the following:

A Window Displaying the Current Page . This window behaves like any other window; it can be opened, closed, resized, and moved around on the screen. Scroll bars at the right side and bottom of the window allow you to see parts of a page that are not currently visible (the Page Up and Page Down keys also work in Navigator). The title of the current page appears in the window's title bar. If your computer has enough memory, you can run other programs in other windows at the same time, or open several windows within Navigator.

A Row of Buttons at the Top of the Window. Use the Back and Forward buttons to re-visit pages that you have already visited during the current session. The Forward button is only active if you have used the Back button. The Home button (the one with a picture of a house) will bring you back to the home page specified in your Preferences (the one that loads automatically when you start your browser). Pressing the Stop button will abort an attempt to retrieve a page from a web server. Use it if you change your mind and want to look at something else instead of waiting for a slow page to load. The Refresh (Internet Explorer) or Reload (Netscape) button will re-load the current page. The Print button will allow you to print the current page (remember that one web page could be the equivalent of several printed pages). Both IE and Netscape will probably have some additional buttons. Most are pretty self-explanatory.

Address/Location Window. The Address (IE) or Location (Netscape) window contains the URL (Uniform Resource Locator) for the page that you are currently viewing. If you would like to view another page, just delete the current address and type a new one (don't forget the http://www). Then press Enter. This is one way to navigate the Web.

Hyperlinks. Hyperlinks are another way to navigate the Web. By default, links appear underlined and in color -- blue if you have not yet followed them, purple if you have. This helps you remember where you have been. Click once on a link to follow it to a new page or to a different part of the current page. If you don't like what you see, click the Back button.

A Note About Non-Working Links. Inevitably, you will click on a link and get an error message. If this happens, try again. If you still get an error message, then you have clicked on a "broken link." The most common reason links "break" is that the page the link refers to has been removed from the Web or moved to another location on the Web. If this is the case, then you will probably get a message that says something to the effect of, "Error 404" or "File not Found." Sometimes you may get a message that says something like "Unauthorized Entry Refused." This means that you need special permission to view that page.

Preferences

Both IE and Netscape allow you to set your preferences. You can control colors and fonts, your home page, how the browser starts, as well as many other things. You can also set preferences for your "history" file, which is what shows the pages you have visited. To edit your preferences in Netscape, click on EDIT and then PREFERENCES. You now have the ability to change your preferences for your browser, as well as your e-mail (if you use Netscape for e-mail).

In Internet Explorer, click on TOOLS, and then INTERNET OPTIONS. Once here, you can edit your Internet preferences, including changing your home page, colors, fonts, history options.

Home Page

The home page is the page that first appears when you start your browser. The default is usually either the Netscape web site or the Internet Explorer web site, depending on which browser you use. If you are not thrilled with your current home page, then you can specify any web page to be your home page. If your town has an official web site, you might want to use it as your home page.

Netscape.
  1. Choose EDIT, PREFERENCES.
  2. Click the Navigator category in the box down the left side of the window.
  3. To start with no Web page, click BLANK PAGE. To choose a page to start with, click HOME PAGE, click the box below it, and type the URL of a page you would like to use as your home page. You also have the option of starting where you left off last time by clicking LAST PAGE VISITED.
  4. Click OK.

Internet Explorer.
  1. Display the Web page you want to use as your home page.
  2. Choose TOOLS, INTERNET OPTIONS or VIEW, INTERNET OPTIONS from the menu.
  3. Click the GENERAL tab along the top of the dialog box.
  4. In the Home Page section of the dialog box, click the USE CURRENT button.
  5. Click OK.

Bookmarks/Favorite Places

Often you will visit web pages that you would like to visit again in the future, such as your favorite search engine(s) or state government sites. The Bookmarks (Netscape) or Favorite Places (IE) menu allows you to add these pages to a personal list. Once you've added a page, you can revisit it with just a few clicks, rather than having to remember its URL every time.

Netscape. To create a bookmark for a page, navigate to the page, and then click on the Bookmarks button on the toolbar. Then click on Add Bookmark or File Bookmark. You can click on Edit Bookmarks to organize, add, or delete bookmarks. To revisit a page you have bookmarked, just click on the Bookmarks button and then choose the one you want.

Internet Explorer. To designate a page as a Favorite Place, navigate to the page, then click on Favorites and then Add to Favorites. You can choose which folder you would like to include this favorite place, or create a new folder for it. Click on Organize Favorites to organize, add, or delete favorite places. To revisit a favorite page, just click on Favorites and choose the one you want.

Saving Stuff

If you see something on the Web that is worth saving for later, you can save it. You can save and entire page or a specific picture that appears on a page. Choose FILE, SAVE AS to save the current Web page in a file. Click in the SAVE AS TYPE box to determine how to save the page. Choose Plain Text to save only the text. Choose HTML to save the entire HTML file. Indicate which directory to which you would like to save the file. Then click the SAVE or OK button.

To save an image that you see on a Web page, click on the image with your right mouse button (not the one you usually use). Chose SAVE IMAGE AS or SAVE PICUTRE AS form the menu that appears. Move to the folder or directory in which you want to save the file, type a filename in the File Name box, and click the SAVE or OK button.

Copyrights. Most Web pages are copyrighted by their authors, and some image files may also be copyrighted. This means that if you save a page or an image, then you don't have permission to use it any way you want. Before reuse the text or image, send an e-mail message to the owner of the site to ask permission.

Printing Stuff

To print a page, just click the PRINT button on the toolbar or choose FILE, PRINT from the menu.

 

Homework:

  1. Write down the current location (URL) of your home page.
  2. Change your browser's home page to: http://crs.uvm.edu/tocp
  3. Use the hyperlinks and the BACK and FORWARD buttons to explore the Town Officers' Connectivity Project Web site.
  4. Change your home page to something that you like (or to its original setting).

Sources:

Kasser, Barbara. Practical Internet, Indianapolis: Macmillan Computer Publishing, 2000.

Levine, John R., Carol Baroudi, and Margaret Levine Young. The Internet for Dummies , New York: IDG Books Worldwide, 2000.