by Derik Casper
This Fall I committed myself to writing an issue of Word Works as part of an internship to create an Internet site for the Writing Center. The creation of the site was more involved than I thought it would be. However, in the process I learned a lot about the Internet and its resources. The Writing Center is now global; that part of the internship is done. Now it's time to record my suffering and hopefully enlighten you along the way about using Internet resources.

The first thing I did was teach myself the codes necessary for creating web documents. I surfed the web,tapping into the information on the superhighway. As I surfed, I realized I was going to have to learn several terms before I could get to work: hypertext, Internet, World Wide Web, news groups/USENET, news reader, web browser and Listserv.

I'm going to give definitions for these but I want to include a disclaimer. I don't want to be overly technical so the definitions will be as simple as I can make them. Because of this, the definitions might sound oversimplified for those in the know. However, I think they will work for our purposes.

hypertext- a type of language or code that is read by programs called browsers that allows links to be made between documents.

Internet- a bunch of computer networks such as those at universities, corporations and private organizations, linked together through existing infrastructure like phone lines.

World Wide Web- the part of the Internet that uses hypertext to encode and transmit information.

news groups/USENET- discussion groups that allow information to be posted similar to bulletin boards and the oldest part of the Internet.

news reader- a program that allows you to access and read news groups.

web browser- a program that allows you to explore the World Wide Web by navigating through hypertext links.

Listserv- a discussion group held through e-mail.

After I had a fair understanding of what I was doing, I created the web site. You can visit it at the address given on the back page.

The Information Superhighway

The Internet is a global network of computers. The computers share information with each other and we can access that information. For example, there's a computer at BSU that has information on the Writing Center that I can access by having my computer at home talk over the phone with the computer at BSU.

It starts with a simple network. One computer has information and another computer has different information. We put a cable between the two so they can share the information. Now we want to hook up five computers. The cables cross and the information gets jumbled. The computers get overwhelmed from the extra information and quit working. We need a computer to control the flow of information.

This is where we introduce server computers. Server computers "serve" the information to the other computers. The servers also keep track of the information so it doesn't get jumbled. Now if we connect the server of one network to the server of another network, we dramatically increase the amount of information both networks have access to. If we do this on a global scale, we create the Internet.

Because the Internet is made up of a bunch of different networks, it has a bunch of different parts that do different things. Each part has a different way of accessing information. The part of the Internet I worked with in creating the web site was the World Wide Web. The World Wide Web is the section of the Internet that uses hypertext. Hypertext is like cross-referencing one document with another. For example, if you look in the glossary of a book about the Internet for "www," it might say "see World Wide Web." This is what hypertext does. It cross-references one document with another by using things called links. A link in hypertext is usually highlighted and underlined or stands out from the regular text in some way. When activated, a hypertext link takes you directly to the document or page referenced.

The programs that read hypertext links and other information coded in hypertext are called web browsers. Out of all the different programs, Netscape is probably the most widely known web browser.

Internet Resources

While teaching myself how to create an Internet site, I also learned about Internet resources. There are three big ones: the World Wide Web, news groups/USENET and e-mail Listserv. Each of these can provide good information and each is accessed differently.

The World Wide Web

There are several ways to find information on the web. One way is to click on a highlighted link and see what you find or where it takes you. Sometimes you might click on several links and visit multiple pages before you find something interesting. This is what's known as "surfing." Surfing is a great way to become familiar with and appreciate the web.

Another way to find information on the web is to do a search. Most web browsers have a button for "net search." By clicking on the button, the browser will go to a place that you can start a search from. It will be a page that allows you to type in key words to search for in documents on the web.

The web has lots of information that incorporates text, colors, graphics, sounds, and even video. You can find information on just about anything. Because of the use of multimedia on the World Wide Web, finding information can be exciting. I was looking for information on radio stations and found a page with links to several different radio stations. Some of the stations I could actually listen to over the web.

Here's an example of a really well done site on the Web being viewed with Netscape.

news group/USENET

Another resource on the Internet is the news groups/USENET. USENET has been around from the beginning of the Internet and has a huge amount of information. You can find some strange things on USENET. Topics range from animals to zippers. Some of the news groups are serious, others are humorous and still others are controversial.

This is the magic of USENET: Anyone, anywhere in the world, can say whatever they want about any subject, in front of an audience of thousands, sometimes millions, and anyone in that audience can respond (Clark 47).

You can access USENET by using a news reader. Netscape has a good news reader built into it. To use the Netscape news reader, click on "window" in the menu bar. A menu will drop down and in the menu you should see "Netscape news." Clicking on Netscape news will open the news reader window. In the news reader window you can choose a news group, read messages posted to that news group and submit your own message. It's a nice place to find varied information on specific topics.

Last year I bought a computer and needed help with some software. Unfortunately for me, it was two o'clock in the morning when I had the problem. I got on USENET and found a news group that had information that solved my dilemma.

Here's an example of a news reader.

Listserv

The third main Internet resource is the e-mail Listserv. The Listserv is very similar to USENET. The main difference is in the way you receive and access the information. Listserv has many topics that are almost as varied as the news groups. When you find a topic that interests you and has a Listserv, you subscribe to that topic's Listserv. Once you subscribe, the Listserv will automatically send any messages directly to your e-mail account. You open up your mail account and there's all this mail from other subscribers. Another difference between USENET and Listserv is that with Listserv you don't have to post to the whole group if you don't want to. You can simply mail your response directly to a person.

My first encounter with the Internet was with e-mail and Listserv. I subscribed to a writing workshop that was conducted through Listserv. We submitted drafts to the group and the group would read and comment on the drafts. It was actually very helpful. Some members were professors at other schools. Some were published writers and others were students or people who wanted to be writers.

One of my professors subscribed to a Listserv and found a call for papers. She submitted one that was accepted and she went to Ireland to deliver the paper. She might not have known about the call for papers if she hadn't subscribed to the Listserv.