Web Walking With Mosaic

In this chapter, Gareth is your guide for a stroll through the Web. Afterward,
Sean takes you through the steps of creating your own home page.

Gareth Takes You on a Jaunt Across the Web

Jumping into cyberspace has always been an exciting experience for me. Even my
first login, as frustrating as it was, gave me the Net bug. I had acquired a
funky 300-baud modem and was itchin' to see what it could do. It came with no
documentation, and I really had no clue how to install or use it. Sticking the
circuit board inside my Apple IIe, I did get it up and running--sort of. I tried
logging in to some local BBSes and the newly formed (now rather famous) Whole
Earth 'Lectronic Link (the WELL) in Sausalito, California.

It was like hearing a radio message from a ship lost at sea. There was so much
line noise in among the text that I could barely make out what was going on. But
I was still fascinated. I immediately sensed all these tiny ports of call in some
vast electronic ocean. There were people "in" there...talking to each
other...having fun...exchanging information... building something unique. After
several noisy sessions, I gave up in disgust--I would have to wait for a real
modem. I held out for about six months, until I couldn't take it any longer. I
had to get back online to see what I was missing. I went out and bought a new
computer and a 2400-baud modem, dialed up the WELL and have hardly been offline a
day since. That was 1987--several lifetimes in computer years.

Mosaic and the World Wide Web have made today's Internet a far cry from the world
that I first visited. Until recently, the language of the Internet (and its
ancestors) was rather harsh and intimidating to learn. To navigate, you needed
persistence and a head for second-guessing how machines "think." And on top of
that, everything had to be communicated in plain text. It was far from
user-friendly. Information services like CompuServe, Delphi and America Online
have tried to make things easier, with login software and graphic interfaces, but
the quality of the information and virtual community they offer is not nearly as
impressive as the Net at large.

Mosaic and programs like it are changing all that. They're bringing the ease of
an online service to the information riches of the Internet. And, with the
addition of hypermedia and an easy-to-use document creation system (HTML), they
are moving far beyond the media desert of the "old" Internet and into an
uncharted media oasis.

Web walking feels different than other types of Internet experiences. The beehive
of activity taking place is visible regardless of how you're logged in, but a
screenful of text, however brilliant in content, is very different from a
hyperlinked web of texts with accompanying multi-media. For example, when I log
on to the UNIX-based WELL BBS, I run through a text list of conferences, and then
through topics within those conferences. I come to the end of a topic, and if I
want to say something, I post a response. Then I move on to the next conference
down the line. It's all very list-like--top to bottom.

On the Web, in contrast, there's a feeling of being potentially everywhere at
once, or at least everywhere that's hyperlinked to the site you're on, and
everywhere linked to those sites. It feels vastly interconnective in a fashion
that makes "web" an apt description. Being in the Web, with its graphical user
interface and hypermedia offerings, is an immense thrill to a Net old-timer like
myself. Having been involved in hypermedia, specifically Macintosh's HyperCard,
for many years, the Web is like a HyperCard stack that spans the globe. It even
has pop-up QuickTime movies, graphics windows and the familiar Home button!

But enough hype for the moment. Let's stroll onto the Web, and I'll show you a
bit of what I'm talking about.

The Web Session

The first place Ventana Mosaic takes you upon launching is the Mosaic Quick Tour
Home Page. For now you'll probably want to leave that as your default home page.
After you've become a Web hot shot, you can select a new home page, ideally one
that you've created yourself and specified in the Preferences dialog. Later on in
this chapter, you'll learn how to do this.

Internet Connections List

From the home page, we can go wherever we want on the World Wide Web. For
starters, let's check out Scott Yanoff's Special Internet Connections List. It's
a great source of links to a diverse range of Internet offerings. I press
Command+U to pop up the URL dialog and then type in the location
http://info.cern.ch/hypertext/DataSources/Yanoff.html. Pressing the Return key
(or choosing the Open button) starts the connection. Once connected, Scott's List
appears in the Ventana Mosaic window. It includes lots of hyperlinks to telnet
addresses, Gopher sites, finger sites and, of course, more Web sites. The range
of topics and interests includes agriculture, ham radio, games, philosophy,
aviation, careers and family issues. Since I'm in the mood for something more
recreational and for sites I can show off to you, let's take a hyperlink to the
Internet Mall to see if it's gotten any better since my last visit.

The Internet Mall

Nope. It still has a rather vacant, gloomy feeling to it, like a real-world mall
that's only opened a few stores and has the rest curtained off with signs that
promise "Coming Soon!" It's organized by floors: First Floor: Media, Second
Floor: Personal Items, Third Floor: Computer Hardware and Software, Fourth Floor:
Services. There are currently only a few items on each "floor." Not finding much
of interest here, I decide to try the link to the Future Fantasy Bookstore.

http://www.mecklerweb.com/imall/

Future Fantasy Bookstore 

This virtual book shop has a real-world counterpart in Palo Alto, California. On
the Web, it offers its book catalog, new book listings, back issues of the
store's newsletters and some fantasy art. In the new book area, you can click on
the name of the book and view its cover art or click on the author's name to see
all the books that Future Fantasy carries by that author. Trouble is, I don't
like fantasy. I came, attracted to the "Future" part of the name, but I don't see
much in the way of scifi titles. I do see a link to the Science Fiction Resource
Guide at Rutgers University. After goofing around here for a while, looking at
some full-color scans of book covers and searching on a few authors, I jump
across the Web in search of the sci-fi guide.

http://www.commerce.digital.com/palo-alto/FutureFantasy/home.html

Science Fiction Resource Guide

This place turns out to be the mother lode. The Guide contains a staggering
amount of information on science fiction literature, film, TV and criticism. The
first thing I see is a hyperlink to "A Short History of the Internet" by my WELL
buddy, sci-fi writer and cyberpundit Bruce Sterling. (Nice essay, BTW. I hope
people will read it. If you do choose to read this, be sure to return to the
Science Fiction Resource Guide to keep up with our tour.) Scrolling through the
home page of the Guide, I pass dozens of links to essays, reviews, articles,
interviews and even whole books (e.g., Sterling's Hacker Crackdown). There are
long lists of subject bibliographies, sci-fi film and TV show synopses, links to
sci-fi critical journals, conventions and awards--and if that's not enough, there
are links to all the other sci-fi archives in the Web!

ftp://gandalf.rutgers.edu/pub/sfl/sf-resource.guide.html

If I were on my own, I would probably spend the rest of the night scrambling
along these interconnected threads, reading some of the interviews and other
material available here (a FAQ for Brazil, my favorite movie, and a three-part
FAQ on the Alien films). But since you're tagging along, I'll move on. Before I
leave, I choose Add Current to Hotlist from the Navigate menu. (See Chapter 3 for
more information on hotlists and the Navigate menu.) I notice a link to the Best
of the Net page (of which the Science Fiction Resource Guide is a worthy
recipient). Let's go and see who else was so honored.

Best of the Net

A nice big blue logo welcomes you to the Best of the Net sponsored by GNN
Magazine.

http://src.doc.ic.ac.uk/gnn/botn/index.html

The award winners are listed and described, with hyperlinks to each. The 1994
winners were (envelope please):

ArtServe 

ArtServe is an art history database consisting of 2,800 images of prints, largely
from the 15th century to the end of the 19th century, and 2,500 images of mainly
classical architecture and architectural sculpture from around the Mediterranean.
From here, you can also link to a tutorial on Greek art, pictures of Hong Kong
architecture, and even Michael Greenhalgh's book on the Greek and Roman cities of
Western Turkey (available only on the Web).

http://rubens.anu.edu.au/

The Currency Converter 

The Currency Converter is a script that converts currency from one denomination
to another. Choose the country that interests you and view its approximate rate
of exchange with other countries. 

http://www.ora.com/cgi-bin/ora/currency

Edupage Newsletter 

Educom is a nonprofit consortium of higher education institutions seeking to
transform education through information technologies. The Edupage Newsletter,
published three times a week, summarizes printed news coverage of interest to all
Net citizens. 

http://www.educom.edu/

International Teletimes 

International Teletimes is a general-interest magazine published online by teen
Ian Wojtowicz. According to Ian, "Teletimes seeks to present informed opinion and
observation drawn from the experience of living in a particular place." 

http://www.wimsey.com/teletimes.root/teletimes_home_page.html

Internet Underground Music Archive 

The Archive is billed as the "Net's first free hi-fi music archive." It also
seeks to promote obscure and unsigned bands. Lately, IUMA has become a pretty
happenin' place, even getting profiled on MTV.

http://sunsite.unc.edu/ianc/

New Zealand Information 

Here's everything you always wanted to know about New Zealand, and then
some--geography, language, food, culture and wildlife. 

http://www.cs.cmu.edu:8001/Web/People/mjw/NZ/MainPage.html

The Paleontology Server 

The Paleontology Server is an interactive natural history museum on the Net.
Learn about phylogeny, the "Tree of Life," or examine photographs of great white
sharks off the California coast. 

http://ucmp1.berkeley.edu/welcome.html

Science Fiction Resource Guide 

"More information on science fiction than any one person can comfortably keep
track of." I'll say! 

ftp://gandalf.rutgers.edu/pub/sfl/sf-resource.guide.html

Taxing Times 

Taxing Times is a repository of tax forms, including many electronic IRS
publications. 

http://www.scubed.com:8001/tax/tax.html

U.S. Census Information Server 

Here you can get financial data on state and local governments as well as
schools. The Census Bureau Art Gallery has a display of posters used to promote
participation in the census. 

http://www.census.gov/

Hypertext USENET FAQs 

On this hypertext database of FAQs (Frequently Asked Questions), you'll find more
information than you need on subjects you never knew existed.

http://www.cis.ohio-state.edu/hypertext/faq/usenet/FAQ-List.html

Xerox PARC Map Viewer 

Map Viewer is an application that dynamically renders a map based on user input.
Click on a region, and Map Viewer zooms in on it. You can also use a geographic
name server to locate a particular location by name. 

http://pubweb.parc.xerox.com/map



This looks like an exciting list of Web locations (well, I might skip the tax and
census sites). First I'll take a look at ArtServe. But before I do, I'll add this
document (Best of the Net) to my hotlist by choosing Add Current to Hotlist from
the Navigate menu. That way, I can come back and check all of these documents out
at my leisure.

ArtServe

This site offers both an art and architecture collection and some art tours. You
can view the databases alphabetically, with or without thumbnail images, or you
can search the databases on keywords. I decide to browse through the print
collection with the inline images turned off. Pressing on one of the hyperlinks
takes me to a page of alphabetical artist listings. To see a painting by a
particular artist, I click on that artist's name in the list, and Ventana Mosaic
begins downloading an image. I can see how much of the image has downloaded by
watching the progress bar in the lower left corner of the Mosaic window. When the
download is complete, Mosaic displays the painting in a new window (if you have
an external helper application defined in the Helpers dialog, it launches that
rather than presenting the graphic within Ventana Mosaic). When I'm done viewing,
I close the image window and am returned to the art database. After some more
browsing and downloading, I decide to leave. But again, before I do, I'll add
this site to my hotlist. I plan to come back and take a tour of the architecture
section. Because I'm a graphic designer, this could prove to be a significant
resource for me.

From here I check out the Xerox PARC Map Viewer. Because the Map Viewer is not
hyperlinked on this document, I need to return to the Best of the Net page to
take the link from there. I select the History list from the Navigate menu, click
on Best of the Net, and then click the Go To button. From the Best of the Net
page, I take the hyperlink to Xerox PARC.

Xerox PARC Map Viewer

The Map Viewer proves easy to use. First, to find out my map coordinates, I have
to take a hyperlink to the U.S. Geographic Name Server. By typing in the city and
state in the keyword box, I find the map coordinates I want to view. The
coordinates are hyperlinked. By clicking on them, I'm taken back to the Map
Viewer and my location is plotted on the map. I typed in my hometown, Arlington,
Virginia. Here's what my map looks like. See Figure 4-3.

After about two hours online, I'm bushed. I press Command+Q to quit Mosaic and
then disconnect my Internet connection. The main thing I'm excited about from
this little jaunt is the Science Fiction Resource Guide. I plan to return there
as soon as I have some free time (after this book is finished!). The Best of the
Net had other offerings I want to check out as well. An electronic magazine
called International Teletimes edited by a teenage kid seemed enticing. Toto, I
don't think we're in Kansas anymore.

Now that we've had a full-blown trip through the Web and tried some of its
hypermedia offerings, let's take a closer look at how these media (hyperlinks,
inline images, graphics and movies) work. In the previous chapter, we looked at
the features contained within the Ventana Mosaic program. In this chapter, we'll
look at the contents of the Web itself and how to bring its awesome resources to
your desktop using Ventana Mosaic.



If you want to see a record of your entire Web session, check the History list.
Ventana Mosaic saves all of the documents you've visited, limited only by the
size of your available memory. If you've hopped through a particularly cool set
of sites in one Web session and want to save that entire list of sites, you can
export your session's history list to an HTML file by selecting Export... from
the History window. Then, use TeachText or SimpleText (or any other text editor)
to edit the list down to only the links you want to save. Later, you can use the
Open Local (Command+O) command to open this link list.



Hypermedia in Mosaic

As we discussed in Chapter 1, hypermedia is the marriage of hypertext and
multimedia (sounds, graphics and movies). While the real lifeblood of the World
Wide Web is still text, its multimedia aspects are important and will become more
so as the Web expands, as connections become faster and as browsers like Mosaic
become more sophisticated. While onlookers may find the MPEG movies and the
pop-up images of a SLIP- or PPP-connected Mosaic to be pure novelty, the Net
visionary knows that he or she is looking at the future. It may appear as though
we're getting all excited about silent films in an age of breathtaking color
cinematography, but it's the potential of the medium that's so alluring. The
sense of anticipation and spirit of cooperation is everywhere in cyberspace, with
lots of people working alone or in small groups, chipping in to wire the planet
for a hypermedia feed.

Right now things are rather crude. A SLIP- or PPP-connected machine running
Mosaic can be a tortoise-like media delivery system. Compressed images do
well--some are downright stunning--but they take several minutes to download.
Movie downloads are even slower, and the quality is often poor. Hopefully,
multimedia technology will soon see some significant breakthroughs and Net-based
hypermedia will get a much-needed upgrade. Lots of sites are now using forms,
user-input boxes, password-only areas, pictures containing multiple hyperlinks
and other advances in Web interactivity. Next year's Web will be a far cry from
this year's. Or so we hope.

The main forms of media currently available in Ventana Mosaic are as follows:

´	Inline images--color and black-and-white graphics that appear as part of the
Web document. 

´	GIF and JPEG images--color and black-and-white graphics that are transferred
to your Mac and opened within Ventana Mosaic or by an external viewing
application. (Other image types, such as TIFF, are also viewable with the
appropriate external application.)

´	MPEG movies--moving images in the MPEG format that are transferred to your
Mac and played on an external movie player.

´	QuickTime movies--moving images in the QuickTime format that are transferred
to your Mac and played on an external movie player.

´	Audio--music, spoken words and sounds that are transferred to your Mac and
played within Ventana Mosaic or on an external audio player. Ventana Mosaic can
play AU and AIFF files internally, but you'll have to configure a helper
application to play WAV and other sound file types.

Inline Images

Next to text, the most common element in a Web document is the inline image.
These are graphics that can either be transferred with the rest of the page (if
Load Images Automatically has been turned on in Preferences) or marked by a boxed
text description that gives the option of loading the image after the page has
been downloaded. These descriptions are defined by the Web page author as
"alternate text," and you see them if Load Images Automatically is turned off. If
no alternate text has been defined, the word "image" appears in parentheses
inside the text box. 

Inline images might be confusing at first because a similar image or alternate
text box is used to hyperlink larger graphics, sounds, movies and even other Web
documents. The difference between an inline image and a piece of hyperlinked
media is that inline images all load to the screen when Load Images Automatically
is selected in Preferences. They are resident to the current document.
Hyperlinked media do not load automatically. You must click on the link to
retrieve the image, movie or sound, or to go to the hyperlinked page. This type
of hyperlinked file is also outlined in the anchor color (which is defaulted to
blue).

On a directly connected Internet machine, you can choose to keep the Load Images
Automatically option checked. This way, you'll quickly see the whole Web page as
its creator intended it, as soon as it's been transferred. On a SLIP- or
PPP-connected machine, having all the inlines transferred when you connect to a
site can be very time-consuming, especially if you have no idea beforehand how
many images are stored on the page. For this type of connection, the best
procedure is as follows:

1. Keep Load Images Automatically turned off in the Preferences dialog box.

2. When you get to a site and you've read through the text, click on the inline
image and hyperlink descriptions that interest you. Double-click on an inline
image description to view the image and click once on a hyperlink description to
go directly to the linked file. 

Table 4-1 shows the various inline images and alternate text descriptions
encountered in Mosaic. Really considerate Web page publishers will include some
text telling you how large the item is. Also, images (such as page icons or fancy
bullets) are sometimes repeated on the same page. Since they are cached, they
don't take any extra time to download. 

There are three phases to accessing something indicated by an alternate text box
with an anchor color border around it (defaulted to blue). Assuming you have Load
Images Automatically turned off and you want to see the inline image before
taking the hyperlink, you would follow these steps:

1. Double-click on the alternate text box with the anchor color line around it. A
small graphic or preview image will be loaded.

2. If you still want to access the full file, click once anywhere inside the
preview image. The larger image, movie or sound will be transferred and
displayed. If this icon is being used to indicate a link to another Web document,
you can go to that page by clicking on the inline image. In the above example,
clicking on this small image of Vice President Gore will transfer a full screen
JPEG version of the same image.

Note: If you don't wish to view the inline image before going to the linked item,
you don't have to. Clicking once on any hyperlinked alternate text box will move
you directly to the hyperlinked item.

3. If the link is to an audio file, you will usually get some type of speaker
icon. Click on this icon to download the audio file. When the transfer is
complete, Mosaic will play the clip or open up the audio helper application and
play the clip then (depending on the choice you've made in the Helpers dialog).

As long as the little yellow lights and spinning planet are visible on the status
indicator, a download is still in progress. Sometimes things will temporarily
stop moving. The transfer is not complete until the lights go out.

GIF & JPEG Images

Although Ventana Mosaic has the resources to present any hyperlinked GIF or JPEG
image, it displays the image in a window within the main Ventana Mosaic window.
If the image is larger than the window, you have to scroll down it to view the
whole thing. For this reason, larger, more complex images are best handled by one
of the external viewing programs such as JPEGview. To use an external viewer,
first be sure the viewer is selected in the Helpers dialog (which you can get to
from the Edit menu). When you click on an inline image or a text anchor that's
attached to a hyperlinked graphic, the status indicator lights up and starts
spinning and the transfer begins. You can track the progress of the transfer by
watching the status bar to the left of the status message area. The transferred
image is stored in temporary memory, the external viewer is launched and the
image is loaded. For GIF and JPEG images, JPEGview is the most frequently used
application (see Chapter 3 for full details on selecting other viewers).

After viewing the image, you can close the viewing window if you're using Ventana
Mosaic to view the image. If you're using an external viewer, you can choose to
save or manipulate the image using the graphic program's image tools and then
quit the external viewer. Ventana Mosaic will automatically reopen the viewer the
next time it's needed.

QuickTime & MPEG Movies

If you encounter any movies online, you can transfer and view them if you have
the appropriate players installed (see Chapter 3). It's a good idea to have both
the QuickTime and MPEG players installed since Web documents don't always specify
the format their movies are in (although MPEG is the most common). You also want
to check the size of the files before you transfer them (if any clues are given).
Some movies are megabytes in size. Luckily, most Web documents do tell you the
file sizes (see Figure 4-9). 

Sparkle (for viewing MPEG files) is available from the Mosaic Quick Tour Online
Companion (http://www.vmedia.com/mqtm.se.html) and at many other Internet sites
that offer Mac software. For viewing QuickTime movies, you'll need a program such
as SimplePlayer (which comes with QuickTime). There are several freeware and
shareware alternatives if SimplePlayer is a bit too bland for you, such as
Popcorn and BijouPlay. Check the Graphics directory at the Info-Mac Hyperarchive
(http://hyperarchive.lcs. mit.edu/HyperArchive.html).

QuickTime movies work fine (or at least OK) on all QuickTime-compatible Macs,
while MPEG movies do better on higher-powered machines like Quadras and Power
Macs. If you're not satisfied with the quality of MPEG movies on your machine
(and you won't be if you have anything slower than a Quadra 605), you can get
better quality out of them by converting them to QuickTime before viewing, as
follows:

1. Click on the hotlink or inline image of the MPEG movie to transfer it to your
hard drive. These things are usually pretty big, so this might be a good time to
grab a cup of coffee.

2. Once the transfer is complete and the MPEG movie player pops up, choose Save
As... in the File menu.

3. Select QuickTime format and click on Save.

4. A box of compression settings appears. Ignore it (unless you really know what
you're doing) and choose OK.

5. The MPEG player starts saving the move frame by frame to QuickTime format. If
you have a slower Mac, take this opportunity to refill your coffee cup. The
converted MPEG movie is now on your hard drive.

6. To view, you'll need to launch your QuickTime movie player.

Figure 4-10 shows BijouPlay, a typical QuickTime viewer. Your mileage may vary
depending on the QuickTime and and MPEG viewers you're using.

MPEG handles frame-to-frame compression in a fascinating way. Since most video
consists of a series of objects moving in the foreground and relative static in
the background, MPEG transmits only the motion of the foreground objects, rather
than retransmitting both the foreground and the background over and over again.
MPEG uses a form of pattern recognition to decide which pixels are part of moving
objects (and therefore transmittable) and which are not.

Audio

Ventana Mosaic lets you access spoken words, music and other audio files. These
are transferred in the same manner as images and movies. Since audio of any
significant length can take up a lot of disk space (and take forever to
download), see if the Web page tells you how big the file is before you transfer
it. Some Web pages will tell you the size, and others won't. If you encounter AU
or AIFF files on the Web, a quick click will download and play the cound through
Ventana Mosaic. However, you'll need a helper application to play WAV or other
sound file types. Figure 4-11 shows the control window of a typical audio
playback/record application. The application shown here is SoundMachine.

Using Mosaic as an Internet "Front End"

One of Mosaic's distinctions from other Web browsers is that it's not only a
hypermedia browsing tool--it can also be used to access regular Internet services
such as FTP, telnet, Gopher and WAIS. You can even read USENET newsgroups from
within Mosaic. In the following section, we'll run through each type of service
and describe how you can best take advantage of it using Mosaic.

FTP

File transfer, the ability to freely move documents and programs from computers
all over the Internet into your home computer, is one of the big advantages of
Net connectivity. Using Gopher, Web search engines and other tools, you can find
information on just about anything. If you hear about a new piece of free
software, an electronic magazine or something else that's recently floated into
the Net, you can often find and download it in a matter of minutes. File Transfer
Protocol (FTP) is the main standard used on the Internet for transferring files
from one computer to another. While FTPing is not difficult in any of its forms,
it is especially easy with Mosaic. To access an FTP site you'll need the FTP
server's URL in the form ftp://site/filepath (if any). See Table 4-2 for more
information on URL forms for Internet services. Many FTP sites are hyperlinked,
so all you have to do is click on the link and you will be transported either to
the site or directly to the file. Once you're at the site and have found the
document you're looking for (usually stored in a document hierarchy not
unfamiliar to Windows users), all you need to do is

1. Click on the name of the file you want to FTP. 

2. A typical Save As dialog box pops up asking you to name the file and direct it
to the appropriate directory on your hard drive. Mosaic then transfers the file.
The status indicator lights up and spins while the transfer is in progress. The
status bar keeps you informed as to how many bytes have been transferred.

That's all there is to it. See Table 4-3 for descriptions of many of the file
types found on an FTP site and how Mosaic handles them.



External applications will not launch unless you have the appropriate helper
application on your hard drive and selected in the Helpers dialog box (available
under the Edit menu). See Chapter 3 for instructions on how to locate and
configure helper applications.



Gopher

The Internet Gophers "go for" information, providing information search and
retrieval on computer systems throughout the world. Connecting to a Gopher server
using Ventana Mosaic works exactly the same as connecting to an FTP site. You
browse through a hierarchy of directories and files until you find the file you
wish to transfer. When you find it, click on its name to begin the transfer. You
can access a Gopher site either by clicking on a hyperlink that's pointing to a
Gopher or by typing a Gopher URL into the URL box. The form is
gopher://site/filepath (if any). Table 4-3 shows many of the file types you might
encounter in Gopherspace. 

Telnet

Telnet is a computer terminal protocol that lets you log on to other remote
computers on the Internet. For instance, you could use the telnet command to log
onto the popular WELL BBS in Sausalito, California. To do this, you would log on
to your local dial-up account and then give the telnet command telnet well.com.
You are instantly transported to the WELL's front door where you can log in (if
you have an account there) and go about your business.

In Mosaic, you can't send e-mail or log in to another computer remotely. The
solution is to get a telnet program such as NCSA Telnet (available from Ventana
Online's WWW site) and point to its location in the Helpers dialog (see Chapter 3
for more details on configuring your helper application). It then works the same
as any helper applications. If you come to an Internet resource that requires you
to log in to a remote machine to access it, the telnet address will either be
typed out or hyperlinked. If it's typed, you'll need to enter its URL in the URL
box (in the form telnet://site) and choose OK. If it's hyperlinked, all you do is
click on the link. If you have a telnet program installed on your machine (and
linked via the Helpers dialog box), Mosaic automatically launches it and makes
the connection. That's all there is to it.





Don't forget that you can use the Note Pad to cut and paste URLs you find while
in Mosaic or while using other Internet services. By saving them electronically
rather than writing them down, you remove the risk of copying them incorrectly.



USENET Newsgroups

USENET newsgroups are among the biggest attractions on the Internet. These are
discussion groups covering every conceivable subject. The discussions are often
erudite, funny, feisty and bizarre. They are like global town meetings divided
into special interest groups of staggering variety. 

While Ventana Mosaic allows you to read these USENET groups, you can't join in on
the conversations or have much control over the news feed. If, after listening in
for a while, you get interested in posting messages, it's recommended that you
download a freeware newsreader program such as NewsWatcher or Nuntius (see "Other
Helper Applications" later in this chapter) and use that instead of Ventana
Mosaic. That way, you'll not only be able to read the discussions, you'll be able
to roll up your sleeves and dive right into them. 

Reading newsgroups with Ventana Mosaic is a cinch. First you need to enter the
address of an NNTP server in the News Server box in the Preferences dialog (see
Chapter 3 for more details on setting your preferences). The NNTP address is the
address of your local Internet provider that carries USENET news (NNTP stands for
Network News Transport Protocol). Ventana Mosaic accesses this local server when
you want to read your groups. To access a newsgroup, you need to know its name.
Many of the Internet books in the bibliography include lists of newsgroups. Once
you know the group's name, say rec.arts.tv, you need to put it in a form that
Mosaic understands. This would be news:rec.arts.tv. All you do is type
news:newsgroupname in the URL box and click Open or press Return. In a few
seconds, you'll be looking at the current discussion on that topic--in this case,
the latest offerings on the other monitor in your house. 

The titles of the 20 most recent postings to a newsgroup (called "articles")
appear on your screen in a hyperlinked list. To read one of the messages, click
on the title and the full article is displayed. There is always a hyperlinked
item at the top of the window called Earlier Articles. By clicking on this, you
can access the previous 20 postings.

WAIS

WAIS (pronounced "ways") is a text search and retrieval system similar to FTP and
Gopher. An acronym for Wide-Area Information Server, WAIS gives you the ability
to search databases of mostly text-based documents by using keyword queries.
Similar to Gopher, you don't have to know anything about what type of database is
being accessed or where it's located. WAIS deals with all this for you. Unlike
Gopher, you can't browse the databases; you can only keep trying keyword
combinations and hope for a match. WAIS databases cover everything from
agriculture to social sciences. The easiest way to plug into the WAIS system is
to go to http://info.cern.ch/hypertext/Products/WAIS/Sources/Overview.html. There
you'll find a master index of WAIS databases.

Finger Files

Finger is a utility that lets you look up information about users on UNIX
systems. Most of the time a user's Finger file consists of his or her login name,
real name, the last time the account was accessed and notice of any unread mail.
There is also an area in the Finger file to show a ".plan," which can be a bio or
anything else the user wants people to see. Many UNIX system administrators don't
make Finger files available over the Internet without the express permission of
the users.

Some people use Finger files as a way of broadcasting information to the Net.
There are Finger files with baseball scores, quotes of the day, California
earthquake information and other news and trivia. These public information Finger
files are traded over the Net like other cool sites, newsgroups and mailing
lists. Some Net artists put ASCII-based art into their files. In Ventana Mosaic
for Macintosh, you can access Finger files by going through a gateway that
accesses Finger. The gateway address is http://www.cs.indiana.edu/finger/gateway.
At the gateway site, you can read more information about Finger files and the WWW
gateway to them. You can also use the URL to search on a Finger file from
anywhere within the Web using the format
http://www.cs.indiana.edu/finger/hostname/username.

For instance, to view a Finger file of late-breaking NASA news, type
http://www.cs.indiana.edu/finger/space.mit.edu/nasanews.

Making Your Own Web Documents With Sean

Making your own Web documents isn't rocket science--in fact, it isn't hard at
all. If you can use a word processor and are familiar with fonts and style
changes (bold, italic and underline), you can create HTML documents. HyperText
Markup Language is simply a method for marking text so that it looks and behaves
the way you want it to when it's viewed in a Web browser. The marking codes may
look arcane at first, but once you get the hang of them, you'll be confident in
moving on to more sophisticated document construction. Let's get started by
making a simple home page. All you'll need is a text editor and a little
patience.

Format Containers

Browsers that read HTML (like Ventana Mosaic) use only the formatting tags you
enter when formatting text. All spaces, tabs and indentations you put in the
original text are ignored when your HTML document is displayed. So to make things
look the way you want them to, you've got to use the appropriate formatting tags.

For the most part, HTML formatting tags surround (or contain) the text you want
to format. For instance, if you want something to appear in boldface type, you
need to tag the text with bold codes, like this:

<B>The Web is Wide, Wild and Wonderful</B>

The first three characters <B> mark the beginning of the HTML formatting. The "B"
character indicates boldface. The "less than" (<) and "greater than" (>) symbols
set the tags off from the actual text. The message "The Web is Wide, Wild and
Wonderful" is the text that is being marked for presentation in boldface.
Finally, the line ends with the code </B>. This marks the end of the area that is
tagged as bold. All HTML tags end with the same </code> form.

The important thing to remember is that HTML considers most formatting codes to
be "containers" that hold data to be formatted (in this case the sentence "The
Web is Wide, Wild and Wonderful"). The neat thing about this concept is that you
can place containers within containers. This is called "nesting" and can be used
for things like applying two attributes to one object. For example:

<I><B>The Web is Wide, Wild and Wonderful</B></I>

Now our sentence "The Web is Wide, Wild and Wonderful" will appear as both bold
and italic, because it is contained within bold and italic formatting containers.

Believe it or not, those are the basics. Armed with the knowledge that WWW
browsers only look at formatting codes to decide how to show your text, and that
these codes are containers that can be nested, you're now ready to dig
deeper--constructing your own home page, complete with images and hyperlinks.
Table 4-4 lists the basic tags and the part of an HTML document each affects.

Building Your Home Page

Your most basic home page would consist of a title, a header or two and some
text. At this point, we won't worry about links, images and sounds. To begin, do
this:

1. Open a new document in your favorite text editor or word processing program. 

2. Decide on a title for your home page. "My Home Page" is probably as good a
place to start as any. Since the title of your page should appear as the first
line in your HTML document, type <TITLE> to indicate you are about to enter the
title of your page.

3. Next, type in the name of your home page and then </TITLE> to indicate the end
of the title. Your document should look like this:

<TITLE>My Home Page</TITLE>

4. Let's put a header at the top of the page. There are six levels of header tags
in HTML, with each level down a slightly smaller typeface. Since this is your top
header, and you want to make it big, you should use Header level 1. 

5. Type <H1> to indicate the beginning of your header and then type the actual
header. Something like "Welcome to My Home Page." Finally, type </H1> to indicate
the end of the header. So far, your home page HTML document should look like
this:

<TITLE>My Home Page</TITLE>

<H1>Welcome to My Home Page</H1>

6. Now, add some text or a blurb about yourself. Since this information might be
several lines long, you'll want to use the paragraph HTML tag so that it formats
correctly. Type a <P> tag, press to get to the next line and type some stuff
about your home page, like this:

<P>

This is my first home page. It will be my jumping-off point into the rest of the
Web. Hello cyberspace!

Note: Remember, Mosaic doesn't care how many blank lines you use, or how many
spaces you indent your paragraph, or where you put the line breaks. Mosaic is
concerned only with the way the document is tagged. So, if you want the lines to
break at a specific point, such as in a poem, you need to put a <BR> code at the
end of the line where the break should occur. This is like hitting a hard return
in a word processor. If you do this, no matter how big or small the Mosaic window
is, it will go to the next line when it encounters the <BR> code. If you want to
include a line to divide your sections, use the <HR> code.

At this point, your home page HTML document should look like this:

<TITLE>My Home Page</TITLE>

<H1>Welcome to My Home Page</H1>

<P>

This is my first home page. It will be my jumping-off point into the rest of the
Web. Hello cyberspace!

You have constructed a working home page! A little dull maybe, but it is an HTML
document and will function quite nicely as a home page until you want to get more
elaborate. Let's go look at it in Mosaic.

7. Save your document as a text file in the folder containing Ventana Mosaic.
Call it whatever you like (e.g., home.html), but make sure it ends in .html. 

8. Launch Mosaic and select Open Local... from the File menu. From the Open
dialog box, find your text file and click the OK button. Your home page should
load and be visible within the Ventana Mosaic document view window. How does it
look?

9. To make this your new home page, go to the Preferences window from the Edit
menu and type in the URL to your new home page on your hard drive. For example,
if your home page is located in the WWW folder on your hard drive, which you've
named MacintoshHD, the URL would be file:///MacintoshHD/www/home.html. One good
way to make sure that you type the URL correctly is to use Open Local... from the
File menu to select your home page on your hard drive. Then copy the URL from the
document URL box and paste it into the Home Page box in the Preferences window.
This method will make sure that you don't type anything incorrectly. You've done
it! Now when Ventana Mosaic starts up, you'll go directly to this home page
rather than the Mosaic Quick Tour Home Page.

Adding Some Pizzazz

Face it, a home page like this one is pretty boring. If you've been doing any Web
walking, you know that the WWW is just bursting at the seams with graphics,
sounds and hyperlinks. In fact, if you came upon a home page like the one you've
just constructed, you'd probably keep right on walkin'. The great thing about
HTML is that adding all the media files is as easy as formatting them!

To add a link to a picture on your hard drive, do this:

1. Find a suitable picture. If you have a scanner, you can scan something in--a
picture of yourself, for instance. Or, how about a piece of computer art? It
doesn't matter what it is, as long as it's in GIF format (and not too big). 

2. Put the picture in the same subdirectory as your home page and name it
name.gif, with "name" being whatever you choose.

3. Open your home page HTML document in your text editor. To insert a link to
your picture, enter a special tag that tells Mosaic where to look for the picture
when it opens your home page. Type <IMG SRC="name.gif" alt="A stunning picture of
me!">. You need to type this in the place in your document where you want the
picture to appear. For example, if you want the picture to appear below the first
header in your home page, you would add the line like this:

<TITLE>My Home Page</TITLE>

<H1>Welcome to my Home Page</H1>

<IMG SRC="name.gif" alt="A stunning picture of me!">

<P>

This is my first home page. It will be my jumping-off point into the rest of the
Web. Hello cyberspace!

Note: By specifying alternative text with the alt="" tag, you'll make sure that
you'll know what the picture is even if you've turned off Load Images
Automatically.

4. Save your HTML document as a text file, using .html as the file extension, and
open up Mosaic. Choose Open Local... from the File menu.

If you look up at the status indicator as your home page is being opened, you'll
see that the icon lights up and starts spinning. That's your multimedia home page
being loaded!

If you have the Load Images Automatically option checked in the Preferences
dialog (found under the Edit menu), your picture will appear when your page does.
If you have this option turned off, you'll see an inline image icon (where your
picture is stored) containing the words "A stunning picture of me!" If for some
reason your image doesn't load (if it's not a GIF or you didn't type the name
correctly), you'll get an Error Accessing message. Go back and look at your home
page HTML document to make sure that you correctly typed the name of the image.
Also make sure that you've put the picture file in the same folder as your HTML
document. If it's floating around somewhere else on your hard drive, Mosaic wan't
be able to find it and will give you an error message.

Now that you have a picture on the page, how about adding some sounds?

1. First, record your sound with SoundMachine and save it as an .au sound file in
the same folder as your home page. Say you record a greeting--you could call it
greeting.au. 

Since Mosaic won't auto-load sounds as it does images, you'll have to put in a
link anchor to your sound. A link can be anything: a word, a sentence or an
inline image. In this case, we'll use a word as our link.

2. Construct the link to your sound by typing the tag into the place where you
want the link to appear on your home page. For example, the tag below tells
Mosaic you want to link to whatever comes after the =.

<A HREF=

3. Next, type the name of your file in quotes.

<A HREF="greeting.au"

4. To make a link show up in your home page, you need to type in the description
of what you are linking to. First, type >, the beginning of the container for the
link's name. Next, type in the name of the link as you want it to appear on your
home page. In this case, let's use "Click here for greeting." Your line should
now look like this:

<A HREF="greeting.au">Click here for greeting

5. To end the line, type </A> to mark the end of your tag. Your final sound link
tag looks like this:

<A HREF="greeting.au">Click here for greeting!</A>

6. Save your home page HTML document, open Mosaic and watch your home page load.
You should see your new greeting link appear. Click on it to hear the audio.

Links to the Outside World

You now have a snazzy little multimedia home page! But something important is
still missing. You have no way of getting onto the Web. You need to add some
hyperlinks so you can easily take off from this home page to global ports of
call. 

The basic format of any link is the familiar URL. If you were asleep during the
URL discussion in Chapter 3, you should go back there now and brush up on what a
URL is and how it works. 

Before you add any links to your home page, you'll want to add a new header to
indicate that this is a hyperlinks section of the document:

1. Open your home page in your text editor. Go to the end of the document. Since
this header is below the first header in terms of the layout priority of the
document, you'll want to use a Header level 2 this time. Type something like

<H2>Links to the Outside World</H2>

2. Now you can add a few handy links. A good one is the NCSA What's New Page. By
checking this page frequently, you can keep track of all the latest Web
happenings and announcements.

3. To construct a link to this page, you'll use a format similar to the one we
used to link sound. The sound link was to a file on your own machine. Since here
you want to connect to a file (the NCSA What's New Page) on another server, a URL
is needed to make the connection. Below your second header, type <A
HREF="HTTP://www.ncsa.uiuc.edu/SDG/Software/Mosaic/Docs/whats-new.html".

This line tells Ventana Mosaic to go to the NCSA WWW server (www.ncsa.uiuc.edu),
skip to the /SDG/Software/Mosaic/Docs/ directory and grab the file
whats-new.html.

4. Just like the sound file, you need to have some way of indicating on the home
page that there's a link. Add a link description similar to the one for sound.
Type >What's New on the Web</A> at the end of the URL line. The line should now
look like this:

 <A
HREF="HTTP://www.ncsa.uiuc.edu/SDG/Software/Mosaic/Docs/whats-new.html">What's
New on the Web</A>

When this line loads into Ventana Mosaic, you'll see "What's New on the Web"
underlined.

5. How about adding another link? Sometimes you want to search for something on
the Web but have no idea where to find it. Something called a Web search engine
keeps an index of all the contents of the WWW and lets you search on it by
keywords. When it finds a match, you get a list of those matched items, presented
as hyperlinks. These search engines are like robot librarians with a collection
that spans the globe. An excellent and highly recommended search engine is called
the WebCrawler. To add a link to it, go to the next line in your document and
type <A
HREF="HTTP://webcrawler.cs.washington.edu/WebCrawler/WebQuery.html">WebCrawler
Search</A>

When this appears in your Ventana Mosaic document, all you'll have to do is click
on the words "WebCrawler Search" to be instantly transported to the WebCrawler's
home at the University of Washington.

Now that you've got two links in a row, you've got a list! Well, at least you
think it's a list. Ventana Mosaic still thinks it's two links right next to each
other. Remember, Mosaic doesn't know diddly about text formatting! To put the two
links into list form for Ventana Mosaic, you have to attach HTML tags.

There are two major types of lists: numbered and unnumbered. Numbered lists have
numbers appearing at the beginning of each unique list item. Unnumbered lists
have a bullet in front of each item. They work the same way, so it's up to you
which one to use. Here's how to add a list-format container:

1. Go to point just above the first item (NCSA What's New Page) and press Return
to insert a blank line. If you want your list to be numbered, type <OL> for
"ordered list." If you want an unnumbered list, type <UL>. 

2. Next to each link, type <LI> to indicate that the link is a list item.

3. Close the container by going to the line right beneath the last link and
typing </OL> if you have a numbered list and </UL> if you have an unnumbered
list. 

4. Save your document, open it up in Mosaic and gloat--you have now constructed a
full-featured home page!

You can add as many links as you like by adding them as we've outlined above or
by cutting and pasting them from other HTML documents.

Your First HTML Document

Your home page HTML document should look like this (see Figure 415):

<TITLE>My Home Page</TITLE>

<H1>Welcome to my Home Page</H1>

<IMG SRC="name.gif" alt="A stunning picture of me!">

<A HREF="greeting.au">Click here for greeting!</A>

<P>

This is my first home page. It will be my jumping-off point into the rest of the
Web. Hello cyberspace!

<H2>Links to the Outside World</H2>

<UL>

<LI><A
HREF="HTTP://www.ncsa.uiuc.edu/SDG/Software/Mosaic/Docs/whats-new.html">What's
New on the Web</A>

<LI><A
HREF="HTTP://webcrawler.cs.washington.edu/WebCrawler/WebQuery.html">WebCrawler
Search</A>

</UL>

Now that you've gotten your first taste of HTML document making, you may want to
delve deeper into how it's done. Why not use this as an opportunity to ask your
robot librarian for some advice? Go to the WebCrawler and do a search on "HTML"
(or maybe something more specific, like "HTML Primer" or "HTML Style Guide").



A great way to learn how to create HTML documents is to look at other people's.
You can mimic, copy, cut, paste and change what they've done. Choose the View
Source... item in the Edit menu. This opens a special document window showing the
HTML document for the page you are viewing. You can either look at the code to
see how it was done, or you can save the file to your hard disk. After it's
loaded to your hard drive, you can open it in a word processing program and
monkey around with it to your heart's content. Remember to always save it as a
text file with an .html extension. Then, choose Open Local... from the Mosaic
File menu, find the document and double-click on it. If it didn't turn out the
way you planned, you can open it again in the word processor. Make further
changes, save the document and then open it again under Ventana Mosaic's File
menu. The altered document will appear inside the Ventana Mosaic document view
window. Tinkering and experimenting in this way, you'll learn a lot.



Winning Web Page Design

As more users create HTML documents, there's starting to be a glut of really bad
page designs. Terrible text layout, unnecessary use of large images and audio
clips, and content of questionable merit are elements in far too many documents.
As in many situations where there's a spirit of open participation, mediocrity
can quickly take over. Here are a few design suggestions:

´	"KISS" is an acronym commonly used in graphic arts. It stands for "Keep it
simple, stupid!" This and all basic rules of graphic design should apply to Web
pages. You are publishing something that thousands of people may see. Add to
their visual field, don't clutter it with trash. Try to keep the number of
stylistic elements to a minimum and plan the flow of the document so it has as
much impact as possible. An old graphic arts trick is to squint when you're
looking at a page. By fuzzing your vision a bit, you can see the elements of a
page as interacting objects. Do this on your documents until the elements are
balanced (or unbalanced in a pleasing way).

´	Keep in mind that different types of browsers will be used to view your
documents. While lots of graphics and jazzy color elements might look great on
your browser, someone using a text-based browser (such as Lynx) might see a
confused mess. This is why it's a good idea to specify alternate text with your
images.

´	White space can be a good thing. Learn how and when to use it to your
advantage. Set things off for emphasis by surrounding them with white space.

´	Try to "chunk" information into logical units. Use common sense and an eye
toward logical organization when you're laying out your documents. It is best to
let the material unfold in levels, rather than having everything appear at once.

´	Integrate your links into the material. Don't put "Click here!" off by
itself with no point of reference. Your links should go where they make the most
sense, ideally in context. If you do put them off by themselves, say what they
are: "More information on widgets."

´	Check your links! It's a nuisance to find a document whose links don't go
anywhere. Before you post your documents, make sure that everything works.

´	Be literate. Again, this is as much a publishing environment as anything
else. Use a spell checker and read over everything before you post it. One
writer's tip: Read out loud what you've written. If it sounds good spoken,
chances are it will read well on the page.

´	Sign all of your documents. People like to know who wrote Web documents, and
ideally, how to contact them. Don't just sign the "front" page of a document
series. Sometimes people will come in the back or side doors to your documents
(if they have a URL to a page that's not the first). If you don't label these
secondary pages, no one will know whose handiwork they are.

 ´	Give as much information as possible about the size and content of inline
images and hyperlinked media. You can label inline images with a caption (57k
image) or hyperlinked media with a written description: "1.2mb performance video
in MPEG format." If a media item is really huge, it should have an even more
emphatic message: "CAUTION: This QuickTime movie is 2.7mb in size!" (Remember,
people don't read instructions. You have to shout sometimes.)

´	Limit your use of inline images. Try to find small, high-impact images, and
overall, use images sparingly. Think in terms of the different types of users who
will be accessing your pages. Some may have fancy Silicon Graphics workstations
connected to T5 lines, but others will be putting along at 14,400 baud. Try to
create pages that will communicate and satisfy at all levels. It's a challenge,
but it can be done.

´	Don't be afraid to break any of these rules if you've got a good reason for
doing so.

Staying on the Crest of the Wave

Things move quickly in cyberspace. Just when you think you have a handle on
what's going on--when you think you're in the vanguard--you discover a whole new
corner of the Net that you knew nothing about. Mosaic and WWW are like that. It
seems as though the Web has just now caught the attention of many Net citizens.
They are often shocked to learn that the Web has been around for years and that
it's as large as it is. Now that you're a full-fledged Webwalker, you can use the
impressive resources of the Web to stay on top of its development. Listed below
are many of the key documents, Web sites and USENET newsgroups that cover the
late-breaking news and announcements concerning WWW and Mosaic.

FAQs & Other Reading Material

comp.infosystems.www FAQ

Here's an amazing collection of Web information, packed into a single document.
The comp.infosystems.www FAQ covers just about everything you need to know about
starting out on the Web, the basics of HTML, a description of relevant terms and
lots more.

http://siua.cshl.org/~boutell/www_faq.html

WWW Primer

The WWW Primer is a friendly introductory guide to the Web. It's much more
accessible than a lot of the FAQs and a lot better written than most "primers."

http://www.vuw.ac.nz/who/Nathan.Torkington/ideas/www-primer.html

Entering the World Wide Web: A Guide to Cyberspace

This is a thick treatise on the World Wide Web by Kevin Hughes, with history,
basic concepts, places to visit, a hypermedia timeline and a glossary of terms. 

http://www.eit.com/web/www.guide/

Information Sites

Mosaic Information Site

Try starting here to find any type of Net/Web-related information and help. Lots
of links fan out from here.

http://www.ncsa.uiuc.edu/SDG/Software/Mosaic/MetaIndex.html

WWW Information Site

The WWW Information Site graciously provides a link breakdown of WWW-related
information. Users, developers, service providers and Web page authors will find
plenty of interest here. And because it's all hyperlinked, each link connects to
even more interesting Net points. This is a good place to start if you have a
specific subject area you want to explore.

http://www.bsdi.com/sever/doc/web-info.html

Newsgroups

news.answers 

A huge body of information is accessible at news.answers, which is the repository
for FAQ files from across the Internet. Before you ask, get the FAQs! All FAQ
files posted to this newsgroup are archived at ftp://rtfm.mit.edu/ or
ftp://ftp.uu.net/usenet/news.answers/ 

They are also available in HTML format at

http://www.cis.ohio-state.edu/hypertext/faq/usenet/ FAQ-List.html

comp.infosystems.www.announce

This newsgroup for the announcement of new information systems has also become
the de facto place to announce new Web pages and sites. The University of
Rochester has created a Web document announcing all the new page announcements
posted to this group. You can access the Rochester document at

http://www.cs.rochester.edu/u/ferguson/announce.www/

It's a good idea to add this address to one of your hotlists.

comp.infosystems.www.users

Try this newsgroup for discussions of browsing software, new user questions and
general news, information and assistance.

comp.infosystems.www.providers

If you're interesting in setting up and administering a WWW server, this is the
place to find out more about it. 

comp.infosystems.www.misc

This group is set up to discuss everything not covered in the other WWW
newsgroups. The future of the Web, protocols and standards have been recent
topics of interest.

comp.infosystems.www (defunct)

comp.infosystems.www was the original group created for discussing WWW. It has
now been subdivided into the groups listed above. Many sites that carry USENET
news still include it, but it will soon dissolve in favor of the other
comp.infosytems.www.* groups.

comp.sys.mac.comm

This group carries discussions about all things that have to do with Macs and
telecommunications. A really good place to ask if you're having problems getting
your SLIP or PPP connection configured correctly. Stop by often for the latest
Mac telecom tips and tricks.

alt.hypertext

Discussions of hypertext, both in and out of the World Wide Web. People often
announce their Web hypertext projects here. The FAQ file for this newsgroup can
be found at gopher://ftp.cs.berkeley.edu

alt.etext

Discussions on all forms of electronic texts. Not strictly related to hypertext
or the WWW, but often includes postings on where to find electronic texts on the
Web and how to set up your own e-texts in Webspace.

Other Helper Applications

The helper application scheme used in Mosaic is brilliant. It frees up Mosaic to
do what it does best and it gives you, the user, the flexibility of choosing what
types of applications and which specific applications you want Mosaic to use for
media presentations and file decompression. Even the telnet applications, while
not considered "official" helper applications, work like one within Mosaic (see
the "Telnet" section earlier). But alas, Ventana Mosaic doesn't think of
everything. Most importantly, it doesn't handle e-mail or full newsgroup
participation. Here are a number of excellent freeware programs that you can use
to fill in the gaps left by Mosaic. Most, if not all, of these programs are
available from the Ventana Visitor's Center
(http://www.vmedia.com/archives/index.html) or from the mother of all Mac
archives, the Info-Mac Hyperachive
(http://hyperarchive.lcs.mit.edu/HyperArchive.html).

Eudora

Even if Mosaic does get e-mail support in a future upgrade, chances are you'll
still need an extra program to read mail. Eudora is one of the best Macintosh
e-mail programs around, offering scriptability, Finger, aliases, filtering,
sorting and lots of other sophisticated features. Eudora is easy to find on the
Net and easy to set up.

ftp://ftp.qualcomm.com/quest/mac/eudora/1.3/eudora131.hqx

NewsWatcher

NewsWatcher is a dedicated USENET newsgroup reading program. It lets you set up
lists of newsgroups you want to subscribe to, loading only the lists you want to
view. You read the news by clicking on the names of the articles as they appear
in the newsgroup window. NewsWatcher actually uses several helper applications of
its own. With the addition of uuUndo, you can download and decode "binary" files
posted to picture-, sound- and program-related newsgroups. One of the coolest
features of NewsWatcher is its support for URLs. Once you've configured
NewsWatcher to use Ventana Mosaic, if you encounter any URLs in the newsgroups
you read, just Command-click on them and NewsWatcher will tell Mosaic to go to
that link! This is a great feature when you're reading
comp.infosystems.www.announce, because you can go straight to the sites you're
reading about without leaving NewsWatcher.

http://hyperarchive.lcs.mit.edu/HyperArchive/Archive/comm/tcp/news-watcher-20b24.hqx

Nuntius

Like NewsWatcher, Nuntius lets you configure and read USENET news via an
intuitive Mac interface. You can maintain lists of newsgroups that you can read
by pointing and clicking, and you can even decode binary files from within the
program. Why not download both of these newsreaders and see which one you're most
comfortable with? Some people swear by NewsWatcher, others by Nuntius.

ftp://ftp.cc.utexas.edu/microlib/mac/tcpip/nuntius-203-fat.hqx

TurboGopher

There may be times when you don't want to fire up Mosaic just to look up some
information. For those quick-and-dirty info grabs, you might want to use
TurboGopher. TurboGopher is a Gopher client that makes use of standard Mac
features. Gopher directories appear as folder icons and individual Gopher files
are shown as document icons. Because Gophers don't really have much, if any,
multimedia capability, TurboGopher tends to run much faster than Mosaic,
especially on lower-end Macs. It's definitely no substitute for the hyperlinked,
multimedia Web, but TurboGopher is still great for a quick burrow through the
Net.

http://hyperarchive.lcs.mit.edu/HyperArchive/Archive/comm/tcp/turbo-gopher-20b8.hqx

Anarchie

Anarchie is an FTP client for the Mac. Unlike Fetch, however, Anarchie adds
several useful features. First, it includes an integrated Archie file lookup
client, so you can use it to search for hard-to-find files. It comes
preconfigured with many of the global Mac FTP sites and directories, allowing you
to jump right in with just a click of the mouse. Also, it features variable-size
windows that can even be enlarged to full-screen size--a far cry from Fetch's
little mutt-size windows.

http://hyperarchive.lcs.mit.edu/HyperArchive/Archive/comm/tcp/anarchie-14.hqx

Hotlist2HTML

This little application performs the elegant task of translating Mosaic's
binary-formatted hotlists into text files readable as HTML documents. This is
useful if you want to share your sizzlin' hotlists with someone who's using a WWW
browser on another type of computer. Tip: It's very easy to run your hotlist
through this program and then edit the document, add some information about
yourself and voilĂ--instant home page!

http://hyperarchive.lcs.mit.edu/HyperArchive/Archive/text/hotlist-to-html-072.hqx

BBEdit & HTMLExtensions

BBEdit is a programmer's text editor available in both a feature-rich commercial
version and the good-enough-for-all-but-superhackers shareware version. It
translates and saves text files in Mac, PC and UNIX formats so that documents you
write in BBEdit can be read by people using other machines. HTMLExtensions are
plug-in modules providing BBEdit with the ability to create HTML documents just
by highlighting text and selecting HTML tags from a menu. Very useful!

http://hyperarchive.lcs.mit.edu/HyperArchive/Archive/text/bbedit-html-b8.hqx

HTML Editor

This is the premiere WYSIWYG (what you see is what you get--pronounced wizzy-wig)
HTML editor for the Mac. Using this editor to tag text in an HTML document, the
results show up looking like they would inside of Mosaic. While HTML Editor is
not necessary for creating your own home pages, it is helpful for more visually
oriented Web page makers.

http://hyperarchive.lcs.mit.edu/HyperArchive/Archive/text/html-editor-10.hqx

Moving On

Hopefully you've now had enough time online to understand how the Web works and
what Ventana Mosaic has to offer. If you haven't tried all of its features, take
some time to go back through this chapter, focusing especially on browsing the
Best of the Net award-winning sites and trying out the various Internet services.
Doing this will put both you and Ventana Mosaic through your paces. You'll also
make sure Ventana Mosaic is properly configured and that all the Helper
Applications are installed.

Chapter 5 is a directory of Web sites, covering everything from online libraries
and art galleries to electronic magazines and recreation centers. This is not an
exhaustive catalog, but thanks to the beauty of hypermedia, all these sites are
connected to dozens more, which are connected to still more, and on and on. There
are enough access points here to take you deep into the fabric of the Web, enough
connections to keep you busy for years. So pack a lunch, lace up your power
walking shoes and scamper onto the first available Web link that strikes your
fancy.