Introduction
Browse
This is another way to find what you are looking for online. Browsing a website is like browsing in a shop – you look at what is displayed, and see if it fits your requirements. Browsing does not require that you can describe what you are looking for; instead you take advantage of the layout of the website to find what you are looking for. Websites may use categories, headings and site maps to help you to browse successfully.
Directory
A database compiled by humans available for web searching.
Form
A form that you fill in as if it were on paper. It can be entering details for a web based search or registering with a website.
Home page
The main or introductory page of a website.
HTML
A language recognised by computers used to write webpages.
Internet
A large collection of computers, connected together to allow them to share information with one another.
Keyword
Words that are related to or can describe your intended search.
PC
Personal computer.
(Portable Document Format) A PDF is a type of computer file (in the same way that an MP3 or a Microsoft Word file is a type of file), which is commonly used on the Internet for presenting documents. PDFs are excellent for printing out – a printed PDF generally looks much better than a printed (HTML) Web page. PDFs are thus mainly used for material which the user is expected to print out (such as Government forms, brochures, reports), rather than material which is meant to be viewed online. PDFs require a specific piece of software, a PDF viewer, to be viewed and printed out. By far the most common PDF viewer is Adobe Acrobat, which is available for free online.
Search engine
A program running on a web server computer which creates and maintains a directory of web pages on the Internet. The engine has a web page with a form; you type in words describing what you are looking for; the engine looks up its directory and sends back a list of web pages that it thinks will fit your search criteria.
Spider
A computer program that searches the Internet and locates web pages for indexing in a search engine database.
URL
The Uniform Resource Locator, or address, of a web page. Like the phone number of a particular person, this is unique and goes direct to the web page it is associated with.
Web page
A web page is made up of text and images mostly, and is what we see when we access a website. Think of the web pages of a website, as the pages of a book.
World Wide Web
(WWW) Also called the WWW or the Web. A service that sends information over the Internet from web server programs to web browser programs. The browser then displays this information to the user on his computer screen.
