What is the World Wide Web?

The World Wide Web (or just The Web) is way of delivering text, graphics and sound over the Internet. It is just one part of the Internet, which is a network of interconnected computer networks.

What will you find on the Web?

The Web is a particularly rich source of information. Any topic you can think of can be found on the World Wide Web including information from:

• Government and non-government organisations
• Corporations
• Universities and colleges world wide
• News and current affairs.

Moving around the Web

You can navigate or move around the Web by using a piece of software called a browser. Examples of browsers include Netscape and Internet Explorer.

Click on coloured links in web pages to go other web pages. By clicking on a link you are clicking on a Web page's address or URL (Uniform Resource Locater). The URL of the page you are looking at appears in the Browser's location box and can help you determine what type of site you are looking at.

For example the University of Tasmania Library's address is: http://www.utas.edu.au/library

You can bookmark Web sites on your computer so you can quickly return to them whenever you want

Evaluation

Anyone is free to put information on the Web. Many Web pages are put up without passing through the quality control processes which academic books and journal articles undergo. If you use a Web site for an assignment it is your responsibility to evaluate the site to ensure that, to the best of your knowledge, the information is authentic, accurate and reliable. The following criteria will help you with your evaluation:

• URL:What is the domain of the page you are looking at (com, gov, org )? Is it appropriate for the information you are looking for? For example, a government reports from the appropriate government (gov) Web site?
• Authorship/organisation: Can you identify who created the site? Is the author qualified in the subject? Is it someone's personal web page? Does the author or organisation have authority and a good reputation in the subject area covered by the site?
• Bias or point of view: Is the site trying to promote a particular point of view? Are there sponsors and do they have an influence on the content?
• Purpose: What is the purpose of the site? Is it there to sell something, promote an opinion, disseminate data or statistics, inform or explain?
• Accuracy: Is the information presented accurate? If you are not sure then double check facts or details by using a reliable source such as an encyclopedia or similar. Are documents reproduced from other sources with acknowledgment and without changes? Do footnotes or references document factual information?
• Date: Does the site have date when it was created or last updated? This is usually at the bottom of the page. Is it important for your topic to have up to date information?
• Integrity: What is the overall impression of the page? What other Web sites are linked to the page? Is the site listed in a reputable directory such as Infomine? Could the page be a hoax?

Do you want to learn more about evaluating web sites? http://www.ithaca.edu/library/Training/hott00.html

Finding information on the Web

The World Wide Web contains millions of documents (also called pages and sites). The sheer size of the Web can make it a daunting task to locate what you need. By effectively using directories and search-engines you can find relevant Web pages from all over the world.

Directories

Directories are an attempt to bring order to the Web by grouping web sites under subject headings. The Web sites are selected and organised by the directory's editors into subject headings. You click on a subject heading then keep clicking on a sub-headings until you reach a list of sites for the topic you are after. Many directories also allow you to search for sites by keyword.

Yahoo is a good example of a popular directory.

Directories

Search engines and "meta-search" engines

Search engines are pieces of software that retrieve Web pages that contain the keywords or phrases you have searched on. Results are usually listed or ranked in order of where the search words or phrase appears in the Web document, such as the title, and/or how many times they appear in the page.

Try these examples
AlltheWeb     http://www.alltheweb.com
Google             http://www.google.com

Meta-search engines transmit your search simultaneously to several individual search engines and their databases of web pages. Within a few seconds, you get back results from all the search engines queried.

An example of meta-search engines:
Ask Jeeves http://www.ask.com/

Search Engines

Search Tips

Before starting a search take a moment to do some planning so as to avoid being overwhelmed by a large number of irrelevant Web pages.

• Analyse your topic to identify concepts. Pick out key words and phrases that you can use in your search. Common words often have multiple meanings so you may have to think of alternative words or phrases to help narrow your search.

For example: If you are looking for:
Recent information on The Australian government's policies on global warming

You could pick out the following keywords and phrases as your search terms:
Keywords: Australia or Australian, policy or policies,
Phrases: global warming or  greenhouse gases( as an alternative to global warming).
Timespan: Does recent mean this year, the last 6 months, or the last 2 years?

• Think about the kind of information you are looking for. Are you after statistics, factual information, opinions, or policies? Are you looking for a government, non-government or commercial organisation Web site?
• Directories or search engines? If you are after background information on a topic or not sure where to start try a directory. If you are looking for something specific or an obscure topic start with a search engine.
• Look at a directory's or search engine's Help pages. These pages are generally well laid out and contain tips on:
• phrase searching: enclosing the phrase in "double quotations" is Commonly used. For example "global warming".
• Combining words and phrases: Either + or and are common ways of combining search terms.
• Truncation and Wildcards: * at the end of a word will search for variants beginning with that word. Polic* finds policy, policies, police etc.
  
• If you are looking for an organisation's Web page you can often guess their Web address. For example: ANZ Bank    http://www.anz.com.au
  
• Maximize your chances of finding good academic information by using portals to pre-evaluated sites. The best of these include:
  RDN- Resource Discovery network (UK)
  LII -Librarian's Index to the Internet (US)
  INFOMINE -Scholarly Internet Resource Collections (US)

Referencing Web resources

If you use information from a Web site in an assignment then you need to include it in your assignment's list of references. For examples of referencing Web pages see:

Citation Styles Online
http://www.bedfordstmartins.com/online/citex.html
This site includes examples of citing sources from the Web using MLA, APA, and Chicago style guides.

An authoritative non-web source is

Information and documentation, bibliographic references, part 2, electronic documents of parts thereof / International Organization for Standardization. (1997)
Cent Reference Z 1001 .I54 1997

Web tutorials

In addition to the Help pages in search engine and directory's the following sites are some of the many that offer tutorials and on-line instruction on using the World Wide Web.

• Finding Information on the Internet
  http://www.lib.berkeley.edu/TeachingLib/Guides/Internet/FindInfo.html
  From the University of California Berkeley. This comprehensive tutorial covers tips on using specific directories and search engines and evaluation
• Bare Bones 101: a very basic Web search tutorial
  http://www.sc.edu/beaufort/library/bones.html
• Net Learn
  http://www.rgu .ac.uk/~sim/research/netlearn/callist.htm

Keeping up to date with the Web

It is a challenge to keep with changes to the Web, what with new sites and search tools appearing and existing ones changing or disappearing. The following sites will help you keep in touch with the changes:

• The Scout Report
  http://scout.cs.wisc.edu/report/sr/current/index.html
  This is a weekly publication offering a selection of new and newly discovered quality Web resources of interest to researchers. It also has subject specific reports and there is an e-mail version to which you can subscribe to free of charge.
• The Search Engine Report
  http://www.searchenginewatch.com/sereport/index.html
  This is a free, monthly newsletter about new search engines and changes to search engines.

Important resources not available on the Web

The Web is not always the best place to start looking for assignment material.

• If you are looking for journal articles start by searching the Library's databases. Although many of these database are available through the Web they can only be accessed through the Library's subscription on the Library's Web page and not through general Web searches.
• The Library's Reference Collection is a good starting point for finding assignment material. It has an extensive collection, encyclopedias, dictionaries and statistical data and biographical information, much of which is unavailable electronically, that can help you define unfamiliar terms and locate background reading on assignment topics.

Ask the Library staff for more information about these and other Library resources.