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Surfing the Internet Safely

Posted by on April 8, 2011 Leave a Comment

keys
Image courtsey of reconstruction.eserver.org

Nowadays nearly every American knows how to access the Internet on a basic level.  Being online can mean a variety of things—conducting research, communicating with family and friends, shopping, working— but merely browsing the web has become a hobby.  Also known as “web surfing,” internet browsing means rapidly moving from one web page to another for entertainment.  Like web surfing, there are dozens of other terms exclusive to the internet that have become part of ordinary.
Blogs have become common and are a popular journaling style unique to cyber culture.  Blogging (from the expression “web logging”) is the act of adding content to a particular website and publishing the content so that it is available to other to view.  Some bloggers maintain their blog as a type of daily journal to record their thoughts and writing and get international feedback.  However, it is important to not include too much personal information on your blog.
Online chatting is also a popular way to communicate with distant friends, or make new ones.  Chat rooms provide a medium for talking via typing to other people in real time.  However, chat rooms are also a place where your identity is self-determined, allowing anyone with internet access to enter and type what they want.  These dangers have led to the creation of private chat rooms, or monitored chat rooms that censor inappropriate data and have the ability to eject offensive chatters from the site.  With all internet applications there exists a certain amount of freedom and facility, but it is important to exercise caution when web surfing, blogging, or chatting online.

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The Google Chrome Web Browser

Posted by on October 6, 2010 Leave a Comment
A pie chart of the usage share of web browsers...
Image via Wikipedia

Google Chrome is one of the most recent newcomers to the Web browser game. Just developed and released in 2008, it is a Web browser that currently works only with the Microsoft Windows operating system. The operating system got a huge boost simply by coming from Google- perhaps the best-known Internet company today. Perhaps in part because of its origins, Google Chrome was immediately popular, and in the two years since its release it has become the third most popular Web browser available. This has given in a market share of a little more than 7 percent. Though that may not sound like much, 7 percent of Web users represent millions upon millions of users.

Standing on the shoulders of the Internet browser giants, Chrome has many similarities to Web browsers that have come before. It has a set of options that are reminiscent of Apple’s Safari Web browser, and the settings are similar in design to Internet Explorer. The design of the browser is different from the main Google site in many ways, and the browser uses different colors for its logo than most people are used to seeing on the Google website. This may remove the site from the browser in many people’s minds.

Though initially offering it in a version that is only compatible with the Microsoft Windows operating system, that won’t always be the case. The limited accessibility may be hampering the Web browser’s customer numbers for now, but when later versions are released this will almost certainly not be the case. The company plans to release newer versions of Chrome that will run in Mac OS X. This will open up the Apple market and bring millions of customers who are fans of Google as well as Mac users who are interested in trying out new browsers on their Macs.

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What Is a Web Browser?

Posted by on October 5, 2010 Leave a Comment
web browsers
Image by smemon87 via Flickr

While most Internet users are familiar with the concept of Web browsers, or at least of their own favorite Web browser, many people don’t know what a Web browser really is. Is it something that simply makes it easier to use the Internet, or is it the only way to use the Internet on a computer or mobile device? Is it something that really changes the user experience depending on its features, or is that just a lot of marketing hype?

A Web browser is a piece of software that allows your computer to retrieve and present the Internet to the user. It allows the view of Web pages, videos, pictures and anything else that is available online. Web browsers not only give you a way to access the Internet, they also allow you to connect with private networks and to receive information that is sent that way.

The many features that are offered do offer a different Internet browsing experience, but often that depends on the user taking advantage of the features. These include tabbed browsing, which allow users to conveniently keep many sites open at once, private browsing, which keeps websites form tracking your actions, and various “favorites” features that allow you to save sites, bookmarks and even a full row of tabs. Some features, however, are built into your user experienced and do not have to be specifically accessed in order to be of use. Most Web browsers today support the safety features of websites, including the HTTPS safety features that can help keep Internet users safe when buying or filling out forms online. Other automatic features include the saving of cookies and the speed at which an Internet user can browse the Web. Which operating system that you use may also affect how well a particular Web browser works for you.

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Web Browser Patches and Why They Are Needed

Posted by on October 4, 2010 Leave a Comment
BEIJING, CHINA - DECEMBER 22: Boon-Lock Yeo, ...
Image by Getty Images via @daylife

If you’re a Web user, understanding the threat the hackers pose to all Internet users is important. There are so many threats, and those threats keep escalating so regularly, that Web browsers themselves are often under attack. A Web browser is a very complicated software application, and the many aspects that go into creating a useful, effective and attractive Web browser often mean that some aspects of safety, somewhere, may be overlooked. Sometimes this is a security hole that can allow unethical people to exploit the weakness at the expense of those who use the browser. Other times the flaw is simply something that makes the browser less efficient than it could be if the flaw were fixed.

Some flaws in browsers are large flaws that leave critical systems vulnerable to hacker attacks, frequent crashing or other problems. With the many threats against Web browsers, virtually all browsers now come with frequent updates that can fix the flaws whether they are big or small. Very large flaws, so-called critical flaws, may result in an entirely new version of the browser. The smaller fixes, however, can be enabled by simply downloading the latest patch without having to install a new browser or a new version of the old one.

When you get a notification that there is a patch or an update as they are more frequently called, whether it’s a pop-up or an email notification, every Internet user needs to take it seriously. The flaw that was detected may leave your information vulnerable to scammers or to hackers who want to seize remote control over your computer. You may also be at risk of losing important data or less important data such as your saved tabs. Getting the patch immediately when it is offered can help to give you extra security in an insecure inline world.

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Birth of the Browser

Posted by on September 26, 2010 Leave a Comment
PhotonQ-Tim Berners Lee on Linked Data at TED
Image by PhOtOnQuAnTiQuE via Flickr

The first internet browser was released in 1993 by Tim Berners-Lee, and was called WorldWideWeb. By the way, this is also the same guy who created the first web page. Not to be confused with the World Wide Web, it later changed its name to Nexus. Prior to the WorldWideWeb browser, there was no way to view the Web.

Working on a NeXT computer at CERN during the end of 1990, Tim Berners-Lee created the first internet browser called WorldWideWeb. The first program was completed after only 2 months of development. Several updates were made prior to its release to the public in the summer of 1991. The project team, Tim Berners-Lee, Robert Cailliau, Bernard Pollermann, Nicola Pellow, and Jean-Francios Groff, created passive browsers that did not posses editing prospects because it was too difficult to port. Nobody on the team had experience with Windows X, so it was not possible to use the browser with that operating system.

Later, some of the team members changed most of the programming for WorldWideWeb to the C programming language and created the libwww application programming interface (API). Shortly after, new browsers started to appear, such as ViolaWWW, which was used on UNIX and the X Windowing System. This was the first well known web browser prior to Mosaic, although the computer audience was limited at this point in time. Mosaic became the most popular browser in 1993 replacing the WorldWideWeb. This was the browser that opened the door for common people to access the Web because it was easy to understand, reliable, simple to install, and was the first browser to be able to display images inline with text instead of in a separate window.

Some of the original code for the WorldWideWeb browser is on Mr. Berners-Lee’s computer in a museum at CERN. It is said that the code can not be recovered because of the computer’s historical artifact status. In the spring of 1993, CERN released the source code for WorldWideWeb and made it free software. There are several versions of this software still available for download, free of charge.

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