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Easy Web Navigation
Getting through the Web can be like cutting through a brick wall with a putty knife. But if the browser is worth a dime, it should be as sharp as a sword cutting down all that stands between you and your information quest.

Geek Speak: Navigation Terms

Home Page: This is the first page of a Web site. It usually includes a summary or links to the information provided in the whole Web site.
Link: A link works as a pointer to another location or document. It is also called hypertext link.
Dead Link: This is a hypertext link that is outdated and leads you to an error message.
Surf: People move through Web documents by surfing. Sit back, relax and ride the Web waves. See? You�re surfing!
URL: An acronym for Uniform Resource Locator, an URL basically is a Web document address.


A decent Web navigator enables you to hop back to previously visited sites with a click of a button, such as with the Back button in Mosaic. Other browsers enable you to take running leaps through the sites you visited, rather than forcing you to walk back baby-step by baby-step. The Go menu in Netscape Navigator 3.0 shows the last 15 Web sites you visited in the current session. You can jump five or ten sites backward, and the jumps don�t make the browser cough at all.

In Netscape Navigator and Microsoft Internet Explorer, you can bookmark your favorite sites. (Microsoft Internet Explorer calls this feature Favorites.) Suppose that you read the New York Times CyberTimes each day. You can mark the site in the Bookmark or Favorites menu, and jump to the site quickly when you�re ready for the news. You can also set the New York Times as your Home Page that downloads automatically when you open up your browser. That way, the New York Times is on your cyberspace doorstep everyday!


Managing Your Favorite Web Sites


Libraries that have been cataloguing books for years can�t figure out a way to classify the numbers of Web sites that fly by night. But it doesn�t hurt for you to try to organize your favorite sites into hierarchies, categories, or maps. The following bookmark utilities might do the trick:
ClearWeb for Windows 95http://www.clearsoft.com
NetBuddy http://www.netree.com/netbudy.html
Vizion WebSpecial http://www.sirsi.com
Netscape SmartMarks http://home.netscape.com/comprod/smartmarks.html
Surfbot http://www.surflogic.com
KnowIt All http://www.grasp.com