What is Welcome to the White House?

Welcome to the White House is a key access point to government information that is available on the Internet, a network of computer networks used by people in over 150 countries. Using a service on the Internet called the World Wide Web (WWW), people all over the world can locate documents that not only contain text but also include graphics, photos, sound, and video.

Welcome to the White House was developed to improve the way the Federal government uses the Internet to communicate and interact with the American people. This site provides access to all the government information and services that are available on the Internet. This site enriches the government information available to citizens, businesses, schools, libraries, and other institutions, and demonstrates real progress in improving the National Information Infrastructure by showing that the government is using information technology to make itself more accessible and responsive to the public. Welcome to the White House helps promote interaction with citizens by offering government agencies a method to present their missions and programs.


What can you do with it?

Welcome to the White House has four principal functions. First, our service allows users to link to all online resources made available by U.S. government agencies. A subject index to government information and a free-text searching engine provide efficient access to White House documents on a Publications server. All Cabinet-level agencies are providing public information this way, as well as most of the independent agencies and commissions.

Our service provides an enhanced interface for sending electronic mail to the President, Vice President, and the First Lady, which improves the handling and analysis of e-mail and the ability to gather information from incoming messages.

Welcome to the White House provides indexing of all White House publications so that finding and retrieving documents is made easier.

Finally, our service lets people view White House photographs and listen to the President's Saturday radio addresses and other audio segments. For example, we offer people an historical tour of the White House, the art collection, and past residents. To serve our growing youth population and their teachers, the White House for Kids lets them see the President's house from their perspective.


How does it work?

Using software such as Mosaic (distributed for free by the Federally-supported National Center for Supercomputing Applications) or one of the commercial versions such as Netscape Navigator, people with a communicating computer and an Internet connection are able access the World Wide Web. Such "browsers" and the WWW provide an easy-to-use graphical interface for the Internet by allowing words and images to be used as direct links to additional information on related topics. Simply by "clicking" on a linked word or image, a user can retrieve and display new files and information effortlessly, without learning commands.


Who has access to it?

Of the 20 million or so who have access to the Internet, currently several million Americans have access to the World Wide Web. Most universities are connected to the Internet as are an increasing number of public schools, libraries, local governments, and other public institutions and non-profit organizations. Because it makes the Internet significantly easier to use, the WWW is the fastest-growing service on the Internet. However, since many people have access to the Internet but not at a level that supports graphical browsers, the service has been designed to work very well with Lynx and other popular text-based browsers.


What about people without computers?

People without computers can call the Federal Information Center at 800-688-9889, which has access to Welcome to the White House as well as other sources of information for helping citizens.


What about people with disabilities?

Services on the WWW also are accessible with software that does not display graphics, so they can be used with Braille readers and voice-generation devices. The White House service has been specially designed to facilitate access by people with text-only software such as Lynx.


What have you done to improve the service in 1996?


Who is working on this?

The project team includes the Office of the Vice President, the Office of Communications, the Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP), the Office of Administration, the National Economic Council, and the Office of Correspondence and Presidential Messages. Please send mail to Feedback with any additional questions.

To comment on this service: feedback@www.whitehouse.gov