A Little History of the WWW
The origins of the WWW began in 1980 when the
European Organization for Nuclear Research began looking for a
way to share data and scientific findings. By 1990,
there was finally some interest in their developments, and a
telephone directory was published to encourage the use
of the Internet. Early adopters of the World Wide Web
were primarily university-based scientific departments or
physics laboratories.
In 1992, the first browser was developed,
called Mosiac, and its development was a turning point for the
WWW. Mosiac allowed the use of multi media files,
graphics, animation, and scripting files. The first web site
came from the University of Illinois in 1992. Microsoft
released its first browser in 1993, called Cello.
Mosiac's name was changed to Netscape in 1994.
By 1996, publicly traded companies saw the
possibilities of having a web presence, attracted by free
publishing, and a world wide market. E-commerce was born
and products began to be advertised and sold on the
Internet. Dot-coms began to spring up, and the WWW
gained momentum. Between 1999-2001 we saw the big
explosion of dot-coms as investors went hog wild, only to have
the balloon burst in 2001. The wild ride made many
people rich, but many businesses went bankrupt.
Since 2002, the Internet has become so integrated
into our society, it has become a popular part of our
culture. Schools started using computers in their
classrooms. Sites like E-Bay, You-Tube, and MySpace, and
Wikipedia became a part of our everyday lives. PayPal
gives us a convenient system of internet payment.
Personal online banking, bill pay, and shopping is
widespread. You can follow the progress of your UPS
packages after shipping, read news within minutes of its occurrence,
and express your views in blogs. The Internet is now
accessible via cell phones and PDA's, and other devices.
Our lives would not be the same without the Internet!
Why is it important to know this
history? Because the Internet used to be simple, with no
standards. Web designers just needed a good knowledge of
HTML and even then, poor code was acceptable. They
only needed to code for the screen, or possibly for print, and
there were only a few browsers with their individual quirks to
consider.
NOW there ARE standards, although these
standards are not yet enforced. A web designer now needs
to know HTML, CSS, XHTML, XML, PHP, ASP, SSI,
JAVASCRIPT, FLASH, and other formats that render most web
pages. There are many different browsers today, and each
has peculiarities. Making a web page appear the same in
all browsers is a complicated matter. Now, too, a web
designer has to consider, and code for (or not), multiple
platforms: print, screen, screen readers, video,
"intelligent devices" such as cell phones, PDA's and
other devices that connect to the Internet. The Web
continues to grow and change, and webmasters need to keep up
to be competitive! It's not so simple anymore!
Now, lest I discourage you, we can still make
simple web pages! There doesn't HAVE to be FLASH
animations, or big bells and whistles. Let's see what we
CAN do!
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