Internet
STRAND 3.4 –THE INTERNET
Introduction
“The internet and World Wide Web are omnipresent in contemporary society. This topic introduces ITGS students to the technology that enables access to the internet. The tools and applications that contribute to the creation of web-based resources and websites are addressed under topic 3.6, “Multimedia/digital media”.
The use of the internet for activities such as e-commerce, academic research and social networking can raise ethical issues and have positive or negative social impacts. These may include exposure to undesirable materials, cyber-bullying, e-fraud, improved communication between individuals and groups, intellectual property theft, plagiarism, spamming and the global dissemination of ideas.
Students are expected to discuss, where appropriate, possible solutions to a specified problem and evaluate their effectiveness. “
- From IBO ITGS Guide
Social and ethical Issues and Knowledge of technology
Ethical and Social Issues of The Internet
3. Social Impact on the Dependence on the Internet.
4. Netiquette.
5. Social Impact of open access to unsuitable material on the internet.
6. Ethical issues related to the misuse of the internet.
7. Social Impact of identity theft through the internet.
8. Social Impact of global viruses
9. Social impact of the domination of English as the main web language
10. Ethical considerations of IT-rich versus IT poor nations as a result of differing access
Fundamentals
• WWW (World Wide Web), URL (uniform resource locator), internet, intranet, extranet
• Internet protocols: for example, HTTP (hypertext transfer protocol), HTTPS (hypertext transfer protocol secure), FTP (file transfer protocol), TCP/IP (transmission control protocol/internet protocol)
• IP address
• Modem, browser, internet service provider (ISP), bandwidth, download, upload, streaming audio/
video, compression, decompression, cache
• Domain names, domain name system (DNS)
• Features of a website: for example, hyperlinks, navigation, metatags, tags, forms
Tags – HTML tags are keywords surrounded by angle brackets like <html>
Metatags – HTML tags that help you control how search engines index your siteby using the keywords and descriptions you provide. They are usually used in web creation in order to enable key words in your site to be found easily by search engines thereby enabling your website to record many hits.
Form (in website) – is a webpage (or part of a webpage)that allows a user to enter data that is sent to a server for processing.
• Features of a browser: for example, bookmarks, visited links, tabs
- Bowser tabs allow you to open several tabs (web pages) within a single active web browser.
• Web-based languages: for example, hypertext markup language (HTML), JavaScript
JavaScript – a web enabled scripting language that uses JAVA – like command codes
• Adding functionality to a browser (for example, plug-ins)
plug-ins – programs which extend your web browser by making it able to work with additional types of web content
• Data-driven websites: for example, active server page extended (ASPX), personal home page (PHP)
ASPX are web pages that have been scripted (written) using micsofoft .net programming language and the web pages are hosted in Micsoftt enabled servers (Servers running IIS)
PHP is a scripting language that is used to create dynamic web content. PHP enabled web pages are usually hosted on Apache web servers – Microsoft web servers do not host php web pages.
• Site management: for example, web hosting, uploading
• Other site use: for example, bounce rate, click-through rate (CTR), avatar, profile
Bounce rate – The bounce rate for a webpage, through which visitors enter your site, tells you how many people ‘bounce’ away (leave) from your site after viewing one page.
click-through rate (CTR)- Click-through rate tells you how many people are clicking through to your site from a third-party. For example from a link, search engine, banner, advertising or email campaign. Your click-through rate tells you the success of your campaigns.
Avatar- An avatar is a computer user’s representation of himself/herself in the form of a three-dimensional model used in computer games or a two-dimensional icon (picture) used on Internet forums and other communities.
Tools
• Search engines, web crawler/spider, search directories, search techniques, filtering, keyword density, keyword prominence, ranking of sites
web crawler – A Web crawler is a computer program that browses the World Wide Web in a methodical, automated manner or in an orderly fashion with the aim of collecting websites, (relevant to the owner of the crawler), on the Internet. A Web crawler is one type of bot, or software agent.
• Social networking: for example, newsgroups, message boards, chat rooms, forums, instant messaging
newsgroups- A newsgroup is a discussion group of people in the intenrt who discuss about a particular subject consisting of notes written to a central Internet site and redistributed through Usenet, a worldwide network of news discussion groups.
message boards-an online discussion site where people can hold conversations in the form of posted messages
• Email, email server, list server
list server- is a web server that handles subscription requests for a mailing list and distributes new messages, newsletters, or other postings from the list’s members to the entire list of subscribers as they occur or are scheduled
• Web 2.0, Web 3.0 and beyond, collaborative online tools: for example, wikis, blogs, micro-blogs, RDF, RSS (really simple syndication) feeds, mashups, forums, social bookmarking, online collaborative applications, podcasts, photocasts, vidcasts, social networking sites, templates, tagging, viral marketing, webcasts, widgets, virtual worlds and learning environments.
Web 2.0, Web 3.0 – a group of web technological advances that uses tools that make advanced web creation very easy and faster.
Wiki - is a website that allows the creation and editing of any number of interlinked web pages via a web browser using a simplified web editing language
Blog- (web log)- is a web site with regular entries of commentary, descriptions of events or notes – www.kennedyb.co.nr is a blog
RDF – The Resource Description Framework (RDF) is a set of rules that enable the encoding, exchange and reuse of structured metadata. RDF is an application of XML that provides clear methods of expressing semantics. It has come to be used as a general method for conceptual description or modeling of information that is implemented in web resources, using a variety of syntax formats.
RSS (really simple syndication) –is a format for delivering regularly changing web content. RSS is a family of web feed formats used to publish frequently updated works—such as blog entries, news headlines, audio, and video—in a standardized format
Mashups – In web development, a mashup is a web page or application that uses and combines data, presentation or functionality from two or more sources to create new services. This enables easy, fast integration of data sources to produce enriched results that were not necessarily the original reason for producing the raw source data.
Tagging – like in facebook,
viral marketing – refers to marketing techniques that use pre-existing social networks to produce increases in brand awareness
widgets- is a small self contained program that you can easily put on your website, blog, or personalized start page in order to add more functionality to your web page and/or web site.
• Web databases, encyclopedias
Services
• Online advertising and marketing technologies: for example, banners, pop-ups, cookies
• Push–pull technologies: for example, email newsletters
Push–pull technologies- Push – pull technology: Contrary to “Pull’ web pageswhere users request data from another program or computer, via a web browser, “Push” enables services to be targeted at the user, without them having to initiate the information collection activity. Instead, information finds the user.
• Content management systems: for example, Moodle, Blackboard
Content management systems (CMS)- is a software system which provides website authoring and administration tools designed to allow users with little knowledge of web programming languages to create and manage the site’s content with relative ease.
A content management system is software that keeps track of every piece of content on your Web site, much like your local public library keeps track of books and stores them. Content can be simple text, photos, music, video, documents, or just about anything you can think of. A major advantage of using a CMS is that it requires almost no technical skill or knowledge to manage. Since the CMS manages all your content, you don’t have to.
• E-commerce technology: for example, business-to-business (B2B), business-to-consumer (B2C), consumer-to-consumer (C2C), payment services, secure transactions
• The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C)
W3C – is an international community where Member organizations, a full-time staff, and the public work together to develop Web standards.
Internet threats and security
• Internet security: for example, firewall, proxy server, SSL (secure sockets layer), encryption, public and private keys, digital signatures
SSL - Short for Secure Sockets Layer, a protocol developed by Netscape for transmitting private documents via the Internet. SSL uses a cryptographic system that uses two keys to encrypt data − a public key known to everyone and a private or secret key known only to the recipient.
Whereas SSL creates a secure connection between a client and a server, over which any amount of data can be sent securely, SHTTP is designed to transmit individual messages securely. SSL and SHTTP, therefore, can be seen as complementary rather than competing technologies.
• Internet threats: for example, global viruses, hackers, spam, phishing, pharming, spyware, adware
Practical techniques
• Collaborative online tools: for example, wikis, blogs, RSS feeds, mashups, forums, social bookmarking,
online collaborative applications, podcasts, photocasts, vidcasts, social networking sites, templates,
virtual worlds and virtual learning environments
References:
http://quizlet.com/18449698/ch-1-intro-to-the-internet-flash-cards
http://www.opentracker.net/article/bounce-rate-and-click-through-rate
http://www.webmasterworld.com/forum47/3336.htm
http://www.tech-faq.com/browser-plugins.html
http://www.newprosoft.com/web_spider.htm
http://searchexchange.techtarget.com/definition/newsgroup
http://searchsoa.techtarget.com/definition/list-server
http://kennedyb.wordpress.com/2011/01/10/strand-3-4-%E2%80%93the-internet/