Re: MS Internet Assistant

["Steven J. Owens" <puff -at- NETCOM -dot- COM>]

Shelly La Rock (smlarock -at- mtu -dot- edu) suggested:
> I would guess that you would need at least a basic understanding of
> HTML before you could use I.A., but I'm sure you wouldn't need to
> know anything extensive.

> My advice would be to find a WWW site that can provide you with a
> little background about HTML and some of the basic tags.  That way,
> you should have a much easier understanding of what the <br> button
> or the <hr> button are for.

     I'd suggest the WWW & HTML Developer's JumpStation, maintained by
SingNet and hosted by OneWorld Information Services, which has links
to various resources:

     http://oneworld.wa.com/htmldev/devpage/dev-page.html

     A quick review of the table of contents:

 1. Writing HTML Documents
 2. Information on the World Wide Web (WWW)
 3. WWW Server Software
 4. WWW Directory Services
 5. WWW Names and Addresses, URIs, URLs, URNs
 6. HTML Editors
 7. HTML Converters
 8. Using Mosaic as a Database Client
 9. Using Mosaic Forms
 10. Art Galleries and Graphics
 11. WWW. Conferences and Papers
 12. Conferences and Papers


     The basics of HTML are really quite, er, basic, and one of the
best ways to learn is to go webcrawling and use the "view source"
command on your browser to see how they did it.  The only aspects of
HTML that I couldn't immediately pick up this way were doing clickable
image maps (images where different parts of the image were links to
different URLs) and CGI scripts (which allow you to do menus and forms
and the like; doing the menus and forms was easy enough, but
understanding how the scripts on the server end interpret them was a
bit trickier).

     There's also an HTML mailing list you can use to get advice and
listen to conversations between HTML developers.  To subscribe, send
e-mail to listserv -at- netcentral -dot- net with no subject and a single line
in the body:

     subscribe html-list yourfirstname yourlastname

     Once you get confirmation from the listserv, you can post to the
list by sending to html-list -at- netcentral -dot- net -dot-   You can contact the list
moderator, Cy Fenton, by sending to html-mod -at- netcentral -dot- net -dot-   I'd
suggest that you just lurk for a while, until you get comfortable with
HTML.  The following is from confirmation message:

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NOTE: This Mailing list is intended for HTML authors with at least SOME
      experience writing HTML.  If you need pointers for learning about
      how to write HTML initially, there are many excellent Web based
      tutorials and documents available.  Several of the best include:

   *  http://www.ncsa.uiuc.edu/General/Internet/WWW/HTMLPrimer.html
      The Classic HTML Primer by the folks that bring you Mosaic.

   *  http://www.ziff.com/~eamonn/crash_course.html
      A Crash Course in writing HTML.  Excellent starter material!

   *  http://akebono.stanford.edu/yahoo/Computers/World_Wide_Web/HTML/
      Basically all there is to know about HTML design - This is a great
      link for ANYBODY!

   *  http://sunsite.unc.edu/boutell/faq/www_faq.html
      The WWW Frequently Asked Questions document - Everything you
      always wanted to know about WWW and how it works.

      These documents should help you get the basics down.  After
      you have created your first page or two, then feel free to
      subscribe to the list and ask questions to your hearts content!
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