World Wide Web

The past week saw the twentieth anniversary of the beginning of the World Wide Web - a development that we now all take for granted but which has dramatically changed the way we communicate and search for information.

The following links provide information about the development of the World Wide Web. A link to the first www website is included in some of these articles. -

CERN statement - Twenty years of a free, open web

Happy birthday www - About computers

Birth of the web - CERN

Evolution of the Web - About computers

A timeline of the history of the world wide web

Articles on developments of the Internet -

Hobbes' Internet timeline

Internet history - Computer History Museum

Digitisation resource

The NSW State Records have a resource that contains useful information about digitisation as well as digitisation projects. Check the tag for digitisation in the blog, Archives Outside for  relevant articles. A recent post this month is part 1 of a series - Digitising your collection - Project Planning. Worth a look.

Backing up computers

More and more valuable information is now being stored on computers. This article from About computers is directed at home owners of computers but is also definitely applicable for members of community groups. The Dos and-Don'ts of PC Backups

Choosing a safe password

Today we need passwords for almost everything. This article in About.com Internet for beginners provides useful tips for creating a safe password - How to Choose a Good Password.

Web design - how to drive away your readers

About.com recently published an article How to drive away your readers  which includes a number of points relevant to historical society websites. Points to avoid include using impossible navigation on a site, not maintaining the site (outdated material), trying to use latest web tools without considering whether the computers of your readers will be able to use them and using too many images (particularly large images that take too long to download. As usual with About.com articles there are also links to other related articles on the topic. About.com articles do have adds on their pages but if you keep reading you will usually find relevant information.

CSS - Cascading Style Sheets

For those who prefer to design their own web pages using html, learning to use cascading style sheets can be a useful tool in the design of the website. About.com recently provided an introductory article on the topic of Cascading Style Sheets - Learn to love CSS - along with links to other articles on CSS in the About.com Web design / HTML section.

Photoshop tutorials

A recent post from About.com provides a link to a Photoshop Tutorial - How to Use the Levels Tool. The tutorial includes a short video plus written instructions. Although this is for Photoshop CS6 the information could be useful as a guide when using other versions of Photoshop or other photo editing software. Links to other Photoshop Tutorials provided in the About.com Graphics Software section can also be found in the article. - Photoshop Tutorials