The World Wide Web on AzTeC (through LYNX browser)

One of the services that the AzTeC Free-Net offers its members is the use of World Wide Web access to the Internet. The World Wide Web (WWW or just "The Web") is only one way to get information from the Internet. There are many types of software (called browsers) available for displaying information on the Web (Mosaic, Cello, Netscape, etc.); the software that AzTeC uses to display Web information is called Lynx.

Lynx is a text-based browser. This means that although some of the sites on the Web have recorded sounds, technical and scientific graphs, images of art, the planets, or President Clinton, or even Socks meowing, we will not be able to see or hear these things when using the Lynx browser. However, we will be able to see all the textual information that is available.

How it works:

  1. Choose the World Wide Web option from the main menu (currently option #11).

  2. The AzTeC Home Page will come up. Take a look at the layout of the screen; commands are at the bottom; options for you to pick are highlighted. Move the highlight with the tab key or the down arrow. Then select it by pressing enter or the right arrow.

    The AzTeC Home Page is still under development but you can see what is available now (for example the Arts & Entertainment option, the City of Tempe info, and the Local Information on Other Servers menu).

  3. Choose "Local Information on Other Servers" and you'll get a list of subjects to choose from. Next, choose Arizona Universities. Then, choose "Arizona State University Web Server"

    Choose help to get a list of all possible keystroke commands.

  4. To exit from the Web, type "q" for quit, then "y" to confirm that you want to exit.

Tips

If you get stuck at any point and can't connect to a site or can't exit, press "z" or "Control G" (Ctrl G). Either of these two commands should stop what the machine is doing (even if it is waiting to 'time out'). You will be returned to the screen before the interrupted command. If you find yourself still stuck, then press "Control C" (Ctrl C) but then the machine will take you back to square one (back to the AzTeC main screen) and you will have to start all over again to choose the Web and re-start browsing it from the beginning.

There are a few options on Lynx that AzTeC members don't have access to: bookmarks, saving, downloading and the "go" command.

To mail a file to yourself, or to any valid email address, use the "p" command and it will give you the option to print to the screen (it will display the text of the document scrolling on the screen) or mail. Just be sure to enter your entire AzTeC email address at the prompt.

Press "Backspace" or "Delete" to get to the History Page. This page is very valuable because it tells how you got to where you are.

Press "=" to find information about the file you are viewing.

Press "/" to search through a long list of menu items for a subject or keyword.

Press "i" to access and view the corresponding "index".

[IMAGE] means if you had a browser that was capable of displaying the image, you would see it on your screen right now. AzTeC members won't see images because we are using the Lynx browser.

To search the Web

There are many ways to find information on the Web. One way is to get to a page with some WWW search options. To find one, follow these steps from the AzTeC home page.

Choose:

Selected Additional Information

Federal Web Locator (Under the 'government related' section)

Way down at the bottom of the page (hit the space bar several times) are several search engines to choose from.

At this point read the screen and choose one of the search engines. Be careful; you may get stuck in a data entry line. If that happens, the down arrow may input the number 2 in the space rather than move you on to the next link. Don't worry, use the tab key to continue moving down the page. Lycos is the name of one of the most popular (and busiest) search engines. If you decide to use it, choose the most current catalog. When you see this prompt at the bottom of the screen:

        --More-- This is a searchable index. Use 's' to search.
you can press "s" and enter your search terms (genealogy, amateur radio, hiking, Clinton, job openings, Star Trek, or keywords that describe whatever you are looking for).

When Lycos completes your search, it will tell you how many items it has found. Then you need to page down a screen or two to see pointers to the documents it has found. When the congestion of queries is too much of a burden because, e.g., some of the Lycos engines are down, the screen will only show little more than the titles and the Web addresses pointing at the documents. In any case, don't panic, you will be able to retrieve all the documents to the screen, one by one, by first highlighting the address of reference and then pressing Enter.

If you know that you are going to email more than one document to the same address, you can save typing by entering the address in the 'Options Screen' that you can access by pressing 'o' any time while you are using the Lynx browser. Lynx will remember the address until you quit.

You can exit the WWW at any time by pressing "q" to quit, then "y" to confirm.




             AzTeC Help Line Volunteer Team
             revised 3/13/95