A primary purpose, if not the primary purpose, of the Internet is the sharing of information between universities, companies, governments, nonprofit organizations, and individuals. At present, millions of pieces of information are available on the Internet in a variety of formats. Many people call this an information overload or an information wasteland. This need not be the case, however. In this chapter, you receive the knowledge and tools needed to navigate the Internet and find the information you are looking for. We hope that the tips in this chapter help you avoid much of the information you have no interest in.
In the early days of the Internet, the information situation was vastly different, but it is important to understand the past to understand the present. The original part of the Internet, the ARPAnet, was funded as a research project in computer networking. Needless to say, people quickly started using the network for exchanging information. Because the number of sites on the Internet was relatively few, however, users could find just about any information they were looking for—or find out that it was not available on the network at all. Advanced information-searching tools were not needed. The traditional method of providing information on the Internet in those early days was the anonymous File Transfer Protocol (FTP) site, which is discussed in more detail later.
In the mid-1980s, the Internet started experiencing exponential growth, which continues to this day. Universities and other users began placing information services—such as library catalogs known as Online Public Access Catalogs (OPACs) and systems known as Campus Wide Information Systems (CWIS)—online. These services, which contain information about specific universities, were accessible with the Telnet and rlogin protocols. Quickly, people discovered that they could no longer easily find the information they sought on the Internet. For the remainder of the 1980s and even through 1991, the situation was still not too bad. A handful of electronic guides appeared during the end of this period to help users find what they were looking for on the Internet.
These guides were just an electronic equivalent of a paper list. In fact, it was common that these electronic lists were printed and used as a paper reference book. Later, several of the guides even had official print editions. However, by the early 1990s, many of the guide authors became overwhelmed with just the sheer number of additions and changes to the guides.
In 1990 and 1991, new ways to provide information on the Internet—such as Wide Area Information Servers (WAIS), Gopher, and the World Wide Web (WWW)—hit the scene. These systems enable many Internet users to make information easily accessible on the Net. Previously, only professional computer professionals had easy methods of providing information. The result was that the number of pieces of information on the Internet soared from thousands of items to millions of items in a short period.
Meanwhile, tools such as Archie, Veronica, and Jughead came out to help people search for information. Although these tools are heavily used on the Internet, they are still going through an evolution and are becoming more sophisticated over time.
The first major electronic hypertext guide to Internet resources—Hytelnet—became available at the end of 1990. Since then, several of the earlier guides have been discontinued (because of author burnout). At least one major guide is now generated electronically. Also, instead of general guides, it is more common today to find specialized guides on topics such as agriculture and law all over the Internet.
In 1993, the United States government funded the Internet Network Information Center (InterNIC) to help users find Internet access and information on the Internet.
What effect has this history had on the current state of information on Internet? The effects can be seen just about everywhere in the current state of the Internet. Let's look at the effects:
At different times on the Internet, different information location methods have been used. Today, all information location methods exist in parallel. Each method has its strengths and weaknesses, but all are useful in their own way. The different information locations are these:
The proponents of hypertext argue that it leaves traditional browsing methods in the dust. The arguments against hypertext can be summed up in one commonly stated sentence: "You see a lot of little hypertext links all the same." This sentence is a quote from the Infocom text adventure game Zork, and it's true. The basic problem with hypertext is that most people start looking at the links and may even traverse a few. But after a few jumps, the user is reading materials on an entirely different subject. Also, people tend to get lost in the hypertext links.
Good hypertext can be really good. Unfortunately, the majority of hypertext seems to fall somewhere in the poor-to-bad category. Hopefully, over time, people's skills at writing hypertext material will improve. Over the last few years, there has been only a small improvement in hypertext authoring skills. In addition, HTML (HyperText Markup Language) is getting more advanced (which may help to some degree).
This book covers three different hypertext systems. The first is Hytelnet, which is a good piece of hypertext. The second is the fast growing World Wide Web, which is made up of millions of hypertext documents. The quality of these documents goes all the way from excellent to terrible—with the majority of them somewhere in between. The third hypertext system is relatively small and unknown but shows some signs that it could be the next World Wide Web in size. It is called Hyper-G.
When using the Internet, it is important to be able to take advantage of all five information location methods. Some pieces of information on the Internet can be found with only one method.
Many of the chapters in this part of the book describe individual tools for finding information on the Internet. It is important to know when to use one tool over another one.
You often select a tool based on where the information is stored. At other times, an information resource on the Internet is in multiple formats.
Here's a brief list of specific Internet tools:
In addition to the information-finding tools described in this part of the book, Chapter 21, "Finding People on the Internet," explains how to find people—and their computers—on the Internet. It may be necessary for you to refer to some of the other chapters in this section because Telnet, WAIS, the WWW, and Gopher are all useful tools for finding people. In addition, Chapter 21 describes several tools that are unique to the problems of finding people on the Internet.
When you first start looking for information on the Internet, do yourself a favor and look for something that interests you instead of a boring topic. If you are interested in rock music, don't waste your time looking for Moby Dick (although information on the novel is available). You can search for lyrics to the Blue Oyster Cult song "Don't Fear the Reaper"—if you hunt around, you can find them (try using Archie or Veronica to find the lyrics). Remember that the Internet can be fun and fascinating if you let it be. Don't think it is boring!
If you want to hone your searching skills, you can join the Internet Hunt contest held monthly. Every month, the context moderator asks a few questions that have answers on the Internet. People around the world try to find the answer and send in the answers. The winners receive prizes!
Remember that if you cannot find a piece of information you are looking for, you can always find a mailing list or newsgroup on the topic. Look for tips in the FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions) file for the newsgroup. If you do not see a tip, feel free to post a question. Someone will usually provide an answer.
Now review the following chapters on finding information. You do not necessarily have to read them in order; start with the one that interests you most.