Which Font to Use?

To change the font settings in the Windows version of Internet Explorer, from the View menu choose Options. Internet Explorer opens the Options dialog. Make sure the General Tab is selected.

Next, click the Font Setting button to display the Fonts dialog, with the equivalent Font tab from the Preferences dialog in the Macintosh version of Internet Explorer.

Web browsers use two different font-proportional fonts and fixed-width fonts. If you’re unfamiliar with the difference, in proportional fonts characters are different widths, so the letter I is thinner than a capital W. It’s easiest to read in a proportional font, which is why all books use them, In contrast, in a fixed-width font; every character is the same width. Old typewriters tended to use fixed-width fonts. The main utility of fixed-width fonts in today’s Internet is that output from spreadsheets and other columnar documents can be displayed so all the columns line up correctly.

Almost all the text you see on the Web uses proportional font, so select a different font from the Proportional Font drop-down menu to change how most web pages display. Feel free to change the fixed-width font s well, but you’re unlikely to see the results of that change often.

On windows, Times New Roman works pretty well, so you may not feel the need to change it. If you do, try Comic San MS if that’s installed on your system. I’ve used that in Windows and rather like it. On the Macintosh I strongly recommend you switch your font from the standard Times to New York or another font that was designed for screen display (They tend to have names of cities). Once you’ve made your choices, click OK button to save them.

Don’t worry about the Language, Character Set or Font Encoding settings unless you use alternate languages on your computer.

Fonts

The aspect of your web browser that you’re most likely to want to change is the font. Perhaps it’s too small, perhaps it’s too large, or perhaps you simply don’t like the default font, which is Times New Roman in Windows and Times on the Mac.

There’s a huge debate on the Internet about whether or not individuals should be allowed to specify what font their web browsers use. Web page designers want to control the look of their web pages completely, and if you’ve chosen to read web pages using a very large font because your eyes aren’t as good as they used to be, you’re upsetting the design of the pages you see.

Personally, I believe in giving individuals choice and control over their lives, and that applies equally to web page display. So, as mush as I encourage you to customize your copy of Internet Explorer as you want, keep this debate in mind, because some web pages will explicitly specify certain fonts, and you may not be able to override those setting.

Lingua Internet

• Active X: ActiveX is a microsoft technology that enables small programs, call ActiveX control, to your within your web browser.

• ALT tag: An ALT tag is a short text description of a graphic that appears if you turn off the Show Pictures option in Internet Explorer.

• Bookmark: A bookmark is a shortcut to specific web page. Bookmark have easily understood names, in contrast to the often-cryptic URLs they represent.

• Favorites: Firefox uses the term "Favorites" in place of the more common "bookmarks." They're exactly the same thing.

• Fixed-width font: In a fixed-width font, every character is exactly the same width.

• JAVA: Java is a technology and programming language from Sun Microsystems that enables small programs, call JAVA applets, to run within your web browser.

• Proportional Font: In a proportional font, each character is just as wide as it needs to be, ensuring that some characters take up much less space than others.

• Ratings: Internet Explorer supports ratings, which are a way to identify web pages that have potentially offensive content.

Have you ever tried to read the instructions for filling out your IRS tax forms? I certainly hope so, and if you have, I'm sure you were irritated by the tiny font size the IRS uses to keep the booklets form being Novels. Wouldn't it be nice if you controlled how your personal copy of the instruction booklet looked, so you could ensure that the font was large enough to read?

This issue applies equally to web browsers. For instance, the Macintosh version of Internet Explorer defaults to Times for its standard body font. Unfortunately, Times was designed primarily to look good on laser-printed paper, not the screen, and I consider it almost unreadable on screen. I always change the standard font in that version of Internet Explorer as soon as possible so I can read web pages without smudging the monitor with my nose.

There are a number of other features in Internet Explorer that you can customize to turn it into your personal web browser. Of course, if you share your computer with your spouse or kids, you may have to negotiate over some of the personalization settings-your cup of tea might be your spouse's cup of scalding water infused with bits of odoriferous dead plants.

Know more before making a webpage

The World Wide Web is just PART of the entire Internet. In particular, the Web (or WWW) is the part of the Internet where information is presented in a highly visual, often multimedia, format

Information on the World Wide Web is presented in pages. A Web page is like a page in a book made up of text and pictures (also called graphics). A Web page differs from a book page, however, in that it can include other elements, such as audio and video, and links to other Web pages.

It is this linking to other Web pages that makes the Web such a dynamic way to present information. A link on a Web page can point to another Web page from the same author, or to a page on another Web sire. Most link are included as part of a Web page's text and are called hypertext links. (If a link is a part of graphic, it's call a graphic link.) Links are usually in a different color than the rest of the text, and are often underlined. Links are easy to use, Just position your cursor over ta link a notice how the cursor changes shape form the normal arrow to a pointing hand. When the cursor is over the link, click your mouse button; your Web browser will automatically take you to the linked page.

Web page reside at a Web site. a Web side is nothing more than a collections of Web pages (each in its own individual computer file) residing on a host computer. the host computer is connected full-time to the Internet so that you can access the site-and its Web pages-anytime you access the Internet. the main page at serves as "opening screen" that provides a brief overview and a sort of menu of everything you can find at that site. The address of a Web page is called a URL, which stands for Uniform Resource Locator.

Fortunately, you don't need to know what an URL is to access a Web page. All you have to do is enter the URL for a Web page directly in to your browser's Location box, and then press the Enter key. This loads the Web pages that resides at the address you entered into your main browser window

I find that cruising the Web is like browsing through an encyclopedia. Invariably when I'm reading one article in an Encyclopedia, I find a reference to a related article that interests me. When I turn to the new article, I find a reference to another article...and, before I know it, I have all twenty-four volumes open in front of me. when you're n the Web, it's the same sort of experience. In the course of a single session, it's not unusual to discover that you've visited more than a dozen different sites-and still have a lots of interesting places to go!

Your cruise the Web using a piece of software called a Web browser. The two most popular browsers are Netscape Navigator (part of the Netscape Communicator suite of Internet products) and Microsoft's Internet Explorer, Mozilla Firefox, or Opera of which work in similar fashion.