Assignment 2

In this course, it is required that you have some experience using the World Wide Web. You have probably already used a search engine site like Lycos or Yahoo to look for information and websites on a particular topic. The purpose of this assignment is to introduce you to other types of resources that are available through the Web. Naturally, we can only cover a few; but feel free to explore, that's what the Web's all about. In addition to the reading assignment in the syllabus, you may want to review the section on browser basics in Tutorial 3. Be sure to check out the section labeled "Addresses on the Web" on pages 3.05 through 3.10.

Questions from the reading assignment:

1. Who has centralized control over the Internet?
   
   
2. UNIX is case sensitive (T/F).
   
   
3. What is an IP address, and what is its purpose?
   
   
4. What is a URL, and what are its four main parts?
   
   
5. Your book goes into a lot of detail about exploratory questions vs. specific questions. Give an example of each.
   
   
6. Search engines search every web page on the Internet (T/F).
   
   
7. Explain the purpose of the wildcard character in your own words.
   
   
8. What are the two most common image file formats that appear on web pages, AND why are these the most common?
   
   
9. According to the book, where does one look to find standards for citing electronic resources?
   
   

Basic Web searches

The most common way to get information from the Web is to use one of the popular search sites. For this exercise, we will use http://www.google.com. Search Google for an article about broadband in Sacramento.

10. List the information you found, what search terms you used to perform the search, the date, and the time you did your search.

Now go to http://www.mapquest.com/ and get a map for the CSUS area: enter 6000 J st. Sacramento CA. 95819 in the search form. Click "map it!", and mapquest should generate a map for you. Below the newly generated map, you can select specific categories to display. Choose the "Gov/Schools" tab, select "Colleges", and update the map. Now, select the "Identify Icon" radio button immediately below the map and answer the following:

11. What colleges show up on this map?

Search Tools:

12. Find two additional search sites of your own. Describe them, including what type of search site they are.

Some Useful Information:

The school of ECS has its own source now for offering computer based training to CSUS students, faculty, and staff. The site is: http://sage.ecs.csus.edu/ Once you download and install the client software, you have free access to dozens of self-paced computer courses that you can take on your own time, some for credit. See the Computer Science department web page for more details.