INTERNET INTRODUCTION

The Internet, often called the Information Superhighway by the media, connects computers all over the world to a degree not even anticipated by futurists. With the Internet growing at an astounding rate, businesses around the world see a wealth of opportunity presented by this new medium. Some companies see the Internet primarily as a tool for speeding existing business processes. Others see it as a way to offer new services and to create new sources of revenue. Prophets tell of the day when all business transactions, ranging from customer service to buying and selling of goods and services, can be conducted on the Internet.
The Internet is a large network formed by the interconnection of the computer networks and individual computers all over the world, via phone lines, satellites, an other communications systems. The Internet has it roots in ARPAnet, established by the Advanced Research Projects Agency. It was a research and defense network created by the US Department of Defense in the early 1970s to research network systems and to allow scientists and researchers better communication and data exchange for other projects. One of the early outcomes of this initiative was the development of new ways of routing data via multiple paths using units of data called packets, the destination address of each packet was built into its structure. These methods became the standards known today as Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol (TCP/IP), and form the common language of the Internet allowing different types of computers and different types of networks to interact.

User Friendly for Business

The Internet has become user friendly both for individuals and for businesses. In the past, business activities on the Internet were indeed limited, but now, not only can business be done on the Internet, it is being done by tens of thousands of business.
Business access, previously confined mostly to business dealing with government contracts, is now readily and inexpensively available to all business. Business can now be online 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, world-wide.
User Friendly for People
Until recently, an individual had to learn about many different Internet systems to make full use of Internet's resources. This included learning the nature of, and commands for : FTP, Archive, Gopher, Veronica and WAIS. Now, however, fueled by the growth of the world Wide Web on the Internet, programs have been written that act as an interfaces between you and the Internet. These programs, called "browsers," provide a uniform, easy-to-learn way of dealing with the diverse systems and resources on the Internet.


Excellent for Marketing and Sales

The web is a system on the Internet that allows anyone to have a 24 hour-a-day "presence" on the Internet. Specially written files are placed on a computer connected full time to the Internet. Others on the Internet then can, by using one of the browser programs, view these files. Those "browsing" the Internet can be presented with much more than words -- the files can contain full color pictures, movies, sound, and interactive programs. Viewers indicate their choices of items on a Web page by pointing and clicking with their computer's mouse. These choices can be for other pictures, audio, lists, or even on-screen fill out forms that can be used to send responses to the business or individual that owns the Web page.
Here are just a few of the possibilities for marketing and sales using the World Wide Web
· Full color virtual catalogs with formatted pages of text and pictures -- easily updated, with updates available to others immediately
· On-screen order forms
· Online customer support with graphics, photographs, sound, and text information
· Worldwide distribution of product and other business announcements, without printing or mailing costs
. Customer feedback, request, and survey forms, with data collected in files for you to use whenever you want
Today, for business on the Internet, the absolute hot spot is the World Wide Web. From kitchen table entrepreneurs to multinational conglomerates, businesses are creating their own business presence in cyberspace on the web. There are numerous business functions and activities that can be pursued by using the Web online. These include communication (both internal and external), information management and distribution, public relations, customer service, technical assistance, cost containment, and, of course, marketing and sales.

WORLD WIDE WEB INTRODUCTION

The World Wide Web is a system that makes exchange of data on the Internet easy and eff icient. It consists of two basic components :
1. The Web Server : a computer and software ("server" can refer to either) that stores and distributes data to other computers throughout the Internet that request the information.
2. The Web Browser : software running on an individual's ("client") computer that request information from the Web server and displays it in a manner of directed in the data file itself.

To use the Web, an individual needs a computer with Web browser software and a modem installed. After the Web browser is launched (started), the computer is directed to dial an Internet service provider (with which an account has been arranged). The browser is then given the address of a Web "site" where a Web server will respond by sending a "page" of information. This "page" may have text of various sizes and styles, with pictures and other graphics intermixed. Certain pictures and text will have special highlights or underlines. These special highlights indicate that further information is available. All the individual needs to do is to move the mouse indicator over the highlighted item and click, and the remote Web server will respond with the appropriate information.
More than text and picture can be offered
· Movies and animation
· Moving graphics
· Sound files and real-time sound
· Database and catalogs
· Programs that run directly on your computer
· Opportunities to send information to the owner of the Web site.
The World Wide Web is perhaps the most influential vehicle of information distribution since the invention of the television. The recent boom in the number of Web sites on the Internet attest to this fact. As more and more people gain access to the Web through online services or directly by way of a local Internet Service Provider (ISP), many organizations will focus more on using the Web to keep their customers informed of new products, carry out business transactions, and provide customer service.

History

Until the early 1980s, what is now called the Internet was a relatively small network called ARPAnet. This small network was mainly used as a research tool for about 15 years. After the Internet was created many universities and government organizations got connected to it to exchange and distribute information. Although at first the Internet was used exclusively for educational purposes, commercial organizations realized the potential of the Internet and connected to it, as well.
The Web was created to address information distribution problems on the Internet. Until the creation of the Web, almost all information distribution was accomplished through email, FTP, Archie, and Gopher. Email (electronic mail) became widely used for exchanging information between various groups of people as well as individuals. FTP (File Transfer Protocol) was used to transfer files from one computer to another. Archie was used to locate various files on the Internet. Due to its very nature, before long information was scattered all over the Internet. Therefore, unless you knew where information you needed was located, you had no way of searching for it. This became a major problem when someone had to navigate the Internet in search of information. Because a well organized information infrastructure was missing, the Internet could not be used to its full potential.
As a solution to this problem, Gopher was invented at the University of Michigan. Gopher is a database of information that is organized by using a hierarchical menu interface. Gopher was designed to narrow a user's search from general information to very specific information by offering the user selections of topics from various layers of menus. To extend the amount of information that can be provided, Gopher proved to be a more efficient way of locating and distributing information, its capabilities were limited. Mainly, information distributed by way of Gopher was virtually limited to plain text, and access to information at various locations was not very well organized. Furthermore, Internet information technologies that wee being used around that time were plugged with limitations, such as the following :
· Platform dependence
· Lack of standards
· Incapability of richly formatting content
· Limited virtually to plain text
· Cryptic user interface
· Lack of security
· Familiarity with UNIX often required
· Incapability of being extended to accommodate new technologies
Due to these and other limitations, a new platform independent method had to be invented to distribute information on the Internet. This issue was addressed at the European Particle Physics Laboratory CERN (Conseil Européen pour la Recherche Nucléaire) in Geneva, switzerland, when Hyper Text Markup Language (HTML) was created. HTML was derived from a document formatting language called Standard Generalized Markup Language (SGML). HTML was designed to be a document markup language that's easy to learn, use, and transmit over the Internet. HTML is simpler to use and easier to learn than SGML. To transmit HTML documents on the Internet, a TCP/IP (Transport Control Protocol/Internet Protocol) based protocol was invented. This protocol became known as Hyper Text Transport Protocol (HTTP). The World Wide Web was born with the creation of HTTP and HTML. The Web addresses many of the limitations listed earlier by providing content providers with a powerful medium to distribute information. Web servers speak HTTP to transmit HTML files, and Web browsers use HTTP to retrieve HTML files. Web browsers display various objects, both static and interactive (such as text, images, and java applets), upon retrieving them from Web servers.
With the unification of text, graphics, video, sound, and interactive applications, the World Wide Web has become an exciting medium of information interchange compared to Gopher. Thanks to the World Wide Web, someone looking for information is finally able to browse various information sources and easily travel from one source to another by following various hyperlinks. Hyperlinks are objects that refer to Uniform Resource Locators (URLs) of Web pages. When a user clicks on a hyperlink, he or she is transferred to the Web page to which the hyperlink is linked. URLs can be thought of as addresses of Web pages. Every Web page has one or more URLs associated with it. With the help of special applications and browsers, the World Wide Web has quickly become a vehicle for text and multimedia distribution on the Internet. The World Wide Web gained much of its popularity after Mosaic (Web browser) was released in 1993 by the National Center for Supercomputing Applications (NCSA).

References :
Jill H. Ellsworth & Matthew V. Ellsworth, Marketing on the Internet, Second Edition, 1997
Sanjaya Hettihewa, Windows NT 4, Web Development, Sams net, Indianapolis, First Edition, 1996