Introduction to the Internet: Read & Quiz Yourself

What is the Internet? It's a global information system, made up of linked computer networks from around the world.

What resources and tools will you find on the Internet? a. The world wide web b. Email c. Instant messaging d. Fee-based databases e. All of the above, plus more!

In this unit, we will focus just on the world wide web, which provides information from websites that are detectable by search tools such as Google and Yahoo!.

I can find everything on the Web. True False

There are billions of web pages. Who creates all these webpages? a. Companies b. Colleges & universities c. Governments d. Non-profit organizations e. Anyone with web access! [mark all correct answers]

You can get an idea of what kind of organization a web page is coming from just by looking at the web address, or URL.

Part of each URL includes a domain name, such as .com.

For example, a URL that has .edu as the domain name is from an educational institution:

If it has .gov as the domain name, it's from a government source:

Match the following domain names with the correct institution or country:

Match the items. a b c d e f g 1. .com     a. United Kingdom a b c d e f g 2. .org     b. Commercial organizations a b c d e f g 3. .edu     c. Educational institutions a b c d e f g 4. .mil     d. Japan a b c d e f g 5. .jp     e. India a b c d e f g 6. .in     f. Non-profit organizations a b c d e f g 7. .uk     g. Military

If you're interested in learning more about domain names, visit the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN).

If it's on the web, it must be true. True False

Websites on just about any topic imaginable are only a mouse click away. However, due to the lack of editorial and quality control and the enormous number of web pages available, the web pages found on the Internet represent a very wide range of quality, reliability and objectivity. There are many excellent web pages that are appropriate for college research, and many that are not. We'll look at ways to evaluate a web page's appropriateness for college research later in this unit.

All information on the Internet is free. True False

 Let's try a few Google questions. We'll take an in-depth look at Google later.

If you do a search in the search engine Google, you are searching the entire Web. True False

Google is fast and easy. One does not need special skills to use it. True False

Google is the best search engine out there. True False

One last question: What's the difference between a website and a webpage? A website is made up of many webpages. For example, Northern Virginia Community College has a website, which consists of hundreds of webpages. If you're ever on a webpage wondering who created it, look for a "Home" button to take you back to the website's main page.