Browsing web-pages

A web-browser is the main way for you to view information on the internet. If you are reading this guide on the web, then you are using a web-browser to do it. The most commonly used browsers are Internet Explorer, Mozilla Firefox, Apple Safari and Google Chrome. Most of what you do on the internet can be done via the web-browser.

This includes: -

• Reading web-pages
• Research using a search engine
• Reading and composing email
• Creating and editing documents and spreadsheets, using online applications
• Interacting with online communities and networks
• Creating and updating your own web-pages
• Communicating in real time via text and voice.

Things you will find in a web browser:

• An address bar where you can type the address (or URL) of a website (such as www.tacticaltech.org).
• A search window (in which you can type keywords) that connects to a search engine
• A home button which will take you back to a designated web-page that is opened every time you restart your browser (this can be changed in the 'preferences' or 'options' menus).
• A stop button which will stop a web-page from loading. This is helpful if the page seems to be taking a while to download into your browser 
• A reload/refresh button which will start downloading the page again from the beginning
• Forward and Back buttons which make it easy to navigate through pages you have already browsed.
• A bookmark bar, where you can store website addresses which you might want to visit again.