In this section we provide a very basic introduction to the hyper text mark-up language, and related HTML documentation and tools. We then describe what a homepage is and how they are located with uniform resource locators, We then discuss the value of hypertext maps and forms. Last, we explain what it is like developing HTML applications for the World Wide Web.
Before documents can be effectively displayed on the network, they have to be first marked up in the hypertext markup language (also commonly referred to by the letters in its abbreviation - html or HTML). Such documents can then be attractively and consistently displayed by web readers or, as they are sometimes called, browsers. An example is the National Center for Supercomputer Application's Mosaic browser. Html documents are formatted in a very structured manner. Paragraph headers, for instance, are surrounded by special notation as in: <H1>This is a Demonstration Header</H1>. Paragraphs ended with <P> while blank lines in the source text are ignored by html browsers. Similar formatting is available for producing indented lists (ordered or unordered), lists within lists, italics, et cetera. Documents also can include embedded links to other documents or to other locations within the same document. The text pointing to these other locations is highlighted in a different color or, for black and white monitors, underlined.
Other html commands are used to insert graphics, previously recorded sound, or full motion video clips into the text. In these instances, if the web reader is capable of handling the material, an icon would be inserted on the displayed screen, indicating that there was a 
graphic available. Non text-based documents require far more memory and communications bandwidth than do text and therefore considerably reduce system responsiveness. A video of 10 seconds, which would appear only in a small corner of the screen might consume several minutes to download from the server.
Extensive online documentation exists for the Windows, Macintosh, and workstations versions of Mosaic as well as for the WWW, and the NCSA. Developers will also find useful information in web sites such as the WWW and HTML Developers Jump Station , W3 and HTML Tools, and the Web Developers Work Bench. Foreign language versions of some documentation is available on the Web including a Japanese guide to the Hyper Text Markup Language. English language hypertext documentation is also available for introductory, intermediate, and advanced capabilities. But, despite the extensive documentation available online, one of the best ways to learn html is to look at the html for screens developed by others. Each workstation needs to have a copy of the marked up code to present the attractive screen images. That same html code is available in the workstation so t he user can see how a particular effect was achieved. Web Browsers had various ways, some easy and some less so, to make that source html code available for inspection.
The hypertext mark up language will probably eventually be produced automatically by word processors, but most web users in 1994 are still marking up their own documents with the html commands. Specialized software called hypertext editors and converters are available via the web to assist with big conversion efforts. But projects are still time consuming.
Establishing a link from one document to another requires that you know its location or URL (uniform resource locator). Just as an electronic mail address is required to send someone a message over the internet, URL's are necessary to access information. When Mosaic or another web reader is provided with a URL, either by the user keying it in or clicking on highlighted hypertext, the reader initiates a request to the server named in the URL to provide a copy of the file designated. In 1994, URL's were beginning to show up on business cards, advertisements, letterhead, and in the trailers (called 'signatures') to electronic mail messages.
In addition to text and graphics, users can specify in html a map. Maps are graphics that contain links to textual information or to other graphics. A Texan planning a trip to Palo Alto, for instance, scanned a Web-based map of the city of Palo Alto , provided by the Chamber of Commerce, and identified an accommodation close to the site of his meeting. The proprietor of the bed and breakfast, although unaware that their name appeared on a listing on the Web, was delighted by the prospect of this new distribution channel.
Html also supports the use of data capture forms. For instance, The Management Information Systems Quarterly, a journal of research on information systems management , and Grant's Florist and Greenhouse both used the forms fill-in capability to take orders for their merchandise. Customers with web readers that were incapable of handling forms could instead print out the text-based versions of the web documents which they could then complete and fax to the supplier; thus the customer still gets fast turnaround and a greater likelihood of availability, but with no requirement for the supplier to modify current business practices. Other web merchandisers rely on electronic mail addresses for ordering. An example is the Electric Gallery, that displayed and sold original paintings by Haitian artists such as Fernand Pierre's painting entitled, "Arbre de vie" (Tree of life). Images such as those displayed by the Electric Gallery or sound recordings required additional software on the users computer. Once available, however, these programs could be automatically started up and run by web readers such as Mosaic. Much of this software was itself downloadable from the internet often at little or no charge.
Although time consuming, the html documentation syntax is relatively simple. It is also relatively easy to spread the burden of creating web documents across different parts of the country or world. The hierarchical nature of related documents, coupled with the ability to observe one another's work, makes it very easy to work cooperatively or to quickly blend two projects together even across continents. But users of the web commonly encounter under construction notices or file not found error messages in the web pages of even the most sophisticated web developers. Moreover, the web is a very dynamic force with new homepages or changes in old ones occurring daily. But it is also common for web data to be poorly maintained, for servers not to be operating, for homepages to relocate to new servers (and therefore new addresses), or to disappear completely.
