Web 1.0

Tim Berners'-Lee said in his written short personal history that "the dream behind the web is of a common information space in which we communicate by sharing information" Berners-Lee, Tim, (1998).  I think this sum up web 1.0.  Its structure was in the format of a web page with linkages to sub pages and included search functions (Cormode and Krishnamurthy, 2008 pp.8). It’s been described as static, non interactive and read only web pages, Strickland, J. (2008).  However, Web 1.0 allowed information to be shared and access freely over the internet and created an explosion of information. It revolutionized how libraries would service their customers.  In particular how reference libraries delivered resources and access to online databases. Web 1.0 technologies include the Internet, World Wide Web and Information Retrieval.

Defined as a global network of computers the internet was created in the 1990's, TechTarget Inc. (2006).  Tim Berners-Lee created the internet based upon the client /server model of communication by piecing together 3 elements: HTTP, URL and HTML, (Berners-Lee, Tim, 1998 pp. 39). These elements would allow computers to communicate with each other.  HTTP (Hypertext Transfer Protocol) is the set of rules that facilitates the flow of information between computers.  URL (Uniform Resource Locator) is the address of file that is requested. The URL address would include the protocol e.g. HTTP, a domain name and a hierarchical description of the location of the file e.g. http://www.student.city.ac.uk/~abjm507/first1.html . The user can request a file by typing the URL in the web browser or by clicking on a hyper text link. HTML (Hypertext Mark up Language) is defined as the set of mark up symbols or codes inserted in a file intended for display on a World Wide Web browser page. It tells the browser how to display the document. By using tags, documents can be created in natural language and can include text, picture and links. Tags are characterized by the angle brackets, <>. This structure facilitated the transmission of information and formed the World Wide Web[1].

In Web 1.0, web pages were mainly read only pages, hence the aesthetics of the web page played a significant role with their creators. This is where CSS (Cascading Style Sheets) come into use.  CSS are pre defined web pages that enhance the appearance of web page. CSS are a set of instructions that defined what the web page will look like to the user. It gives creators more control over the appearance of their web pages e.g. adding different fonts, colours and headings and allowed the creators to use initiative in vying for user’s attention.

Databases existed before the internet. They came about in an effort to organise data for easy retrieval.  In the 1960's, companies employed computers to store huge amounts of data.  A file centred approach was used where each department kept their own records. Problems aroused with managing and retrieving huge amounts of data. In particular, data was being duplicated and there was a program data dependence which meant that any changes to the data storage would result in program changes. Also, there was the lack of a search function.  In the 1970's E.F. Codd proposed a relational database structure which resulted in data being centralised and which introduced SQL query, Bandwidthco (2006). Relational database was centred on tables which had a two dimensional grid of rows and columns.  Each column represents a different data item.  By assigning primary and foreign keys to the tables, they could be linked to each other to form relationships, Deitel, H.M., Deitel, P.J. & Goldberg, A.B. (2004).  Structured query Language (SQL) is the language program designed to search the database. By using statements like, Select, From, Where, and using operators e.g. =, <, > the data can be retrieved. The database management system (DBMS) acts between the data and the user, it stores the data and allows the user to execute structured searches without the user knowing the mechanics of the system.

Whilst databases organised and stored data and the internet provide the means for information to be available online, Information Retrieval[2] seeks to identify users’ information needs and evaluate how best to satisfy those needs, Broder, A. (2002). Why users do searches can be classified into 3 main types: navigational queries[3], transactional queries[4] and information queries[5]. Web 1.0 is concerned with information queries since in this era web pages were static and required no interaction from the user, Broder, A. (2002).  A process of indexing which involves, identifying fields, indentifying words, removing stop words, stemming specifying synonyms is use to create surrogate records and inverted files for quick retrieval.  Search techniques included Boolean searching which uses combinations AND, OR, NOT to retrieve documents, hypertext which can be used by clicking on what you want and natural language which can be use by typing a string of words in a search box.  Often searches may not retrieve any relevant results and users are required to do a query modification. This can be done manually where the user adds or delete words or automatically where the modification is done for you by using formulas to calculate blind expansion[6] and relevance feedback[7]. Precision[8] and recall[9] can be used to evaluate the effectiveness of searching. Their formulas can be used to find out how good their system is at retrieving documents (Monica Brinkley and Mary Burke, 1995).

Web 1.0 technologies meant that librarians had to be equipped with new skills and knowledge to satisfy customer's information needs. The internet had become a reference tool and new resources which included online databases, online directories search engines was made, accessible to customers. Although this made a positive impact on disseminating information to users’, issues that cropped up included legal issues e.g. licences and copyright, web accessibility, and relevant staff training,(Margaret Jay and Sheila Webber, 2005).  As were heading into Web 3.0 these problems still have to be constantly addressed to ensure the creators and users are compatible with each other.

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[1] World Wide Web defined as “the universe of network accessible information, an embodiment of human knowledge” by W3C

[2] Information Retrieval defined as part of computer science which studies the retrieval of information (not data from a collection of written documents, U C Berkely School of Information (2010

[3] Navigational searching defined as the immediate intent is to reach a particular site, Broder, A. (2002)

[4] Transactional searching defined as. the intent is to perform some web-mediated activity, Broder, A. (2002)

[5] Informational searching defined as the intent is to acquire some information assumed to be present on one or more web pages, Broder, A. (2002) more web pages, Broder, A. (2002)

[6] Blind expansion is where search engines use a formula to come up with a better set of search terms, Robertson (1990)

[7] Relevance feedback is defined  the process of taking retrieved documents that have been determined to be good examples of what the user wants, and using them to produce an improved query, Shneiderman, B. (1997)

[8] . Precision is the ratio of the number of documents retrieved that "should" have been retrieved -- i.e., the number of retrieved documents that were really relevant to the query -- to the total number of documents retrieved, Shneiderman, B. (1997)

[9] Recall is the ratio of the number of relevant documents retrieved to the number of relevant documents in the database. Each can vary from 0 to 1, and the higher the value, the better, Shneiderman, B. (1997)

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References

Books

 Berners-Lee, Tim. (2000) Weaving the World Wide Web: the past, present and future of the World Wide Web by its inventor. London:Texere

Deitel, H.M., Deitel, P.J. & Goldberg, A.B. (2004) Internet and world wide web: how to program, Pearson Education Ltd

Morville, P. 2006, Information architecture for the World Wide Web, 3rd ed. edn, OReilly, Beijing Farnham.

Articles
Margaret Jay, Sheila Webber, (2005) "Impact of the internet on delivery of reference services in English public libraries", Program: electronic library and information systems, 39 ( 1), pp.25 - 38

Monica Brinkley, Mary Burke, (1995) "Information retrieval from the Internet: an evaluation of the tools", Internet Research, 5 ( 3), pp.3 - 10

Websites

Asgarali-Finn, S. (2010) DITA session 2 assignment. Available: http://www.student.city.ac.uk/~abjm507/first1.html  [29 October 2010]

Bandwidthco (2006). Available: http://www.bandwidthco.com/history/db/A%20Short%20Database%20History.pdf [30 October 2010]

Broder, A. (2002). A taxonomy of web search SIGIR Forum Fall, 36(2). [Online: visited 25th October 2010]

Cormode, Graham and Krishmamurthy, B. (2008) Key differences between Web 1.0 and Web 2.0. Available: http://www2.research.att.com/~bala/papers/web1v2.pdf  [29 October 2010]

Shneiderman, B. (1997) Clarifying search: a user framework for text searches. Available: http://www.dlib.org/dlib/january97/retrieval/01shneiderman.html  [29 October 2010]

Singhal, Amit. (2001) Modern information retrieval: a brief overview. Available:  http://singhal.info/ieee2001.pdf      [29 October 2010]

Strickland, J. (2008) "Is there a Web 1.0?”  Available: HowStuffWorks.com. http://computer.howstuffworks.com/web-101.htm#  [30 October 2010]

TechTarget Inc. (2006), Whatis?com. Available: http://www.whatis.com/ [30 October 2010]

U C Berkely School of Information (2010) Modern Retrieval Information glossary. Available : http://people.ischool.berkeley.edu/~hearst/irbook/glossary.html#I    [29 October 2010]

World Wide Web Consortium (2009) Available: http://www.w3.org/ [30 October 2010]