http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/buzz/css/ Recent content in Css on Ariadne Hugo -- gohugo.io en-gb Mon, 08 Jul 2013 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/71/cooper-brewerton/ Mon, 08 Jul 2013 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/71/cooper-brewerton/ Reviewing Loughborough University Library’s Web site statistics over a 12-month period (October 2011 – September 2012) showed a monthly average of 1,200 visits via mobile devices (eg smart phones and tablet computers). These visits account for 4% of the total monthly average visits; but plotting the percentage of visits per month from such mobile devices demonstrated over the period a steady increase, rising from 2% to 8%. These figures were supported by comparison with statistics from the Library’s blog, where, over the same period, there was also a steady increase in the percentage of visits from mobile devices. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/71/reese/ Mon, 08 Jul 2013 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/71/reese/ Assessment of electronic resources has long proven a difficult challenge for librarians when looking to make collection development decisions.  Often, these decisions are made by looking at usage statistics provided by the vendor, and through informal conversations with selected faculty within affected disciplines.  The ability to capture point-of-use information from users remains a significant challenge for many institutions.  The purpose of this paper will be to suggest a novel approach to providing intercept survey functionality for librarians looking to simplify the gathering of user feedback for library provided materials. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/70/turner/ Fri, 30 Nov 2012 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/70/turner/ At the moment organisations often make significant investments in producing Web-based material, often funded through public money, for example from JISC. But what happens when some of those organisations are closed or there  is no longer any money or resources to host the site? We are seeing cuts in funding or changes in governmental policy, which is resulting in the closure of some of these organisations. What happens to those Web resources when the organisations are no longer in existence? http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/69/bunting/ Mon, 30 Jul 2012 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/69/bunting/ Tools and strategies for content management are a perennial topic in Ariadne. With more than one hundred articles touching on content management system (CMS) technologies or techniques since this online magazine commenced publication in 1996, Ariadne attests to continuing interest in this topic. Authors have discussed this topic within various contexts, from intranets to repositories and Web 2.0,  with some notable surges in references to 'content management' between 2000 and 2005 (see Figure 1 below).  Although levels of discussion are by no means trending, over recent years it is clear that Ariadne authors have taken note of and written about content management tools and techniques on a regular basis. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/68/edui-2011-rpt/ Tue, 06 Mar 2012 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/68/edui-2011-rpt/ The third annual edUi Conference [1] was held October 13-14, 2011, in Richmond, Virginia, USA. The sold-out event saw 225 ‘Web professionals serving colleges, universities, libraries, museums, and beyond’ join together to discuss the latest and greatest in Web trends and technologies. The all-volunteer conference was presented by the Virginia Foundation for the Humanities, and major sponsors included Microsoft, the University of Richmond, and Virginia Commonwealth University. The two-day event consisted of four tracks [2]: http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/67/blackwell-hackneyblackwell/ Sun, 03 Jul 2011 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/67/blackwell-hackneyblackwell/ Quotation is the heart of scholarly argument and teaching, the activity of bringing insight to something complex by focused discussion of its parts. Philosophers who have reflected on the question of quotation have identified two necessary components: a name, pointer, or citation on the one hand and a reproduction or repetition on the other. Robert Sokolowski calls quotation a 'curious conjunction of being able to name and to contain' [1]; V. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/66/hitchcock-tarrant/ Sun, 30 Jan 2011 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/66/hitchcock-tarrant/ Preservation: The Effect of Going Digital Preservation of scholarly content seemed more straightforward when it was only available in printed form. Production, dissemination and archiving of print are performed by distinctly separate, specialist organisations, from publishers to national libraries and archives. Preservation of publications established as having cultural significance - printed literature, books and, in the academic world, journals fall into this category - is self-selecting and systematic in a way that has not yet been fully established for digital content. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/64/iwmw-2010-rpt/ Thu, 29 Jul 2010 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/64/iwmw-2010-rpt/ This was the 13th Institutional Web Management Workshop [1] to be organised by UKOLN [2] held at the University of Sheffield from 12 to 14 July 2010. The theme was 'The Web in Turbulent Times' [3]. As such, there was a healthy balance of glass-half-empty-doom-and-gloom, and glass-half-full-yes-we-can. More detailed reporting, including live blogging by Kirsty McGill of T Consult Ltd [4] and blog posts by presenters, can be found at the IWMW Blog [5]. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/63/massam-et-al/ Thu, 29 Apr 2010 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/63/massam-et-al/ 'The mobile phone is undoubtedly [a] strong driving force, a behaviour changer…Library users will soon be demanding that every interaction can take place via the cell phone' [1] The move towards mobile technologies in libraries and in the wider educational environment is gathering increasing momentum as we enter a new decade. This is reflected in the huge amount of Web content, research reports and innovative projects devoted to mobile learning and mobile applications in libraries which can be found via a quick search on Google. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/61/iwmw-2009-rpt/ Fri, 30 Oct 2009 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/61/iwmw-2009-rpt/ The 12th annual Institutional Web Managers Workshop (IWMW) attracted nearly 200 delegates, making it the largest workshop in the event's history. Whilst the popularity of the physical event has grown, so too has the remote audience. So this year organisers Marieke Guy and Brian Kelly decided that it was time to start treating this remote audience as first class citizens. That's where I came in. As live blogger, my job was to amplify IWMW 2009; providing a live commentary via Twitter on the dedicated @iwmwlive account, blogging on the IWMW 2009 blog [1], uploading video interviews and co-ordinating all the online resources via a NetVibes page [2] to give the remote audience a more complete experience of attending and to create a digital footprint for the proceedings, complementing the fantastic live video streaming provided by the University of Essex. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/57/cliff-rvw/ Thu, 30 Oct 2008 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/57/cliff-rvw/ Serendipity can be a wonderful thing. It was a Tuesday, over coffee, that the esteemed editor of this publication presented me with a copy of Website Optimization and asked if I would be interested in reviewing it. Two days later, at a regular team meeting for the Repositories Support Project 1, we discussed (rather generally) how we might boost the search ranking and usage of the RSP Web site. Marvellous, an interesting book to review and a real life problem to which to apply to it. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/56/iwmw-2008-rpt/ Tue, 29 Jul 2008 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/56/iwmw-2008-rpt/ 'Aberdeen??!! Make sure you take some woolly jumpers and a sou'wester then.' Friends are always keen to give helpful advice, bless 'em, but as it turned out, it was a good job that I ignored it, as it was t-shirts every day for the 180 or so who had the privilege of attending the Institutional Web Management Workshop (IWMW) in the Granite City this year. Three days of glorious sunshine, mixed with stimulating talks, thought-provoking parallel sessions, lively BarCamps, good food and interesting company made for a combination that's hard to beat, despite the allocated (Hillhead) accommodation crying out for an urgent and intimate encounter with a wrecking ball * and the seagulls being on a mission to wake me up by 4. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/56/newsline/ Tue, 29 Jul 2008 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/56/newsline/ Minding the Skills Gap: A Workshop for Key Training ProvidersLeeds University Business School 3 September 2008 Over the last few years, researchers have enthusiastically embraced new technologies and services that allow them to discover, locate, gain access to and create information resources on their desktops. Yet there is evidence to suggest that their research information skills and competencies have not kept up with the rapid pace of change. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/55/joyce-et-al/ Tue, 29 Apr 2008 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/55/joyce-et-al/ The evolution of the Web has changed the way that people access information. Web 2.0 technologies have allowed information providers to integrate their services in people's existing online spaces, and users expect to be able to synthesise, edit and customise content for their own specific purposes. Intute, the JISC-funded service that aims to offer the best of the Web for Higher and Further Education, has responded to these changes by developing a variety of integration services which offer flexible ways of delivering its content to users. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/47/krowne/ Sat, 29 Apr 2006 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/47/krowne/ In this article we present a framework, QMSearch, which improves searching in the context of scholarly digital libraries by taking a 'quality metrics-aware' approach. This means the digital library deployer or end-user can customise how results are presented, including aspects of both ranking and organisation in general, based upon standard metadata attributes and quality indicators derived from the general library information environment. To achieve this, QMSearch is generalised across metadata fields, quality indicators, and user communities, by abstracting all of these notions and rendering them into one or more 'organisation specifications' which are used by the system to determine how to organise results. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/46/lauke/ Wed, 08 Feb 2006 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/46/lauke/ When it comes to assessing a Web site's accessibility, any Web designer should know by now that simply running the mark-up though an automated testing tool is not enough. Automated tools are limited, purely testing for syntax, easily ascertained "yes or no" situations and a set of (sometimes quite arbitrary) heuristics, which are often based on an interpretation of accessibility guidelines on the part of the tool's developers. Nonetheless, automated checkers are a useful tool in the arsenal of accessibility-conscious designers, provided that their results are checked for false positives/negatives [1] and backed up by the necessary manual checks, carried out by a knowledgeable human tester who is familiar with any potential access issues and how they manifest themselves in a Web site. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/44/lauke/ Fri, 29 Jul 2005 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/44/lauke/ In a previous issue of Ariadne [1], I gave a brief overview of Mozilla Firefox [2] and introduced a few of its most useful extensions. In this article, we will use one of these extensions, Chris Pederick's Web Developer toolbar [3], to aid us in a preliminary assessment of a web site's accessibility. Although awareness of web accessibility has steadily increased in recent years, many web developers are still uncertain about how to evaluate their sites. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/42/lauke/ Sun, 30 Jan 2005 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/42/lauke/ Mozilla Firefox [1] is a free, open-source Web browser based on the Mozilla codebase. Version 1.0 was recently released after two years of development, so now may be a good time to evaluate this browser's capabilities. "Out of the box" Mozilla Firefox offers a variety of features catering to both occasional Web surfers and power users. The more advanced functionality can be particularly noted as a real time saver during the Web development process. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/40/web-focus/ Thu, 29 Jul 2004 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/40/web-focus/ The potential for use of television for accessing Web resources has been suggested for a number of years without having any significant impact. However the growth in use of digital TV technologies may provide another opportunity for accessing Web and other networked resources from the comfort of your living room. This article introduces the Netgem i-Player digital TV player and describes the implications for Web developers if such devices grow in popularity. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/39/browning/ Thu, 29 Apr 2004 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/39/browning/ The Web is over ten years old but it has yet to realise the vision of its founder - '.... it should be possible for grandma to take a photo of grandchildren and put it on the web immediately and without fuss ....'[1]. The Web, for most of its users, remains a read-only medium. The 'Universal Canvas' is a term introduced by Microsoft; two definitions are [2]: It builds upon XML schema to transform the Internet from a read-only environment into a read/write platform, enabling users to interactively create, browse, edit, annotate and analyze informationA surface on which we view, but also create and edit, words and tables and charts and picturesCentral to the concept of the Universal Canvas is the idea of the write-enabled or 'Two-way-Web' [3]. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/38/web-focus/ Fri, 30 Jan 2004 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/38/web-focus/ The Importance of HTML ComplianceA recent Web Focus article [1] argued that there was a need to ensure HTML resources complied strictly with HTML standards in order to ensure that they would be functional, widely accessible and interoperable. The importance of HTML compliance is growing as the HTML format develops from being primarily an output format used for display by Web browsers to its use as XHTML in which the resource can be transformed for a variety of purposes. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/38/alexander/ Fri, 30 Jan 2004 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/38/alexander/ This article reports on a recent study of the accessibility of Australian university Web sites. A selection of key pages from all 45 Australian tertiary education Web sites were analysed to assess their compliance with basic accessibility standards, as required by Australian anti-discrimination legislation. The results–98% of sites failed to comply–suggest that Australian university Web sites are likely to present significant barriers to access for people with disabilities. Web accessibility is poorly understood by university Web publishers, and procedures are not in place to ensure that university Web sites provide equitable access to important online resources. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/36/web-focus/ Tue, 29 Jul 2003 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/36/web-focus/ WWW 2003 was the 12th in the series of international World Wide Web conferences organised by the IW3C2 (the International World Wide Web Conference Committee). The international WWW conferences provide an opportunity for the Web research community to describe their research activities. Other tracks at the conference cover areas such as cultural resources, e-learning, accessibility, etc. In addition W3C (the World Wide Web Consortium) gives a series of presentations which describe many of the new Web standards being developed. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/34/public-libraries/ Wed, 15 Jan 2003 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/34/public-libraries/ Background to the workshopThe third Public Library Web Managers workshop to be organised by UKOLN was held at the University of Bath on the 5th and 6th of November 2002. This year’s event aimed to provide public library web managers with a brief respite from the trials and tribulations of the workplace, and the chance to share networking experiences with colleagues up and down the country. It also aimed to bring together some key speakers on this year’s hot topic –e-government (electronic government). http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/34/little/ Wed, 15 Jan 2003 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/34/little/ The MedHist gateway [1] was launched in August 2002, providing access to a searchable and browsable catalogue of high quality, evaluated history of medicine Internet resources. MedHist has been funded and developed by the Wellcome Library for the History and Understanding of Medicine [2], but is hosted by the BIOME health and life sciences hub [3], and as such is part of the Resource Discovery Network (RDN). MedHist was developed principally to fill the gaps left in the coverage of the history of medicine by existing resource discovery services within and outside the RDN. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/34/web-focus/ Wed, 15 Jan 2003 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/34/web-focus/ In the last issue of Ariadne the Web Focus column encouraged Web developers to "get serious about HTML standards" [1]. The article advocated use of XHTML and highlighted the importance of documents complying with standards. Many authors of Web resources would agree with this in principle, but find it difficult to implement in practice: use of validation tools seem to require launching a new application or going to a new location in a Web browser and copying and pasting a URL. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/33/nt-explorer/ Wed, 09 Oct 2002 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/33/nt-explorer/ Microsoft’s Index Server is a service supplied with the Windows NT 4.0 Server and Windows 2000 Server products. The service indexes HTML and other content residing on the file system. These indexed files may be queried using a number of techniques, but of particular relevance to web developers is the ability to build completely customised search facilities based on Active Server Pages (ASP) by making use of Index Server’s Component Object Model (COM) objects. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/32/web-focus/ Sun, 07 Jul 2002 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/32/web-focus/ The Institutional Web Management Workshop series is the main event organised by UK Web Focus. The workshop series began with a two-day event at King's College London in June 1997. The event has been repeated every year since then and, after the first event, was extended to a three-day format. Overview Of This Year's EventThis year's event was held at the University of Strathclyde. The full title of the workshop was " http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/31/information-environments/ Wed, 10 Apr 2002 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/31/information-environments/ The JISC Information EnvironmentThe Distributed National Electronic Resource (DNER) [1] is a JISC-funded, managed, heterogeneous collection of information resources and services (bibliographic, full-text, image, video, geo-spatial, datasets, etc.) of particular value to the further and higher education communities. The JISC Information Environment (JISC IE) [2] is the set of networked services that allows people to discover, access, use and publish resources within the DNER. The JISC IE technical architecture [3] specifies the standards and protocols that provide interoperability between this network of services. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/31/web-focus/ Wed, 10 Apr 2002 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/31/web-focus/ “Cool URIs”What are “cool URIs”? This term comes from advice provided by W3C (the World Wide Web Consortium). The paper “Cool URIs don’t change” [1] begins by saying: What makes a cool URI?A cool URI is one which does not change.What sorts of URI change?URIs don’t change: people change them.All Web users will, sadly, be familiar with the 404 error message. But, as W3C point out, the 404 error message does not point to a technical failure but a human one - hence the warning: “URIs don’t change: people change them. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/30/techwatch/ Fri, 25 Jan 2002 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/30/techwatch/ Content management? That’s what librarians do, right? But we’ve already got a library management system (LMS) – why should we consider a content management system (CMS)? The second initial is perhaps misleading – “manipulation” rather than “management” might better summarise the goals of a CMS. Content creation and content re-purposing are fundamental aspects which tend to lie outside the current LMS domain. Actually, from the point of view of workflow (and to lesser extent content re-purposing), the CMS and LMS have much in common. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/30/dti/ Fri, 25 Jan 2002 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/30/dti/ The Software Technology Outreach Programme (1) was initiated in Autumn 2000 by the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) to bridge the gap between academia and industry. As Tony Stock explains “More than 1,000 advanced projects are carried out in UK universities every year, each producing on average five potential business applications - but companies are missing out because they and the universities are out of touch with each other”. Software Technology Outreach coordinates a variety of different workshops on relevant technology research areas that provide an opportunity for academic researchers to present to a commercial audience. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/28/graphics/ Thu, 21 Jun 2001 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/28/graphics/ To view the Scalable Vector Graphics in this article you will need a viewer. The Adobe® SVG Viewer is a plug-in that will allow your Web browser to render SVG and is available free from the Adobe Web site. IntroductonThe early browsers for the Web were predominantly aimed at retrieval of textual information. Whilst Tim Berners-Lee's original browser for the NeXT computer allowed images to be viewed, they appeared in a separate window and were not an integral part of the Web page. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/28/web-focus/ Thu, 21 Jun 2001 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/28/web-focus/ Previous Web Focus articles have provided trip reports on the International World Wide Web conferences [1] [2] [3] and [4]. These reports have commented on the birth of new developments such as XML, RDF and WAP and the mobile Web. So what was hot from WWW10? Well the weather certainly was hot - and very humid. The 1,200+ delegates were very appreciative of the air-conditioning in the Hong Kong Conference Centre, located on Hong Kong island, next to the harbour (see Figure 1). http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/28/web-watch/ Thu, 21 Jun 2001 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/28/web-watch/ Is your University home page big, bold and brassy? Is it colourful and interactive, making use of new technologies in order to stand out from the crowd? Or is it mean and lean, with a simple design providing rapid download times and universal access? This survey of the size of the entry points for UK University and College entry points seeks an answer to these questions. The MethodologyThis report is based on use of two Web-based tools: NetMechanic and Bobby. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/26/web-focus/ Wed, 10 Jan 2001 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/26/web-focus/ What's the future for Web browsing? Is it the PC running some flavour of MS Windows?. Will the Linux platform take off on the desktop? Or will the Macintosh come back into fashion? Many statistics on browser usage would suggest that the MS Windows platform has won the battle. The proportion of platforms illustrated in Figure 1 (which shows accesses to the Cultivate Interactive by graphical browsers) is probably not too untypical (information available at [1]). http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/23/web-focus/ Thu, 23 Mar 2000 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/23/web-focus/ BackgroundUniversity web managers are busy people. University departments seem to have never-ending requirements for new services on the institutional web site. But, as we all know, it can be difficult to get the funding to buy expensive software products or extra staff to install and support free software. But is there an alternative approach to trying to do everything in-house? Nowadays the Web provides not only access to information resources, but also to applications. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/22/planet-sosig/ Tue, 21 Dec 1999 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/22/planet-sosig/ The purpose of this article is to introduce The Question Bank contents and situate the resource in the context of its Information Space, that is its relationship to other projects that aim to make social surveys more accessible. I have the subsidiary aim of using this text to present the choices and decisions that need to be identified, preferably before undertaking the introduction of a medium sized web-based information resource. I aim to be decidedly non-technical, however many of the problems the Question bank team has overcome have been solved because of the increasing flexibility that newer software offers. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/21/disinhe/ Wed, 22 Sep 1999 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/21/disinhe/ The web is one of the most rapidly developing media for communication and information storage and retrieval available today. Many people with extra-ordinary needs (such as users of palm-tops, legacy systems, and car-based systems, as well as disabled people using special technology) are restricted from access to the information available on the web, due to poor design caused by both a lack of information and sources of good advice for developers. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/21/web-focus/ Wed, 22 Sep 1999 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/21/web-focus/ The "Institutional Web Management: The Next Steps" workshop took place at Goldsmiths College, London on 7-9 September 1999. This was the third annual event for institutional web managers which has been organised by UK Web Focus. The first workshop was held over 2 day (16/17 July 1997) at Kings College London. As described in the workshop report published in Ariadne [1] the event attracted a total of 95 participants. The workshop provided a valuable opportunity for web editors to meet their peers at other institutions and compare experiences. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/20/404/ Mon, 21 Jun 1999 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/20/404/ What are the ten most visited pages on your website? Your main entry point, no doubt. And possibly your search page, a site map or other navigational aids. A greeting from your Vice Chancellor may be a popular page - or is it more likely to be a Student's Union Society page, or a personal home page? All of these are possibilities, but isn't a frequently visited - if not popular - page missing from this list? http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/19/web-focus/ Fri, 19 Mar 1999 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/19/web-focus/ The WebWatch project [1], which was based at UKOLN, involved the development and use of a variety of tools to analyse web resources and web servers. During the early development of the software, individual summaries (particularly of outliers in the statistical data) were often required in order to check that the software was working correctly. Initially summaries were obtained using simple Unix scripts. For example the urlget script displayed the HTTP headers for a resource as illustrated below: http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/17/web-focus/ Fri, 18 Sep 1998 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/17/web-focus/ In July 1997 a 2 day workshop on Running An Institutional Web Service was held at King’s College London. As reported in Ariadne issue 11 [1] the workshop proved very successful. Comments received on the workshop evaluation form indicated that participants would have likely a longer workshop and would have liked certain topics, including web design, database integration and management issues, to be covered in more depth. In addition several participants would have likely more time to be devoted to group sessions. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/16/web-focus/ Sat, 18 Jul 1998 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/16/web-focus/ Since February 1998 HTML 4.0 [1], CSS 2.0[2], the Mathematical Markup Language MathML [3] and the Extensible Markup Language XML [4] have all become W3C Recommendations. These web protocols, all of which are concerned with the way in which information can be represented and displayed, were initially Working Drafts which were developed by the appropriate W3C Working Group. The Working Drafts were then made publicly available as W3C Proposed Recommendations. Following a review period the Proposed Recommendations were voted on by W3C member organisations. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/15/web-focus/ Mon, 18 May 1998 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/15/web-focus/ Australia is a long way to go for a conference. What were you doing there? I attended the conference in my role as UK Web Focus and the JISC representative on the World Wide Web Consortium. Attendenance at the World Wide Web conference provides me with an opportunity to monitor the latest Web developments and keep the community informed. What were the highlights of the conference? In a three letter acronym - RDF! http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/15/what-is/ Mon, 18 May 1998 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/15/what-is/ About XMLWhat is XML? XML stands for the Extensible Markup Language. XML has been designed to address a number of deficiencies in HTML. Which deficiencies in particular? HTML is not extensible. Submitting proposals for extensions to HTML can be a very lengthy process. Browser software vendors can short-circuit the standardisation process by introducing their own extensions, but this has caused problems, as we have seen with controversial extensions such as Netscape’s <BLINK> and Microsoft’s <MARQUEE> elements. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/13/web-focus/ Mon, 19 Jan 1998 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/13/web-focus/ Launch of the W3C-LA InitiativeOn Wednesday 3rd December Tim Berners-Lee, the British computer scientist who invented the World Wide Web, was one of the guest speakers at a meeting held in London to mark the launch of the W3C-LA, an initiative funded by the European Union’s Esprit programme aimed at leveraging the Web for European Industry. The meeting [1] provided an opportunity for W3C staff members to summarise recent developments to web protocols. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/9/trenches/ Sun, 18 May 1997 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/9/trenches/ The World Wide Web is intended to be “an embodiment of human knowledge” [1] but is currently mainly an embodiment of only West European and North American knowledge resources. The reason for this is simple; despite the name, the development of the World Wide Web has until recently been very heavily oriented towards English and other Western European languages[2]. If you want to display a resource with an ideographic character sets from Asian languages for example then you have been forced to either use inlined images or localized, kludged versions of software. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/8/web-focus/ Wed, 19 Mar 1997 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/8/web-focus/ I first saw the Web in December 1992 at a meeting of the Information Exchange Special Interest Group at Leeds University. At that time, as Information Officer in the Computing Service, I was looking for software which could be used to develop a Campus Wide Information System (CWIS). Quite a number of institutions in the UK were running CWISes, mainly based on home-grown software, but some were beginning to make use of Internet tools, such as Gopher. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/7/midas/ Sun, 19 Jan 1997 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/7/midas/ MIDAS [1], based at Manchester Computing, University of Manchester, is a National Dataset Service funded by JISC [2], ESRC [3] and the University of Manchester [4], to provide UK academics with online access to large strategic and research datasets, software packages, training and large-scale computing resources. The datasets are supplied by arrangement with CHEST [5] and The Data Archive [6]. Anne McCombe was appointed on October 1996 to promote awareness and use of MIDAS in the academic community. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/2/wire/ Tue, 19 Mar 1996 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/2/wire/ I represent JISC at the Advisory Council meetings of the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C). Most of the delegates are representing commercial companies, wheras I am effectively representing the UK Higher Education sector! W3C member companies are given advance information in confidence, and I am currently working with W3C to see how I can involve UK HE in the work of W3C without violating that confidence. This position is funded through the Advisory Group on Computer Graphics (AGOCG) and covers 25% of my time.