__     __ __     __ __     __      web's eye view                    01-31-97
| | /| / /| | /| / /| | /| / /      alan levine                          
| |/ |/ / | |/ |/ / | |/ |/ /       Maricopa Center for Learning & Instruction
|__/ |__/ |__/|__/  |__/|__/        http://www.mcli.dist.maricopa.edu/eye/
..............New bag of URLs.......http://www.mcli.dist.maricopa.edu/eye/bag/
==============================================================================

Someone Stop This Crazy Web!
While watching televison recently, I saw three consecutive commercials that
subtly listed URLs in their message. These were not techie ads (although I kind
of like the one with the "Hawaii 50" music and the guys in suits surfing
asphalt waves) but a mutual fund, a bank, and a automobile manufacturer.

Cheap Net Access is Coming for Maricopa (soon)
Look soon for an announcemnt about dial-up full Internet access for Maricopa
students, faculty, and staff for under $12/month. I've noticed that my current
provider has been increasingly busier over the last two months, probably a
result of disgruntled AOL customers jumping ship (?)

Phoenix College Home Renovation
Look for a lot of newness at PC's web site:

   http://www.pc.maricopa.edu/
   
with some nicely used (and they are so over-used elsewhere around the web)
animated GIFs and some JavaScript gymnastics for hilite effects.

Look soon for some major overhauls at Paradise Valley and South Mountain's web
sites.

Writing HTML Espanol
Arturo Garc’a Mart’n wrote us by email a few months ago inquring whether he
could translate our Writing HTML into Spanish. You cans see the results

   http://www.mcli.dist.maricopa.edu/tut_es/

Perhaps language translation will become automated in the future? Or sooner?
The Web Translation Page is an experimental service that will translate pages
of 10K or less for any URL you submit from its original langauge to another for
selected languages.

    http://www.systranmt.com/translate.html

We tested it with MCLI's URL and translating from English to Italian. The
result, returned in minutes, can be viewed at:

   http://www.mcli.dist.maricopa.edu/index_it.html

I don't know Italian, but it looks right!

The Absolute Worst of the Web
It is probably virtual tongue-in-cheek, but take a peek at the "Bud-Ugly" Home
Page:

   http://www.wwwvoice.com/bud/bud.html

for great examples of what NOT to do!

The Big Issue: the Digital Revolution
Forbes magazine recently published some wonderful essays by leading authors
about history and politics, private life, science and technology, and
public life.

   http://www.forbes.com/asap/120296/the_big_issue.htm
   
See also "The Revolutionaries: On Turning Inspiration into Innovation
in Silicon Valley"  nterviews with some of top technology and science
pioneers 

   http://www.thetech.org/revolutionaries/

Yahoo! Image Surfer
More Yahoos! Now they have a search engine and category collection of images on
the web.

   http://isurf.yahoo.com/

An Awesome GIF Tool
Put your images on a diet! GIF Wizard Is an online tool for optimizing the file
size of your GIF images. You can submit them via a URL or select the file from
your desktop. The site then offers you several selections to download your new,
streamlined GIF:

   http://www.raspberryhill.com/gifwizard.html  

Also, in "Optimizing Animated GIFs", Andy King shows how you can create the
smallest possible animated GIFs.

   http://webreference.com/dev/gifanim/  
  
Why Would Anyone Even Care
The web site is nicely designed, but how many are interested in "Driveways of
the Rich and Famous"? 

    http://www.cris.com/~Driveway/
    
You might be surpised, Or not.

Medical Web Sites:
(This is from the EDUPAGE listserv)

CR TACKLES ONLINE MEDICAL HELP
Consumer Reports spent two months exploring and evaluating the myriad
medical information sites on the Web, and has concluded, "The wealth of
useful medical information available online is well worth the initial
difficulty of finding one's way around this new world -- and the constant
need to be on guard against dubious material."  Their recommendations?  <
http://www.ama-assn.org >, < http://www.medicinenet.com >, <
http://medscape.com >, < http://www.oncolink.upenn.edu >, <
http://parentsplace.com >, < http://pathfinder.com/thrive >.  Also
recommended are two sites that offer links to other sites:  <
http://www.arcade.uiowa.edu/hardin-www/md.html > and <
http://www.slackinc.com/matrix >.  Oh, and if it sounds too good to be true,
it probably is.  (Consumer Reports Feb 97 p27)

Streaming Video Movies
The American Film Institute OnLine Cinema is playing classic hollywood movies,
the first being Charlie Chaplinin "The Rink", streamed across the web. You'll
need to download the VDOLive player (a link and instructions from the AFI site)       

    http://www.afionline.org/cinema/
    
    
The Evershrinking URL
When you are connecting directly to a new site, don't you hate typing URLs into
a box? (We wish we had a shorter one for MCLI!). For example when trying to
connect to "Biff's Banana Exporters", you might type in the "Open URL" box:

  http://www.biffco.com/
  
Most web browsers are forgiving for neglecting the trailing slash:

  http://www.biffco.com
  
Over the last year, browsers also assume that the address is a web site and
will accept:

  www.biffco.com
  
And recent versions of NetScape will assume the site is of form www.XXXXX.com
if you enter a single word

  biff
  
Internet Explorer 3.0 for Mac
We've been impressed by the functionality of Microsoft's Internet Explorer 3.0
for Macintosh-- and at requring 4 MB of RAM, it may be a compelling option for
labs low on RAM:

  http://www.microsoft.com/ie/download/