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I. What is the purpose of Web
Site?
Why did they put the information on the Internet? What is the web
site trying to do? Why was it created? Does it:
Sell things like services
and products?
Try to entertain you?
Just present information or numbers?
Try to advocate ideas (to convince you, manipulate your mind or
make you believe in a certain point of view)?
Have more than one purpose, such as entertaining you while
trying to sell you things or convince you to believe in something?
II. Who wrote the Web Site?
Who is the author? Is it a group, an organization, an individual? Did
someone write the web site but another group paid for it? Does the web
site even tell who wrote it?
Find out about the author's
background using a search engine such as the one from the Illinois Math
and Science Academy at http://toolkit.imsa.edu/locate
Check out this site for great hints on search tips:
http://www.coollessons.org/search.html
What information can you find from the search about the author or group
who put up the web site?
Is the person who wrote the
web page an expert or an authority?
Has the person been to school to learn about the topic of the
web page?
Do other experts on the subject agree that the author of the
web page is an expert?
What credentials does the author have?
How do other people categorize the author or group?
What is said about them?
Is there anything controversial about them? If so, what is the
controversy?
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III. How can the web location or address to find out about the web
site? (The location or address is the thing that begins with
http://www. The location or address is also called the URL.
A. Some of the clues you will
find at the end of an URL are:
| URL |
STANDS FOR |
URL |
STANDS FOR |
| .org |
non-profit
organization |
.state.us |
state or local
government |
| .gov |
government (state,
federal, local) |
.edu |
educational (school
or college) |
| .museum |
museum |
.biz |
business |
| .info |
informational |
.com |
commercial |
| .coop |
business cooperative |
.pro |
professional |
| .aero |
aviation |
.net |
personal page from a
private net provider |
| /users |
personal page from a
private net provider |
/members |
personal page from a
private net provider |
| ~name |
personal page from a
private net provider |
.name |
an individual's web
address |
(~ is pronounced
tilde)
B. Use the URL to find out
information about the site by going backwards to each file.
For example: Copy and paste the following URL
http://starchild.gsfc.nasa.gov/docs/StarChild/solar_system_level2/planet_hop.html
into the address or location of your web browser, you will see that
it is a web site to find your age and weight on different planets.
If you go backwards in the URL
and remove the last file,
/planet_hop.html
now
http://starchild.gsfc.nasa.gov/docs/StarChild/solar_system_level2
should be in the address or
location. The web page is now about information about the solar system.
If you continue to go
backwards in the URL and remove the next file,
/solar_system_level2
now
http://starchild.gsfc.nasa.gov/docs/StarChild
should be in the address or location. The web page is now called
"Star Child" and it is "A Learning Center for Young Astronomers".
If you continue to go
backwards in the URL and remove the next file,
/StarChild
now
http://starchild.gsfc.nasa.gov/docs
should be in the address or location. The web page is now called
"High Energy Astrophysics Science Archive Research Center" and as you
see from the bottom of that web page, it is page of NASA, the space organization in a governmental (.gov) web
site. The new link is now:
http://heasarc.gsfc.nasa.gov/docs/
So, in this web site the
government through NASA is giving
your information about the solar system.
IV. Find
out who is linking to (using) the web page.
In the
Google search engine there is an 'advance search' where you can find out
how many website link to this site. Why is this important? The more
people or webmasters who link their webpage to this page tells us that
it must be pretty accurate if hundreds of sites link to it. In this
case, nearly 2,000 web pages link to this page: at the very bottom where
you'll see
Page-Specific Search
How many pages were
returned?
What kind of sites link to the starchild site?
Are these sites controversial? Do these sites worry you in any way?
Why?
Are these sites trying to convince you of something? What is it?
V. Does the information you
get from other web pages agree with the information on the web page you
are wondering about?
Are their major disagreements?
If there are disagreements, what do most web pages say.
Does the information agree with other information you can get from
books such as encyclopedia in the library, or from recognized good
magazines.
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