HTML and CSS Reference
In-Depth Information
The user reads the document, selects a hyperlink to another document,
and the entire process starts over.
1.2.3. Beneath the Web
We should point out again that browsers and HTTP servers need not be
part of the Web to function. In fact, you never need to be connected to
the Internet or to any network, for that matter, to write HTML/XHTML
documents and operate a browser. You can load and display locally
stored documents and accessory files directly on your browser. Many
organizations take advantage of this capability by distributing catalogs
and product manuals, for instance, on a much less expensive, but much
more interactively useful, CD-ROM, rather than via traditional print on
paper. Many graphical-user applications even document their features
through HTML/XHTML-based Help menus.
Isolating web documents is good for the author, too, since it gives you
the opportunity to finish, in the editorial sense of the word, a document
collection for later distribution. Diligent authors work locally to write and
proof their documents before releasing them for general distribution,
thereby sparing readers the agonies of broken image files and bogus
hyperlinks. [*]
[*] Vigorous testing of HTML documents once they are made available on the Web is, of course, also
highly recommended and necessary to rid them of various linking bugs.
Organizations, too, can be connected to the Internet but also maintain
private web sites and document collections for distribution to clients on
their local networks, or intranets. In fact, private web sites are fast be-
coming the technology of choice for the paperless offices we've heard
so much about during these last few years. With HTML and XHTML doc-
ument collections, businesses can maintain personnel databases com-
plete with employee photographs and online handbooks, collections of
blueprints, parts, assembly manuals, and so onall readily and easily ac-
cessed electronically by authorized users and displayed on a local com-
puter.
 
 
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