WWW4

Tutorial abstracts

Information on registration and schedule for tutorials is on the main Tutorial page. This page provides detailed abstracts for each tutorial. All tutorials are given on Monday, December 11.

The abstract for each tutorial describes its content, its intended audience, the background of the presenter, and its relationship with other tutorials.


Morning tutorials


A. Getting Started with HTML: Authoring for the Web

Dennis Sheldrick, Hewlett-Packard
Dan Keller, independent consultant

This tutorial provides a comprehensive overview of the Web and a quick start to HTML authoring. Attendees will get all they need prepare material for WWW publishing: Web architecture, HTML syntax, hyperlinks, page structure, images, image maps, URL's, and conversion. The session also introduces tables, forms, and CGI scripts.

Suitable for those with little or no experience writing HTML.

The authors are experienced tutorial presenters. Sheldrick is currently a Computer Education Consultant at Hewlett Packard. He has taught X Windows courses at many conferences, and published articles on the Web and X. Keller teaches HTML authoring classes to corporate clients.

This is the most fundamental tutorial of the day. Most other tutorials require mastery of this material. Afternoon tutorial G, Advanced Authoring, is a continuation of Tutorial A for those who want to cover all the basics of Web technology in a day.


B. Designing and Maintaining a Highly Usable Site

Jakob Nielsen, Sun Microsystems

Users will not waste time on sites that are poorly structured, confusing to navigate, difficult to understand, or unattractive. This tutorial helps you avoid these problems by teaching simple methods to increase the usability of a WWW design without slowing development.

The tutorial is suitable for those responsible for authoring or designing WWW page content. It is especially valuable for those responsible for the overall design of a site or its home page. The attendee should understand Web pages and HTML. No specific user interface or other advanced technical expertise is required. This course concentrates on design and evaluation and does not address implementation details.

Jakob Nielsen is a Sun Microsystems Distinguished Engineer. He was the user interface lead for the recent redesign of Sun's WWW pages, codesigned SunWeb (Sun's company-internal Web pages), and has contributed to user interfaces for several other WWW projects. He is well-known in both the hypermedia and usability engineering communities.

This tutorial emphasizes design and usability issues. It does not cover the use of HTML to create Web pages, covered in Tutorial A, nor systems administration issues, covered in Tutorial F. Tutorial I (afternoon) is complementary to this one, as it discusses organizational and management issues.


C. Java Programming, including Database Access

Matthew Calame, Sun Microsystems

Java is an object-oriented, portable, multimedia programming language and system designed specifically for sending behavior over the Web. The tutorial introduces the Java language and works through increasingly complex examples of Java programming, including file manipulation, GUI applications, interprogram communication, applets, relational database access.

Suitable for programmers who wish to learn Java. Experience with object orientation is helpful.

Matthew Calame is a Senior Systems Engineer with Sun Microsystems. He is involved in the design and implementation of Internet servers and their Web content and gives Java courses to Sun customers and employees.

This tutorial concentrates specifically on Java, and its role as a client-side extension language. Tutorials E, Forms, Tables, and CGI and G, Advanced Authoring, cover server-side extension. Tutorial L, Porting Interactive Applications to the Web, discusses using such extensions to port existing applications. No other tutorials cover Java explicitly.


D. Writing Web Software through Client APIs

Tom Magliery, NCSA, U. Illinois
Briand Sanderson, idem

Browsers can communicate with other applications using Client APIs: TCP/IP CCI, Netscape, Mosaic OLE, Netscape OLE, DDE, and AppleEvents. These APIs allow extending browsers with additional functionality such as extended history lists, group browsing, and demonstrations. The tutorial shows how to use these APIs, and gives examples.

The tutorial is suitable for application developers familiar with programming in languages such as C++ or Visual Basic.

Briand Sanderson is program manager for NCSA Mosaic at NCSA's Software Development Group. Tom Magliery is a Research Programmer at NCSA's Software Development Group. Both presenters have been deeply involved with Mosaic and Web research, and are experienced presenters.

This tutorial covers client-side programming. Tutorial C, Java Programming, covers applets which run within clients. Tutorials E, Forms, Tables, and CGI and G, Advanced Authoring, cover server-side extension. Tutorial L, Porting Interactive Applications to the Web, discusses using such extensions to port existing applications.


E. An In-Depth View of Forms, Tables, and CGI

Alan Richmond, CyberWeb SoftWare

This tutorial covers the more advanced features of HTML, forms and tables, and server-side programming in CGI using Perl. It gives examples of interfacing databases and searchable documents to the Web.

Suitable for those who have mastered basic HTML and wish detailed coverage of forms, tables, CGI programming, and recent HTML extensions.

Alan Richmond is a Web systems consultant doing business as CyberWeb SoftWare. He built NASA's first interface to astrophysics satellite data on the Web, through a forms-based search tool. He operates The Web Developer's Virtual Library and The WWW Virtual Library's section on WWW Development. He has presented tutorials at many conferences, and is known for his thorough coverage of complicated specifications.

This tutorial covers forms, tables, and CGI in greater detail than Tutorial G, Advanced authoring, but provides less of an overview of other subjects. Since it is given in the morning, it allows those taking it to choose a different subject for the afternoon.


F. Server Administration

Carlos Varela, NCSA, U. Illinois

This tutorial covers setting up and administering a Web server. It includes a discussion of server software, server configuration, indexing, access control, WAIS, server-side includes, proxy servers, caching, and CGI.

The tutorial is suitable for those who are or will be responsible for putting up a Web server site. Some experience in system administration or programming is desirable.

Carlos Varela is a research assistant at NCSA, where he has contributed to httpd, Shape2D, and Zelig. He is interested in integrating AI methods into software engineering, with particular emphasis in world-wide information systems. He is an experienced presenter of tutorials on Web server software.

This tutorial focuses on server administration. It introduces CGI programming issues which are treated in detail in Tutorials E, Forms, Tables, and CGI and G, Advanced authoring. It introduces security issues which are covered in greater depth in Tutorial H, Security. Tutorial B, A Highly Usable Site, concentrates on design issues, and Tutorial I, Decentralized Web, on managerial issues.


Afternoon tutorials


G. Advanced Authoring: scripts, forms, tables, image maps, converters, VRML

Dennis Sheldrick, Hewlett-Packard
Dan Keller, independent consultant

Advanced HTML provides examples of advanced features and HTML elements, including CGI scripts, forms, clickable image maps, editors and converters, design and structure issues, an introduction to VRML, and more.

For attendees who have done some authoring already, or who have taken Tutorial A.

The authors are experienced tutorial presenters. Sheldrick is currently a Computer Education Consultant at Hewlett Packard. He has taught X Windows courses at many conferences, and published articles on the Web and X. Keller teaches HTML authoring classes to corporate clients.

This is the continuation of Tutorial A, Getting Started, for those who want full coverage of basic Web technology. It is less detailed than the morning Tutorial E, Forms, Tables, and CGI, but covers more topics.


H. Security, Authentication, and Privacy on the Web

Adam Cain, NCSA, U. Illinois

This tutorial introduces the security issues, requirements, and threats relevant to the Web, and surveys many of the technologies offered to address them. Digital payment systems are discussed only to the extent that their contrast with these more general Web security schemes is clear.

Attendees are assumed to understand the basics of the Web and HTTP. No background in security issues is necessary.

Adam Cain is a Research Programmer at NCSA's Software Development Group, studying technologies and issues pertaining to security, privacy and digital commerce on the Web.

His Security presentation was voted Best Tutorial at WWW3 in Darmstadt.

Tutorial F, Server Administration, introduces some of the issues which are covered in depth in this session.


I. Developing and Maintaining a Decentralized Web

Katie Scheding, UCLA
Kelly Stack, idem
Kent Wada, idem

Web sites often spring up throughout an organization before an organization-wide Web plan is formulated. Neither radical decentralization nor radical centralization is effective: departments' needs must be balanced against the wider organization's needs. This tutorial discusses experience with such decentralized Webs at UCLA, and gives recommendations on managing them.

General understanding of the Web is required.

All three presenters have been heavily involved in UCLA's Web, are Webmasters of various sites at UCLA, and are members of the UCLA Campus Web Publishers' Group. Scheding has coordinates the UCLA Office of Academic Computing Web. Stack and Wada are members of the InfoUCLA team, which develops and maintains the UCLA CWIS.

Organizational and management issues are emphasized. It does not cover the use of HTML to create web pages, as does Tutorial A, nor the systems administration issues covered in Tutorial F. Tutorial B, A Highly Usable Site, emphasizes design and usability issues, and should be complementary to this one.


J. Web Image Databases: Formats, Sources, Organization

Andreas Bittorf, U. Erlangen

This presentation covers creating an image database on the Web, from the images themselves to the organization of the database. Examples will show the effects of compression, gamma correction, change of resolution, and color depth. Recommended design of the database and description system will be shown along with alternatives, and the effects of these design decisions on system and network load will be discussed.

Basic knowledge of databases and WWW technology is assumed.

Bittorf has been investigating the applications of digital images in dermatology, and is Webmaster of the Dermatology WWW Server, Project Dermatologic Online Image Atlas. He is also interested in high-speed communications networks, videoconferencing, and multimedia mail.


K. SGML Tools for Web Developers

Keith M. Corbett, Harlequin, Inc.

SGML provides a standard, flexible representation for a variety of document and data structures; moreover, HTML is an SGML document type, and can be processed by SGML tools. This tutorial shows how to take advantage of SGML and SGML tools to represent information, reformat it, reuse it, and present it on the Web. It includes an introduction to SGML, concrete application examples, and demonstrations of useful tools, many available as freeware.

The material is targeted toward HTML authors and Web application programmers. No experience with SGML is required.

Corbett has twenty years of experience in design, development, and integration of electronic publishing and information retrieval. A leader in the Interleaf developer's community, Corbett has given many talks and has helped many developers building custom publishing solutions with state-of-the-art publishing tools.

The material in Tutorial E, Forms, Tables, and CGI, is complementary. No other tutorial addresses the active manipulation of HTML and SGML documents.


L. Porting Interactive Applications to the Web

Brian R. Gaines, U. Calgary

Many interactive applications can benefit from the Web technology of distribution and user interface. This tutorial will: show which applications can benefit from the Web; provide a detailed technical framework for porting; analyze relevant design decisions; describe possible problems; and detail methods for overcoming them. The tutorial is illustrated through examples of innovative client-server applications operating on the Web.

Targeted to developers porting interactive applications from PCs to the Web, and decision makers evaluating the cost or feasibility of such ports. A background in software development and basic knowledge of HTML/HTTP is assumed.

Brian Gaines is Professor at the University of Calgary. He is editor of the International Journal of Human-Computer Studies and Knowledge Acquisition. He has authored numerous books and papers on computer and human systems. Gaines has an extensive background in information systems development, has developed a wide range of client-server systems and PC applications, and has ported highly interactive applications to the Web.

The morning tutorials D, Client APIs, E, Forms, Tables, and CGI, and J, Java, cover some of the programming techniques which may be useful in porting.


MIT/LCS OSF-RI W3C
Webmaster
Created 30 Oct 1995
Last updated 13 Nov 1995