Using internet explorer 8.0

Using internet explorer

Internet Explorer is a world-class browser that is designed to support various internet standards across a variety of platforms. Since it is created by Microsoft, it is closely integrated with the Windows operating system. With an Internet connection and Internet Explorer, you can find and view information about anything on the Web

To start Internet Explorer, click on the “Launch Internet Explorer Browser” icon on your desktop. If you do not see this icon, click on the “Start” button and select “All Programs → Internet Explorer”.

At the top, you see a long rectangular box called the “Address Bar”. When you want to visit a website, type the website address or URL in the address bar, for example, http://www.microsoft.com/ and press “Enter”.

Another way to navigate the web is to go the address bar and type what you are looking for. Say you are looking for “digital cameras”. Type “digital camera” and press “Enter”. Internet Explorer automatically sends your query to a search service and displays the results. The URL of the web page is displayed in the address bar.

To the right of the address bar, you can see the “Refresh” button. You may use this to reload a web page. The “Stop” button to its right is used to stop a page from loading. Use the “Back” button to the left of the address bar to go to the previous page you were on. If you clicked the Back button and you want to move forward to the page you were on just before you clicked it, you may use the “Forward” button. To quickly go back to a website you visited earlier, you may click the down arrow just to the right of the Forward button and select the webpage from the dropdown list.

Below the address bar, you can see a toolbar. Right-click on a blank space on the toolbar and select “Menu Bar”. You now see a menu displayed above the toolbar.

Home Page: The default page displayed when you start Internet Explorer is called the “Home Page”. The Home Page of a website is the opening or main page of the website, which is intended chiefly to greet visitors and provide information about the site or its owner. You may change the Internet Explorer Home Page to a site of your preference. Select “Tools → Internet Options”. On the “General” tab, you may enter your preferences under “Home page”.

Tabbed Browsing: Tabs enable you to have multiple websites open in one Internet Explorer window at one time. You can quickly switch between open websites by simply clicking on the tabs. To create a new tab, click the “New Tab” button or use the keyboard shortcut “Ctrl+T”. To close a tab, click on the “X” to the right side of it.

Quick Tabs: To see a thumbnail view of all the websites you have open in your tabs, click the “Quick Tabs” button to the left of the first tab. Click on a thumbnail to view a particular website.

To access the Internet Explorer Tabbed Browsing options, select “Tools → Internet Options”. Under “Tabs”, click “Settings”. In the “Tabbed Browsing Settings” window, you may enter the settings you require.

AutoComplete: Internet Explorer automatically records Web addresses, forms data, and passwords. To access the Internet Explorer AutoComplete options, select “Tools → Internet Options”. On the “Content” tab, under “AutoComplete”, click “Settings”. In the “AutoComplete Settings” window, you may enter the settings you require.

You can scroll through a web page using the horizontal and vertical scrollbars.

Selecting links: When you point to a link on a web page, the pointer changes to a hand and the URL is shown in the status bar. When you click on the link, the web page related to the link is opened. Links may be in the form of underlined text, buttons or pictures.

Using frames: The browser area can be divided into different scrollable areas called frames. When you click on a link on one page included in a frame, the related page is displayed in another frame. You may adjust the size of the frames by dragging the border between the frames.

Viewing thumbnails: Thumbnail images are small images shown on a web page because of space limitations and the time required for downloading. Click on thumbnails to view related documents.

Displaying web pages in other languages: Some Web sites offer their content in several languages. To view these pages in your preferred language, you can add languages to your list of languages in Internet Explorer. Select “Tools → Internet Options”. On the “General” tab, click “Languages”. In the “Language Preference” window, click “Add”. In the “Add Language” window, select the language you want to add and click “OK”. Click “OK” in the other windows as well. If you speak several languages, you can arrange them in order of priority. If a Web site offers multiple languages, content will appear in the language that has the highest priority.

In this interactive session, we will learn to enter a URL in the address bar.

In this practice session, you will enter a URL in the address bar.