Browsers
What is a browser?
A browser is a piece of software used for viewing or ‘surfing’ pages on the world wide web. It is really just a tool that translates pages coded in HTML (the language of the Internet) into visual content for the user. The most popular Internet browsers are Microsoft Internet Explorer and Netscape Navigator, although other browsers like Opera and Mozilla are becoming more popular.
Alternative browsing devices
Lynx browser
Lynx is a web browser, just like Internet Explorer and Netscape. What makes it different is that it is a text-only browser, and does not display the graphics on web pages. Lynx has no support for tables, CSS, images, JavaScript, Flash or audio and video content.
WebTV
WebTV lets you access the Internet from your TV. You do not need a computer and there is no software to load. All you need is a television, a phone line and a WebTV Internet terminal, and you are on the Internet. WebTV has a small screen that shows a very limited amount of information compared with a traditional computer screen.
Screen reader
The screen reader is a software program that reads the contents of the screen aloud to the user, in the order that it appears in a web page. Screen readers are usually used by blind and visually impaired people. They can only interpret text content, so all graphics and multimedia must have alternative text descriptions.
Handheld mobile devices
Handheld mobile devices have very small screens, with limited support for JavaScript and large images. The number of people accessing the Internet from these personal digital assistants (PDAs) is increasing rapidly. Almost three million were sold in 2002 in Western Europe. In 2008 there will be an estimated 58 million PDAs sold worldwide (source: eTForecast).
