Computing & Network Services
Upon starting Navigator, Communicator's browser component, the first page
you see is your current home page.
To view Web pages
-
Click highlighted words (colored or underlined) in a page to bring another
page of related information to your screen.
-
Click Back and Forward toolbar buttons
to go
back (or forward) to a page you have previously seen.
To display the content you seek, you'll need connections to those pages.
Well-crafted pages provide built-in connections to other pages. These connections
are presented as highlighted word, picture, or menu links. Each link contains
Internet location information that serves as an address of the web site.
When you click with the mouse cursor over a highlighted word, picture, or
menu link, you bring another page of information to your screen. The entire
network of pages can be potentially interlinked, one pointing to another.
To move back and forth between two pages
-
Click any highlighted words to view a new page.
-
Click the toolbar's Back button (left arrow) or, from the Go
menu, select Back.
-
Repeat step 1 and notice the changes in the location field (which shows the
page's network location), the Netscape company logo (which animates during
a page transfer), the status message area (which shows a link's location
or a transfer's progress), and the progress bar (which illustrates a transfer's
progress).
To find and return to pages
You can go directly to pages that interest you by choosing menu items.
-
Search and Guide items available through toolbar buttons
display pages
that help you use Communicator and Internet features.
-
Bookmark menu items
in the location
toolbar (on the menu bar in the Mac OS)
display
pages you have marked for easy access.
-
History items in the Go menu display pages you have viewed before.
To open a new Navigator window
From the File menu, choose the pull-right item New, then
Navigator Window.
The new window displays another copy of your home page on the screen in a
fully functional and independent Navigator window.
To create simultaneous network connections
Each time you open the Navigator window, you begin a new session of Internet
interaction. Even if one connection has not completed its page display, you
can begin another connection in a second Navigator window.
-
Click any link in the frontmost window.
-
Click any another Navigator window to bring the window to the front.
-
Click any link in the second window to begin a second connection.
To display content in a Navigator frame
Using frames, Communicator can display pages within a page (like the
picture-in-picture feature of television sets). Frames segment a page into
rectangular areas, each area capable of displaying a page.
-
Click a link in a page that contains frames. The author of a page determines
which pages have frames and the frame's original positioning.
-
Check to see if the link you clicked changes one or more frames within a
page, or displays an entirely new page.
-
Drag the edge of a frame to resize the frame within a page. This gives you
control over the layout of the presented information.
About the Internet
The Internet is a collection of information stored in computers physically
located throughout the world. Much of the information on the Internet is
organized onto electronic pages. You'll bring one page to your computer screen,
discover its contents, and have the option of bringing more pages of information.
The World Wide Web (or Web) is one facet of the Internet consisting of client
and server computers handling multimedia pages. Client computers use software
such as Netscape Communicator to view pages. Server computers use server
software to maintain pages for clients to access.
Foremost, Communicator presents pages of the Internet with elegance and
efficiency. The software allows you to immerse yourself in content unencumbered
by the complexity of distributed networks.
The component bar lets you easily open windows for each of the primary
Communicator
components.
To view the component bar
You can display the component bar in two ways:
-
As a floating palette (a small window you can position anywhere on the screen).
-
As a stationary palette docked to the bottom-right of each component's window.
To switch from the floating palette to the docked palette
Click the close box
(
)
in the floating palette.
To switch from the docked palette to the floating palette
Drag the lines on the leftmost part of the docked palette to another position
on the screen.
To open windows using the palette
Click one of the four component bar icons. The four commands of the component
bar are:
-
Open a Navigator window for web browsing.
-
Open the Mailbox window for mail messaging.
-
Open the Discussion Groups window for discussion group messaging.
-
Open a Composer window for page composition.
You can also perform component bar commands from the Communicator
menu.
Navigator software offers two distinct tools to help you locate information:
Internet "search" tools and page "find" tools.
-
A search tool helps you locate information such as web pages and discussion
group messages that resides on the Internet network.
-
A find tool locates particular words or phrases within the page that you're
currently viewing.
To search for information over the Internet
-
Click the Search button on the toolbar. This displays a page offering
access to Internet search engines and other search services.
-
Follow the instructions on the search engine site. Typically, you'll type
in search text, click a button, then wait for the engine to locate occurrences
of the text among a database of web pages.
-
Examine the search results. These are usually presented as a list of links
to pages containing the text you
requested.
-
For additional Internet exploration, click the Guide button on the
toolbar to display a pop-up menu listing Internet directory items. These
directories can guide you to various Internet sites and services.
To find information in the current page
-
Open the Edit menu and choose Find in Page.
-
In the resulting dialog, type the text you want to find, then click Find
Next. Located text is highlighted and, if necessary, the page scrolls
to the text's position.
-
Click the Edit menu's Find Again item to search for more
occurrences.
The Edit menus of the Bookmarks window and Message window have similar
commands, Find in Bookmarks and Find in Message, respectively.
To learn more about Netscape and its products
-
Click the Netscape company logo in the top-right corner of the window to
display the Netscape home page.
-
Click links on the home page to display the company's content pages. You'll
find links for company news columns, a merchandise store, customer service,
technical support, and up-to-date information on Netscape software.
To identify page locations
To understand how a single page is kept distinct in a world of electronic
pages, you should recognize its URL, short for Uniform Resource Locator.
Every page has a unique URL.
Not only does each page have a unique URL, but also each image and frame
on a page. You can access a page, an image, or an individual frame by supplying
its URL.
A URL is text used for identifying and addressing an item in a computer network.
In short, a URL provides location information and Navigator displays a URL
in the location field. Most often you don't need to know a page's URL because
the location information is included as part of a highlighted link; Navigator
already knows the URL when you click highlighted text, click a toolbar button,
or select a menu item. But sometimes you won't have a link and instead have
only the text of the URL (perhaps from a friend or a newspaper article).
To enter a URL
-
Type the URL directly into the location text field.
-
Alternatively, you can choose Open Page from the File menu
and type the URL in the resulting dialog box. (On the Mac OS, select the
pull-right menu item Open, then choose Location in Navigator
or Location in Composer to enter a URL.)
By entering a page's URL, Navigator can bring you the specified page just
as if you had clicked a link.
Here are some sample URLs:
http://home.netscape.com/index.html
ftp://ftp.netscape.com/pub/
news:news.announce.newusers
To interpret the location field label
-
The label of the location field reads Netsite after you display a
page that comes from a Netscape server.
-
The label of the location field reads Location after you display a
page that comes from a non-Netscape server.
-
The label changes to Go to if you enter text in the location field.
Pressing the Enter (Return) key displays the page specified in the Go
to field and changes the label back to Location.
To enter partial URLs
If you omit certain parts of a URL in the location field, Navigator automatically
completes the entry. You can omit the following:
-
The prefix http://. Navigator automatically adds the necessary prefix
to complete the URL search.
-
The partial pathname http://www.. Navigator automatically adds the
necessary pathname to complete the URL search.
-
The suffix .com; Navigator automatically adds this suffix if none
is specified.
On Windows, when you begin to type a URL in the location field, Navigator
attempts to automatically complete the URL. As you type, Navigator checks
for previously visited URLs that match the letters you have typed and, if
a match is found, fills in the remainder of the letters. If more than one
match occurs, you can press the down-arrow key to fill in the next matching
URL.
Also on Windows, the location field offers a pop-up menu to the right of
the field. The menu contains up to 14 URLs of pages whose locations you've
most recently typed into the field and viewed. Choosing a URL item from this
menu brings the page to your screen again. The URLs are retained in the menu
for each of your Navigator sessions.
To identify URL components
Communicator uses the URL text to find a particular item, such as a page,
among all the computers connected to the Internet. Within the URL text are
components that specify the protocol, server, and pathname of an item.
Notice in the URL http://home.netscape.com/index.html that the protocol
is followed by a colon (http:), the server is preceded by two slashes
(//home.netscape.com), and each segment of the pathname (only one
here) is preceded by a single slash (/index.html).
-
The first component, the protocol, identifies a manner for interpreting computer
information. Many Internet pages use HTTP (short for HyperText Transfer
Protocol). Other common protocols you might come across include file
(also known as ftp, which is short for File Transfer Protocol),
news (the protocol used by Usenet discussion groups), and
gopher (an alternative transfer protocol).
-
The second component, the server, identifies the computer system that stores
the information you seek (such as home.netscape.com). Each server
on the Internet has a unique name that identifies the location of the server.
-
The last component, the pathname, identifies the location of an item on the
server. For example, a pathname usually specifies the name of the file
identifying the page (such as /welcome.html), possibly preceded by
one or more directory/folder names that contain the file (such as
/home/welcome.html).
Some pathnames use special characters. If you are typing a URL into the location
field, you'll need to enter the characters that exactly match the URL. For
example, some pathnames contain the tilde character (~), which designates
a particular home directory on a server.
About HTML tags
Web pages are created by authors using a language called HTML (HyperText
Markup Language). Composer, Communicator's editing component, automatically
generates HTML.
HTML uses short tags (source text enclosed in angle brackets) to designate
a page's links and graphical elements. When you transmit a page, Communicator
interprets the HTML tags and presents them as links and other graphical elements.
Tags often contain URL information. When you click a tag containing a URL,
you're instructing the Navigator application to display page information
that's located on a server, irrespective of the server's geographic location.
The URL part of the HTML tag is hidden in the page's source text; the content
area only displays the highlighted link.
A link is a connection from one page to another. You find a link by looking
for one or more words highlighted with color, underlining, or both in the
content area of a page. Images and icons with colored borders also serve
as links. A link within a page that contains frames can be a connection that
displays one or more new pages within frames, or an entirely new top-level
page replacing all frames.
To use a link
-
Point the mouse cursor over a link. The URL location of the link appears
in the status message area at the bottom-left of the window.
-
Click once on the highlighted text, image, or icon. This transfers page content
from a server location to your location.
-
After you click a link, the Netscape company logo animates to show you that
the transfer of the page to your computer is in progress.
-
Examine the status message area and progress bar at the bottom of the window
to receive feedback about the progress of a transfer.
To identify followed and unfollowed Links
-
An unfollowed link is a connection to a page that you have not yet viewed.
By default, unfollowed links are blue.
-
A followed link is a connection to a page that you have viewed. By default,
followed links are purple.
You can change the colors used to denote unfollowed and followed links; from
the Edit menu, choose Preferences, then select the
Colors panel. If you have a black-and-white monitor, unfollowed and
followed links are highlighted only with underlining and not differentiated.
To stop a page transfer in progress
-
Click the Stop button.
-
Alternately, you can stop a link's action by choosing Stop Loading
from the Go menu.
You can stop a transfer whenever the loading process takes longer than you
like. This might happen if the content of the page is large or if the server
computer is sluggish. Sometimes the page specified by a link just isn't
available. You'll usually get a message if a connection was not made or a
page not found.
Links to Content inside Pages
When you bring a page to your screen, you'll see the whole page or, if the
content is extensive, only a portion. (Scroll bars let you see the rest.)
Often the portion you see is the beginning of the page, but sometimes a link
brings you content from the page's middle or end. A link can display a new
page or display a different portion of the same page (in effect, automatically
scrolling for you). For example, the beginning of a page might include a
table of contents that links each chapter title to its respective content
further down the page.
"Mailto" Links and Internet Addresses
Yet another kind of link doesn't display a page at all. A "mailto" link whose
URL begins with mailto: produces the Message Composition window for
sending mail (with the recipient's address automatically filled in).
Whereas a URL identifies a server's page location on the Internet, an Internet
address identifies a user's mailbox location. Here are the components of
the Internet address aname@aserver.com:
-
aname identifies a user.
-
The @ symbol (pronounced "at") separates the user name from the location
of the server computer.
-
aserver.com identifies the location of the server computer.
Addresses use lowercase letters without any spaces. The name of a location
contains at least a string and, typically, a three-letter suffix, set apart
by a dot (the period is pronounced "dot"). The name of a location might require
several subparts to identify the server (a host name and zero or more
subdomains), each separated by dots. For example, the address
aname@aserver.bserver.com uses a subdomain.
The three-letter suffix in the location name helps identify the kind of
organization operating the server. (Some locations use a two-letter geographical
suffix.) Here are the common suffixes and organizational affiliation:
-
.com (commercial)
-
.edu (educational)
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.gov (government)
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.mil (military)
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.net (networking)
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.org (noncommercial)
Mail addresses from outside the United States often use a two-letter suffix
designating a country. Here are some examples:
-
.jp (Japan)
-
.uk (United Kingdom)
-
.nl (the Netherlands)
-
.ca (Canada)
In addition to links in the content area, you can also access links using
Communicator toolbar buttons and menu items. Menu items offer each of the
links available through toolbar buttons, plus many more.
To display the home page
Click the Home button. The URL of your home page is designated in
your preferences.
To display previously viewed pages
-
Click the Back button to display the previous page in the history
list.
-
Click the Forward button to display the next page in the history list.
This button is available only after you've used Back or a history
menu item.
-
Choose history items from the Go menu. Communicator automatically
puts the title of a page you have viewed at the top of the history list.
-
From the Communicator menu, choose History to see the history
lineage.
To display pages that you have preselected as bookmarks
-
On Windows and Unix, choose bookmark items from the Bookmarks pop-up
menu.
-
On the Mac OS, choose bookmark items from the Bookmarks menu available
on the menu bar.
To display links to Internet and Communicator information pages
-
Click the Guide button (on the Mac OS, hold down the button) to display
a pop-up menu containing Internet directory links.
-
Choose items from the Help menu to display pages with information
about Communicator.
To display pop-up menu links
-
On Windows and Unix, press the right-mouse button to produce the pop-up menu.
-
On the Mac OS, press and hold down the mouse button.
Pop-up menus offer utility features and shortcuts for certain links. When
you hold down the mouse button over various elements of a page, pop-up menu
items let you go to pages, view individual images, save files onto your disk,
copy locations to the clipboard, and perform other tasks depending on where
the cursor is pointing.
To use toolbar buttons for navigation and page control
Click one of the following buttons. Buttons on the toolbar provide quick
access to commonly used features.
-
Back
Click this button to display the previous page in the history list. Hold
down the button to display a pop-up menu containing the the pages you can
go back to in the history list. A history list contains a hierarchy of pages
you've already viewed. You can view a subset of the history list in the
Go menu or view the entire list by choosing History from the
Communicator menu.
-
Forward
Click this button to display the next page in the history list. Hold down
the button to display a pop-up menu containing the history list (the pages
you can go forward to). If you've retrieved a page by using the Back
button or a history menu item, using Forward displays the preceding
page. Forward is only available after you use Back or a history
item.
-
Reload
Click this button to redisplay the current Navigator page, reflecting any
changes made since the original loading. To reload, Navigator checks the
network server to see if any change to the page has occurred. If there's
no change, the original page is retrieved from a cache. If there's a change,
the updated page is retrieved from the network server. If you press the
Reload button while holding down the Shift key (Option key on the
Mac OS), Navigator retrieves the page from the network server regardless
of whether the page has been updated (the cache is not used).
-
Home
Click this button to display the home page designated in the Navigator
preferences panel. The default page is the Netscape home page.
-
Search
Click this button to display a page containing a directory of Internet search
engine sites and services.
-
Guide
Click this button to display a pop-up menu containing links to pages that
offer tools and links for finding Internet information.
-
Images
This button is available when you have deselected the Advanced panel's
Automatically load images preference item and icons have been substituted
for images. Click this button to remove the substitution icons and display
the page's images.
-
Print
Click this button to print the content area of the currently displayed page.
A dialog box lets you select printing characteristics.
-
Security
Click this button to display the Security Info window. This page lets
you view and interact with elements such as encryption status, personal and
site certificates, security-related applications, and passwords.
-
Stop
Click this button to halt any ongoing transfer of page information.
(On the Mac OS, the Bookmarks menu is available only from the menu
bar.)
To use the Bookmarks pop-up menu
Click the Bookmarks icon (also called the Bookmark QuickFile icon) to the
right of the label Bookmarks.
Click this icon to display a pop-up menu containing your bookmark links as
well as menu commands for adding and editing bookmarks. Select a bookmark
item from the pop-up menu to display the page represented by the bookmark.
To use the location field to specify a page's URL
-
Click in the location field.
-
Type the URL of the page you wish to view.
-
Click the Enter (or Return) key.
Alternatively, you can select Open Page from the File menu
to type or choose a URL, and then open the page in the Navigator or Composer
window.
On Windows, when you begin to type a URL in the location field, Navigator
attempts to automatically complete the URL. As you type, Navigator checks
for previously visited URLs that match the letters you have typed and, if
a match is found, fills in the remainder of the letters. If more than one
match occurs, you can press the down-arrow key to fill in the next matching
URL.
To open URLs you have previously typed in and
visited
(Windows only)
Choose an item from the location field pop-up menu. To display this pop-up
menu, click the pop-up menu arrow located to the right of the location field.
(On the Mac OS, the personal toolbar is not available.)
The personal toolbar lets you create buttons that link to your favorite web
sites, discussion groups, mail folders, and Address Book entries. You can
add, remove, and reorder buttons. You can drag and drop icons onto the toolbar
to quickly create buttons.
You can use the Bookmarks window for full toolbar control. Items added to
the personal toolbar are stored as bookmarks in a special folder you can
designate in the Bookmarks window.
To specify a bookmark folder you wish to set as the personal toolbar folder,
open the View menu in the Bookmarks window and choose the Set as
Toolbar Folder item. Alternatively, you can create a new folder named
"Personal Toolbar Folder" that will be automatically used as your toolbar
folder when no other folder is specified.
The bookmark folder you designate to hold your personal toolbar buttons can
contain bookmarks or other folders. That is, bookmark folders can be embedded
in your personal toolbar folder.
You can add, delete, and reorder personal toolbar buttons in the same way
you add, delete, and reorder bookmarks. You designate personal toolbar buttons
simply by storing the button items in a designated personal toolbar folder.
If you have a toolbar button for a particular bookmark, clicking the button
opens the page. If you have a toolbar button for a bookmark folder, clicking
the button displays a pop-up menu containing each of the bookmarks within
the folder.
To specify a bookmark folder as your personal toolbar folder
-
Open the Bookmarks menu and choose Edit Bookmarks to open the
Bookmarks window. Alternatively, you can open the Communicator menu,
choose the pull-right Bookmarks item, then select Edit Bookmarks.
-
In the Bookmarks window, select the bookmark folder whose items you want
to appear on the toolbar.
-
From the View menu, choose Set as Toolbar Folder.
The items contained in the folder you have designated appear as personal
toolbar buttons.
You can also create a new folder with the name "Personal Toolbar Folder"
that will automatically serve as your toolbar folder. This name is used as
the default personal toolbar folder when no other folder has been specified.
To add a toolbar button for a particular bookmark or bookmark folder
-
Open the Bookmarks menu and choose Edit Bookmarks to open the
Bookmarks window.
-
Drag the bookmark or bookmark folder icon into the designated personal toolbar
folder. Alternatively, you can select a bookmark and bookmark folder icon,
then choose Add Selection to Toolbar from the File menu.
-
You can also drag and drop the Page Proxy icon to add a personal toolbar
button for the page you are currently viewing. Drag the icon (located to
the left of the location field) onto the personal toolbar.
Each bookmark and bookmark folder contained in the personal toolbar folder
appears as a toolbar button, though the toolbar's size allows for access
to only a small number of buttons.
To remove all your toolbar buttons
-
Open the Bookmarks menu and choose Edit Bookmarks to open the
Bookmarks window.
-
Click (select) the current personal toolbar folder.
-
From the View menu, choose Turn Off Toolbar Folder.
You cannot turn off a folder named "Personal Toolbar Folder." This name is
used as the default toolbar folder when no other folder is selected. You
can turn off such a folder by giving the folder a different name (select
the folder, then choose the View menu's Bookmark Properties
item and type a new name) before choosing Turn Off Toolbar Folder.
To replace all your toolbar buttons
-
Open the Bookmarks menu and choose Edit Bookmarks to open the
Bookmarks window.
-
Click (select) a new bookmark or bookmark folder that you want to put on
the toolbar.
-
From the View menu, choose Set as Toolbar Folder.
To replace or remove a button for a particular bookmark or bookmark folder
-
Open the Bookmarks menu and choose Edit Bookmarks to open the
Bookmarks window.
-
Drag the bookmark or bookmark folder icon out of the designated personal
toolbar folder (or choose the Edit menu's Delete item to remove
the item entirely).
To reorder buttons
The order of the bookmark items in the Bookmarks window determines the order
of the buttons in the toolbar. To reorder the buttons, drag and drop the
bookmark items in the personal toolbar folder to the order that you want.
To quickly add a button for the current page
Drag the Page Proxy icon onto the personal toolbar. The Page Proxy icon,
located to the left of the location field in the location toolbar, represents
the current page you are viewing. You can drag the Page Proxy icon to the
toolbar when the toolbar is expanded or collapsed.
The added item appears both in the personal toolbar and in the bookmark folder
designated as your personal toolbar folder.
To add a button for a discussion group, mail folder, or Address Book entry
-
Open the window of the component you wish to access.
-
Drag the icon of a discussion, mail, or address book item onto the personal
toolbar.
The added item appears both in the personal toolbar and in the bookmark folder
designated as your personal toolbar folder.
Bookmarks offer a convenient means to retrieve pages whose locations (URLs)
you've saved. You store your bookmarks in a list that's saved on your hard
disk. Once you add a bookmark to your list, the item stays until you remove
it or change lists. The permanence and accessibility of bookmarks make them
invaluable for personalizing your Internet access.
History offer a convenient means of redisplaying pages you've previously
viewed. Unlike bookmark lists, which store page locations that you've designated,
history items are saved automatically when you display a page.
(On the Mac OS, the Bookmarks menu is available from the menu bar.
The Bookmarks window is opened from the Communicator menu.)
Bookmarks offer a convenient means of page retrieval. You store your bookmarks
in a list. Once you add a bookmark to your list, the item stays until you
remove it or change lists. The permanence and accessibility of bookmarks
make them invaluable for personalizing your Internet access.
Navigator offers many options for creating a bookmark list. Basic options
let you add and access a page through a pop-up menu on the location toolbar
or through the Communicator menu of the main menu bar. The simplest
way to obtain direct access to a favorite page is to open the
Bookmarks menu and choose Add Bookmarks. This adds the current
page as an item in the Bookmarks menu.
More advanced options, available from the Bookmarks window, let you create
hierarchical menus, partial menu displays, multiple and shared bookmark files,
list descriptions, and list searches. The Bookmarks window lists your bookmarks
and offers a set of menu items to help you organize your list. In addition,
many drag-and-drop options are available for creating and filing your bookmarks.
The bookmark list you create is represented by a bookmark file on your hard
disk. Each item in the list contains the title of the page (which you can
choose in a menu), the associated URL (which lets Navigator retrieve the
page), and some additional date information.
The same Bookmarks menu is displayed by either the pop-up menu in
the location toolbar or the Communicator menu of the main menu bar.
To display the Bookmarks menu
-
To display the Bookmarks menu using a pop-up menu, position the mouse
cursor over the Bookmarks button in the location toolbar, and press
the mouse button.
-
To display the Bookmarks menu using the main menu bar, open the
Communicator menu, then choose Bookmarks. The Bookmarks
item displays a submenu.
To add and file bookmarks using the Bookmarks menu
Choose one of the following items:
-
Add Bookmark
Adds the title of the currently displayed page as the last item in the bookmark
list. The Bookmarks menu grows as you add bookmarks.
-
File Bookmark
The pull-right File Bookmark menu item lets you add the current Navigator
page to a selected bookmark folder. The items in this menu are bookmark folders.
To edit or delete bookmarks using the Bookmarks menu
Choose Edit Bookmarks to open the Bookmarks window. You can drag and
drop bookmark icons or use the window's menu items to arrange the display
of your bookmarks and bookmark folders.
To delete a bookmark, select the bookmark icon in the Bookmarks window, then
press the Delete key (or choose Delete from the Edit menu).
To display bookmarks using the Bookmarks menu
Choose one of the following items:
-
Bookmark items
These items are the bookmarks you've created. Choose an item to display the
bookmarked page. Each time you add a bookmark, the page's title is added
to this menu and links to the bookmarked page.
-
Guide
The pull-right Guide menu item is a preset group of bookmarks built
into Navigator. These bookmarks offer tools and links for finding Internet
information. They're the same as the items offered by the Guide button
in the navigation toolbar.
To quickly add and file a bookmark for the current page
-
Place the cursor over the Page Proxy icon in the location toolbar. The cursor
and icon change when the cursor is over the icon.
-
Drag the Page Proxy icon (an icon image follows the cursor) to the Bookmarks
icon, which is at the left side of the location toolbar.
If you release the Page Proxy icon over the Bookmarks icon, a bookmark for
the current page is added to the bottom of the bookmark list.
If you hold the Page Proxy icon over the Bookmarks icon, the Bookmarks
menu is displayed, allowing you to further drag the Page Proxy icon to a
particular position in your bookmark list. When you release the mouse button,
the bookmark is filed at the menu position you have selected.
You can drag and drop the Page Proxy icon anywhere in the list, including
nested bookmark folders (displayed as pull-right menu items). As you drag
the icon over your current list of bookmark names, a horizontal line appears
between menu items to indicate where the new bookmark will be placed when
you release the mouse button.
The main menu bar contains the following menus:
-
File: for working with files.
-
Edit: for editing page content and setting Communicator preferences.
-
View: for options on viewing page content.
-
Go: for navigating to pages.
-
Communicator: for displaying Communicator component windows.
-
Help: to find help on using Communicator.
Communicator also offers a context-sensitive pop-up menu whose items are
shortcuts for several commonly used and frame-specific commands. The items
offered in the pop-up menu depend on which screen element the mouse is positioned
over.
On Windows and Unix, clicking the right-mouse button displays the pop-up
menu. On the Mac OS, holding down the mouse button displays the pop-up menu.
On the Mac OS, the Bookmarks menu is available from the menu bar,
and both the Bookmarks and Communicator menu titles are displayed
as icons.
Many
of the File and Edit menu items in Communicator work as they
do in other applications.
To print the contents of the current page
From the File menu, choose Print, or click the Print
button in the toolbar. A dialog box lets you select printing options and
begin printing. On Windows, you can choose Print Preview from the
File menu to see a screen display of a printed page.
To print a frame
When you view a page containing frames, in the File menu you'll see
Print Frame in place of Print. The command lets you print only
the page within a currently selected frame. The dialog box options for printing
the page are unchanged.
Print Layout
When printing a page, Navigator formats content according to the size of
the printed page rather than the size of the onscreen window. The Print command
rearranges the page layout (text is word-wrapped and graphics are repositioned)
in order to accommodate paper size.
To set up the page for printing
From the File menu, choose Page Setup. You can use this command
to choose page layout options including header and footer information.
To find a word or phrase within a page
Choose the Edit menu's Find in Page item. A Find dialog
box lets you type the string of characters you wish to find. Select the
Match case checkbox (Case Sensitive on the Mac OS and Unix)
to require that capital letters are matched.
On
Windows, select the Up or Down radio button to direct the search
toward the beginning or end of the page. If there is a current selection,
the search begins at the selection and does not wrap around to the beginning
of the page. On the Mac OS and Unix, select the Find Backwards checkbox
to start the search from the beginning or end of the page.
To find the same word or phrase again, choose the Edit menu's Find
Again item.
By accessing a page whose URL begins with ftp (short for file transport
protocol), you can navigate folders/directories, view files (including HTML
and image files), download software, and upload software. For example, you
might use links to FTP server sites for downloading updates to Communicator
and helper application software.
Communicator lets you access FTP servers in the same way you access World
Wide Web (HTTP) servers. However, you may find the FTP directory and content
pages have minimal formatting. When possible, Communicator shows the type,
size, date, and a short description of each file in a directory. A directory
is presented as a list of links, each link often preceded by a small icon
indicating another directory or a file. Clicking a directory link displays
a subdirectory. Typically, at the top of a subdirectory is a link that displays
the parent directory.
Clicking a binary file or program automatically downloads the software to
a folder on your computer. (On the Mac OS and Unix, this folder can be designated
in the Applications panel). After downloading, Communicator automatically
looks for a suitable helper application to launch the file. If the necessary
helper application is not available, a dialog box asks whether you want to
save or discard the downloaded software.
Note that not all files are downloaded using FTP. By using the pop-up menu
or by clicking a link with the Shift key held down (Option key on the Mac
OS), you produce the dialog box for saving an HTTP page, an image file, or
other file type to disk.
After you have accessed an FTP server, you can upload files to the site by
dragging and dropping files from the desktop to Navigator. Alternatively,
after you've accessed an FTP site, choose the File menu's Upload
File item. In the resulting dialog box, select the file on your hard
disk that you wish to upload. Note that you need "write" privileges to the
FTP server (permission granted from the site) to upload files.
AUGUST 10, 1997
Copyright © 1994-1997 Netscape Communications Corporation; used by
permission.
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