What is World Wide Web

The term ‘World Wide Web’ abbreviated as WWW is a network of online resources and websites recognized by URLs, interconnected by hypertext links and accessed through a web browser via internet. WWW was invented in 1989 by Tim Berners-Lee, a British scientist at CERN. The web was conceived and developed with an idea to meet the demand for automatic sharing between the scientists and professors in universities and institutes around the world.

Web Technologies

WWW is based on three core technologies: HTML, HTTP, and Web servers & Web browsers

• HTML: Hyper Text Markup Language is the standard markup language used to create webpages and web applications. HTML represents the structure of a web page with semantic information, images, interactive forms and other objects.
   
• HTTP: Hyper Text Transfer Protocol is an application protocol used to distribute the information among the systems. It is the foundation of information exchange on the web. HTTP is designed within the framework of internet protocol suite, which enables the communication between clients and servers.
   
• Web servers and Web browsers: Web browser is a software application for retrieving and sending information through the internet. Web browsers are the primary key that led to the usage of the internet today. Web server is a computer system that processes the request from clients through HTTP.

Popular Web browsers

Tim Berners-Lee developed the first web browser which was previously known as ‘WorldWideWeb’ (no spaces) and later renamed as Nexus. Though there were many web browsers developed, particularly Netscape became the first browser in terms of usage and popularity. Netscape Navigator has given ways to the development of many other browser applications, based on the concept of client and server communication. The most popular web browsers are Google Chrome, Internet Explorer, Safari, Opera and Firefox.

• Google Chrome is a free web browser originally developed by Google. It was developed for Microsoft Windows operating system and later adopted to Linux, MacOS, and Android operating systems.
   
• Internet Explorer (IE) formerly known as Microsoft Internet Explorer is a series of graphical web browsers developed by Microsoft. IE was first released as part of the add-on package for Window 95 and later versions were available with the service pack originally equipped with the operating system.
   
• Safari is a web browser developed by Apple and released in 2003 with MacOS X Panther operating system. It is a default browser available on all Apple devices.
   
• Opera is a fifth most popular web browser developed by Opera Software for the operating systems like Windows, MacOS and Linux operating systems.

Popular Web Servers

Apache is the most popular web server developed by the Apache Software Foundation. It is an open source software that can be installed on all the operating systems including Linux, Unix, Windows, MacOS X and many others. Apache server can be customized easily and modified accordingly to required needs.

• IIS Web Server is originally developed by Microsoft. It is very similar to Apache but it lacks the open source technology capabilities and the ability to modify and add the customized module.
   
• Nginx Web Server is also a popular open source web server, which includes IMAP/POP3 proxy server. Nginx is best known for high performance, stability, simple configuration and low resource usage.