World Wide Web Organizations

GRC 175 Class Lessons

World Wide Web Organizations

LECTURE 1 Internet Technologies & Services

The following four organizations are those web designers should be familiar with.

World Wide Web Consortium (W3C)

The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) was created in October 1994 by Tim Berners-Lee. He did so to ensure the World Wide Web's interoperability.

Today, W3C has more than 500 member organizations from around the world and has earned international recognition for its contributions to the growth of the World Wide Web.

Purpose

The Consortium is to oversee the standardization of the various protocols and languages related to the World Wide Web

HTML

XML

CSS

SMIL.

Mission

Promote interoperability and encourage an open forum for discussion

Lead the technical evolution of the World Wide Web

To help meet the growing expectations of users and the increasing power of machines, by laying the foundations for the next generation of the World Wide Web.

To help make the World Wide Web a robust, scalable, and adaptive infrastructure for a world of information with its technologies.

Long-term Goals

Universal Access—to make the World Wide Web accessible to all by promoting technologies that take into account the vast differences in culture, education, ability, material resources, and physical limitations of users on all continents.

Semantic Web—to develop a software environment that permits each user to make the best use of the resources available on the web.

Web of Trust—to guide its development with careful consideration through the legal, commercial, and social issues raised by this technology

Principle Tasks:

Vision—W3C promotes and develops its vision for the future of the World Wide Web. Contributions come from several hundred dedicated researchers and engineers working for Member organizations, from the W3C Team, and from the entire web community. These contributions enable W3C to identify the technical requirements that must be satisfied if the World Wide Web is to be a truly universal information medium.

Design —W3C designs web technologies to realize this vision, taking into account existing technologies as well as those of the future.
Standardization - W3C contributes to efforts to standardize web technologies by producing specifications, called recommendations, that describe the building blocks. W3C makes these recommendations freely available to all.

Design Principles

The World Wide Web is an application built on the fundamental design principles of the Internet. These principles guide the work carried out within W3C activities.
Interoperability—Specifications for languages and protocols must be compatible with one another and allow hardware and software used to work together.

Evolution—Must be able to accommodate future technologies. Design principles such as simplicity, modularity, and extensibility will increase the chances that current technologies will work with emerging technologies.

Decentralization—Allows scalability to worldwide proportions while limiting errors and breakdowns.

IANA

Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA ) is responsible for assigning domain names, IP addresses, and protocol numbers.

ICANN

Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) is a private, non-profit corporation that is responsible for IP addressing, space allocation, protocol parameter assignment, domain name system management, and root system server management functions.

WaSP

The Web Standards Project (WaSP)—a grassroots coalition fighting for standards that ensure simple, affordable access to web technologies for all.

Others

ISOC—The Internet Society (ISOC)—a non-governmental, non-profit organization dedicated to maintaining and enhancing the Internet. Through its affiliated organizations (see below), ISOC is responsible for developing and approving new Internet standards and protocols.
IAB—Internet Architecture Board—the technical advisory group of ISOC that oversees the evolution of the Internet. The IAB supervises the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF), the Internet Research Task Force (IRTF), and the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA).
IETF —Internet Engineering Task Force—the body that defines standard Internet operating protocols, such as TCP/IP. The IETF is a large international community of network designers, operators, vendors, and researchers concerned with the evolution of the Internet architecture and the smooth operation of the Internet. Standards are expressed in the form of Requests For Comments (RFCs).
IRTF—Internet Research Task Force—works under the direction of IAB to develop new network technologies.

GRC 175 Class Lessons