EDITORIAL
Issue 3

If there is one thing in the past decade that has revolutionised the world, it would have to be the internet. 
Undoubtedly it is the powerful item to be invented. 
It has given more people, more power than ever before. Hundreds of millions of individuals are now having their say and expressing their views on all types of subjects. 
And in many cases it is like sitting down and letting them talk about themselves.
Individuality is a wonderful thing but when it comes to accessing their creative talents, the window is their website and this is where many a problem lies. 
In some respects, it is fortunate that a number of different programs and access formats are available but slight incompatibilities produce enormous problems. 
I am at the stage of producing a list of links so the reader can get additional information on a particular subject, by simply clicking on a link. 
At the moment I am having considerable trouble compiling this list. 
Many of the links to individual sites do not go through and others take a long time to download. 
I don't particularly want to get to the stage of conformity on the web but as with any developing media, evolutionary trends tend to peel away the inefficient designs and the best emerge triumphant.
Take the VCR. The original tapes for these machines were very large cassettes with the tape starting at the top and unwinding to a spool directly below. 
This required twisting the tape slightly as it flowed to the bottom spool but the biggest reason for its demise was the cost. The VHS won out. Even though it was not the best system, it was the cheapest. 
The VHS cassette was not patented and could be copied by manufacturers at a much lower cost. 
The same happened with computers and operating systems.  The cheapest (and the best?) won out. 
What's going to happen with the web?
Already some of the older browsers have died a natural death and others are being upgraded. 
But the main problem with web-sites is the downloading time. 
Many producers of sites are not aware of the downloading time for the individual files and pictures and especially the ability to optimise some of the files. 
Many are producing "flashy" sites, not realising the time to download the  pages is quite considerable.
In the end, the content of many of these files is quite irrelevant to the theme of the site and it's a bit like forcing you to read through the first 100 pages of advertising of a telephone directory, before you can look for the information you want. 
I have suffered so many times with poor loading that I have concentrated on the "fast is best" approach and any of the sites I will be suggesting, needs to have the same criteria. 
Some of the sites are absolutely excellent and I will either try to add them as a link or  ask if they can be included in our site. 
By including the content, I can reduce the loading time considerably. As an example, I reworked an article on boxes and reduced the loading time from 180 seconds to less than 30 seconds. There are lots of tricks to achieving this and it's a long learning curve.
I'll get back to the list very soon and it will be available in a future issue, but for now I must get back to finishing off another page. 

For now,
All the best, 

Colin Mitchell
Editor - TALKING ELECTRONICS Interactive