Web Browser

A web browser or internet browser is software application for retrieving, presenting and traversing information resources on the WWW.
An information resource is identified by a Uniform Resource Identifier (URL) and may be a web page, image, video, or other piece of content. Hyperlinks present in resource enable user to easily navigate their browser to related resource.

Although browser are primarily intended to access the WWW, they can also be used to access information provided by web servers in private networks or files in file system. Some browser can also be used to save information resources to file system.

User interface
Most major web browsers have these user interface elements in common:

• Back and forward buttons to go back to the previous resource and forward again.
• A history list, showing resources previously visited in a list (typically, the list is not visible all the time and has to be summoned).
• A refresh or reload button to reload the current resource.
• A stop button to cancel loading the resource. In some browsers, the stop button is merged with the reload button.
• A home button to return to the user's home page.
• An address bar to input the Uniform Resource Identifier (URL) of the desired resource and display it.
• A search bar to input terms into a search engine.
• A status bar to display progress in loading the resource and also the URI of links when the cursor hovers over them, and page zooming capability.
• Major browsers also possess incremental find features to search within a web page.

 

Function:

• The primary purpose of a web browser is to bring information resources to the user. This process begins when the user inputs a Uniform Resource Identifier (URL) for example http://www.google.com/, into the browser.
• Once the resource has been retrieved the web browser will display it.
• HTML is passed to the browser's layout engine to be transformed from markup to an interactive document.
• Aside from HTML, web browsers can generally display any kind of content that can be part of a web page.
• Information resources may contain hyperlinks to other information resources. Each link contains the URI of a resource to go to. When a link is clicked, the browser navigates to the resource indicated by the link's target URI, and the process of bringing content to the user begins again.
• All major web browsers allow the user to open multiple information resources at the same time, either in different browser windows or in different tabs of the same window. Major browsers also include pop-up blockers to prevent unwanted windows from "popping up" without the user's consent.
• Most web browsers can display a list of web pages that the user has bookmarked so that the user can quickly return to them.