Our UUA Website USH

WWW.ushartford.com (May 02)

It's been about two months now since David Newton launched our Society's new web site, www.USHartford.org. For those who'd been thinking of this much hoped for step as an extremely complicated, labor intensive prospect, this was an exciting event.

After receiving his Ph.D. from the University of Illinois in Entomology, David Newton taught at secondary, undergraduate and graduate levels of education, served as AAUP Union President for the CSU System, then as Vice President of Personnel. He learned Web development from a stint as web master for the CSU System Office web site, and then from his work as web master of the Noah Webster web site, which he still maintains.

The Name: Web sites have unique addresses , called domain names. You can apply for any name you care to use and, if nobody else has claimed it, receive it for a nominal annual fee. It is best to create a simple domain name, short and easy to remember. The ORG extension means the organization is non-profit. Our address, ushartford.org makes logical sense, as well as being easy to remember.

The Design: The guiding principle of web development is to create attractive, well designed pages. Simplicity is especially important, given the spectrum of browsers and machines reading the pages. Unlike with the printed page, the viewer can determine a good bit about the way pages will be displayed on his or her computer. Navigation... the way the viewer moves around the site ... depends upon clarity of organization. However, the most important objective is to have current information. We have all had the experience of finding old, abandoned web sites.

How it Works: Our Society's Web Site was created on Microsoft Front Page, Adobe Page Mill, and BBEdit. Completed pages are uploaded to the server using an FTP program called Fetch. The web server, also called a host, provides a place where we can electronically post our site. As soon as the site is posted, everyone on the internet can find your web site if they learn the unique address. When you use your web browser (Netscape Navigator, Microsoft Explorer, etc.) to look at a web address, the address is looked up and traced to a particular numbered machine which identifies the address. There is one file on your site, the home page, transmitted to your browser. That home page is what references the other pages on your site, or anywhere else on the Internet where you have created links. The possibilities are endless. Our Society's web site links to the UUA and Clara Barton District Web Sites. We have asked the UUA to update their references to us so browsers of their web pages ... i.e. people looking for a church in Connecticut, etc. ... will find a hyperlink to our site.

How it's Used: Our web site is organized to permit any committee to publish information related to its activities. We will not publish any name or phone number of a person who notifies us that this is a problem. A web site is more or less like a phone book or dictionary. Information is there for those who seek it. In reality, there is not much interest in our kind of web site beyond our own members and a few others seeking information about Unitarianism. David believes, on that note, that our information is not secret ... that if we have sensitive information we would not wish others to know, we should not publish it on the web or even in written documents circulated among members. The more significant problem is not how to hide information but how to bring the web site to the notice of those who would find its information useful. If the web editor finds something questionable, it will be referred to Terasa and/or Council prior to publication. This policy applies to links as well as page content. Committees wanting to publish something are asked to send the ELECTRONIC VERSION of their page or article to dcnewton@snet.net. Small pieces can be mailed to D. Newton, 3 Deborah Lane, Farmington, CT 06032. Most items will be published in 1–3 days. Timely information is deleted after a month. Information of continuing interest is maintained for longer periods.

Advantages: Most web pages have no fixed length. Publication is instant, distribution is instant, and revision is instant. Modern electronic storage makes volume of stored information no problem. Greater quantities of information about our Society become readily available both to us and to the public.

Limitations: One disadvantage of electronic web pages is their instant removal and loss. A page can be deleted with a single keystroke, revised pages replace the page revised. This can be overcome but often isn't. Another problem is access. Not everyone has a computer and web browser. Though computers are available in libraries, and more homes get computers every year, until everyone has access, we must continue our present method of sending a hard copy of essentially the same information on our site to each home. The Communications Committee will certainly be studying the economy of this along with all our other Communications vehicles.

Let us know of any comments, errors and corrections - thanks (revised 2/21/05)