To extend information transfer into new electronic frontiers, the Water Resources Research Center has established AZWATER, a World-Wide Web site on the internet, aka the information superhighway. The Web is the portion of the internet that allows users to "browse" multimedia documents that contain not only text, but color pictures, animated images, sound, and linkages to other Web documents. It is the explosive popularity of the Web which has the likes of Al Gore, Newt Gingrich and Time magazine gushing "cyberhype."

The growing number of persons with full access to the internet can use free, graphically-based programs such as Mosaic or Netscape to easily navigate through hypertext that can include links to pictures, sounds, and animation (see sidebar, p. 12).

AZWATER provides round-the-clock, easy and interactive access to a growing collection of water-related text, photos, maps and data. The site is intended to be used by Arizona's water community, educators, and the general public. Services currently available at this site include:

full text of current and past issues of AWR and Arroyo. Articles and sections are organized to aid searching and navigating, and the formatted documents can easily be printed or downloaded to disk. In the near future, our periodicals will be available on the Web even before they are mailed to subscribers;

a glossary of water-related terms and acronyms. Many of AZWATER's documents have links to these terms, so that the click of a mouse button calls up its definition. Fuller definitions of terms and descriptions of water-related organizations are being developed;

WRRC's recently updated database on water expertise at the three state universities. The database can be searched by using an electronic interactive form. The interface allows the user to tailor the search by name, general or specific research specialty, institutional affiliation, geographic specialty, and language spoken;

An overview of water issues in Arizona. Broken down according to the dozen water issue areas presented on WRRC's Arizona Water map poster, the overview presents text, photographs and other information. The overview of surface water includes a "clickable" map of selected stream gauge sites around the state — click on the site, and up pops a description of the gauge and historical flow data, presented in both tabular and graphical form; and

Information about the Water Center and its staff, including areas of current research and recent publications, plus email access.

Sorting out "information superhighway" hype from fact is difficult, and for those researching water issues, the Web can be a mixed blessing. While the number of sites has exploded, many beg the question, "Where's the beef?" Much of the growth of the World-Wide Web is fueled by its commercial and entertainment potential, and in the rush to join the Web, form often is emphasized at the expense of content. Fortunately, the Web allows both form and content to be brought together in substantial ways, and there are many water-related home pages with highly useful information to be found on the Web, if the user only knows where to look.

There are several useful tools for navigating the vast array of interconnected sites. The search and organization tool, "Yahoo," (located at http://www.yahoo.com/) is one of the better utilities for finding what you want. Easier still, the WRRC's home page includes links to several of the more useful water-related sites, which, in turn, are linked to still more sites. When you stumble upon a particularly interesting site, the browser software allows you to create "bookmarks" for sites that you may wish to revisit.

Web browsers also provide access to less interactive, non-graphical portions of the internet, including Gopher and File Transfer Protocol (FTP).

AZWATER represents the start of an ambitious, long-term effort by the WRRC to provide current, useful information on water issues of interest to Arizona. New publications and features will be added in coming months. Right now, we urge AWR readers with access to the World-Wide Web to explore AZWATER and tell us what is good, what needs improving, and what you most want added.

What You Need to Get on The Web

To access graphical information on the Web, a user must have "full" access to the internet, rather than just a text-based "shell account." The minimum setup requires a personal computer with a color graphics card and monitor, a 14.4k modem (28.8k is better), and a SLIP or PPP account.

A number of commercial internet providers offer these services, and access fees have declined substantially, to under $10 per month in some instances. Higher-speed connections from networks at universities and some businesses offer substantially less wait time, and the ability to take full advantage of graphics.

In addition to the hardware, users must have a TCP/IP software "stack," and a Web browser such as Netscape or Mosaic. These are available as freeware all major platforms (PC, Mac, Unix, etc.). Netscape can be downloaded from ftp://ftp.mcom.com/netscape/.

Many public schools and libraries also have computers that can access the Web.

If all this seems hopelessly complex and difficult, be patient -- several major software vendors are building Web access into future versions of their word processing or operating system software.

Common Terms

Browser: A software package that allows users to examine hypertext on the Web. The first highly useful browser was Mosaic; the current version of Netscape offers somewhat greater functionality and ease of use.

Home Page: A "table of contents" or starting point for a particular Web site.

HTML: Hypertext Mark-up Language, the rudimentary computer language that formats and links documents on the Web.

Hypertext: Multimedia documents that can contain pictures and sounds as well as text, with imbedded links to other parts of the same or other hypertext documents.

Internet: The global network that links other computer networks.

TCP/IP: A set of data protocols that allows computers on the internet to communicate with one another.

URL: Universal Resource Locator, or address of a particular location on the internet. Web URLs begin with the prefix, "http." WRRC's URL is http://ag.arizona.edu/.

Web: Also known as World-Wide Web or WWW, a portion of the internet that supports hypertext.