Computer Information
Extracted from Ordained Servant vol. 5, no. 1 (January 1996).
The purpose of this page is to provide useful information for computer users. The information provided in this issue of Ordained Servant is for those who use the Macintosh Computer, are using America Online and wish to learn the Web Surfing Procedure for access to the OPC World Wide Web Page. The Steps for accessing follow.
Please read these steps through once or twice before actually trying them.
1. Be sure that you are running America Online v2.6. Without this version the AOL web browser software will not work properly. For details on doing this see Step 8.
2. Log in to your account on AOL.
3. When “In The Spotlight” comes up point and click on “Go To Main Menu” at the bottom of the screen.
4. Point and click on the menu item “Internet Connect.”
5. From the pull-down menu “Go To” select “Keyword” and enter in the space provided the word “Upgrade” and press your “Enter” key.
6. A picture of a city appears along with a number of highway signs offering options for upgrading your services. Point and click on “Download Now.”
7. You will be prompted with the question box
“Are you certain you wish to exit this free area?...You will be charged from this point on.” Click on “Exit.”
8. From the menu “MAC Upgrade Software Library” select “AOL Browser Only” and click “Download Now.” This process will take anywhere from 8 to 15 minutes depending on what speed modem you have. We believe that, if you don’t have version 2.6 of America Online, you can download it from this menu as “AOL Application Only.” You should also be able to select “AOL v2.6 with Browser” and get both at once but it will take more than forty minutes of connect time and it’s easier and cheaper to just get a new disk in the mail.
9. When the download is complete return to the Internet Connection screen, point, and click on the hemisphere in the upper left corner labeled “World Wide Web—Browse the Web.”
10. The America Online browser will start up and retrieve the Web page for America Online. You have now begun “surfing” the Internet.
11. From the “Services” pull-down menu select “Open URL.” (1) In the space provided enter: http://www.opc.org and press enter. This should initiate the retrieval of the OPC Web page. (2) Once complete you can scroll up and down to see all of the main page if your screen isn’t capable of displaying it all at once. (3) Text that is displayed in blue and underlined (for those with monochrome displays) are hypertext links. Being hypertext means they can be pointed to and clicked to take you to those items. (4) To back up a selection you use the “Back” (left arrow) button. To go forward to the item you backed up from press the “Forward” button.
12. When you are done “surfing” select “Quit” from the pull-down menu labeled “File.” You will be returned to your normal America Online session from which you can “Go To” “Sign-off.” Caveats: It appears that the AOL Web browser does not support some common features of other Web browsers. Some reformatting of the OPC Web pages will have to be done to compensate for this thus losing some aesthetic qualities we had hoped to use. Perhaps AOL will catch up soon and permit us to restore those features. In another article we will describe what a URL is and suggest some Christian sites to browse.
The Subcommittee on the use of Technology
Larry Wilson
Clifford Collins
G. I. WilliamsonFor the Christian Education Committee of the Orthodox Presbyterian Church.