10 Netsurfing Tips
How to Save Time & Avoid Frustration

1. Disable Auto-load Images

This is the number one time saver. Most pages have images that are not necessary. If the images are necessary, you can always click the "images" button. Even if you are the type of person who likes to see all the images, you don't need to see all the images all the time. In other words, you don't need to see the images on "links" pages and other pages which you pass through on the way to your destination.

• Advantages
  • You can save a lot of time, since you don't have to wait for images to download. Most images on a page aren't necessary. On a well-designed page, none of them are.
  • You avoid a certain amount of advertising, since most advertising is done with images.
• Disadvantages
  • On a well-designed page, there are no disadvantages, since the page writer will ensure that it is usable without images.
  • On poorly-designed pages, you may need to download some of the images to understand the page.
    • In most cases, you don't need to download all the images, but just click the icons of the images that you think may be important. You can usually skip the first couple of images on a page, since they are often the page name and advertising.
    • If there are lots of image icons and you think you need to see them all then you can do one of two things.
      • Decide that you don't want to visit the page and click the back button.
      • If you feel the page may be worthwhile, click the "images" button, go make a cup of coffee, then come back and view the page.
    • If the font color makes reading impossible, it's because the writer assumed that you would download his background image.
      • You can hit the "images" button and download all images, which includes the background image.
      • You can set your user preferences to "use my own colors"
  • Some well-designed pages have images which you'll want to see, but since the images will be well labeled, it's easy to know which icons to click to view that image only.

2. Disable JavaScript

Probably over 90% of the use of JavaScript on the Net is unnecessary and time-wasting for the visitor.

• Advantages
  • You can avoid Geocities.com, Tripod.com and similar advertising.
  • You avoid all those JavaScript error messages from pages with poorly-written code or code that only works on certain browsers.
  • You avoid those irritating scrolling messages, alert messages and so on.
  • If the page writer has used the "mouseover" code, you can still see the URL of links in the status bar rather than the "cute" messages.
• Disadvantages
  • The only disadvantage is that a few pages which you visit may require JavaScript. In those cases you can do one of two things.
    • Decide that you don't want to visit the page and click the back button.
    • If you feel the page may be worthwhile, enable JavaScript and then hit the reload button. (There are some worthwhile uses of JavaScript.)

3. Learn How to Open Links in Another Window

• On a Macintosh, click the link, hold down the button until a menu appears, then choose "new window with this link".
• On a Windows Computer, right-click the link then choose "new window with this link".
• Advantages
  • For pages with lots of links, you can open up a link in a new window, read it, then close that window. Since your "links" page is still on the screen, you don't need to wait for it to load back in.
• Disadvantages
  • Just be careful that you don't get so many windows open that you run out of memory.

4. Always Choose the Text-only Page When Offered

Here are a couple of popular sites which have text-only pages. Go to these pages now and bookmark them for future use.

• Text-only Yahoo
• Text-only AltaVista

5. Always Choose the Non-frame Page When Offered

Why do page writers make frames?

• The page writer assumes that you will stay on his site as long as he does. This is not usually the case, so you spend a lot of time downloading something that you don't use.
• The page writer assumes that you know what is on his site, so he allows you jump directly to different sub-pages. In most cases, it requires you a larger amount of time, since you end up jumping to the wrong pages.

6. Don't Bookmark Frames or "Front" Pages

• Cho0se "New Window with this Frame" (If you don't know how, experiment until you find the command.)
• Once the page is in its own window, then do "Add Bookmark".

7. Save Frequently-used Pages to Your Own Hard Disk

• Under the "file" menu, choose "save as", then do "save as source" or "save as HTML" depending on the browser.
• Later you can load the page into your browser using the "open" option under the "file" menu.

8. Disable Plugins

• Advantages
  • If you have removed the "default plugin", you won't get messages that tell you a plugin is needed.
  • You won't have to wait for things to load in and process that you don't want.
• Disadvantages
  • You may miss out on some interesting things.

9. Avoid Pages with Advertising When Searching

10. Learn to Surf More Than One Window at a Time

• Advantages
  • You can be reading one page while another is being downloaded, so you don't waste time waiting for pages.
• Disadvantages
  • Some poorly-designed pages require that you use a wide window. This means that you must scroll horizontally if you have a small screen or are using less than full-screen windows.

Bonus Tip: Ignore Tips Which Don't Apply to You