What problem was the Web invented to solve?

Start with what you see

Information in a research organisation lives in many places. A document can describe an experiment while another explains the equipment or the people involved. Hypertext links let a reader move between related documents without collecting them into one giant file.

What is happening?

The Web and the Internet are not the same thing. The Web uses network infrastructure to connect documents and services through addresses and links.

A closer look

1. 1989 · proposal

   Tim Berners-Lee proposed information management at CERN.

2. 1990 · working system

   A browser and server made the idea usable.

3. 1993 · free to use

   CERN made the Web technology freely available.

Try a concrete example

Suppose a research note refers to an instrument’s manual. Copying the entire manual into every note creates duplication and makes updates difficult. A link lets the reader follow the relationship instead. This only works while the destination remains available, which also explains why old links can break. The network carries the communication; addresses identify resources; links express relationships between them. Keeping these roles separate makes the difference between the Internet and the Web easier to understand.