RDC Tdx Using Your Browser With Teledex

Using Your Browser With Teledex

Accessing Teledex requires that you acquire and learn to use a browser and whatever other software and hardware you need to successfully access the Internet. Your experience on the Web in general and with Teledex in particular will improve as you develop proficiency with this hardware and software. It is impossible for us to support you on the basic functionality of your software and equipment. Nevertheless, here are some important and useful points about using your browser with Teledex.

Click a link in the index below or simply scroll through this page. All of the links in the index point to topics on on this page. Printing this page will print all the indexed topics.

Index

Browsers and browser versions
Fonts and display size
Force your browser to maximum reread
Avoid ISP's that cache pages
Use the back button - but carefully!
Printing from your browser
Copying and pasting text from Teledex pages
Copying and pasting Teledex pages as images

Browsers and browser versions

We intend for Teledex to work with Versions 3.02 and 4 of Microsoft's Internet Explorer (IE) or Version 3 or 4.03 of Netscape. Teledex will not work correctly with earlier versions of these browsers. We also intend to keep Teledex working correctly with newer versions of these browsers as they come out. Teledex might not work correctly with new versions of these browsers that we have not tested and listed here. Please see the message on the log on page for the latest notes and/or trouble reports.

The actual listed versions work best overall!

You must use one of these browsers. We understand that this limits access but all browsers (and even different versions of the same browser) work differently. Teledex stretches the limits of the interactive database look-up capability of the Web. Teledex has to do this to work the way it needs to. Each browser therefore imposes its own programming and testing overhead. Economics, the state of Web technology, and the current browser wars dictate that we limit our testing to current versions of these two most popular browsers.

Fonts and display size

If the type appears too large or small, try experimenting with the font control on your browser. This does make some difference although it does not control all the type.

We are doing our best to make the Search Criteria Page entirely visible at one time so you don't have to scroll back and forth to use it. It works fine at 800 X 600 or higher resolution displays but we have not been able to pack it into a non-scrolling display at 640 x 480. We're still trying to improve the display at this lower resolution but there will probably be a limit to what we can do. If you're shopping for new hardware, we urge you to get a high resolution display. You're missing a lot in this brave new Web world without one. The size problem seems to become worse with later versions of the supported browsers. If you must use a low resolution display, stick with IE 3.02 or Netscape 3 for the time being.

Force your browser to maximum reread

Teledex is highly interactive and depends on frequent communication between your browser and our server to work properly. Make sure that you set your browser to force the most frequent rereads of the server pages possible. The procedure for doing this is different in each browser. Review your browser's documentation or ask your "significant computer person" to help you.

Avoid ISPs that cache pages

Teledex relies heavily on "server side" technology. Therefore Teledex will not work properly if your Internet Service Provider (ISP) is attempting to cache Teledex pages. If this is a problem, talk to and/or change your ISP.

Use the back button on your browser - but carefully

Your browser will usually store the last few pages you have looked at. It does this by saving these pages in its cache (memory). You can often conserve hits by using the back button on your browser to look at these cached pages if you want to see them again. This works best if you are scrolling through index pages or the detail pages for any single index page. The more convoluted your path through the indexes and detail screens, the less likely it is that your browser will retrace your steps exactly. If you go back and forth between several index pages and look at a few detail pages along the way, your browser might ignore all but the last detail screens you looked at and take the shortest route back to the Search Criteria Page. See the Teledex Hit FAQ for information about why we must deduct hits "going backward"

You can definitely conserve hits by using the back button but things will quickly get confusing. Teledex really only works correctly when you are "going forward" using the controls we have provided. Also, don't rely on any hit status information that you see as a result of using the back button and above all don't back up past the page that opened your session! See Sessions and Your Browser.

Printing from your browser

To print Teledex pages, use the print icon on your browser's toolbar or the print options under "File". Remember that you can only print the page you are looking at. To print a series of pages, show and print each page separately. Note also that this will print the entire page you are looking at, not just what you can see on your screen. This does not mean the entire Web site, just all of the single page you are looking at. If you're concerned about what you might get, use the Print Preview to check.

Copying and pasting text from Teledex pages

You can save text from Teledex pages by copying and pasting it to another program such as Word or WordPad. First select the data you want using your mouse or "Select All" (under "Edit"), then use the "Copy" command to copy the selected data into the paste buffer (clipboard). Then use Alt-Tab to bring up the target window and paste the contents of the buffer into your work area. You can build up your target document with additional information if you use the cursor to control where you paste each successive selection. The formatting you see on Teledex does not carry over to your target document so the results will not be pretty. Your text will be strewn all over the page. Exactly what you see will depend on the browser and target software you are using. For more information, consult Windows help or ask your "significant computer person" to guide you through it the first time.

We don't think that the above is acceptable behavior but this process is a "Windowsism" over which we have no control. There ought to be a better way but we haven't found one. If you know of a better solution (a downloadable program that we can recommend or provide a link to perhaps?), we'd love to hear about it.

We have had some difficulty copying and pasting from IE 4.0. We don't yet know why.

Note that the Teledex Terms of Use require you to reproduce the RDC copyright notices on permitted copies. Remember also that Teledex is designed and licensed for case by case use. It is not an appropriate or legal vehicle for wholesale downloads of data. Downloading of this type is not only difficult to do from windows, it isn't allowed under the Teledex Terms of Use. The same data used in Teledex is available form RDC in several ASCII formats. Contact us for information on licensing RDC data for database use.

Copying and pasting Teledex pages as images

You can save images of Teledex pages in much the same way as you can save text (see the previous paragraph). Instead of selecting the text, use Alt-PrintScreen to copy the active window into the paste buffer (clipboard). You can then paste these images into your work area. Note that the image you get will be only what is showing in the active window at the time you press Alt-PrintScreen. Anything that is scrolled off your screen or not visible due to the position of the active window on your screen will not be included in the image.

Since the images will tend to fill a good part of a page, you might want to only paste one image per page. As with text, the setting the cursor position before each paste is critical to getting useful results. Generally, press the right arrow, then the Enter key after you paste each image. This will usually set you up to paste the next image. If this doesn't work, consult Windows help or ask your "significant computer person" to guide you through it the first time.

Hint - You'll find that the only way to get a readable copy of the Search Criteria Page with your settings is to copy it as an image as described here. You might want to start your target document with a paste of the Search Criteria Page before you submit it. Then you can decide whether to continue pasting text or images from there.