This site isn't very origional, but it's content is something I'm very interested in. It's called "Internet Movie Data Base", and I can usually find what I'm looking for as well as lots of information I never intended to find. The organization of the site is good, and the content seems to cover the area very well. I also like that I can participate in the site by adding content and voting.
I chose Yahoo classifed as a cool URL:"http://classifieds.yahoo.com/".
I think classified ads fits really well in the web interface domain where users post, browse, and search for information that they need. Printed classified ads are convenient when just looking for information, but most of time incredible amount of paper is wasted unused. Plus, placing an ad costs money and some effort. In the web classified ads, posting is free and simple. Yahoo first lets you narrow your search by geographic information; buyers of gome sand heavy items will use this a lot, while buyer looking for software might opt to allow all locations. Then the buyer can narrow their search by catogory or attributes of the catogory (e.g. miliege for auto). Posting works similarly. Users can respond via email, phone, or print out computer generated map of the poster's home. Currently, there's not much postings, but it will be a matter of time before this weel designed site takes off.
The most innovative and useful web site I've seen is located at www.whowhere.com. It allows users to look up people all over the United
States instantaneously. The user picks some selection criteria, such as zip code, last name, area code, etc., and the program returns all persons that match that criteria. Being a person who has lived in ten different states througout my life, this has been the most useful thing I've ever encountered. I've located several lost friends.
http://adam.eigenmann.indiana.edu/main-frs.htm
One of the more interstinting URL that I visit is http://adam.eigenmann.indiana.edu/main-frs.htm, The AdamPages Main Page!. I enjoy that site just because of the jokes. Whenever I am working on a project and get stuck, or I am waiting for a long program to run or I just need to take a break, I will go to Adam's Page and read a few jokes. I rarely read the poetry or chat Live. I enjoy it because I can take a few minutes and just laugh. Another important things about his pages is that I generally share his sense of humor. Rarely do I find I joke that I didn't think was funny, in fact so far only two jokes in two years.
A real-time video server is available at:
http://www.real.com/ is interesting too.
I also find http://bongo.www.media.mit.edu/people/bongo/ an interesting experiment.
The coolest AND most useful URL I've come across has got to be the MapQuest page, http://www.mapquest.com. It's useful because it allows you to pinpoint exactly where something is located and it can even provide you rudimentary directions. It also has controls for zooming in and out and for moving the map in a specific direction (i.e. North, South, etc.).
http://www.ipsilon.com/~pn/papers.html
The interesting part is that the image animates the traffic over the Internet and somehow reflects the layered model of IP over ATM. It is useful because the papers are very important contributions of combining IP and ATM.
The URL that I have chosen is of the New York Exchange Web site :
It lists the companies on the exchange, and updates it with new listings frequently. The site is designed as an educational tool for investors and provides regular market summaries and statistical data. Has lots of good links and a wealth of information. An ideal site for all INVESTORS !!
This is a site that sells classical musical instruments and accessories. What I find innovative about it is the way it sells sheet music. Rather than placing an order for a printed copy to be sent by mail, you purchase the right to download an Acrobat version. Of course, people argue that once you download it, you can make infinite copies. However this problem has plagued the sheet music industry in the form of photocopies for years. A few innocative retails have realized this and gone ahead. Very little business will be lost due to little old lady music teachers reselling these acrobat files for a profit. They have decided to market the ease and SPEED of getting music over the net. A nice touch (though musically, not very beneficial) is that each sheet music download comes with a MIDI file of the piece. As with any new business, they still need to up the quality and size of their inventory.
A second place URL would be:
http://rick.stanford.edu/opera/main.html
This site, known as the OperaGlass, provides clear and easy to follow bio's, libretti, plot synopsis, performance history of hundreds of famous and less well knows operas. Generous links are provided to other resources and to opera company home pages. Unfortunately, there are still too many gaps in the data provided.
Why, you ask? This site is very well organized, innovative, dynamic, and very professionally made. It may possibly be the best site that I have ever visited! (My opinion may be slightly swayed because I am in the market for a car).
This site makes efficient use of frames, which can clutter the screen if not properly used. In addition, it is very easy to get to information on the site, and to search for items that are more difficult to find. Not only does is this site totally dynamic (each html page is generated on the fly from a long visual basic & java script) but it makes efficient use of web technology instead of using technology for technology's sake. For example, there is a tool that allows viewers to look at the inside of a desired vehicle with a 360 degree range of visibility. In addition, there is a tool that dynamically displays the monthly payment based on a series of variables that reside on slider bars.
This is definitely one of the best sites that I have ever seen, and I have not seen one yet that comes close to its efficient use of frames, organization, innovatoin, and ease of use. I encourage anyone to visit this site to see how a 'good' website looks.
This site lets us find door to door routes given the source and destinatin. It gives the distance between the two locations, approximate time to travel between the two locations, directions to go from source to destination and a map showing the source and destination. The map allows us to zoom in and out. There are several other features that are very useful in this site. The site is also well designed.
The site allows users to search a number of dictionary and thesaurus databases on the WWW. I have found this site to be useful for two reasons. First, all off my dictionaries, in both the forms of books and computer applications, are static and somewhat lacking. By using the online dictionaries, I can access a number of constantly updated reference materials very quickly. Second, the online reference materials are available anywhere the Internet can be accessed.
http://www.ibm.com/ibm/hci/ IBM HCI Works
I chose it for several reasons. First of all, it has very nice web page designs. The images and the layout are beautiful, especially when you view them on an SGI screen. Secondly, it is very informative. It has lots of HCI resources you can count on and very good real world examples of HCI design. Finally, I think it is a URL which is useful in future HCI courses.
http://cossc.gsfc.nasa.gov/htmltest/rjn_bht.html
The URL http://cossc.gsfc.nasa.gov/htmltest/rjn_bht.html is titled "Virtual Trips to Black Holes and Neutron Stars". It rates high in the useful content area (if you want to see a visualization of such effects. It's a lot more informative than staring at a numerical solution to Einstein's Equation). It could probably use a better background color than gray, but it is also well organized. (Since there are lots of images and mpegs, they are listed as links so you don't spend a lot of time down-loading things you don't want. There are also links to very good explanations of what's going on in the pictures.) Plus, we seem to have a nice network path to this machine - downloads are quick.
http://www.csee.usf.edu/~mulder/bloopers.html
(I wanted to submit http://www.csee.usf.edu/~mulder/bloopers.html because its hilarious and I like the design - the info is replicated elsewhere but not with as appealing a visual format, or as consistent with what is being presented. But its mostly humor and didn't quite seem to fit the criteria for sites.)
Browsing on the internet, I found two URLs that I think are cool. LucusArts Entertainment (www.lucasarts.com) and Microsoft Network, or MSN, (www.msn.com). I feel that the latter is highly more innovative, better designed and has plenty of useful content. So I selected MSN as the cool URL of choice.
It is not overdone in color. It is sometimes a little inconsistent in highlighting words, using the same format that is used with links. There are five main topics listed at the top: onstage, essentials, custom, find, help. Each time the cursor moves across, each topic is featured with a contrasting background. Onstage is the default page that you will enter each time the URL is accessed. A custom page, under the topic custom, can be developed by the user, relieving the interface of unnecessary items. There are links to other URLs that otherwise would not have been known, such as Carpoint and Expedia. It has redundancy in placing these two items into two topics, essentials and custom. In the find, the user has a choice of web search engines. The help is useful for online support and access to newsgroups of the latest Microsoft applications and software. Each topical interface is consistent in its simplistic design. The background may vary with color and finer details of design but the basics remain in font and layout.
The given reasons are why I think MSN is a cool URL.
You said in the assignment to "identify a set of URLs" which implies more than one site; however you seem to only want one site. I've gone both routes here, giving you a list and picking the best from the list.
URLs for Web Page Style
http://ds.dial.pipex.com/pixelp/wpdesign/wpdintro.htm
http://www.zeldman.com/faq.html
http://www.killersites.com/core.html
Between these four sites, there is great discussion on HTML *style*. None of the boring "How do I define a tag?" but lots of "How do I make my web page readable, interesting, and fast?" I couldn't live without the tips I gleaned from all of them. If I had to pick one, http://www.dsiegel.com/tips/ would be my favorite.
One of my favorite sites is http://www.caissa.com
It's a web based chess server that let's you play live games against other people via a Java applet (or via a cgi interface if your browsers doesn't support Java).
I'm not all that good a chess, but I found that this site can teach you more about the game than reading books can. Players of all skill levels (from beginner to international grandmaster) play there, and you can chat back and forth while you are playing. This is really nice when someone is kicking your ass and they are nice enough to tell you what you did wrong :)
The site also has an extensive library, message areas, live tournaments, email tournaments, and it lets you personalize your interface to suit your needs.
Pretty cool site (unfortunately it costs like 20 bucks to join). One of the few sites that uses Java in a way that's actually useful instead of just annoying eye-candy.
The site is www.travelocity.com. I use this site frequently to check on fares and flights to Boston. I fly home about once a month. It is very practical in that I dont have to go through a travel agent unless I want to fly Valujet ( I try not to.). You can also get inforamtion on car rentals accomadations, etc. The only drawback is that the site gets slow at peak times and it is hard to login.
http://c.gp.cs.cmu.edu:5103/prog/webster
It is a hypertext Webster dictionary. Type in the word, and do a lookup. It will tell you the definition and pronounciation of the word. The words in the definition are all hyperlinked, so if there is a new word there, you can always click the word to get its definition. Thesaurus is also provided for the word being looked up. The online dictionary is particularly useful when you compose or read an electronic document. A real dictionary may not always be accessible, but you can bring up the hypertext Webster dictionary whenever it's needed.
http://dps1.travelocity.com:80/glwhere.ctl
http://dps1.travelocity.com:80/gltrsub.ctl?tv_module=TR&tr_module=FF
http://dps1.travelocity.com:80/lglogin.ctl?tr_module=FF (3 best itineraries)
It will ask you to create a password, and you should be able to create a password. I have also attached printouts of the pages.
The site might have sounded innovative a couple of years back, but I guess such sites are common now a days.
(A) What I liked most about it is that it provides almost all the
functionality that a traveler might need:
(1) Flights: In flights it provides almost all the categories
that might be useful:
Flight Paging:
3 Best Itineraries:
etc.
(2) Cars:
(3) Cruises:
(4) Retrieve Existing Reservations:
(5) Hotels:
(B) additionally, the interface is very clear and easy to use
for a naive user. (I could use it without any problems or errors).
It is very intuitively and simply organized for a naive user,
thereby not driving him away to talking to a travel agent on phone.
(C) Most importantly, it is free from heavy graphics,
which is extremely important for users at the end of a modem,
and for one who does not have a color monitor. It is surprising
why some sites have heavy color graphics, which take long time
to load or which look so blurred in a black and white monitor.
http://www.lcc.gatech.edu/ptrl/orbital/ Why? Because it is one of the most interactive sites I have seen. It allows client side remediation ond formmatting of material - look a the interactive light chow and the hyper audio engine. It was also done by IDT students, and the music is excellent.