Internet Tools

Capturing Information from Websites: A Comparison of Options

Many Websites provide a wealth of information for us. Capturing the information can help us in our research, writing, teaching, and other activities. This document discusses and contrasts the different ways that you can capture information from websites.

Copyright Warning: Prior to capturing information from any website, make sure that you have permission for the use that you have in mind.

The Options

Option	Internet Explorer 5.x	Netscape 4.x
Page Content
Copy & Paste	Captures the information displayed on the screen. If pasting into Microsoft Word, the images and formatting (including line and paragraph breaks) will also come with the content. May result in some formatting that is difficult to fix.	Captures the text displayed on the screen. When copied into a program, such as Word, line breaks will appear at the end of the lines as displayed in the browser when you captured the text.
Save As Text	Captures the content only. Text will need to be reformatted. Content in table cells will appear as one unit. Some cleanup required.	Captures the content only. Text will need to be reformatted. Content in table cells may require a significant amount of cleanup.
Save As HTML	Captures the content, images with links, the links, and the page layout. The page can be re-purposed to meet your needs using a web publishing program, like FrontPage.	Captures the content, links, and page layout. Images would need to be recaptures separately. The page can be re-purposed to meet your needs using a web publishing program, like FrontPage.
Images
Drag & Drop	Click the image and drag onto a document that you are working. Doesn't work with all programs. Okay if you don't need the image as an individual file.	not available
Save As	Save the image as picture (use right mouse button). The image is saved as a file that can be added to almost any document. Modifications of the images often violate the copyright law.	Save the image (use right mouse button). The image is saved as a file that can be added to almost any document. Modifications of the images often violate the copyright law.

Summary of the Steps

Content: Copy & Paste

Open desired page in your browser
Highlight the desired content
From the Edit menu, select Copy
Go to document in Word (or other program)
Place insertion point where you want the information to appear
From the Edit menu, select Paste

Content: Save as Text

Open desired page in your browser
From the File menu, select Save As
Adjust the drive, file & folder location to reflect where you want to save the file
Type the desired filename
If you are working in Netscape, add the .txt extension
From the File Format to listing, change to Text File (*.txt)
Click SAVE

Content: Save as HTML

Open desired page in your browser
From the File menu, select Save As
Adjust the drive, file & folder location to reflect where you want to save the file
Type the desired filename
Confirm the file format to save is .htm
This is displayed differently in each browser but is the default format.
Click SAVE

Images: Drag & Drop

Open desired page in your browser
Open the document that you want to add the image to in the appropriate program (e.g., Word)
Adjust the windows so you can see the image in the browser and the document
Click and hold the image, drag into the document

Images: Save As

Open desired page in your browser and locate the image you want to save
Right click on the image
Internet Explorer: From the quick menu, select Save Picture As ...
Netscape: From the quick menu, select Save Image As ...
Adjust the drive, file & folder location to reflect where you want to save the file
Type the desired filename
Click SAVE