ielts-yasi.englishlab.net

Updated Jan. 20, 2011

 

How to Save Pages and Files from the Internet

It seems that some people are trying to use the internet but don't really know how to use it. Recently I received two emails asking me "how to download" my website.

Firstly, we usually say "download" for a single unit, such as "download a song", "download a movie" or "download a file". It's not really wrong to say, "download a website" but my website is not packaged into a single unit that you can download, although some things on the website can be downloaded.

You can say, "download a page" from a website but most people say, "save a webpage". On my website, you can save every webpage you see, as well as download some files.

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How to Save a Webpage

The instructions below are written for those people using Microsoft Internet Explorer but other web browsers are similar. I'm also using the English names for things but, by looking at the photographs, you can easily find the same thing on Internet Explorer written in other languages.

  1. First, point your mouse pointer to the word, "File" at the top left-hand side of the page.
  1. Then, "left-click" your mouse, which means click the left-hand side of your mouse's two "clicking buttons". You will see then something like what is shown in the screenshot, below.
  1. Then, left-click the words, "Save As ...". [In Chinese this is 另存为 (A)...] It will give you the choice of renaming the page, if you want, and where to put it on your computer. It will also give you four choices of saving styles. If this is all new to you, you should experiment with all four styles to see how they are different. 
  1. Sometimes the "Save" (Ctrl+ S) function is also possible. [In Chinese this is 保存 (S)].

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How to Download a File

Let's say you want to download the zip file, CHANGES_APR_14_2009.zip that is currently available for download on my website. (Note written June 28, 2009: That file has now been deleted from the website. Go to this page to choose another file: ielts-yasi.englishlab.net/ZIP_FILES_OF_CHANGES.htm)

  1. Firstly, for many files such as that, the simplest way is just to left-click the blue area. Then you will see something like what is shown in the screenshot, below.
  1. If you left-click on "Open", some files (or some websites) will just run or open the file on the website for you to read, without saving it to your computer. For that particular file on my website, if you click, "Open" it will save the zipped file to a "Temporary  Folder" on your folder which might be a little hard to find. It will then automatically start unzipping the file, if you have WINZIP or a similar  program on your computer. (If you don't have WINZIP, it's easy to find a free copy on the internet that you can download.)
  1. Instead of clicking "Open", I suggest clicking "Save". This will give you the choice of where to put the zipped file on your computer and the choice of renaming it, if you want. (I also suggest never downloading anything that has a very long name because files with very long names are difficult to transfer to storage devices or copy to a CD. It's best to shorten very long file or page names at the point of downloading.)
  1. After you have saved it to a location of your choice on your computer, the downloaded zip file will give you the choice of unzipping it now or opening the folder that it is in. If you choose to open the folder, you will be able to open it simply by clicking on the zip file icon.

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  1. Another way to download a file, (and sometimes the only choice that is available,) is to right-click the blue area (the link). When you right-click on a link such as a downloadable file name, you will see what is shown below.
  1. Next, left-click on the words, "Save Target As ...". You will get the same choices as mentioned in 7, above (after clicking "Save"). If you click on the first choice, "Open", you will be in the same position as mentioned in 6, above.
  1. If you want to save some of the webpages that are shown, for example, on "http://ielts-yasi.englishlab.net/Site_Changes_P3.htm", such as, this, Parts 2/3 Page 39, then there are two choices - the long way and the short way. The long way is to left-click the link. That will open the webpage and then you save it as mentioned in 1, above. The short way is to right-click it, as mentioned in 9, above. The short way allows you to save the page without opening it.

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