yahew.comThe first website

The first website

WorldWideWeb, NeXTSTEP, 1990. The browser that was also an editor.

WorldWideWeb
info.cern.ch
This browser can edit the page you are reading. Hit Edit this page, then type straight into the document. That is not something your browser can do.
Click the underlined words. This is the real 1990 document.
Field marks: how to spot NeXTSTEP
  • The scroller is on the left. NeXTSTEP put it there, opposite to almost everything since. Combined with the next point it is the fastest way to identify a NeXT screenshot.
  • Both arrows sit together at one end of the scroller, rather than one at the top and one at the bottom.
  • Four greys and nothing else. White, light, dark, black. Every bevel on screen is built from that palette.
  • Helvetica, not a bitmap face. NeXT shipped Display PostScript, so the interface used real scalable type years before anyone else.

Source. The document text is the real thing, fetched from CERN's restoration of the original site. Links that led somewhere now gone are marked and inert, which is itself accurate to browsing in 1990. The edit behaviour is a recreation, not an emulation.