A Web server is the server software behind the World Wide Web. It listens for requests from a client, such as a browser like Netscape or Microsoft’s Internet Explorer. When it gets one, it processes that request and returns some data. This data usually takes the form of a formatted page with text and graphics. The browser then renders this data to the best of its ability and presents it to the user. Web servers are in concept very simple programs. They await for requests....

The genesis of the computer revolution was in a machine. The genesis of our programming languages thus tends to look like that machine.But computers are not so much machines as they are mind amplification tools (“bicycles for the mind,” as Steve Jobs is fond of saying) and a different kind of expressive medium. As a result, the tools are beginning to look less like machines and more like parts of our minds, and also like other expressive medium....