Navigation-dependent visualization of distributed Internet structures

One of the main aspects of the Internet is that it is a distributed, multimedia database offering a fast growing amount of valuable information. Searching this database can be done by posing questions to search machines like Alta Vista. On the other hand, it is possible to browse through the space of connected information objects. When browsing, the problem arises that the user usually has no special knowledge of the structure of the visited hypertext area he is looking at. It may happen that he loses orientation and gets `lost in hyperspace´. This article presents a software architecture that provides a visitor to a limited, distributed Internet area with additional structure information depending on his individual navigation path. Knowledge about the local hypermedia area is made available by a server program and is passed on to a visualization tool working in a frame of the client´s Internet browser. This tool is loaded automatically from the server as a Java applet. By communication with the server, the visualization tool remains active throughout the navigation process and can be updated automatically