WebHTTrack: Download and View Websites Offline on your Netbook

WebHTTrack is a Linux-based freeware application for netbook users who want to still access their favorite site contents even though they are not near to any Internet connection or when the website is offline.

For netbook users who are always on the go and do not always have access to a network connection, yet they want to get access to their favorite websites contents, WebHTTrack is a great application for them. And since WebHTTrack is just the Linux version of WinHTTrack, which is for Windows version. Users can read sites offline in either platform.

Suppose, your desktop computer running Windows, is having a copy of WinHTTrack and you have downloaded your favorite website on your desktop. Later on you have transferred the file to your Linux-based netbook running WebHTTrack, without any problem, you can now access and read that site on your netbook. Obviously if both the machines are running Windows with a copy of WebHTTrack or the vice-versa, you still will not face any problem.

Installing WebHTTrack on your Linux-based netbook system

Installation is quite simple, simply follow the steps below. You can use the terminal to install WebHTTrack in Ubuntu.

1. Open up a new terminal window.
2. Type the command: sudo apt-get install httrack
3. Press Enter and then when asked for your sudo password, type your Ubuntu password.
4. Accept any dependencies that might be needed.
5. When the installation is complete, close the terminal window.

When WebHTTrack is installed, you can start it by clicking Applications > Internet > WebHTTrack Website Copier.

How to download a website using WebHTTrack for offline access?

When you start-up WebHTTrack you will need to first create a project. In the first screen, select your language and click on next to continue. You will be asked to fill up the following details:

1. Name: Provide a name for the project or select from already existing projects.
2. Category: Provide project category or select from already existing categories.
3. Base path: Select where you want to save the project (by default websites are saved in ~/websites).
4. Action: Select from a number of options, Download web site(s), Download web sites + questions, get individual files, Download all sites in pages, Test links in pages. You can also choose Continue interrupted download or Update existing download.
5. Web Adresses: Enter the URL you want to download.
6. You can also set Preferences and Mirror options. There are plenty of options to select from (such as Build, Scan Rules, Spider, Log/Index/Cache, Flow Control, and more).
7. Finally, you will get a last warning to make any adjustments. It then allows you to save your settings only (for later download) or you can simply click Start to begin the download process.

After starting the download, you will see a progress screen that will show what has been downloaded. Depending on the size and depth of the site, this process can take some time.

Once the download is finished you can browse the downloaded website offline by opening it up in your web browser and navigating to the download directory of that site. If you haven’t changed the download path, it will be a sub-directory within ~/website.