Getting Started: The Basics

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To consider yourself a developer, you need to learn at least HTML, CSS, a little graphic designing, and JavaScript; even more so to consider yourself a web developer. It is imperative that you learn them in that order as well – create the web document with HTML, style it all fancy with CSS and graphics, and then make the web page interactive with JavaScript.

HTML – HyperText Markup Language

Learning HTML can be pretty boring at first, because all you are doing is committing to memory all of the predefined tags and possible attributes for each.

The most often used tag is the <div> tag.

Common attributes associated with the <div> tag are shown below:

1. The class attribute, <div class="a_class_name">

This class attribute links the tag to a specific style defined in the CSS file with the label "a_class_name".

2. The style attribute, <div style="some simple styling">

You can set this attribute equal to a specified style instead of linking it to a style in a CSS file.

3. The id attribute, <div class="an_identifier_name">

This attribute can be linked to a specified style defined in the CSS file and/or allow script access to its associated tag.

With so many different tags rendering content differently and with different possible attributes, memorizing even the most common tags and their possible attributes will require significant commitment; however, without learning HTML or even XML you won't be capable of developing webpages…
Continue to » HTML Lessons

CSS – Cascading Style Sheets

Now the fun begins when learning CSS. Without proper CSS styling, and well-thought out graphics, a web page will just be an unattractive clump of data and space. CSS styling is how you "hook-up" a webpage making it more attractive to viewers.

A common style would be setting the background color of the web page either through the main HTML tag or the main BODY wrapper tag like so:

1. html {background-color:black;}

or

2. body {background-color:black;}

The greatest feature about CSS is that developers can easily add styling to replace simple graphics or pseudo styling in the place of JavaScript, thus simplifying the design process. It also improves the overall look and feel with what I like to call dynamic simplicity…
Continue to » CSS Lessons

JavaScript – Client-Side Programming Language

After feeling confident with HTML editing and enjoying CSS styling, you will be amazed with what you can do with JavaScript.

JavaScript is a server-side language that allows real-time dynamic changes to occur on a webpage, and much more, for a plethora of unique reasons.

A few common uses of JavaScript include:

1. Developing amazing animations.
2. Developing a User Interface (UI) to create a fully interactive webpage.
3. Handling cross-browser compatibility issues.

Most people, such as myself, use JavaScript as listed above to mainly develop simple web-based applications and widgets.

And after learning the basics of JavaScript, developers can learn Action Scripting for developing more powerful animations, apps, and UI's, including programming native applications for desktop/laptop computers, smartphones, and tablets…
Continue to » Javascript Lessons