Webpage Creation/HTML Links
Write your own HTML
At least the first couple of pages that you author should be written using nothing more than a plain old text editor (like notepad in Windoze). Why?
- Hopefully it will help you focus on adding content rather than
flashy annoying stuff.
- When you use a WYSIWYG (What You See Is What You Get,
pronounced WhySeeWig) editor to write your HTML, the editor will
often add all manner of crufty kludge. (After you have written a
couple of pages by hand, try to duplicate them using a WYSIWYG
editor, I think you will be surprised by all the junk that gets
added.)
- Writing your own HTML is not only empowering, but also quite easy.
There are two main things you need to build a useful website:
- Technical skills that will allow you to actually build the site.
- Philosophical insight about what makes good and bad websites
from the point of view of a user.
Various educational resources address differing amounts of these two
issues. For the sake of web citizens everywhere, please spend time
reading the philosophical as well as the technical literature.
Because philosophy is so often overlooked, the links to "good
design" resources come first.
Philosophy of web page design (a.k.a avoid the blink tag)
- Philip and
Alex's Guide to Web Publishing
- An excellent work that talks about some of the philosophical
concerns every web publisher needs to address. This book has also
been published on dead trees if you would like to buy a copy.
"How to" links (Write your own HTML)
- Writing HTML Lessons
- A very good site for beginners, start here.
-
Introduction to HTML
-
- Case Western Reserve University's critically acclaimed
introduction to HTML (I haven't gone through this tutorial, but
its table of contents looks pretty good).
-
The HMTL Primer
-
- NCSA Beginner's Guide to HTML. An introduction to writing
html that "doesn't pretend to offer instruction on every aspect of
html."
- The Bare
Bones Guide to HTML
-
- Advertises itself as being as concise as possible. Not the
place to find step-by-step information, but a nice reference.
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Email:
sanders@cs.rochester.edu
Last change: October 18, 2000
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