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Fundamentals of Web Design

Fundamentals of Web Design . What We’ll Cover. FTP - why it should be the first tool in your web developer toolbox. HTML basics, what's involved in writing it and understanding the basic elements of a webpage. Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) and how they control the presentation of HTML.

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Fundamentals of Web Design

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  1. Fundamentals ofWeb Design

  2. What We’ll Cover • FTP - why it should be the first tool in your web developer toolbox. • HTML basics, what's involved in writing it and understanding the basic elements of a webpage. • Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) and how they control the presentation of HTML. • Javascript and its role in user interaction, how it integrates and why it matters. • Flash and what role it plays in presentation, interaction and the ups and downs of using it. • PHP and ASP will be discussed in very general terms with an eye toward use of dynamic pages and Content Management Systems.

  3. But first, some background... Basics of how the web works and how your website fits into the big picture.

  4. Basic HTML pages – ‘flat website’ Domain Registry Domain Name Registrars Domain Name Resolver Internet Service Provider HTTP request: “www.sitename.com” User Host IP address 00.00.00.00 Web Page HTTP response Advantages: Speed / Flexibility Disadvantages: Labor-intensive / navigation issues

  5. Database-driven website Domain Registry Domain Name Registrars • CMS – Content Management System • WordPress • Drupal • Joomla • many more DNR ISP HTTP request: “www.sitename.com” User Host IP address 00.00.00.00 PHP Scripts Web Page • “LAMP” • Linux • Apache • MySQL • PHP HTTP response MySQL Database Advantages: Automation of navigation, easy to change overall site design (‘theme’) Disadvantages: Speed / Server Load / Script conflicts (plugins)

  6. FTP • FTP = File Transfer Protocol • This is the method you’ll use to move files to and from your host. • The better the tool integrates with your computer, the easier it will be to publish your site changes. • There are web-based tools but I’ve found them inefficient. • Higher-end tools like Interarchy are blazing fast and support all the special cases you’ll run into. ‘dot’ files being one of them. • Tight integration with your text editor can make editing easier. • Can be used to change file permissions.

  7. Examples of FTP Programs For Mac: • Interarchy(http://nolobe.com/interarchy/) • Cyberduck(http://cyberduck.ch/) • Transmit(http://www.panic.com/transmit/) For PC: • WS-FTP(www.ipswitchft.com/) • FTP Explorer(http://www.ftpx.com/) • Smart FTP(http://www.smartftp.com/)

  8. FTP in the scheme of things HOST HOST Web Page Web Page http F T P Edit/Previewwithin tool F T P Browser View Editor on local PC Text editor / freestanding FTP Dreamweaver / IDE

  9. GUI EDITORS - WYSIWYG • Dreamweaver • Beginners always seem to start with this. It’s a great tool. • The preview isn’t quite right, it’s slow, it’s big, it’s expensive.Has a built-in FTP tool. Tight integration with Adobe CS. • FrontPage • Very common starting point on PC. Solid and serviceable.Deep integration with Windows OS. • Plain-text editor • Cheap. Fast. Efficient. Reliable. Trustworthy. Multi-platform. • My choice – BBEdit for the Mac.Downside: not quite as ‘helpful’ as GUI apps.

  10. TEXT EDITORS For Mac: BBEdit(http://www.barebones.com) Text Wrangler(http://www.barebones.com) SubEthaEdit(http://www.codingmonkeys.de/) For PC: NotePad++(notepad-plus.sourceforge.net/) Crimson (www.crimsoneditor.com) jEdit (http://www.jedit.org/)

  11. HTML BASICS HTML – Hyper Text Markup Language HTML is a ‘markup’ language. It consists of TAGS: <b>This is bold</b> - looks a lot like the pre-WYSIWYG wordprocessor ‘WordStar’. Browsers interpret and ‘present’ the markup code. Tags generally ‘open’ and ‘close’ – except for single-element tags like<img>, <br> and <hr>. Images and link paths can be ‘absolute’ or ‘relative’ – demo For many years HTML page design was done using the <table> tag –in the last decade CSS (Cascading Style Sheets) support in browsers has improved to where object-oriented design techniques can be used, separating design from content and allowing site-wide design changeswith minor edits.

  12. HTML PAGE ELEMENTS DOCTYPE – Rendering rules for HTML HTML – Beginning of hypertext HEAD – Title / Links / Scripts / Meta BODY – The visible content of the page

  13. Anatomy of an HTML page <!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/strict.dtd"> <html> <head> <title>Page Title</title> <link rel="stylesheet" href="/resources/my_styles.css" media="all"> <script src="/resources/js/my_script.js" type="text/javascript" language="javascript"></script> <meta name="keywords" content="dog, cat, bird, mouse, platypus"> </head> <body> <div id="pagewidth"> <div id=”banner">Page Banner</div> <div id="wrapper" class="clearfix"> <div id="twocols" class="clearfix"> <div id="maincol">Main Content Column</div> <div id="rightcol”>Right Column</div> </div> <div id="leftcol">Left Column</div> </div> <div id="footer">Footer</div> </div> </body> </html>

  14. pagewidth banner wrapper Two cols leftcol maincol rightcol footer

  15. CSS – CASCADING STYLESHEETS • Definitions of STYLES for HTML Elements • Rather than: • <p><font size=“3”>Doo Dah</font></p> • (as inline style)<p style=“font-size:12px;”>Doo Dah</p> • (as line in stylesheet)p { font-size:12px; } • Can also refer to DIVisions of a page. • (live demo)

  16. CSS Cheat Sheet http://www.lesliefranke.com/files/reference/csscheatsheet.html

  17. Javascript JavaScript is an object-oriented scripting language used to enable programmatic access to objects within both the client application and other applications. It is primarily used in the form of client-side JavaScript, implemented as an integrated component of the web browser, allowing the development of enhanced user interfaces and dynamic websites. - Wikipedia

  18. JAVASCRIPT • Common uses: • Form validation – check user input before submission • Popups • Hide/show page elements • Image rollover swaps • Javascript can be placed in • A command within a tag (MouseOver) • The <head> portion of a document • The <body> portion of a document • An externally-referenced file • Frameworks – many commons functions are available as ‘frameworks’

  19. FLASH • Flash allows the presentation of scalable, vector-based information. • It has numerous advantages but is not intended as a primary toolfor constructing general-purpose websites. • Here’s a few drawbacks: • How do you bookmark your location? Not supported – all navigation is absolute and programmatic. • Requires an add-on to the browser. Largely supported but can be issue. • Complex animations can run slowly on low-end machines, yielding low framerates and jerky display. • Flash is a great tool to present an animated piece of content but care should be taken to factor in user issues if the entire site will be built in it.

  20. PHP and ASP – the dynamic duo • PHP – Hypertext Preprocessor – a language designed to create HTML using programming logic • ASP – Active Server Pages – the Microsoft version of PHP.

  21. Information Architecture • The blueprint that describes how information is organized and structured. • The relative position of files and folders • The ‘concept’ behind your navigation

  22. about.html contact.html index.html links.html map.html product_list.html products (directory) product1.html product2.html . . . product-x.html staff.html store (directory) order.html validate.js Home About Map Contact form Staff list Products Products Order Form Product 2 Links Product ...

  23. LEARNING RESOURCES HTML Tutorial (http://www.w3schools.com/html/) HTML Reference (http://www.w3schools.com/tags/) HTML Validator (http://validator.w3.org/) HTML Cheat Sheet (http://www.webmonkey.com/reference/HTML_Cheatsheet) CSS Tutorial (http://www.w3schools.com/css/) WestCiv CSS Guide (http://www.westciv.com/style_master/academy/css_tutorial/) CSS Cheat Sheet (http://www.addedbytes.com/cheat-sheets/css-cheat-sheet/) CSS Layouts Step-by-step (http://www.webreference.com/authoring/style/sheets/layout/advanced/) Javascript Tutorial (http://www.w3schools.com/JS/default.asp)

  24. TOOLS 4096 Color Wheel (http://www.ficml.org/jemimap/style/color/wheel.html) CSS Creator (http://www.csscreator.com/version2/pagelayout.php) Layout-o-matic (http://www.inknoise.com/experimental/layoutomatic.php) Little Boxes (http://www.thenoodleincident.com/tutorials/box_lesson/boxes.html) Entity Lookup (http://www.digitalmediaminute.com/reference/entity/index.php) Stu Nicholls (http://www.cssplay.co.uk/) Firebug (https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/1843)

  25. CONTENT MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS WordPress Blogging Community – set up a free blog and get used to using WordPress in a controlled environment before ‘self-hosting’(http://www.wordpress.com) WordPress Developer Community – once you have your feet wet, get your own domain name and host, then roll your own look feel(http://www.wordpress.org) Boulder Digital Arts courses on installing, managing and customizing (http://www.boulderdigitalarts.com/training/details.asp?offering=216) (http://www.boulderdigitalarts.com/training/details.asp?offering=217) (http://www.boulderdigitalarts.com/training/details.asp?offering=235)

  26. Q & A M. Douglas Wray http://www.macwebguru.com macguiguru@spamcop.net

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