Web Building

What does a Web developer have to know? What will the future bring?

This introduction will try to answer that, and help you become a professional Web developer, prepared for the future.

Don't Skip this Chapter! Read it All!

Even if you are a skilled Web developer already, you should read this chapter carefully. You might find our point of view a little different from your existing experience!

If you are a newcomer to Web Building, this chapter will give you an overview of what Web Building is all about and help you to quickly become a professional!

What a Web Developer has to know

One important thing to know is that the functionality of Web Sites will change very drastically. We will see a huge shift from sites displaying "static content" to data driven sites delivering "dynamic content".

We will also see a lot of new browsers, like the browsers found in mobile devices, and we will see a lot more use of XML to communicate data between servers, and between servers and browsers.

We think a Web developer should focus on:

• The HTML 4.01 Standard
• The use of CSS (style sheets)
• The new XHTML
• XML and XSL
• Server Side Scripting
• Managing data with SQL
• Running an "information" server

HTML 4.01

HTML 4.01 is a very important Web standard.

HTML 4.01 is important because it is the latest standard, and because it is very different from HTML 3.2.

When tags like <font> and color attributes were added to HTML 3.2, it started a developer's nightmare. Development of web sites where font information must be added to every single Web page is a long and expensive pain.

With HTML 4 all formatting can be moved out of the HTML document and into a separate style sheet.

HTML 4.01 is also important because XHTML 1.0 (the future HTML standard) is HTML 4.01 "reformulated" as an XML application. Using HTML 4.01 in your pages makes the future upgrade from HTML to XHTML a very simple process.

Make sure you use the latest HTML 4.01 standard !!
Study our Complete HTML 4.01 reference.

Cascading Style Sheets

Styles define how HTML elements are displayed, just like the font tag in HTML 3.2. Styles are normally saved in files external to  HTML documents. External style sheets enable you to change the appearance and layout of all the pages in your Web, just by editing a single CSS document. If you have ever tried changing something like the font or color of all the headings in all your Web pages, you will understand how CSS can save you a lot of work.

Make sure you study our CSS tutorial !!!

XHTML - The Future of HTML

XHTML 1.0 is now the latest HTML standard from W3C. It became an official Recommendation January 26, 2000. A W3C Recommendation means that the specification is stable and that the specification is now a Web standard.

XHTML is a reformulation of HTML 4.01 in XML and can be put to immediate use with existing browsers by following a few simple guidelines.

To prepare for the future: Read how this site was converted to XHTML.

XML - A Tool for Transporting Data

It is important to understand that XML is not a replacement for HTML. In future Web development, XML will be used to describe and carry the data, while HTML will be used to display the data.

Our best description of XML is as a cross-platform, software- and hardware-independent tool for transmitting information.

We believe that XML is as important to the Web as HTML was to the foundation of the Web and that XML will be the most common tool for all data manipulation and data transmission.

Make sure you study our XML tutorial !!!

XSL - A Tool for Transforming Data

Future Web sites will have to deliver data  in different formats, to different browsers and to other Web servers. To transform XML data into different formats, XSL is the new W3C standard.

XSL can transform an XML file into a format that is recognizable to a browser. One such format is HTML. Another format is WML - the mark-up language used in many handheld devices.

XSL can also add elements, remove, rearrange and sort elements, test and make decisions about which elements to display, and a lot more.

Make sure you study our XSL tutorial !!!

Server-Side Scripting

To be able to deliver dynamic Web site content, you have to teach yourself server-side scripting. With server-side scripting, you can:

• Dynamically edit, change, or add any content of a Web page
• Respond to user queries or data submitted from HTML forms
• Access any data or databases and return the results to a browser
• Access any files or XML data and return the results to a browser
• Transform XML data to HTML data and return the results to a browser
• Customize a Web page to make it more useful for individual users
• Provide security and access control to different Web pages
• Tailor your output to different types of browsers
• Minimize the network traffic

At W3Schools we demonstrate server side scripting using Active Server Pages (ASP). We don't do this because we favor Microsoft (ASP is a Microsoft technology), but because it is the easiest way to demonstrate code that you can try out on your own PC (ASP is a free add-on hidden on your Windows CD).

Make sure you study our ASP tutorial !!!

Managing Data with SQL

The Structured Query Language (SQL) is the common standard for accessing databases such as SQL Server, Oracle, Sybase, and Access.

Knowledge of SQL is invaluable for anyone wanting to store or retrieve data from a database.

Any webmaster should know that SQL is the true engine for interacting with databases on the Web.

Make sure you study our SQL tutorial !!!

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Customer: "I don't have a Start button. I have an old keyboard"

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How we converted to XHTML