KEY INFORMATION SECTION 1. Web design is used as a general term to describ

Web design is used as a general term to describe any of the various tasks involved in creating a web page. More specifically, it refers to jobs focused on building the front-end of a web page.

The web consists of myriad pages, presenting information using different technologies and linked together with hyperlinks. There are two basic aspects to any web page found on the Internet. The first is a presentation that the user interacts with, usually visually, while the second is a back-end that includes information for non-human browsers.

The basic markup language used to tell a browser how to present information is called the HyperText Markup Language (HTML), which is interpreted by a web browser to produce hypertext, a blend of text, graphics and links. In more details HyperText Markup Languageis:

Hyper is the opposite of linear. In the good old days - when a mouse was something the cat chased - computer programs ran linearly: when the program had executed one action it went to the next line and after that, the next line and so on. But HTML is different - you can go wherever you want and whenever you want. For example, it is not necessary to visit MSN.com before you visit HTML.net.

Text is self-explanatory.

Mark-up is what you do with the text. You are marking up the text the same way you do in a text editing program with headings, bullets and bold text and so on.

Language is what HTML is. It uses many English words.

A stricter version of HTML is also widely used, known as eXtensible HyperText Markup Language (XHTML). Using HTML or XHTML, a web designer is able to tell a browser how a web page should appear.

One can view the source or raw HTML code by choosing the View Source option in your web browser. To build a website you could learn how to write HTML tags, the coded instructions that form web pages, or else use an HTML editor, a WYSIWYG (What You See Is What You Get) applicationthat converts a visual layout into HTML code. A simpler option is to use a web template provided by

a web-based site builder, where you just fill in the information you want on the page.

There is tendency of separating the underlying structure of a web-page (using HTML) from the visual presentation of the site (using Cascading Style Sheetsor CSS). This approach has a number of major benefits in both the short and long term. From a technical standpoint, the act of web design can be quite difficult. Unlike more traditional print media, HTML has a number of

variable factors.

To begin with, not all browsers interpret HTML according to the standards created by the standard-setting body — the World Wide Web Consortium, also known as W3. This means that while one piece of web design will appear as the designer wishes it to in one browser, it may appear completely differently in another. Another major limiting factor of web design is the plethora of formats a site might be viewed in. While graphic designers know exactly how large the piece of paper they are printing on will be, a web designer must account for different monitor sizes, different display settings, and even browsers for non-sighted surfers. Combined, these concerns often leave a web designer struggling to incorporate enough dynamism to make a web page attractive on a range of browser sizes, while creating a layout static enough to allow for the use of images and other necessarily fixed-size components.

In addition to XHTML and CSS, web designers often use a number of database driven languages to allow for more dynamism and interactivity on their websites. While useful with smaller sites, database driven languages become a virtual necessity on any site presenting huge amounts of data. Some of the most popular languages for “dynamic” web design include ASP(a proven, well-established technology for building dynamic Web applications, which provides the power and flexibility you need to create anything from a personal, Web based photo gallery to a complete catalogue and shopping cart system for your next eCommerce project), PHP(a widely-used general-purpose scripting language that is especially suited for Web development and can

be embedded into HTML), and ColdFusion Mark-up(a tag-based language, similar to HTML, that uses special tags and functions). Macromedia's Flash also allows a different sort of web design and is very popular amongst many web designers. The possibilities for web design are virtually limitless, although at one

point they were quite constrained by the boundaries of the browser itself. With the advent and flexibility of Flash and other embedded technologies, these boundaries have been all but removed, allowing for a versatility and dynamism that challenges the imagination of anyone interested in web design.

There are some special formats to place different files on the web page. RSS (most commonly expanded as Really Simple Syndication) is a family of web feed formats used to publish frequently updated works - such

asblog entries, news headlines, audio, and video - in a standardized format. An RSS document (which is called a "feed", "web feed", or "channel") includes full or summarized text, plus metadata such as publishing dates and authorship. Web feeds benefit publishers by letting them syndicate content automatically. They benefit readers who want to subscribe to timely updates from favored websites or to aggregate feeds from many sites into one place. RSS feeds can be read using software called an "RSS reader", "feed reader", or "aggregator", which can be web-based, desktop-based, or mobile-device-based.