The first misconception that I would like to clear up is that web pages are some kind of complicated conglomeration of code and graphics that only a rocket scientist can understand. The fact is that writing HTML code is fairly simple and you can learn to create clean attractive web pages with a little practice, a little advice and a little common sense.

My intent here is not to make you master web site and graphical designers. The fact is that most of you are already very skilled and seasoned graphic designers. You simply don't have the proper tools to put your ideas and designs into web page format. I intend to give you those tools.

HTML stands for Hyper-Text Markup Language. What HTML really amounts to is a simple formatting language which works a lot like your word processing software. When you create a document in your word processing software you are given lots of choices on how to display your text. You can change the font size, color or style, bold or italicize, align left, align right, justify or a hundred other things. The more modern versions even allow you to import images. That is exactly what HTML allows you to do, it just does it in a different way. With HTML you format by using various tags throughout the page.

What HTML can't do are functions like performing math, checking stock quotes or any other interactive function. It will simply display your text and images in the way that you want them displayed. Interactive functions are done by other kinds of computer languages such as PHP, JAVA and PERL. These languages are far more complicated and do require a great deal of study to master so we won't get into them for now.

In order for us to get started creating web pages you will need some basic tools and software. Since you are reading this lesson via the Internet you already have most of them. The first of course is a computer with an Internet connection. The second is a web browser such as Internet Explorer or Netscape. The third is some type of word processing software. If you are using Windows you can use Notepad as a starting place to create your pages. There are lots of great HTML editing software packages and some of them we will discuss in later lessons. For now though a simple text editor like Notepad will do just fine.

Later you will also need to learn to FTP your web pages from your home computer to a web server. FTP stands for File Transfer Protocol. Again this is a simple set of rules (protocols) that have been written to allow for the transfer of files from one computer to another. In this case you will be transferring HTML pages and graphics from your home computer to the web server. To begin with though, you will be building and viewing your pages directly from your home computer so we will leave FTP for another lesson. I have a simple tutorial on using Acute FTP software already on the site if you would like to get a head start.

I mentioned web server, which I would like to briefly explain. A web server is a computer much like your home computer. The difference being that it has the necessary hardware and software to perform various Internet-related functions such as displaying HTML pages, allowing FTP, and handling your email. Web servers vary greatly from company to company because there are different kinds of operating systems and other software to choose from. What goes on a server depends on what it will be doing. It is important to know what kinds of software are running on the server you will be storing your pages on. This subject will come up in the various lessons when we start building things like forms. The type of form you build will depend on what types of software is running on the web server.

I will be taking you through a series of lessons on building web pages that will start with the most basic HTML to the more complicated trick of using Photoshop. I will emphasize the use of tables in HTML throughout the lessons. Understanding how to use tables and nested tables is the key to a great web design. I hope you enjoy the web site, let us know what we can do to improve it.

Go to Lesson 1.

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