Learning to write a web page

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A computer

Well, actually, strictly speaking you can 'write' your web pages on paper. But nobody would ever be able to see what you wanted to show if you left it there. So a computer it is, then. A multi-media PC like the one at LDPS Out of School Club is perfect, because it has everything you need: lots of power, lots of software and lots of space to put your files. And maybe one day it will have an Internet-connection, too. If the Club would then get some web space somewhere, you could even make your efforts visible to the world. But that's a later worry. We're working for ourselves first. Practice, remember? And for that, you don't need the Internet at all.

Computer programs

Browser

Does anyone know what a browser is?

The answer should appear in the grey bar at the bottom of this 'window'. This window is, in fact, a browser window. It shows you the content of the web writing course. We have probably started this course by double-clicking on the 'index.html' file, which had an icon which looks like an 'e' with a swirl round it. This is the symbol of 'Internet Explorer', one of the most famous browsers around. Another big one is called 'Netscape', but there are lots more. All are slightly different, but the effect is the same: they display web pages and allow you to browse the Internet, or the World Wide Web. When you double-click on the 'e'-icon, the file is automatically displayed with Internet Explorer, unless the computer is set up differently.

Somewhere to write

There are two main ways of writing web pages:

1. With a clever web-page-writer like WebWizard or FrontPage or DreamWeaver (or whatever they are called). These programs help you with everything, so you don't have to think very hard. You want a button? It gives you a button. You suddenly change your mind about your background colour? One press of a button will fix it.
2. By hand. Yes, this means you have to think of every little bit, but it also means total control. Precision in the positioning of pictures, to the last millimetre. Scripts exactly where and how you want them, rather than the standard bits the clever programs provide. Moreover, the files you create are a lot smaller, because they only contain the bits you wanted, rather than all the bits the clever program thinks you might need (including pages and pages of default values for colours etc., which you would not need if you really only used the defaults... Does everybody know what 'default' means?). Writing your web pages by hand means your web site will be a lot faster, and does not take up so much space on your computer. Better still, you won't need the clever programs in the first place! Another space saver. You will only need a very simple program like Notepad (or Wordpad, slightly cleverer...) to write your web pages. And those little programs come standard with every PC these days. Cheap, too! Also, once you've done it by hand, the 'clever' web writing programs will be really easy to handle for you, and you will be able to get exactly what you want out of them, rather than them being a black box which you can't follow.

A bit of cheek

The easiest way to improve your skills in writing web pages, is to look at what other people have done, and how they have done it. When you are on the Internet and you see something you like and you don't immediately know how it is done, check the HTML. The way to do this, is to View Source or View Page Source. This is an option in the View menu at the top of the browser window.

Back to contents

What do we need? HTML and the .html file Tags Formatting Head and body
Size and shape Colour Colour table Colour wheels Pictures
Special characters Special characters table Hyperlinks Combining and nesting tags Lists
Tables Frames Style sheets Maps Forms Scripts Publicising (meta tags) Bits and pieces