Datasheet

Manuals Brands Wiley Manuals Software 978-0-470-22363-5

Crowder c01.tex V3 - 05/26/2008 7:16pm Page 3

The Basics of Building

Web Pages and Sites

IN THIS CHAPTER

Web browsers

Web pages

Web sites

Analyzing Web site types

Understanding Internet

demographics

Determining your approach

Dos and don’ts of Web site

development

f you have a completely solid, totally clear idea of exactly what you

want to do on the Web, you can safely skip this chapter — maybe.

Are you absolutely certain that you have considered all the details? How

does your site compare to other similar ones? Where does it ﬁt in? What

are the differences between them? Are those differences enough to distin-

guish your Web site, to attract visitors away from competing sites? Have

you covered everything from setting a budget to grasping current Internet

demographics? Has it occurred to you that you might want to avoid some

apparently useful technologies?

If your answer to any of these questions isn’t a resounding ‘‘yes,’’ you

should start right here and read this chapter before you do anything else.

Starting here really means stepping back and taking a look at the origins

of the technologies we use today and that ubiquitously govern our com-

munications, our transports, our trade, our military, our education, our

medicine, our understanding of ourselves, and the direction of our society

to come. These are astounding transformations, and we must spend a bit

of time looking at the roots and vines to better understand the fruit of the

Information Age. The future cannot be predicated from a present that has

no past.

Therefore, this chapter begins with a discussion of the origin of Web

browsers so that you may understand why browsers do what they do,

which will allow you, the user, to determine what is the best browser for

you. Similarly, when building your site, you must understand not only its

infrastructure but also the workings of the audience (clientele) that will be

utilizing your Web site so that you will be in a better position to efﬁciently

COPYRIGHTED MATERIAL

Summary of content (30 pages)

PAGE 1

Crowder c01.tex V3 - 05/26/2008 7:16pm f you have a completely solid, totally clear idea of exactly what you want to do on the Web, you can safely skip this chapter — maybe.
PAGE 2

Crowder Part I c01.tex V3 - 05/26/2008 7:16pm Laying the Foundation deliver services. A better understanding of how to structure the delivery method allows more effective delivery of the content itself. This chapter discusses the structure of a Web page using HTML to help you understand what coding a Web page is like.
PAGE 3

Crowder c01.tex V3 - 05/26/2008 7:16pm The Basics of Building Web Pages and Sites shown in separate windows. Figure 1-1 shows the first graphical browser created by Berners-Lee at CERN. WorldWideWeb had significant font-manipulation capabilities. Users could adjust the font size, select from a range of font types, align elements, work with tables, lists, and so forth, and generally implement the features associated with HTML 1.0 — which was the dominant version of HTML from 1989 to approximately 1994.
PAGE 4

Crowder Part I c01.tex V3 - 05/26/2008 7:16pm Laying the Foundation FIGURE 1-2 The violaWWW browser was used by CERN before the arrival of Mosaic. Perhaps it was limited by only running on Unix X-Windows when the world was facing a looming showdown of Mac versus PC, or perhaps it was just too advanced for its time. Regardless of the reason, in this same time period, there was a mad rush to cash in on the Berners-Lee open source Web browser, WorldWideWeb, and commercialize it.
PAGE 5

Crowder c01.tex V3 - 05/26/2008 7:16pm The Basics of Building Web Pages and Sites ■ It was the first commonly available browser to have inline images. ■ It offered support for a number of graphics formats. ■ It was able to render both video and audio formats. ■ It introduced as add-ons the features of history (which allowed the tracking of sites visited) and bookmarks. The Mosaic browser was aggressively marketed with a hitherto unknown 24-hour technical support for its client base.
PAGE 6

Crowder Part I c01.
PAGE 7

Crowder c01.tex V3 - 05/26/2008 7:16pm The Basics of Building Web Pages and Sites There is, as Paul Harvey would say, the rest of the story. It may concern an Easter egg. Those who have Firefox let them see . . . about:Mozilla. Book of Mozilla 7:15. As for the best of the best, about two years ago extensive tests were run by a very committed, highly organized, and methodical programmer named Mark Wilton-Jones in the United Kingdom.
PAGE 8

Crowder Part I c01.tex V3 - 05/26/2008 7:16pm Laying the Foundation user is fetching could be located directly on the domain, or within a folder within the domain. For example, if you have a Web page called Crowder, stored directly on the wiley site, the format of the address would be http://wiley.com/Crowder If the Web page, however, were stored within a folder called, say, CWSB, the file (or Web page) reference would be: http://www.wiley.com/CWSB/Crowder.
PAGE 9

Crowder c01.tex V3 - 05/26/2008 7:16pm The Basics of Building Web Pages and Sites continued to browser. FTP is used to upload and download files to and from a workstation to a file server. Another way to remember the distinction is that HTTP uses port 80, whereas FTP uses ports 21 and 20 (command and data). A Web page is written in HTML or Extensible HTML (XHTML).
PAGE 10

Crowder Part I c01.tex V3 - 05/26/2008 7:16pm Laying the Foundation A simple setup for a Web page would be as follows: A simple web page
This is paragraph one.

This is paragraph two.

and this is paragraph three.
PAGE 11

Crowder c01.tex V3 - 05/26/2008 7:16pm The Basics of Building Web Pages and Sites You’ll see many examples of this (and do it yourself) later in this book as you are developing your own pages. XHTML (which came out in 2001) was designed to provide a strict structure currently lacking in HTML coding. The reason for some of the strict structure may be obvious, but some of it may be needlessly complicated. One reason for XHTML is so that we know how to detect a properly formatted page.
PAGE 12

Crowder Part I c01.tex V3 - 05/26/2008 7:16pm Laying the Foundation And there are numerous extended classifications. Later in this chapter, you will see one breakdown of Web sites, and others will be presented throughout this book as appropriate to the topic. This section offers a brief overview of links, which are the single most critical shared feature of all Web sites.
PAGE 13

Crowder c01.tex V3 - 05/26/2008 7:16pm The Basics of Building Web Pages and Sites FIGURE 1-5 Home page of Emory and Henry College. Chapter 4 provides more information about designing the structure of the Web site. At this point, however, you should at least appreciate the criticality of sitting down and drawing out your site before doing the fun stuff (the content).
PAGE 14

Crowder Part I c01.tex V3 - 05/26/2008 7:16pm Laying the Foundation ■ Organizational ■ Political ■ Commercial As with any attempt at taxonomy (that is, the art of lumping disparate entities into categories based on similarities), there are gray areas, fuzzy situations, and downright overlaps. What do you make of a personal home page that’s largely political? In the system discussed here, it’s still a personal home page.
PAGE 15

Crowder c01.tex V3 - 05/26/2008 7:16pm The Basics of Building Web Pages and Sites The Daily Kos political blog, for example, provides much needed clarification about the confusing political situation within the Democratic party and the state of our nation at www.dailykos.com. Search engines, on the other hand, are a perfect example of the kind of gray area discussed earlier, where it’s difficult to slot many of them into one category.
PAGE 16

Crowder Part I c01.tex V3 - 05/26/2008 7:16pm Laying the Foundation FIGURE 1-7 Spanish Learning Resources provides both free and premium information services. Table 1-1 lists the URLs of several informational sites that you can browse and study. Organizational sites Organizational Web sites are concerned with presenting information about — you guessed it — a particular organization. The reason these are distinguished from pure informational sites is their narrow focus.
PAGE 17

Crowder c01.tex V3 - 05/26/2008 7:16pm The Basics of Building Web Pages and Sites TABLE 1-1 Informational Web Sites Site URL AcqWeb’s Directory of Book Reviews on the Web acqweb.library.vanderbilt.edu/ acqweb/bookrev.html AnyWho www.tollfree.att.net Catalog of Solar Eclipses sunearth.gsfc.nasa.gov/eclipse/ SEcat/SEcatalog.html CIA World Factbook odci.gov/cia/publications/factbook CIAC ciac.llnl.gov/ciac/index.html Dead People Server www.dpsinfo.
PAGE 18

Crowder Part I c01.tex V3 - 05/26/2008 7:16pm Laying the Foundation engage in some kind of fund-raising activity that is secondary to their main purpose. With purely commercial sites, there is never any doubt — the main thrust is simply ‘‘Buy our product or service’’ or ‘‘Support our sponsors.’’ The Barnes & Noble Web site (www.bn.com), shown in Figure 1-10, goes straight to the point. It’s there for one thing and one thing only — to enable you to find and buy books and music.
PAGE 19

Crowder c01.tex V3 - 05/26/2008 7:16pm The Basics of Building Web Pages and Sites TABLE 1-2 Organizational Web Sites Site URL International Center for Reiki Training reiki.org JustLinux justlinux.com National Weather Service www.nws.noaa.gov Nautical Research Guild naut-res-guild.org Nicholas Roerich Museum roerich.org Small Business Administration www.sba.gov State Library of New South Wales www.sl.nsw.gov.au The Naval Dockyards Society www.hants.gov.
PAGE 20

Crowder Part I c01.tex V3 - 05/26/2008 7:16pm Laying the Foundation FIGURE 1-9 The Democratic National Committee site is a prime example of a political Web site. TABLE 1-3 Political Web Sites 22 Site URL Australian Politics Online www.ozpolitics.com.au Chinese Politics Online www.politics.unimelb.edu.au/cpo Conservative Party Website www.conservatives.com/home.cfm Labour Party Website www.labour.org.uk Republican National Committee rnc.org Southeast European Politics Online www.seep.
PAGE 21

Crowder c01.tex V3 - 05/26/2008 7:16pm The Basics of Building Web Pages and Sites FIGURE 1-10 The Barnes & Noble Web site is a prime example of a well-designed and successful commercial Web site. Understanding Internet Demographics There are tons of ‘‘facts’’ available about the Internet. Unfortunately, most of these statistics can be classified by one of Mark Twain’s most famous quips, ‘‘There are lies, damned lies, and statistics.
PAGE 22

Crowder Part I c01.tex V3 - 05/26/2008 7:16pm Laying the Foundation TABLE 1-4 Commercial Web Sites Site URL Australian Bush Flower Essences www.ausflowers.com.au Gibson Research Corporation grc.com Jagex Software jagex.com Janes Information Group www.janes.com Magix Entertainment Software www.magix.net Ptaah www.ptaah.com/home.html Staples Office Supplies staples.com The History Channel www.historychannel.com/ontv/index.html TV Guide tvguide.
PAGE 23

Crowder c01.tex V3 - 05/26/2008 7:16pm The Basics of Building Web Pages and Sites FIGURE 1-11 comScore is one of the best sources of Internet facts. Surveying site visitors When it comes to learning about your particular site’s visitors — or what they like — there’s not much of a substitute for simply asking them. There are drawbacks, however, to the survey concept.
PAGE 24

Crowder Part I c01.tex V3 - 05/26/2008 7:16pm Laying the Foundation TABLE 1-5 Internet Research Firms Company Web Address comScore Networks www.comscore.com Forrester Research www.forrester.com Harris Interactive www.harrisinteractive.com Jupiter Communications jupitercommunications.com Nielsen//NetRatings nielsennetratings.com Nua Internet Surveys www.nua.ie/surveys Statistical Research, Inc. statisticalresearch.com WebSideStory websidestory.com Zandl Group zandlgroup.
PAGE 25

Crowder c01.tex V3 - 05/26/2008 7:16pm The Basics of Building Web Pages and Sites Focusing on goals Every Web site, in order to be successful, must fulfill some sort of need for its visitors. The word ‘‘need’’ doesn’t have to be interpreted too strictly. After all, how many people really need a $400 leather jacket? Or a handcrafted miniature car? Yet, there are sites that are successfully selling such items.
PAGE 26

Crowder Part I c01.tex V3 - 05/26/2008 7:16pm Laying the Foundation Staying deliberately obsolete That said, there are good and solid reasons to deliberately ignore even a well-established Internet technology in favor of still older approaches. And those reasons are stability and demographic reach.
PAGE 27

Crowder c01.tex V3 - 05/26/2008 7:16pm The Basics of Building Web Pages and Sites Dos and Don’ts of Web Site Development The reasons for good Web site design are obvious. You want visitors to your site to have a pleasant productive experience when they do business with you. You not only want them to like what you have to offer but also to appreciate the ease and convenience with which their online shopping is done. You want customers to come back.
PAGE 28

Crowder Part I c01.tex V3 - 05/26/2008 7:16pm Laying the Foundation of three or more possible links actually contains the phone number they are so desperately seeking. ■ Make fonts readable — Have high contrast with the background and, if you use them at all, do not put significant amounts of light-colored fonts against dark backgrounds. ■ Be conscious of backgrounds — Consider white to be the background of choice.
PAGE 29

Crowder c01.tex V3 - 05/26/2008 7:16pm The Basics of Building Web Pages and Sites ■ Have links unrelated to the main purpose(s) of the Web site. ■ Do not use a spellchecker. All of these faux pas have occurred, countless times, on real Web sites. Several examples of bad Web sites may currently be found at such locations as: ■ www.webpagesthatsuck.com ■ www.worstoftheweb.com ■ http://www.bad-websites.
PAGE 30

Crowder c01.