Session Date: Monday Jan 30, 2017
For the first web development class, read from Learning web design : a beginner's guide to HTML, CSS, Javascript, and web graphics , 4th Edition.
Atom is an open source cross platform text editor that works on Macs and Windows. That is my tool of choice when I am developing. You can get Atom here.
If you have a Windows laptop, you might want to download Notepad ++. It is both useful and free.
If you have a Mac, you might want to download either TextWrangler or Brackets. Both are both useful and free. See which one fits your working style better and stick with the one you select.
Read over the class notes and do your best to memorize the bare minimum code for an HTML page.
The fundamental structure of html is the two-part model of <head> and <body> . Every valid HTML page must include a head and a body.
The head and body can be thought of as "markup" content containers:
<head></head> <body></body>
The browser display ignores white space and comments, so the block below will render the same as the block above:
<head> <!-- Head CONTENT goes here.--> </head> <body> <!-- Body CONTENT goes here.--> </body>
Note the definite article "the". There are various html tags all of which can be an html tag. But we are specifically talking about the master every-thing-goes-in-here primary HTML tag.
The head and body tag must be wrapped in the primary html tag container:
<html> <head></head> <body></body> </html>
A Doctype Declaration must be placed at the very beginning. It is one of those exceptions that does not require an end tag. The entire tag is contained in two brackets.
<!DOCTYPE html> <html> <head></head> <body></body> </html>
The Doctype is necessary for legacy reasons and because there are other types of documents, XML for example, which we will talk about in a later class. The curent html doctype is HTML5. The HTML5 doctype is implied. You do not need to put the 5 in the doctype declaration.
There are just a few more requirements to make this a valid web page. We need to put a title in the head and we should put at least an h1 tag and an p tag in the body.
<!DOCTYPE html> <html> <head> <title>Demo Web Page</title> </head> <body> <h1>Demo Web Page</h1> <p> This is a demo web page. It represents the bare minimum layout for a simple web page. </p> </body> </html>
If you leave out the head and body modern browsers will often put it in for you anyway - see this demo video