Introduction to Web Development! Part 1!
- Sejal Bilwar
- 4d
- 3 min read
Website development is a helpful skill that can benefit anybody. The term web development specifically refers to the building and maintaining of websites and includes designing, publishing, and programming the website. Websites can be used for many purposes. They can help you bring businesses to life and develop a relationship with customers, they can help you increase traffic, and they also allow more people to view your content. Many aspects that go into building a thoughtful website, some of which we’ll go into later in the course. But below, we’ll cover some basics.
When designing a website there are many things you will want to keep in mind to increase viewership. First, it's important to make your site functional by implementing intuitive navigation, a site directory for multiple-page websites, fast load times, a search bar, and clear images when necessary. Implementing interactivity such as infographics, animations, quizzes, or polls can make a website fun and engaging, making viewers eager to visit again. Additionally, adding accessibility to websites by choosing clear big fonts, a high-contrast color scheme, alternative text on images, and transcripts for files with audio will make your website easier to view for those with disabilities. Lastly, your website must be secure to protect the users’ information. This is not as important for a beginner website but cyber professionals are trained to detect threats on large-scale websites and eradicate them.
Two types of development go into programming a website. These are front-end and back-end. Front-end is the ‘client side’ of the application or the side that the viewer interacts with. Popular languages for front-end development are HTML, CSS, and Javascript. In the following articles, we will focus on these languages. Back-end development is the server side of the website that users cannot see or interact with. This portion of the software is used to store and arrange data. Popular languages for back-end development are Java, Python, and C#. Full stack is the term for front-end and back-end development together. When building an intricate website you will need to program both the front and back-end.
When developing or interacting with a website you may see some repetitive terms. The following are some common ones you may encounter.
An Application Programming Interface (API): A software that helps multiple applications interact with each other and access information and data easily.
A Domain Name: The name of the website and part of the web address that people use to find a web page online. The domain for Lukupp’s website is Lukupp.com
The Operating System (OS): The main software that manages a computer's hardware, resources, and basic functions. Microsoft Windows and Android are examples of operating systems.
The Internet Protocol Address (IP Address): The unique number assigned to every device connected to the internet, for identification.
HTTP: The common ‘language’ used to communicate between web browsers and website services.
Inspect: By right-clicking on a website and clicking ‘inspect’ from the drop-down menu you will be able to view the website's code. By doing this you can duplicate parts of a website you like on your own.
Now that you understand the principle of website development we will teach you about how you create your own website. The following article will go into examining the structure of a website with HTML, personalizing the design with CSS, and adding interactive elements with JavaScript.
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