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HTML
Basics
By Shelley Lowery
If you're doing business on the Internet, learning some basic web design skills
is an absolute must. Not only will you have the ability to create your own web
pages, but you'll also save yourself a great deal of money.
Selecting an HTML Editor
Although there are many HTML editors available on the Internet, the best editor
I've found is "Coffee Cup." This powerful editor is great for newbies and
experienced webmasters alike. You can download a fully functional shareware
version here:
http://www.coffeecup.com
Web pages are created with special codes known as HTML (Hypertext Markup
Language). These codes, also referred to as tags, are enclosed by the lesser
than (<) and greater than (>) brackets and may be written in capital or lower
case letters.
The opening bracket is followed by an element, which is a browser command, and
ends with the closing bracket.
Example:
<font>
An element may also be followed by attributes, which are words describing the
properties of the element, and further instruct the browser.
Example:
<font size="2">
Attributes are only contained in the opening tags to the right of the element
and are separated by a space and followed by an equal (=) sign. The value
follows the
equal sign and is enclosed in quotes.
Basic Document Structure
Below, is a very basic HTML document structure. It contains the opening HTML
tag, the TITLE tag enclosed between the opening and closing HEAD tags, the
opening and closing BODY tags and the closing HTML tag. All of your text,
graphics and any additional HTML codes will be placed between the <BODY> and
</BODY> tags.
<HTML>
<HEAD>
<TITLE>Your Web Page Title</TITLE>
</HEAD>
<BODY>
</BODY>
</HTML>
Each HTML tag above contains an opening tag and a closing tag. The opening tag
is written with the command enclosed with brackets.
Example:
<HTML>
The closing tag contains a forward slash followed by the command enclosed with
brackets.
Example:
</HTML>
The opening tag is telling the browser to begin the specified action and the
closing tag is telling the browser to end the action.
The proper way to write HTML is to place your closing tags in sequence with your
opening tags.
Example:
<B><I>Example
of the proper sequence of writing HTML</I></B>
Notice that the closing tags are in sequence with the opening tags.
When you have several opening tags, the closing tags will begin with the last
opening tag and end with the first. Are you totally confused now? Here's some
more examples.
This is an example of a properly written code:
<B><I>Example</I></B>
This is an example of an improperly written code:
<B><I>Example</B></I>
Creating a Basic Document
Begin writing your HTML by creating your document's basic layout -- beginning
with <HTML> and ending with </HTML>:
<HTML>
<HEAD>
<META NAME="Description" CONTENT="Description of your
web page">
<META NAME="KEYWORDS" CONTENT="Keywords that best
describe your web page separated with a comma.">
<TITLE>Your Page Title</TITLE>
</HEAD>
<BODY>
This area will contain everything that will be visible
through a web browser such as text and graphics.
</BODY>
</HTML>
<HTML>- Begins your HTML document
<HEAD> - Contains information about the page
such as, the TITLE, META tags for proper Search Engine indexing, STYLE tags,
which determine the page layout and
JavaScript coding for special effects.
<TITLE> - The TITLE of your page. This will be
visible in the title bar of your visitors' browser.
Note: Make sure you include your most relevant keyword phrase within your
"title" for Search Engine indexing. A keyword phrase is two or more words that
best
describe your website. For example, if your website focuses on "grooming dogs"
then your best keyword phrase will be "dog grooming."
</TITLE> - Closes the <TITLE> tag.
</HEAD> - Closes the <HEAD> tag.
<BODY> - This is where you will begin writing your
document.
</BODY> - Closes the <BODY> tag.
</HTML> - Closes the <HTML> tag.
Basic Text Elements
<B> - Bold Text
<B>Example</B>
<I> - Italic
<I>Example</I>
<U> - Underline
<U>Example</U>
Color Codes
If you would like to specify a certain text or background color, you can do so
by using color codes.
RGB color codes are represented as hexadecimal values. The RGB color codes
contain three sets of numbers representing the amount of Red, Green and Blue
contained in a color. These codes must be used within your HTML to specify your
selected colors.
Now, to put the above statement in English...if you'd like to display your text
in a certain color, you must include the hexadecimal color code within your font
tag. Each color has its own color code.
Here are a few of the basic color codes:
Black - #000000
White - #FFFFFF
Red - #FF0000
Green - #00C000
Blue - #0000FF
Yellow - #FFFF00
Example:
<font color="#FF0000">Example</FONT>
You can find a 216 safe color chart here:
216_web_safe_color_chart
Creating Links
In order to navigate a web page, you must create links. Links are created with
an anchor, an href attribute and a URL (Uniform Resource Locator). URL's provide
the browser with the location of the link, the name of the file and the method
in which to access the file.
Example:
<A HREF="http://www.domain.com/">Link</A>
When you begin writing your HTML code, all of your codes will be placed between
your <BODY> and </BODY> tags, as this is the only part of your web page that
will be viewed through a web browser.
You can find an HTML code chart here:
http://www.web-source.net/html_codes_chart.htm
This chart will provide you with all of the basic HTML codes, descriptions and
examples to assist you in creating your web page.
Although this article provides you with a very basic overview of HTML, with the
help of Coffee Cup and the HTML code chart mentioned above, you can easily begin
learning how to create your own web pages.
Copyright © Shelley Lowery
About the Author:
Shelley Lowery is the author of the acclaimed web design course, Web Design
Mastery.
http://www.webdesignmastery.com And, Ebook Starter - Give Your Ebooks the
look and feel of a REAL book.
http://www.ebookstarter.com
Visit Web-Source.net to sign up for a complimentary subscription to Etips and
receive a copy of the acclaimed ebook, "Killer Internet Marketing Strategies."
http://www.web-source.net
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