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HTML Basics, Tips and Tricks
by Fox Bautista
BASICS
Let's start at square one. To start writing HTML, you'll need:
- A computer (gee, I wonder why)
- A browser, like Microsoft Internet
Explorer or Netscape Navigator (so you can view your lovely webpages)
- A word processing program. The simplest ones are the best to use... Notepad or WordPad for Windows, or Simple Text for Mac users.
Now you may be asking... what on earth is HTML? It's a word that stands for HyperText Markup Language. Basically, it's the way of writing programming code for webpages.
You don't need to be hooked up to the Internet to type HTML. You only need to connect when you're sending your beautiful work to your web server (we'll cover this later). You'll be typing up the code in a word processing program. Then, after saving it in HTML format, you'll open it in a browser like IE or Navigator. The browser will interpret the code you wrote, and display it as a Web page.
HTML documents must be saved in TEXT ONLY, which is why I recommend the text-only programs like Notepad, WordPad and Simple Text. This is because they save the document as just text, nothing else. When you save your code in Microsoft Word or a similar program, you're saving more than just the text-- you're saving tab settings, margin settings and a whole lot of other stuff that doesn't need to be in an HTML document. This might cause problems in displaying your page... and that's no fun.
HTML documents MUST be saved with the suffix ".htm" or ".html" in order for them to work (".htm" for PCs with Windows 3.x, ".html" for Mac users and Windows 95/98/2000 users). So from the program you're typing your code in, click on File, then choose Save As. Give the document a name, and add ".htm" or ".html" at the end, whichever applies to your computer. Once your document is saved, either onto a disc or your hard drive, you can open it in the browser like this:
All HTML documents must begin with <HTML> in the first line of code, and close with </HTML> in the last line. This is to tell the computer when the document starts, and when it finishes. They MUST be saved with the suffix ".htm" or ".html" in order for them to work (".htm" for PCs with Windows 3.x, ".html" for Mac users and Windows 95/98/2000 users). So from the program you're typing your code in, click on File, then choose Save As. Give the document a name, and add ".htm" or ".html" at the end, whichever applies to your computer. Once your document is saved, either onto a disc or your hard drive, you can open it in the browser like this:
- Open your browser.
- Under the FILE menu at the top left of the screen, you'll find the words OPEN, OPEN FILE, OPEN DOCUMENT or something like that. Click on it. Some browsers display a Browse button instead of a dialogue box-- click on that if you get one.
- You'll get a dialogue box that allows you to look for the file you want to open. Find it, and double-click it (or press the OK button, depending on what browser you have). The browser will then open the file for you.