introduction to web sites design

Probably More Than You’ve Ever Probably More Than You’ve Ever Wanted to Know About Web Page Wanted to Know About Web Page

Design, But Were Afraid to AskDesign, But Were Afraid to Ask……

Presented by: Marwa Gawad

Objectives

• Participants will create a title & accompanied content.

• Participants will edit text, background, and background images.

• Participants will create a hyperlink to other pages.

• Participants will insert an image into their web page.

• Participants will know how to upload their web page to their account.

• Participants will make changes to their existing web page after it has been published.

What is a Web Site?

• A web site is a digital page consisting of HTML (hypertext markup language) files, images, movies, sound, and other media.

• The code in these HTML files are read by your internet browser and displayed in the format you see every time you go onto the internet.

How Web Sites Work

• Web designer creates web page (.html files)

• The web page is uploaded to a FTP server.

• The end user then sends a request to the server asking to see the web site based on the web address.

Creation Upload to FTP Server End-User

Designing a Web Site

• Steps to follow when designing a web site.

• 1) Decide on a purpose or main idea for your site.

• 2) Flowchart your content graphically.

• 3) Decide on a design interface (navigation, links, buttons, etc.)

• 4) Begin web site creation.


• 1) The first thing to do when designing a web site is to decide on your Main Idea or purpose of the site.

• Is it to interface with parents &/or students, offer additional assignments, promote your class, attract new students?

?


• 2) Secondly, brainstorm subtopics that relate to your site. Make a flowchart and write out the content for each page.


• 3) Decide on your design interface, colors, images, etc. Draw it out on paper if necessary.


• 4) Begin website creation.

• When you have all of the preliminary work done, you have the "map" or direction in which to go. This will make it easier as you start your digital design.

OK, Now What?

• So, you’ve got your design all planned, and your site storyboarded out, so how do I actually make the thing?

• It’s much easier than it might appear…

OK, Now What?

• HTML markup language is very simple, and, among computer languages, actually rather intuitive, once you get the general idea.

• It relies on “markup” code, which the browser (Internet Explorer, Firefox, Safari) interprets to modify and arrange your text, graphics, video, whatever..

OK, Now What?• Here is the HTML code for a basic page…

<head><title></title></head><body>

blah, blah, blah

</body></html>

• Which makes a page that looks like this:

OK, Now What?

• OK, not overwhelmingly interesting yet.

• It’s a blank page, like you start off with your word processor documents, which also use markup language that you don’t see

• So, add some more stuff, and your web page will rock…

OK, Now What?

• Now, you can make web pages with Notepad, using the markup language like we saw before, but that can get tedious

• So, folks have developed web design software to make it relatively painless…

OK, Now What?

• There are tons of them out there, including: Microsoft FrontPage & Expression, Dreamweaver, Page Mill, ColdFusion, etc.

• One I like is called Coffee Cup. They are very intuitively designed, fast, low footprint on your computer, and, they have a free version available.

OK, Now What?• CoffeeCup Web Software can be found here:

• http://www.coffeecup.com/

• With the free stuff here:

• http://www.coffeecup.com/freestuff/

http://www.coffeecup.com/

http://www.coffeecup.com/freestuff/

OK, Now What?

• Plan A was to have you all play around with the free version of CoffeeCup, create your first webpage.

• Well, best the best laid plans of mice and men were laid waste by our friendly and helpful IT department, so, well, nevermind.

OK, Now What?

•To give you a quick idea of what you might do with a web page, let’s look at mine, located at:

•. .www e2st net

http://www.e2st.net/

OK, Now What?

• Now, just in case, here’s what I use my web page for…

• Providing a group of software based solutions

Elmanara.net Includes:•separate pages per course with full course

content

•field trip, lab photos, & video

•classroom procedures

•SAT/ACT information

•articles of interest

•contact information

•a Blog for less formal communication

More?

• Maybe we should end it here.

• If you want more, check out a web page of this presentation with design tips, additional reference and software links, plus more fun and adventure in web design…

• http://www.slideshare.net/marwaabdelgawad

Designer Issues You Should Know.• You should always consider your audience, both with

regard to content and to design technicalities. For example:

• Computer screen size. As a general rule, a site should be developed at 640 pixels wide.

• This will also allow your end user to print out the page so it will fit on a piece of paper.

• Any pages over 780 pixels wide will look poorly or will be hard to navigate on screen sizes that are set at 800x600.

Designer Issues You Should Know.

46KB 6KB

Optimize your images for the web. Make your pictures download fast for your viewers. Use 72 dpi when scanning or creating an image for the web.

See any difference?


• Contrast colors for better readability.

• Keep it simple.

• As a general rule, using a light background with a dark text or a dark background with light text.


• Sans-Serif fonts are easier to read on screens that are being projected or on web pages.

• NEVER USE CAPS

SerifSerif Sans-Sans-SerifSerif

Times New Times New RomanRoman

ArialArial

GaramondGaramond VerdanaVerdana

GeorgiaGeorgia TahomaTahoma


• Your user should be able to navigate to the main sections (especially the home page) on your site from every page.


• Section 508 Requirement.

• (especially if government funding is involved)

• Websites need to be accessible to all people so <alt> tags on all images need to be used.

Designing Layouts

• Too many animations are distracting to your audience, however cool they may seem at the time.

• Example of BAD web page design

http://www.ocf.berkeley.edu/~chenj/brucelee/brucelee.html

introduction to web sites design

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