| HTML (HyperText Markup Language) and CSS | | | | software vendors such as Microsoft, Mozilla and |
| (Cascading Style Sheets) are pretty much the most | | | | Apple. The algorithms employed by the rendering |
| fundamental technologies of the web. They are the | | | | engine are far from identical. As a seasoned web |
| language of all web pages on the Internet and | | | | developer which you are going to be, you have to |
| sometimes they are also used to write documents | | | | be well aware of these rendering differences to |
| and help files in your local computer. Browsers such | | | | avoid any visual inconsistency of your work across |
| as Internet Explorer and Firefox are what is used to | | | | major browsers. For example, when you have done |
| render the documents written in HTML and CSS to | | | | coding a HTML page for IE8, there might very well |
| be beautiful web pages such as this one you are | | | | be some minor bugs on other browsers such as |
| seeing and reading right now. | | | | Firefox. You will want to check and compare the |
| To be a web developer, the first step is to learn | | | | results of each browser against the other to find out |
| about HTML and CSS which goes without saying. | | | | and probably address the issues. Sometimes it may |
| They are the most basic stuff that you will have to | | | | be a wider gap somewhere, sometimes it's a |
| know before diving into more advanced programming | | | | displacement of something. It's really annoying at first |
| and development languages such as JavaScript, PHP | | | | but once you have familiarized yourself with all the |
| and MySQL. So how does one learn HTML and CSS? | | | | differences, it'd be a breeze to code a consistent |
| Very simple, as: | | | | HTML page without even testing it. |
| 1. Find a well written online tutorial site to learn them | | | | 4. HTML and CSS themselves are very simple to |
| step by step systematically. Recommended sources | | | | learn yet hard to master. Visual designs are becoming |
| of learning HTML and CSS include and | | | | more and more sophisticated, you will gain invaluable |
| 2. As you read the tutorials, while making sense of all | | | | experience by converting them into live web pages. |
| the new things you meet in HTML and CSS, write | | | | So go find some web page designs in image format |
| your own code and test them in browsers. Follow | | | | such as PSD or PNG and try to slice them into real |
| the instructions to make certain changes or do it | | | | web pages by hand. |
| yourself in a sort of random way to see what | | | | 5. While you may be faster coding with a modern |
| differences there are between them by refreshing | | | | IDE such as Dreamweaver, it won't be a good idea |
| the browsers. | | | | for learning HTML and CSS which you should be |
| 3. You may take notice of how differently these | | | | practicing by coding bare hand with a plain text editor |
| browsers each may render your HTML and CSS | | | | such as Notepad++. |
| documents. That's because they are built by different | | | | |