Anyone who'd like to create a web page has a number of options. Most business software packages (word processing, spreadsheets, etc.) come with options to save documents for web publishing. There are also many web page design programs such as Dreamweaver, FrontPage, and Netscape Composer, that you can use to lay out a web page.
So why learn HTML?
One reason is that it is the easiest and simplest way to create basic web pages. With a few commands, you can have a heading and some text ready to be displayed on the web. If you are a programmer, knowing HTML allows you to write code that generates web-ready output.
Another reason is to have greater control over your web pages. With a knowledge of HTML, you can tweak web pages that have been generated by programs such as Composer. Adding some HTML code can fix problems that these programs create.
A final reason is that you can create simple, flexible web pages by writing your own HTML code. Web design programs often create unnecessarily complex pages in order to duplicate the exact look of your layout. This is often futile, since people will be viewing your page using different computers with large and small monitors and different browsers. Simple, flexible pages work much better in a medium like the web.
As an example, here's a simple web page coded with HTML:
This document would be saved as a small file (360 bytes) that would be downloaded from the web very quickly. The page would appear in a browser as:
If I used Microsoft Word to create the same page and save it for the web, I would get a very large and complex document:
<html xmlns:o="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office"
xmlns:w="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:word"
xmlns="http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40">
<head>
<meta http-equiv=Content-Type content="text/html; charset=windows-1252">
<meta name=ProgId content=Word.Document>
<meta name=Generator content="Microsoft Word 9">
<meta name=Originator content="Microsoft Word 9">
<link rel=File-List href="./wordsample_files/filelist.xml">
<title>Welcome to bsimple</title>
<style>
<!--
/* Style Definitions */
p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal
{mso-style-parent:"";
margin:0in;
margin-bottom:.0001pt;
mso-pagination:widow-orphan;
font-size:12.0pt;
font-family:"Times New Roman";
mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";}
h1
{mso-style-next:Normal;
margin-top:12.0pt;
margin-right:0in;
margin-bottom:3.0pt;
margin-left:0in;
mso-pagination:widow-orphan;
page-break-after:avoid;
mso-outline-level:1;
font-size:16.0pt;
font-family:Arial;
mso-font-kerning:16.0pt;}
p.Names, li.Names, div.Names
{mso-style-name:Names;
margin-top:0in;
margin-right:0in;
margin-bottom:4.0pt;
margin-left:0in;
mso-pagination:widow-orphan;
font-size:11.0pt;
mso-bidi-font-size:12.0pt;
font-family:"Times New Roman";
mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";}
@page Section1
{size:8.5in 11.0in;
margin:1.0in 1.25in 1.0in 1.25in;
mso-header-margin:.5in;
mso-footer-margin:.5in;
mso-paper-source:0;}
div.Section1
{page:Section1;}
-->
</style>
</head>
<body lang=EN-US style='tab-interval:.5in'>
<div class=Section1>
<h1 align=center style='text-align:center'>Welcome to bsimple.org!</h1>
<p class=MsoNormal><![if !supportEmptyParas]> <![endif]><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class=MsoNormal>This is an example of what should be a <i>simple</i>
web page, generated by <b>Microsoft Word</b>. Word tends to create very
bloated HTML code when it generates a web page.</p>
<p class=MsoNormal><![if !supportEmptyParas]> <![endif]><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class=MsoNormal>This document will end up as a large and
complex web page.</p>
<p class=MsoNormal><![if !supportEmptyParas]> <![endif]><o:p></o:p></p>
</div>
</body>
</html>
Word uses style sheets with specific fonts and point sizes to try to recreate the appearance of the print document on the web. This file would be nearly
ten times as large as the simple one, and it may display incorrectly on some computers.
Not everyone will want to write HTML code, but if you are interested in the ability to create simple web pages using a text editor, this tutorial can get you started.
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