HTML is the common language of the World Wide Web. It's a simple scripting language that allows Web writers to create web pages of text and images that can be viewed by anyone else on the Web, no matter what kind of computer or browser they are using.
Though you may buy many different programs to automatically write HTML, all you really need to get started is a simple word processor that is capable of saving your work in text format and a working knowledge of HTML. The purpose of this first tutorial is to give you the first steps in writing your own web page. It is easy... Just take it step by step. You will be able to write your own first page in about 1/2 an hour.
HTML is a simple markup language. It uses abbreviations enclosed in these symbols: all commands must be within the Lesser than < and Greater than > symbols. The commands inside these symbols will tell the web browser how to interpret your page. A command within these symbols is called a tag.
Start your web page with this tag: <HTML>
That makes sense. You are denoting that this is an HTML document.
You will also end your page with </HTML> to tell the browser that this is the end of the HTML
( and the end of your web page ).
The <HEAD> command is next on your page. You put it in for the browsers to read information about your page. This is the <HEAD> command - this does not show on your webpage but is information that the browser needs to interpret your page and information to help Search engines find your page. The only part of this we will be concerned with at this point is the <TITLE> command - because every web page needs a title. The <TITLE> command is contained inside the HEAD command
TITLE Your next necessary Tags are the open and close title tags. To open the Title-
<TITLE>YOUR TITLE GOES HERE </TITLE>-To close the Title
See the very top of this page? I mean way up top. Above the FILE -- EDIT -- VIEW menus.
The colored bar up there. Right now it reads "HTML - Lesson One" That's the title of the page and that's what you
are denoting here. Whatever you put between these two tags will show up in the title bar way at the top.
Remember to end the HEAD command - you do that by using the / which denotes the end of a command. This is how you end the HEAD command - </HEAD> You already saw this with the TITLE command. Always make sure to open and close each section of your web page with the / or the browser won't understand it and will really do some strange things to your page.
Next you have your <BODY> Tag This is the stuff that shows ! Everything between the BODY tags is used to show your page. This command can be modified to change the colors of your background, text or put in a special graphical background. We will cover that in a later lesson. Remember to close the BODY with this tag </BODY>
Finally, you'll end every page you write with this tag:
</HTML>
Get it? You started the page with HTML and you will end the page with /HTML.- Really kind of
simple isn't it?
OK, now we are ready to go - here is what a very basic web page looks like:
<HTML>
<HEAD>
<TITLE> My first html page </TITLE>
</HEAD>
<BODY>
This is my first HTML page!
</BODY>
</HTML>
OK, NOW GO AHEAD TAKE A 10 MINUTE BREAK, REREAD THIS SECTION AND THEN DO IT YOURSELF. Open your text editor ( that will be Notepad if you are a Windows user ) and start writing.. Make a directory on your hard drive to save this and all the rest of your web stuff. Then save it with the extension .htm or .html - You can use it for a simple template later on. ( mypage1.htm or mypage1.html. -) Then open your browser, go to the File menu and open your page. If its not right recheck your work making sure you've put in all the tags and closed all the tags that require closing.
Now relax and have a coffee - congratulate yourself and then we will go to Part 2 of our Basic Html tutorial.