I have been talking to a lot of people lately who are just starting out in web design. There are a lot of common questions about web design. A lot of mistakes are being made which will stick with people forever if not corrected early on in their learning.
I try to answer some common questions below.
My number one piece of advise to anyone starting out in web design or trying to move onto the next step in web design would be to “learn the coding”. Once you are confident enough to code an entire site from scratch with correct html & css the battle is almost won. Once you understand what the code says and does you will save a lot of time when trying to trouble shoot errors in your sites. You will also be able to view other sites which you think are inspiring and take a look at their sites source code and understand how they made their sites look so good or added certain effects. This doesn’t mean just copy and paste of somebody elses code as that is both illegal and just bad form.
A lot of people when starting to design websites want to make sure they have great colour text and backgrounds when that should really be the last thing that you do on your site. The styling is meant to be built around the content not vice versa. Google and other search engines are interested solely in what your site is about and what content it contains not what it looks like. And of course there is no point having a nice looking site for people to view and then the content within not having as much effect.
Some common questions:
- Books & Sites on learning web design
- Programmes needed for web design
Sitepoint has a great site and also produce some fantastic books on a huge range of computer and design related areas. If you are just starting out I would have a look at a book called “Build Your Own Website the Right Way using HTML & Css”. Great book which covers both mac & pc users. Also sitepoint.com often have giveaways with free downloadable books. Also have a look at W3Schools.com
All you really need is a simple text editor programme such as Text Editor, Text Wrangler. If you want some more advanced features which might save you time by doing some of the harder work coding have alook at something like Adobe Dreamweaver, Coda, Rapidweaver.
There are always people out there willing to lend a hand and offer some advice whether it be an opinion on a new website, how to test your site out or how to approach clients if new to the industry. Places such as Boards.ie , LinkedIn.com are full of people like you and me either looking to get or give information.
If you have any comments, suggestions or questions please leave a comment and if there are areas that need a lot of covering I can try get into some more detail in those areas.
Great tips. I agree with the learn the coding part. In my opinion, there really is no way to get around coding. Also, being a newbie to web design and cramming down as much info as I can stomach over the past year or so has taught me another big one…don’t ignore web standards and best practices. I think you mentioned that, but just to underscore the point: HTML for structural markup, CSS for style. If you don’t, someday you’ll wish you did.
I’ll have to check out the book you mentioned. Actually, I think it’s already on my Amazon wish list. The book I’ve been using to learn from is by Jennifer Norst Robbins called “Learning Web Design” from O’Reilly Media. Very straight forward book.
Hey Joel
You are right about standards. The only thing I would say is to not rely on them as the industry changes so quickly that some standards dont have time to catch up.
For example when using the “moz-border” in your css stylesheet (this lets Firefox display rounded corners on your borders) you may get a validation error even though there is nothing wrong with this coding. I would say use it as more of a guide.
The great thing about web design is the amount of info at your finger tips. And sites like sitepoint where you can buy ebooks instead of having to wait for a copy to arrive in the post or get up and actually go out into the real world and buy one
I have been talking to a few people about adding some posts on here about design related issues. I want people who are just past the starting out stage, such as yourself, who can relate to beginners and will be able to write posts that would be helpful and relevant to new people getting into design.
If this is something of interest let me know.
Yeah, Dave, that sounds great. I’m sure I’ll have plenty to write about once I’m done with learning the WordPress loop!! I’m working on it now – pretty intense, but yet it’s all pretty logical.
Like your thoughts about standards.
JAG
Wow… Really informative post!
Have a lovely day!
Thanks Freeda
Glad you liked the post
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Hi! Sorry that I am asking here – what cms is this? WordPress, Movabletype? Cant locate data anywhere.
No problem at all,
The blog is a custom wordpress theme designed by myself.
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