SCHOOL OF LIBRARY & INFORMATION SCIENCE
CLIS529 Links From Textbook
Chapter 7 - Writing for the Web
Basic HTML Tags
Hypertext links
You can provide a compact preview of all the sections at the top of the page by creating a small table of contents, with each section name linked to a section below. Look at how Lonely Planet Online formats its pages on individual countries. Look up any country you like. Then use View | Source to see the HTML code.
Symbols and accents
For a comprehensive reference of typographical symbols and accented letters, see the Web Design Group's "ISO 8859-1 Character Set Overview".
You have two options to produce typographical symbols and accented letters.
Option 1: Find the ISO Latin 1 numeric entity for the symbol or letter you want at 8 bit ASCII codes , precede it with an ampersand and a pound sign (&#), and follow it with a semicolon (;).
Option 2: Find the character entity for the symbol or letter you want (see list at Webmonkey | Reference: Special Characters) precede it with an ampersand, and follow it with a semicolon.
Web graphics
Clip art
There's a directory of clipart sites at Clipart.com. Some of the better sites include:
Absolute Background Textures Archive - a treasure trove of more than 3,000 backgrounds.
Ender Design: Realm Graphics - a large collection of nice backgrounds, bullets, buttons, icons, etc.
IconBAZAAR - a vast site with hundreds of icons of all kinds.
Pixelsight - an amazing array of beautiful graphics; not free, but well worth a look if you get serious about designing Web content.
Your own original images
Adobe's Photoshop is good if you are serious about creating original graphics and you have $649 to spare. Photoshop Limited Edition provides tools for manipulating photos. It is available for Windows or Macintosh and costs $95. The less expensive PhotoDeluxe Home Edition ($49) runs only under Windows. Compare specifications at Adobe Products.
JASC Inc's Paint Shop Pro can do just about everything you will ever need for $99.
Recommended graphics software (shareware for Windows 95/98/NT)
GIF Construction Set Professional - a collection of tools for editing GIFs and creating animated GIFs and transparent backgrounds.
LView Pro - a full-featured image-editing program excellent for creating transparent backgrounds. Also performs complex color-correction functions, simplifies building a Web "photo gallery," and saves in a variety of file formats.
Recommended graphics software (shareware for Macintosh)
GraphicConverter - converts to and from almost any graphics file format.
wwwART - convert file formats, create image maps, control the palette, paint, create 3D effects, and more.
Screen colors and Web browsers
The Browser-Safe Color Palette - Web browsers can be trusted to display only 216 colors accurately. For a full explanation and ways to compensate for this limited palette, see Lynda Weinman's page.
HTML editor software
If you're not ready to invest in one of the programs listed here, a good place to find "low end", inexpensive of free editor programs is at Tucows.
Both Windows and Mac OS
Dreamweaver (Macromedia) - The professionals' choice for clean, bug-free code, versatility, and ease of use. Cost: $300 US Download a free thirty-day trial version.
GoLive (Adobe) - High-end drag-and-drop functionality. Cost: $299 US Download free "tryout" software.
Netscape Composer (Netscape) - The best thing about this is that it's free. Not a lot of features, but easy to use. If you have Netscape Communicator, you already have it.
Adobe Products - Adobe Collections are complete software suites packaged to meet your design, publishing, and dynamic media needs.
Windows 95/98/NT only
CoffeeCup HTML Editor - Popular among beginners; loaded with features to simplify page building. Cost: $49 US. Download a free trial version.
FrontPage 2000 (Microsoft) - Widely used; much improved over earlier versions. Similar to other Microsoft products such as Word. Cost: $149 US
HotDog PageWiz (Sausage Software) - Very simple for beginners; also includes an advanced "Editor Mode" for more experienced users. Cost: $70. Download a free thirty-day trial version. The company also offers the higher-end HotDog Professional 5.5 for $130 US
HoTMetaL Pro 6.0 (SoftQuad) - Designed for professional use, but popular with beginning Web authors; offers a number of learning aids and templates. Cost: $129. Download a free thirty-day evaluation version.
Macintosh only
BBEdit 5.1.1 (Bare Bones Software) - A superior text editor; not WYSIWYG; lacks site-management tools; beloved by many Web developers. Cost: $119 US Download BBEdit Lite 4.6 free (not a trial version; does not "expire"); it may be the only editor you'll ever need.
How to write for the Web
Exploding the pyramid
For successful examples of this kind of writing:
Go to the Technology section of CNN Interactive's online Cold War site - Explore the article "Life Without the Cold War: An Exercise in Alternate History."
Out There News - provides a collection of stories.
Look at the EPA's global warming site. Note the three distinct sections: "Climate System," "Impacts," and "Actions."
How to publicize your Web site
Submit It! - This is a one-stop registration form, more like "one size fits all".
See Search Engine Watch's page "How to Use HTML Meta Tags".
Topica - a mailing-list search engine that can help to find a list suitable for announcing your pages.
WebRing - will steer like-minded people toward your site.
Search engines to register with
The most important search engines and directories for registering your Web site, based on rankings by Top9.com's Top 99 Search Engines:
Also important (in alphabetical order):
AltaVista , AOL , Excite , Google , Netscape
To find other sites where you may want to promote your pages, see the directory at Search Engine Watch.
More resources on the Web
The Bare Bones Guide to HTML - An excellent, exhaustive reference (but not a tutorial) to HTML 4.0 by Kevin Werbach.
HotWired's Webmonkey - Tons of tips in a how-to article format; particularly good information on tables and frames in the "Authoring" section; see also "HTML Basics."
HTML Help by the Web Design Group - Very clear and complete. See especially the Guide to Cascading Style Sheets. Plus, every question in the world about Web authoring answered at Web Authoring FAQ.
The HTML Writers Guild - With more than 100,000 members in more than 150 nations, the guild offers free trial memberships, online classes, and big lists of useful resources accessible to non-members as well as members. (Explore the "Resources" section.)
Introduction to HTML and URLs - A clear, straightforward reference by Ian Graham, author of The HTML 4.0; very clear explanations. This is a good place for a beginner to learn.
Webreference.com - provides HTML tutorials and Web graphics information.
Web Standards Project FAQ - An educational page about how standards affect web designers and the way web pages look on different computers.
World Wide Web Consortium: HTML - This is the original source for all up-to-date HTML information (technical, but absolutely accurate). HTML4.01 Specification.
Yale Style Manual - High-level style advice.
INFOnuggett
To find out more about Tim Berners-Lee and the beginnings of the World Wide Web, visit the World Wide Web Consortium's page on Tim Berners-Lee.
Also fyi
Palette Man - A Web site that lets you try out different color combinations and supplies the necessary codes for you to use on your own pages.
The Content Exchange - provides tips, resources, and job leads for "online content creators."
Transferring your files via FTP is easy. Download Fetch (for Macintosh) or CoffeeCup Free FTP (for Windows) for free at Tucows. Search for "FTP".
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