WEB DEVELOPMENT GUIDE
CCOL Web
Development Services
General information
Web protocol information
Universal Resource Identifier (URI) information
HTML details
XML
The Extensible Markup Language (XML) is a subset of
SGML. Its goal is to enable generic SGML to be served, received, and
processed on the Web in the way that is now possible with HTML. XML has been
designed for ease of implementation and for interoperability with both SGML
and HTML. An XML page looks something like an HTML page, but there the
similarity ends. XML uses HTML-style tags not just to format documents, but
also to identify the kinds of information used in documents, so that
information can be reformatted for use in other documents and can also be
used for information processing. To put that another way, you can use XML to
represent data portably. XML is clearly the way of the future as it
establishes a common base from which content can be expanded into other
formats.
XSL is a technology related to XML. XSL provides a
mechanism for formatting and transforming XML, either at the browser or on
the server.
General information
XML Resource pages
-
Developer Works
- IBM's XML resource, with lots of valuable XML compatibility
information and home to xCentral, the XML web search engine
-
The Development Exchange's XML Zone
- home to links for valuable XML news, information, and web sites
-
The XML Cover Pages
- a comprehensive online reference work for the Extensible Markup
Language (XML) and its parent, the Standard Generalized Markup Language
(SGML)
-
xml.com - XML information site
-
XML Magazine
- Timely news and information for the XML industry, with features
written by experts and insiders
-
XML Resources
- links to XML related documents
-
XML World
- XML article collection with a Software Guide, FAQ, References and more
Applications for XML
-
MathML
- mathematical markup language
-
SEML
- Semi-Extensible Markup Language is a new language similar to XHTML and
WML that allows the serving of both WML or HTML from a single source
document
-
SMIL
- syncronized multimedia integration language
-
W3C Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG)
- SVG is a language for describing two-dimensional graphics in XML. SVG
allows for three types of graphic objects: vector graphic shapes (e.g.,
paths consisting of straight lines and curves), images and text.
-
WML
- wireless markup language, used in WAP system
-
XHTML
- HTML 4.01 defined according to XML notations
Using XML with your programs and applications
XML Tools
-
Apache XML Project
- The goals of the Apache XML Project are to provide open
commercial-quality standards-based XML solutions and focus for
XML-related activities within Apache projects
-
Xalan
- an XSLT processor for transforming XML documents into HTML, text, or
other XML document types
-
Microsoft XML
Notepad - a simple prototyping
application for HTML authors and developers that enables the rapid
building and editing of small sets of XML-based data
-
Publicly
Available Software for SGML/XML/DSSSL -
The wealth of SGML software made freely available for public. The scope
of interest in this list is mainly the Internet.
-
Simple XML Subset Parser - included in
GLib
-
XT
- XT is an implementation in Java of XSL Transformations.
SMIL information
SMIL is a XML based language for making multimedia
presentations. It enables simple authoring of TV-like multimedia
presentations such as training courses on the Web. The SMIL language is an
easy-to-learn HTML-like language. Thus, SMIL presentations can be written
using a simple text-editor. A SMIL presentation can be composed of
streaming audio, streaming video, images, text or any other media type.
General information
SMIL Browsers
Other XML software
Character sets
Character set problems related to Finland
Web design
General guides
Usability design
Site accessability
Use of frames
Use of tables
Handling errors
Multimedia
Specific site design tips
Bad things to avoid
Useful sites for more information
HTML checkers and validators
Why to validate
Page validators
Link checkers
Forms
Frames
Frames allow you to divide the page into several
rectangular areas and to display a separate document in each rectangle. Each
of those rectangles is called a "frame". Frames are very popular because
they are one of the few ways to keep part of the page stationary while other
parts change. Frames are also one of the most controversial uses of HTML,
because of the way the frames concept was designed, and because many web
framed web sites are poorly implemented.
Normal frames are used to divide the entire browser
window (or a frame) to subwindows. Inline frames appear inside the
presentation of a document and allow embedding relatively small documents
onto pages.
Fonts in WWW pages
Netscape and Microsoft added their web browsers an
option to control the presentation of web documents in a form of FONT tag.
This allowed changing the character font look and size to fit the needs of
web authors. This gives is used right more options for the visual layout,
but if font settings are used carelessly documents can become invisible,
illegible, or inaccessible to many viewers. Well designed pages should
"degrade gracefully". FONT tag is ofther used to vary font characteristics.
Other way to change web page font setting is do it using Cascading Style
Sheets (CSS) have have also many options to control the web fonts.
Cookies
Cookies are a general mechanism which server side
connections (such as CGI scripts) can use to both store and retrieve
information on the client side of the connection. The addition of a simple,
persistent, client-side state extends the capabilities of Web-based
client/server applications.
A server, when returning an HTTP object to a client,
may also send a piece of state information which the client will store.
Included in that state object is a description of the range of URLs for
which that state is valid. Any future HTTP requests made by the client which
fall in that range will include a transmittal of the current value of the
state object from the client back to the server. The state object is called
a cookie, for no compelling reason.
Web programming and scripting
Several technologies are used to create customized
Web pages, including the Perl language, Microsoft's Active Server Pages, the
PHP hypertext preprocessor, Java, JavaScript and other methods. Nowadays
customizd web pages can be created in the web server or on the fly on the
client side. There are many different scripting technologies for this kind
of and they are each suitable for different applications.
Java
Java is Sun's cross-platform, object-based
programmign language which can be used for wide variety of applications.
In web environment Java is most often used as applets which are included
to webpages and then run by the client web browser Java virtual machine.
Java can also be used to make server side web server extensions called
servlets.
JavaScript
JavaScript is Netscape's cross-platform,
object-based scripting language for client and server applications.
JavaScript is most commonly used to add code to web page which is executed
by the web browser in the client computer. JavaScript can also be used to
make server side scripts on Netscape web server. Even though the name is
quite similar to to Sun's Java, the JavaScript is completely different
technology than Java.
General information
Javascript tutorials
-
How to Steal JavaScript - "Borrowing"
JavaScript code is easy. Making it work on your own pages, however,
can prove difficult. Nadav reveals what you need to know to make those
pirated scripts sail.
-
JavaScript-opas
- JavaScript tutorial in Finnish
-
Thau's Advanced JavaScript Tutorial -
Take JavaScript to the next level with if-then-else statements,
cookies, string handling, browser detection, preloaded images,
debugging techniques, and a lot more.
-
Thau's JavaScript Tutorial - Learn the
basics including variables, if-then statements, link events, and image
swaps in what's been called the best JavaScript tutorial on the Web.
Javascript references
Javascrit books
Example source code resources
Related technologies
-
An Introduction To DHTML - JavaScript
and HTML make a nice couple
-
ECMAScript
- based on several originating technologies, the most well-known being
JavaScript (Netscape Communications) and JScript (Microsoft
Corporation)
PHP
PHP is a simple scripting language to implement
server side fuctionality to web servers which support that scripting
language.
Active Server Pages (ASP)
Sctive Server Pages (ASP) is a scripting system
included in Microsoft web servers which makes it possible to include
server side scripts to web pages. There is also an
ASP port for Apache web server.
Other web scripting tools
Server side includes (SSI)
Adding some web server executable code to the web
pages using some suitable tools. Those pieces of code within the page are
executed and the output of those scripts plus the original HTML (without
those executable codes) are sent to the web browser.
Web server information useful for scripting
Web server software
-
Apache
- propably the best and most widely used free web server program with
good documentation available on-line
-
Boa Webserver
- a single-tasking HTTP server that internally multiplexes all of the
ongoing HTTP connections, and forks only for CGI programs
-
GoAhead
WebServer - free embedded web server
-
Jigsaw - The W3C's Server
- Jigsaw is a Web server platform, providing a sample HTTP 1.1
implementation and a variety of other features on top of an
architecture implemented in Java.
-
Red
Hat TUX Web Server - TUX is a
kernel-based, threaded, extremely high performance HTTP server for
Linux. It is able to efficiently and safely serve both static and
dynamic data. TUX moves the HTTP protocol stack to the kernel, and can
handle requests for data with both kernel-space and user-space
modules.
-
thttpd
- tiny/turbo/throttling HTTP server is a simple, small, portable,
fast, and secure HTTP server
-
vWebserver
- freeware Web server for Windows 95, 98, ME, 2000, and NT with ASP
support
-
WN Server
- WN is a Web server which runs on a wide variety of UNIX platforms
and is freely available at no cost for any use under the terms of the
GNU General Public License. The WN server has several extra features
built-in, for example search engine and filters.
Using Apache software
Using other web server software
Perl
PERL is a fairly straightforward, widely known and
well-respected scripting language. It is used for a variety of tasks, but
in the context of web development it is used mainly to develop CGI
scripts.
Python
Python is a powerful, modern, free, open source,
general purpose, interpreted programming language developed by Guido van
Rossum. It is used by many programmers around the world. Python is easy to
learn and allows very rapid developments. Pythin canbe used as scripting
language for example for writing CGI-scripts or it can be embedded to HTML
page using
Zope
system.
CGI scripts
CGI-scripts are executable programs separate
programs which are run by the web server for generating a web page on the
fly (dynamic web pages, web searches) or for processing the information
sen by the client (usually information from form). CGI-scripts can be
written using practically any programming laguage and using many scripting
languages. Propably the most commonly used language for making CGI scripts
is Perl but there are many other possibilities also for this. A lot of
people have Web pages but most feel that CGI scripts are "over their
head", but you can get started quite easily with many free CGI scripts if
your web server you are using supports them.
General information
Information on developing CGI scripts
CGI scripts and script collections
Solving problems
Tools for web page preprocessing
Style sheets
Graphics in WWW
Color information
Display properties
Pictures
Free web graphics
Other free web page resources
-
Free Web Templates.com
- free templates, free wallpapers, free textures, free buttons
-
Pagekits
- website templates, with all the code and images you need to get
started in making your own web site
Vector graphics
Scalable Vector Graphics is an XML grammar defined
by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C). It defines a language for
describing two-dimensional graphics, consisting of vector graphic shapes,
images and text.
-
Adobe SVG Viewer
- Viewer plug-in for W3C Scalable Vector Graphics
-
Batik SVG Toolkit
- Batik is a Java(tm) technology based toolkit for applications that
want to use images in the Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) format for
various purposes, such as viewing, generation or manipulation.
-
Mozilla Scalable Vector
Graphics (SVG) Page
-
W3C Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG)
- SVG is a language for describing two-dimensional graphics in XML. SVG
allows for three types of graphic objects: vector graphic shapes (e.g.,
paths consisting of straight lines and curves), images and text.
Making multimedia web pages
Animation on WWW
Video and web
Audio and web
Multimedia player plug-ins
Legal things to consider
General web legal topics
Linking
Web page usability issues
Useful tools
HTML Editors
-
Amaya
- a browser/authoring tool by W3C
-
Carl Davis's
HTML Editor Reviews - page to help to
select what tool to use
-
Evrsoft First Page III
- free HTML/web authoring tool, designed for DHTML authoring in mind
-
HTMLjive
- HTMLjive is a HTML editor written in Javascript. It allows an
intermediate Internet user to create a HTML document by simply loading a
Web page. No other programs are needed.
-
Mozilla
- web browser software with XML and CSS Level 2 support, has also HTML
editing tool
-
Netscape Navigator
- the most popular web browser, has also a version which has HTML page
editor "Composer" built-in
Processing and converting material
-
Arachnophilia - Powerful Web Site
Workshop with many options
-
ASM
to HTML converter - Java program written
to display PIC assembly files in web pages
-
Converting UNIX to
DOS and DOS to UNIX
-
gohtml.com
- free on-line service which converts many document formats to HTML
-
HTMLDOC
- Convert HTML files to PDF or PostScript
-
HTML Tidy
- processes hard to read HTML files to simpler and easier to manipulate
manually
-
JTidy
- JTidy is a Java port of HTML Tidy, a HTML syntax checker and pretty
printer. Like its non-Java cousin, JTidy can be used as a tool for
cleaning up malformed and faulty HTML. In addition, JTidy provides a DOM
interface to the document that is being processed, which effectively
makes you able to use JTidy as a DOM parser for real-world HTML.
-
Weblint
- free HTML validation program written in Perl
-
Website META Language (WML)
- off-line HTML generation toolkit for Unix
-
wvWare
- wv is a library which allows access to Microsoft Word files. It can
load and parse the word 2000, 97, 95 and 6 file formats. wv allows other
programs access to Word documents for the purpose of converting them to
other formats (for example HTML).
Web page upload and download
-
Expect FAQ
- FAQ on a very useful tool program for automating interctive programs
like FTP
-
GNU Wget
- free utility for retrieving files from the internet using HTTP and FTP
-
Gnu Wget
- a freely available network utility to retrieve files using HTTP and
FTP
-
Lynx
- most popular text only browser, useful in scripting and HTML to text
conversions
-
WebReaper
- web crawler or spider, which can work its way through a website,
downloading pages, pictures and objects that it finds so that they can
be viewed locally, without needing to be connected to the internet
Off-line browsing programs
On-line tools
-
WebCab.de: Fetch Page
- tool for getting web pages from server and seeing debug information,
this tool can imitate many browsers and even WAP
Scripting languages
WWW based discussion boards
-
Discus
- free discussion board script
-
Ezboard
- online community service
-
Phorum
- Phorum is a web based discussion software written in PHP. Unlike some
popular web boards, Phorum utilizes a database to manage its messages.
-
WWWBoard
- free discussion group making script used in many sites
Converting HTML to other formats
-
HTMLDOC
- Convert HTML files to PDF or PostScript
-
html2ps
- HTML to PostScript converter that gives you nice printouts of HTML
pages than many web browser's build-in printing functions
Adobe Acrobat (pdf) file generators
-
HTMLDOC
- Convert HTML files to PDF or PostScript
-
FreePDF
- Free PDF is a utility which allows you to create PDFs just by printing
to a "Create PDF" printer, from any Windows 9x/ME application FOR FREE!
Other utilities
Tips on using web tools
Web server programs
-
Apache - freely available good web server
software for UNIX, widely used
-
Microsoft
Internet Information Server - web server for Windows NT
-
Netscape
Web Server products - available for many platforms
Web browsers
Browser programs
-
Amaya
- a browser/authoring tool by W3C
-
Konqueror
- an Open Source web browser with HTML4.0 compliance, supporting Java
applets, JavaScript, CSS1 and (partially) CSS2, as well as Netscape
plugins
-
Lynx
- most popular text only browser
-
Netscape Navigator
- the most popular web browser
-
Microsoft
Internet Explorer
-
Mozilla
- web browser software with XML and CSS Level 2 support
-
Opera -
small and fast web browser
-
W3M - A terminal based WWW browser
Plug-ins
Web material filters
-
The Internet Junkbuster
Proxy - blocks unwanted banner ads and
protects your privacy from cookies and other threats
-
WebWasher
- filter program for Web pages to avoid unwanted content and for faster
loading times
Other useful utilities
-
Web Secretary
- detects changes based on content analysis and can email the changed
page to you with the new contents highlighted!
-
WebStripper
- makes it easy to copy websites to your hard disk for you to browse
offline later, free advertising supported software
Off-line browsing programs
Resource pages
-
BROWSERS.COM
- download new releases of latest versions of popular browsers
Web caching information
A Web cache sits between Web servers (or origin
servers) and a client and watches requests for HTML pages, images and files
come by, saving a copy for itself. Then, if there is another request for the
same object, it will use the copy that it has, instead of asking the origin
server for it again. This is used to reduce latency and to reduce traffic.
Security issues
Web page announcing and searching
General information on search engines
Information on successfully adding web pages to
search engines
Controlling search engines and robots
Search engines you can add to your site
-
Atomz.com
- site search service to quickly add a powerful search engine to your
Web site with no hardware or software to install
-
FreeFind.com
- free search engine to add to a site
-
ht://Dig Internet Search Engines
- world wide web indexing and searching system for a small domain or
intranet available under GNU General Public License
-
Isearch
- Isearch is an open source software package for indexing and searching
text documents. It supports full text and field based searching,
relevance ranked results and Boolean queries, and it can index many
kinds of documents, including HTML, mail folders, list digests, and text
with SGML-style mark up. Isearch also includes CGI tools to provide a
web interface for searching.
-
Perlfect Search
- customizable and effective site indexing/searching suite available
under an open source licence
-
Sitelevel
- free site search service, includes banner advertising
-
WebGlimpse
- powerful indexing and query system for UNIX that allows you to search
through all your files very quickly
-
Matt's Script Archive
- includes also search scripts
-
Using SWISH-E To Index
Your Site - information on a fast,
powerful, flexible, free, and easy to use system for indexing
collections of Web pages or other text files
HTTP protocol information
HTTP has been in use by the World Wide Web since
1990 and its use has increased steadily over the years, mainly because it
has proven useful as a generic middleware protocol.
Web publishing magazines
Free web hosting
The following web sites provide free web hosting
services. Usually the free web hosting services will add advertisements to
the pages in them. For more details check what those service providers have
to offer.
Non-conventional ways to access web
Tools for webmasters and web publishers
Web statistics
Other related links
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