Evolving from my excitement of building my website, the next step for me to follow was getting into learning the basics of HTML. I was nervous because looking at code gave me the shudders, but at the same time, I was happy to be learning a computer skill. When I built my roadmap to self-teaching myself digital marketing skills, learning HTML wasn’t a part of the original plan, but the Senator We Run Ads YouTube channel said that it would be very beneficial to learn. My plan was to learn HTML on w3schools.com which teaches you and gives you exercises to practice on. On the w3schools homepage, I clicked the “Learn HTML” button and went through all of the topics I was told to learn. I went through HTML Introduction, Basic, Elements, Attributes, Headings, Paragraphs, Styles, Images, iFrames and Java. I will try to explain what I learned as simply as I can, but I won’t go into every detail.
HTML INTRODUCTION
HTML, which stands for HyperText Markup Language, is the standard language used for creating web pages. It is responsible for describing the structure of a web page, and it consists of a series of elements that provide instructions to the browser on how to display the content. These elements are like labels, telling the browser which pieces of content should be treated as headings, paragraphs, links, and so on. HTML is a fundamental building block of the web, and every web developer should have a basic understanding of how it works.
HTML BASICS
An HTML element is a basic part of a website and is made up of a starting tag, some information, and an ending tag. For example, the code below is an element that makes a heading:
<h1> My First Heading </h1>
Some HTML elements don’t have any information in them. These are called “empty elements”. They only have a starting tag and don’t have an ending tag, like the <br> element that creates a line break.
Every HTML document needs to start with something called a “document type declaration”. This is <!DOCTYPE html>. This tells the browser what version of HTML the document is using. The document itself starts with <html> and ends with </html>.
In HTML, headings are labeled using <h1> to <h6>. <h1> is the most important and <h6> is the least important. Paragraphs are written using the <p> tag.
Links in HTML are written using the <a> tag. The place where the link takes you is written in the href attribute. Here’s an example:
<a href=”https://www.quaronjones.com”>This is a link</a>
Images
The <img> tag in HTML is how you put pictures on a website. You tell the website where to find the picture using the src attribute. The alt attribute is important too because it gives a description of the picture in case it can’t be shown. This helps people who can’t see the picture understand what it’s about.
To make the picture the right size, you can use either the width and height attributes or change the size using CSS with width and height. The CSS float property lets you choose whether the picture is on the left or right side of the page.
The <map> tag is used to create a special kind of picture called an “image map”. An image map is a picture that you can click on different parts of. Each part you can click on is defined using the <area> tag. It lets you choose what shape the clickable part is and where it leads to. The <picture> tag is used to show multiple pictures in one spot, depending on the type of device being used to see the website.
iFrames
The <iframe> tag in HTML lets you put one website inside another website. You tell the website which page to show by using the src attribute. It’s important to always add a title attribute because it explains what the page is about.
You can control the size of the page inside the website by using the height and width attributes. And, if you don’t like the border around the page, you can remove it by using the CSS code border: none;. This makes the page look better and fit in more smoothly with the rest of the website.
Javascript
JavaScript makes websites more interesting and interactive. You can add it to your HTML pages by using the <script> tag. There are many different things you can do with JavaScript, like changing the color of things, the text on a page, or the size of pictures.
To use JavaScript, you first need to pick which element on the page you want to change. This is usually done by using the document.getElementById() method. After you choose the element, you can write some code to change it. For example, you can write “Hello Human!” into a page.
If someone has turned off JavaScript on their browser, or if their browser doesn’t support it, the <noscript> tag can show them an alternative message. This is so they don’t see a blank or broken page.
Despite my initial nervousness, I was eager to dive into learning a new computer skill. Learning HTML was relatively simple to learn. I explained things simply, but if you’d like to learn more, I’d recommend you to use w3schools.com as a resource as I did. Overall, my journey to self-teach myself digital marketing skills so far and learn HTML has been an amazing experience. At this point I had a strong foundation to build upon. I was excited to learn how to build my own website and learn HTML, but I was ecstatic to learn my first in demand skill – Pay per Click advertising and Search Engine Marketing also known as PPC and SEM. With that excitement, I went straight into learning it.