The Internet, particularly the World Wide Web, has
revolutionized the way information is stored, retrieved,
presented and viewed.
This revolution has been made possible by HTML, the
HyperText Markup Language in which web pages are written.
HTML is simple, yet incredibly powerful.
It enables information to be delivered by many different types
of user agents, from the common graphical browsers like
Firefox and Internet Explorer
to text browsers such as
Lynx, as well as programs
or devices that convert HTML pages to speech or braille.
Because an HTML file is text, it can be edited in any text
editor (Emacs, Notepad, etc.).
Unfortunately, rather than learn HTML, many web developers use
WYSIWYG
tools and content management systems that generate unnecessarily
verbose and convoluted HTML.
A person viewing the HTML code of pages built with such tools
can be forgiven for thinking that HTML is very complicated.
The writing of simple HTML pages is made possible by using
HTML to describe only what is on the page.
How the page is presented is relegated to one or more
cascading style sheets (CSS).
The resulting page is simple enough for anyone to maintain
with only the minimum of instruction in HTML.
(Look at the source code for this page, for example; use
view->source in your browser.)
If I design and code your web site, you will get a site that
works in all standards-compliant browsers, on all operating
systems, at any screen resolution and window size, no matter
what the default font-size, and yet is simple enough for you
to maintain.
