Basic HTML Tutor
HTML is created in plain ASCII text with no control characters or embedded binary codes. To create an HTML file, use any simple text editor such as Notepad (in Ms Window - pc) or BBEdit (in Mac)
Power up Notepad/BBEdit and start with this...<HTML>
</HTML>Each one of those is called a tag. There is a starting tag <...> and a closing tag </...>. (<HTML>) is the start of an HTML document and (</HTML>) is the end of an HTML document .
Every HTML document needs a pair of HEAD tags.
<HTML>
<HEAD>
</HEAD>
</HTML>
Within the HEAD tags are the TITLE tags.<HTML>
<HEAD>
<TITLE></TITLE>
</HEAD>
</HTML>
The rest of the page is going to be within the BODY tags. Following is the structure of an HTML document and it is the minimum required information for a web document and all web documents should contain these basic components.
<HTML>
<HEAD>
<TITLE></TITLE>
</HEAD>
<BODY>
</BODY>
</HTML>
Now, give your document a title. The title will appear in the blue bar on the very top of the (Netscape/Ms Explorer) web browser window.
<HTML>
<HEAD>
<TITLE>Hai Do's homepage</TITLE>
</HEAD>
<BODY>
</BODY>
</HTML>Now save it as a html document for example myfile.html or myfile.htm (for WS Win 3.1 user) in a new folder somewhere in your local drive. For the rest of this tutor, let's use .htm
Congratulations! You have created a fully functional Web Page! You could upload it to a server and the whole world can see your creation!
To test the file you just created. Power on Netscape, click on File --> Open file --> choose file myfile.htm
Or double click here now to see the result of your hardwork.
Unfortunately, as you see, the page is just a blank but it is still an HTML document. Next step is to start putting information into your page.
Note: The best way to use this tutorial is to run Notepad and two instances of Netscape. One Netscape window containing this tutorial and the other containing your new page. Just toggle between the three windows. If you are looking at this tutor in Netscape right now, you can open a second instance of Netscape in one of two ways:
1) Find the icon of the HTML file you just made (myfile.htm) and double click on it.
Or 2) In Netscape, click on File/Open File In Browser and browse to the file (myfile.htm).
Before put more stuff in your <BODY> ... </BODY> part of your HTML document, you need to know some basic tags first.
(to be continue)