Thursday, September 6, 2007
Now, Let's continue with Part 2. We will discuss the following here:
Creating tables
Using CSS boxes as webpage layout
Here's how:
Creating tables
Tables are very useful in the presentation of data. The following are the html tags to be used to create a basic table:
Single-column table:
row 1 data
row 2 data
Type the above in your mywebpage.html within the body tags, save and refresh your browser. That's the table on the web. Referring to the above html codes, width refers to the width of the whole table (you may also use pixel here like "800"), border is the outside line or outline of the table, cellspacing is the space between the cells, cells are the area where the data are located, cellpadding is the space between border and cells. You may change the values of these table attributes or properties based on your preference or requirement.
Though the above table html codes are still working, W3C.org requires the table properties or attributes be defined in the style sheets or CSS. Using CSS, the above table properties could be presented as follows:
Within style tags in the head:
.type1 {
width: 400px;
padding: 4px;
margin: 2px;
}
.border {
border: 1px solid #000;
}
Then, within the body tags:
row 1 data
row 2 data
Looking at the codes, "type1" is preceded by dot (.), meaning it is a class selector. For the next type of table properties or attributes, you may label it as type2, then type3 and so on or with other names you prefer. "border" is also a class selector and "border: 1px solid #000" is the thickness (1px), border type (solid) and color (#00f) of the border. There are more discussions of CSS in "Creating CSS boxes as web page layout" and in "Using CSS in styling your web pages"
If you want to try the above, then type the codes within the style and body tags as noted, save it and refresh your browser. It must be the same as the first one.
Now, let's make a 2-column or multi-column table:
row 1 data 1
row 1 data 2
row 2 data 1
row 2 data 2
Type the above in your mywebpage.html within the body tags, save and refresh your browser. That's the 2-column table on the web. To add a column, just insert after . 1 is one column, 1 is one row and 1 is one table.
Now, lets make a table with 1 main heading and 3 subheadings:
Main Heading
Subheading 1
Subheading 2
Subheading 3
row 1 data 1
row 1 data 2
row 1 data 3
row 2 data 1
row 2 data 2
row 2 data 3
Type the above in your mywebpage.html within the body tags, save and refresh your browser. See? Yes, just use colspan to merge the columns. To merge 2 columns, use colspan="2" and for 3 columns, use colspan="3" and so on.
If you want to merge rows, use rowspan instead of colspan. See this example:
merge row data
row 1 data 2
row 2 data 2
Now, type the above in your mywebpage.html within the body tags, save and refresh your browser. Now, you see that 2 rows in your first column were merged.
Try creating your own table using different values to familiarize yourself in manipulating tables.
Creating CSS boxes for web page layout
Before, tables are being used as layout of a web page. So, the header, right bars, left bars, main content areas and footer are inside of a table. This slows down the loading of the page as the browser will have to complete first the table before it will display the content. Your visitor may have already left before your page could be displayed. If you prefer to use table as your layout, you have to avoid using big tables. You better use small tables to allow the browser display your page little by little but faster.
Though table could still be used, W3C requires CSS boxes to be used for layout instead of tables due to the issue of accessibility. CSS boxes load faster than tables. These could be controlled within the style sheets that could be within the head tags or in separate CSS file. The most critical part in css boxes is the positioning. So, I'll explain to you the positioning properties of these boxes, based on my experience:
position: absolute - You have to define the x-axis and y-axis as point of reference of the corner of the box. x-axis is either left or right and y-axis is either top or bottom. You have to define also the width or the left and right margin or padding of the box. The box is not affected by the preceding or subsequent boxes. Likewise, the boxes preceding or following the boxes that are positioned as absolute are also not affected.
float: left or right - You need to fix the width. You also need to select if left or right. The box will lean on the side you selected. It will lean on the box preceding it if there is enough space for it. This is affected by the other boxes except for the absolutely positioned boxes.
no position or position: static or fixed - This follows the normal flow. This is also affected by the other boxes except for the absolutely positioned ones. You need to define the width or the left and right margin.
Now, see the illustration below that will create 5 boxes, namely: headerbox, leftbox, centerbox, rightbox and footerbox. These are liquid boxes, which automatically adjust in width when the display window size of the computer is changed:
body {
text-align: center;
margin: 1px;
}
#headerbox {
width: 100%;
height: 15%;
background-color: #9cf;
border: 1px solid #00f;
padding: 0px 0px 0px 0px;
margin: 0px 0px 0px 0px;
}
#rightbox {
float: right;
width: 20%;
margin-top: 5px;
text-align: center;
background-color: #cff;
border: 1px solid #00f;
height: 100%;
}
#leftbox {
float: left;
margin-top: 5px;
width: 20%;
text-align: center;
background-color: #cff;
border: 1px solid #00f;
height: 100%;
}
#centerbox {
width: 99%;
margin-top: 5px;
text-align: center;
background-color: #cff;
border: 1px solid #00f;
height: 100%;
}
#footerbox {
width: 100%;
text-align: center;
height: 15%;
vertical-align: middle;
margin-top: 5px;
background-color: #9cf;
border: 1px solid #00f;
}
HEADERBOX content area
LEFTBOX content area
RIGHTBOX content area
CENTERBOX content area
FOOTERBOX content area
First, you type the above html codes to you mywebpage.html within the head, style and body tags as noted in the above. Then, save it and refresh your browser or open the file with your browser. Are you seeing the headerbox on the top, the leftbox, rightbox and centerbox in the middle and footerbox at the bottom? Try to change the width of your browser window. See? The width of the boxes are also adjusting and that is excellent as your page will auto-adjust depending on the browser window size of your visitors! That is because I used %s in defining the width of boxes.
Now, let me explain the above codes for creating boxes as your layout.
headerbox - preceded with #, meaning it is an id selector and could be used only once per page; float: left means the box will lean on the left if fit; width: 100% means the box is 100% of the browser window and that is the reason why it is liquid; height: 15% means the box is 15% of the browser window; text-align: center is the alignment of the objects or characters inside the box; background-color: #9cf is the color of the space within the box; border: 1px solid #00f is same as discussed in Creating Tables.
rightbox - same explanations in the above except for the float: right which means the box will lean on the right and margin-top: 5px is the distance from the bottom line of the box above (headerbox).
leftbox - same explanations in the above.
centerbox - same explanations in the above except that it has no position defined, meaning it will follow the normal. It will fit itself based on the available space. This will be its 100% or full size. More than this limit will distort the box alignment.
footerbox - same explanations in the above except for the vertical-align: middle, which means that the objects or characters inside the box will be vertically-aligned in the middle.
Try changing the values of the values of the css boxes above, then save. Refresh your browser and familiarize yourself with the effect of each change. Please note, however that there may be minor differences if the above css boxes are displayed with browsers other than internet explorer like firefox and opera.
Continue with Part 3.
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Creating Your Own Web Page is Easy - A Tutorial (Part 3)
Here's the last part of this tutorial. Our topics are:
Linking other pages and other websites
Using CSS in styling your web pages
Let's begin here.
Creating and placing hyperlinks
It is very important to create and place hyperlinks in your website to help your visitors navigate your site from pages to pages. These are the links displayed in your web pages that will change the web page displayed when clicked by visitors. These must be prominent and properly placed in your pages. If not, your visitors will be confused and will eventually leave your site unhappy or unsatisfied. Hence, he may never return. So, make sure that your hyperlinks are prominent, descriptive and orderly placed in your pages.
Linking your pages
In page 1, you have to place the following code where you want the visitor to click to go to your page 2:
your link description
Looking at the codes, "a" is html anchor tag used for hyperlinks, "href" is the attribute referring to the URL of the destination page and "title" refers to the description of your link. If possible, use relevant keywords in your description for search engine optimization.
Now, type the above in your mywebpage.html and replace the domain name, web page name, title and link description with yours. Use relevant keywords in your link description for search engine optimization. Then, save and refresh your browser to show you how the above is displayed on the web.
To see more, hover or place your cursor on the link. The "title" value will be displayed on the link while the "href" value or URL of the destination page will be shown at the left side of the bottom bar of browser window. It may work only if you are online and your site is already active on the web.
Linking to other websites
You have to place the following code in your website pages where you want your visitors to click to go to other particular websites:
your link description
If you notice, it is the same as linking your web pages but it is pointing to other website. So, we added the "target" attribute with value of "_blank" to open the destination page into new browser window. This will make your site remain active or open even if your visitors click the link to other website.
To try it, type the above in your mywebpage.html and replace the domain name, web page name and link description with yours. Use relevant keywords in your link description for search engine optimization. Then, save and refresh your browser to how the above is displayed on the web. Click the link and a new browser window will open while the page where you clicked the link remained open.
Hyperlinks with images
You may use images in your hyperlinks. In this case, the visitors can click an image in your web pages with links that will send them to other pages in your site or to other websites you have linked to. See the example below:
Linking to your other web pages:
10 quick ways to get more website traffic
Lets face it anyone can get a website together and have a good product. What you really need is traffic. Traffic normally equates to sales and sales are what you need to make profit and survive.
Below is some great ways to generate traffic to your site easily and without costing $100's of in advertising.
1- Tell your friends and family (word of mouth)
2- place stickers on cars, letters, emails etc etc.
3- Send email to friend and tell them to tell their friends.
4- get a list of good ezines and advertise in those.
5- post to forums and newsgroups
6- ask other sites to link to you
7- creat a blog
8- and and ad to a newsletter
9- send a video and have you website at the bottom.
10- send out viral e-books.
Hopefully this will flood your site with traffic and bring in some good sales and profits.
For more information on this please go to http://www.moneytreeprofits.com
