Beginning to write code

First, you might be wondering what you can use to practice HTML and CSS coding. You can use the Notepad feature that likely came preloaded on your computer. You can also upload the most up-to-date version of it, Notepad++, which will give a better indication of whether you’re coding correctly or incorrectly. When you start a new notepad, save it as .html or .css, and you’ll notice a change to the content, indicating where tags open and close, and other stylistic indications that go with using HTML and CSS.

When you start you document, you always need to begin the wan HTML tag, indicating what type of code you’re planning on using (XHTML, HTML5, etc.). Immediately after, include a header tag, with a title tag within it, and close both. When you close tags within each other, think of them like boxes…you need to stack them in order otherwise it won’t work. So for the header and title lines, you want it in this order: <head> <title>content </title></head>.

Below the head tags, you move onto the body tag, which will contain the main content of the site. Close this similarly and then end the document with the closing html tag,

Here’s an example page below to get you started. Try messing around with the layout here, and using some of the elements mentioned on the terms page to see what effects you’ll get. Also, you can view the code for every website online. Just go to the “View” dropdown menu on the top left hand corner of the browser window and click “View Source.” This is a really good way to see how other people work their code, and to see it in practice.