No doubt just about one of the most misinterpreted and over-worked titles in the IT field these days has to be the term 'Web-Designer'? Web-Design incorporates numerous distinctive aspects, and an understanding of these facets can help anybody considering getting in the marketplace. Fundamentally, there are two main sides to web-design; the 'creative' side and the 'technical' side. The majority of people believe that a 'web-designer' is somebody that designs the visual aspects of the web-site. To put it differently, they view web designers as artists on the whole. Having said that, a modern web designer will actually be as involved with the 'technical' element of things as they are with the 'creative' element. We can demonstrate this with more clarity when we separate web design down in to it's different parts.

Graphic artists are first - they design and construct the icons & images for a web site. Most are not strictly web-designers as such, and by and large are multi-media artists utilising graphic layout and 'animation' software, (for example Adobe Photoshop and Adobe Flash.) Generally, they will have come from an artistic background, & could have undertaken studies at university or college level. This particular element is more about a creative artistic ability than any other function.

Next there are the web-designers, who develop the lay-out and overall feel of a web-site by using a design environment like Adobe Dreamweaver. They use the work completed by the artist, & together with their clients create an initial look & 'navigational' framework for the brand new site. A lot of amateur web site designers put emphasis first of all on the 'format' of the web-site, instead of its function. To develop a successful web-site however, its crucial to first of all look at what you actually want the website to accomplish. Perhaps it is basically an on-line catalogue, or an E-commerce web site where merchandise can be purchased directly. Possibly rather like this site the chief purpose is straightforward access to relevant information, or it could be it's going to be a show-case for products and services through video & a heavily 'graphical' inter-face. Basically the website must have the capacity to meet its needs - whatever those requirements are. So many web-sites look wonderful but they are a pain to 'navigate' and find where you want - & so visitors move on and never return. The purpose of any professional web-designer is first & foremost to construct an event that individuals enjoy and feel comfortable with - so they come back again and again.

The most important tools utilised by web-site designers are the design-environments, with 'Adobe Creative Suite' (presently in version 4 as of '09/10) staying essentially the most popular commercially. The software that builds websites is Adobe Dreamweaver, & Adobe Flash gives access to graphical content material that can be animated and interactive. You could actually state that 'Dreamweaver' is the Word-Processor of the Adobe CS range. It helps you to lay graphics & text in accordance with certain rules and parameters, & then create basic inter-activity via page-linking. Just like other web design-environments, 'Dreamweaver' creates the program code 'HTML' behind the scenes (HTML is short for Hyper Text Markup Language). It's the 'language' of web-browsers, and is a script which basically 'draws' & controls the web-page you are looking at. Lay-out 'tag' languages like CSS and XML are associated with HTML. As these tag 'languages' are standardised, the streamlined & more efficient results function effectively on a number of different platforms. This means the web page will look exactly the same on Microsoft 'Internet Explorer', Mozilla Firefox, 'Opera', 'Safari' etc. (or shall we say, that's the idea!) Subsequently the graphic-blocks you're laying and the text you're adding is being converted into code behind the scenes by 'Dreamweaver'. If you are going to be a commercially viable web-designer, you will have to have a thorough understanding of these types of 'languages'.

Naturally there are crossovers with many of these jobs - in-fact we have interactions with several web-designers who're skilled in many of them. But, you will need time to develop that much knowledge. A web design program therefore that can prepare you to enter the market must encompass the following - A briefing of the basics of web design first of all, then straight into using 'Dreamweaver' to a professional level & the main nuances of Flash too. This should then lead on to a comprehension of 'HTML' and CSS, with some coaching in the field of E-commerce. To construct 'dynamic' sites you'll need to gain knowledge of 'PHP', which is a less arduous programming-language to start off in than ASP.Net. In addition , you need a rudimentary understanding of databases and 'SEO'. Grasping these abilities will provide you with the ability to begin working on a good cross-section of websites. Just like learning to drive, you must first learn the physical skills, before you effectively push past them & achieve a certain amount of finesse. An intensive program like this would probably entail around 400 to 500 hours of part time study & practice & therefore can be successfully completed part time over a year. A skilled expert will be able to assist you to prepare your path through this quagmire of commercial-learning, and we recommend that you take the time to plan your route with care before you start your training.

Web developers are members of the group, and also the most technically apt. Not only will these people understand the languages already mentioned, they will also have studied other languages, for instance C#, 'VB', 'PHP', Java, ASP.Net and so on. And since most contemporary web-sites of any kind of size store their data using SQL database technology, they are also likely to have a solid grip SQL too. A regular E-commerce site does not have a group of web designers who have created it's many hundreds of web-pages in lay-out form. More usually, following the formation of a place holder 'template', the contents will be extracted from a Database and 'dynamically' inserted. In addition to being massively easier to build, manage and update, it also aids in the feel of the web-site staying constant.

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