What is Web Development and Web Designing? | SAFI Dot Tech Portal

 

What Does Web Development Mean?

Web development refers in general to the tasks associated with developing websites for hosting via intranet or internet. The web development process includes web design, web content development, client-side/server-side scripting and network security configuration, among other tasks.

In a broader sense, web development encompasses all the actions, updates, and operations required to build, maintain and manage a website to ensure its performance, user experience, and speed are optimal.

It might also, but not necessarily, include all those strategic actions needed to ensure its proper ranking on search engine results. Usually, those tasks pertain to a different specialization, namely search engine optimization (SEO)

Web development is also known as website development, while the professionals that maintain a website are called web developers or (more commonly) web devs.

Techopedia Explains Web Development

Web development is the coding or programming that enables website functionality, per the owner's requirements. It mainly deals with the non-design aspect of building websites, which includes coding and writing markup.

Web development ranges from creating plain text pages to complex web-based applications, social network applications and electronic business applications.

The web development hierarchy is as follows:

• Client-side coding.
• Server-side coding.
• Database technology.
  
  

Most web devs use Hypertext Markup Language (HTML), Cascading Style Sheets (CSS), and JavaScript to develop websites.

HTML defines the basic framework of a website – the foundation upon which everything else is built upon. It forms the blocks that define a page’s layout, format, and critical components. Although it is theoretically possible to code a website on HTML only, it will be just a barebone site with no functions unless it’s enriched with CSS and JavaScript. Also, even simple style modifications such as changing the color of a button require a lot of coding to be executed using HTML only.

CSS is used to style the content of a website using a small set of files that are kept across the entire site. This way, whenever a change must be applied to say, consistently change the color of all the buttons found in every page of the website, a web dev needs to edit only a single file in CSS.

The JavaScript programming language is used to take care of the interactivity of many unique website elements. It can be used to create effects that alter the appearance of icons and drop-down menus, add animations, games, and other interactive elements.

Web developers are usually divided into front-end devs, back-end devs, and full-stack devs. A front-end dev takes care of all the visual aspects of the website (layout, navigation bar, etc.), its interactivity, and binds together all its elements.

Back-end devs take care of less visible tasks that ensure the website runs smoothly, such as managing the website’s hosting services, database, and applications. Back-end devs might need to engineer solution to server issues by using additional server-side languages such as Python, Ruby, Java, and PHP.

Full-stack devs are developers able to do both front-end and back-end tasks at the same time.

Web development is the building and maintenance of websites; it’s the work that happens behind the scenes to make a website look great, work fast and perform well with a seamless user experience.

Web developers, or ‘devs’, do this by using a variety of coding languages. The languages they use depends on the types of tasks they are preforming and the platforms on which they are working.

Web development skills are in high demand worldwide and well paid too – making development a great career option. It is one of the easiest accessible higher paid fields as you do not need a traditional university degree to become qualified.

The field of web development is generally broken down into front-end (the user-facing side) and back-end (the server side). Let’s delve into the details.

Comparing Front-End and Back-End Development

A front-end dev takes care of layout, design and interactivity using HTML, CSS and JavaScript. They take an idea from the drawing board and turn it into reality.

What you see and what you use, such as the visual aspect of the website, the drop down menus and the text, are all brought together by the front-end dev, who writes a series of programmes to bind and structure the elements, make them look good and add interactivity. These programmes are run through a browser.

The backend developer engineers what is going on behind the scenes. This is where the data is stored, and without this data, there would be no frontend. The backend of the web consists of the server that hosts the website, an application for running it and a database to contain the data.

The backend dev uses computer programmes to ensure that the server, the application and the database run smoothly together. This type of dev need to analyse what a company’s needs are and provide efficient programming solutions. To do all this amazing stuff they use a variety of server-side languages, like PHP, Ruby, Python and Java.

What about Full-Stack Development?

If both Frontend and Backend development appeal to you, you could consider becoming a Full-Stack Developer.

Full-stackers take care of both the front-end and the back-end, and need to know how the web works on all levels, in order to determine how the client- and server-sides will relate. Naturally working up to this level of expertise will take longer, as there is more to learn.

Getting Started in Web Development

All this may sound daunting at first, but you don’t need to know everything at once. You will grow your knowledge progressively. And things will begin to click. 

The great news is, learning to become a developer is easily accessible and affordable. This is especially true with OpenClassrooms. Emily Reese, Web developer and Teacher at OpenClassrooms explains,

Whatever aspect of web development attracts you, we have programs that can help you reach your goals.

No matter your background, you can learn web development. Emily told us,

In undergrad, I studied art history and architecture and then decided to become a developer whilst I was working at Kickstarter because I saw how the web could complement creativity in the arts. The same is probably true for any field.

Becoming a web professional allows you to participate in absolutely any field, because the web has become universally present in our professional lives. You can be a web developer and specialize in anything from the art world to the automobile industry.

The first step is to decide which aspect of web development interests you and then start out with one programming language.

For example, if you are interested in front end you can start by learning some HTML and CSS, then start working on projects as soon as you are comfortable with the basics. Our Web Developer Program is a perfect fit for this route. But others may suite you as well.

It also helps to join a discussion group or community of other web developers, so that you can troubleshoot, discuss ideas and get inspiration. That’s why you become part of the OpenClassrooms community when you enroll in a program on the site.

 

What is Web Designing?

Web design refers to the design of websites that are displayed on the internet. It usually refers to the user experience aspects of website development rather than software development. Web design used to be focused on designing websites for desktop browsers; however, since the mid-2010s, design for mobile and tablet browsers has become ever-increasingly important.
A web designer works on the appearance, layout, and, in some cases, content of a website. Appearance, for instance, relates to the colors, font, and images used. Layout refers to how information is structured and categorized. A good web design is easy to use, aesthetically pleasing, and suits the user group and brand of the website. Many webpages are designed with a focus on simplicity, so that no extraneous information and functionality that might distract or confuse users appears. As the keystone of a web designer’s output is a site that wins and fosters the trust of the target audience, removing as many potential points of user frustration as possible is a critical consideration.
Two of the most common methods for designing websites that work well both on desktop and mobile are responsive and adaptive design. In responsive design, content moves dynamically depending on screen size; in adaptive design, the website content is fixed in layout sizes that match common screen sizes. Preserving a layout that is as consistent as possible between devices is crucial to maintaining user trust and engagement. As responsive design can present difficulties in this regard, designers must be careful in relinquishing control of how their work will appear. If they are responsible for the content as well, while they may need to broaden their skillset, they will enjoy having the advantage of full control of the finished product.
Take a deep dive into Web Design with our course Gestalt Psychology and Web Design: The Ultimate Guide .
One of the key ingredients to a successful product is the creation of effective, efficient and visually pleasing displays. In order to produce such high-quality displays, whether they are graphical (e.g., websites) or tangible (e.g., remote controls), an understanding of human vision is required, along with the knowledge of visual perception. By observing, researching, and identifying examples of our perceptual abilities, we can design products according to these unifying qualities. In order to spread such skills within the world of interaction design, we have developed “Gestalt Psychology and Web Design: The Ultimate Guide.”
Gestalt psychology is a theory of mind which has been applied to a number of different aspects of human thought, action, and perception. In particular, Gestalt theorists and researchers attempt to understand visual perception in terms of the way in which underlying processes are organized and how they help us make sense of the world. The organization of these cognitive processes is important to our understanding of how we interpret the constant stream of visual information entering our eyes and how it becomes a cohesive, meaningful and usable representation of the world. Over the last twenty years, the work of Gestalt psychologists has been adopted by interaction designers and other professionals involved in the development of products for human users.
Within this course, we have compiled and consolidated some of the best resources currently available on the subject of Gestalt psychology and visual perception. To help you appreciate how you can apply Gestalt psychology to web design, we have provided many different examples from existing designs. These draw attention to the exact qualities, quirks, and features of visual perception. Moreover, they discuss how these have been accommodated and, on a number of occasions, exploited so as to support either the user's intentions or those of the designer or client.
The application of Gestalt thinking to design provides us with insights and new ways of approaching problems and challenges. By cementing in our own minds the many ways we organize visual information, we can improve our designs for all users.