Adobe Edge Preview 3: The Missing Manual

Chapter 6. Understanding HTML and CSS

When you build a project, Edge automatically creates several different files. The Hypertext Markup Language file (.html) is the stuff web pages are made of. Web browsers read HTML files and display the results as web pages. The Cascading Style Sheet file (.css) supports HTML documents, providing formatting and positioning instructions. You don’t have to be an HTML/CSS wizard to work with Edge. On the other hand, when you understand how HTML and CSS documents work, you’re in a better position to customize your projects to meet your needs. Edge compositions live within the HTML/CSS environment, and your audience views your work in their web browsers. In some cases, the files that Edge produces will be all you’ll need. In other instances, your Edge composition may be just a part of a larger page. For example, your project may be a banner ad. Knowledge of HTML and CSS helps you when it comes to sizing and positioning your project.

In this chapter, you’ll learn how to read and interpret HTML and CSS documents. Along the way, you’ll see how HTML’s IDs and classes are used to identify elements on the web page. Toward the end of the chapter, you’ll learn how to open and animate elements in existing web pages and how to position your Edge composition in another web page.

Reading HTML Documents

It’s not hard to learn how to read HTML. If you’ve spent any quality time developing web pages, you likely have some skills. You can open an HTML document in any ...