Web Design For Dummies® 3rd Edition

Part IV

Producing the Final Website

At the end a complex working day, when all the designers go home for their well-deserved rest, the HTML and programmer folks come in — lattes in hand — and begin final assembly of the website. Although website design is a team activity, everyone on the team must know a little bit about everyone else’s job in order to make the whole process go smoothly. As a web designer, you must know enough about HTML, CSS, and what goes on behind the scenes to be able to design a site that makes best use of all those juicy technical capabilities — and is easy to maintain once the site goes live.

For example, if you design a graphics-heavy interface with a weird, slanted layout, the HTML people will have a hard time implementing the design and making it look the way you intend. Additionally, the site will be hard to maintain, take too long to download, and won’t be search engine friendly.

Chapter 13 steps you through what can be done with HTML and CSS. Chapter 14 discusses the critical behind-the-scenes topics of platform selection, content strategy, and site analytics. Lastly, Chapter 15 goes into business-oriented considerations such as database, social media integration, and global strategies (including support for multiple countries and languages).