It's fair to state that one of the most broadly interpreted & poorly understood terms within I.T. is the expression Web-Designer. Website Design includes a lot of distinct facets, & a good understanding of these facets can help anyone thinking of getting in to the marketplace. In essence, there are two main sides to web-design; the 'creative' side and the 'technical' process. To the person in the street, a web designer is somebody that designs the look & 'feel' of a site. In other words, they think of web designers as 'artists' in the main. In reality the present day web-designer's occupation is an 'inter-related' mix of 'technical' expertise and design-creativity - and the two are becoming very hard to split up. We'll illustrate this with more clarity when we separate web-design up into its component parts.

People who design and construct the pictures and graphic symbols which go on a web-site are referred to as graphic-artists. They most often do this by utilising graphic lay-out & 'animation' software (such as Adobe 'Flash' & Photoshop), and aren't really web-designers as such. The majority attended higher-education, with typically a degree standard art background. Above all else, this specific role involves sound creative skill.

Next come the web designers, who create the lay-out & overall 'feel' of a website by using a design-environment such as Adobe Dreamweaver. Bu utilising graphics from the artist, they'll put together the navigational structure of the web-site, working together with their clients to ensure that the feel meets their needs. A web designer with fairly limited understanding may well focus on the form rather than the 'function' of a site. And yet, to truly produce an effective website, you have to start with an understanding of what you need the web site to actually do. It's possible it's basically an online brochure, or an e-commerce site where goods can be bought directly. It's possible you want to highlight products and services by means of video and a heavily graphical interface, or maybe its largely an 'informational' web site where the need is simple access to essential text data (like this particular web-site.) No matter what you require from a site, it must - at its most elementary level - carry out the 'function' for which its designed. There is no value in making a visually interesting web-site that is difficult for people to find their way around! The purpose of any good web-designer is first & foremost to come up with an event that individuals enjoy and feel happy with - so that they come back again.

Many of these functions can & do crossover obviously, we are involved with several freelance web-designers who all can handle a lot of the above tasks. It takes time however to acquire such an array of professional skill-sets. You should be trained in several things on a professionally feasible web-design training program: A basic introduction to web design, and then how to utilise Adobe Dreamweaver & have a fundamental knowledge of Adobe 'Flash'. The languages of 'HTML' and 'CSS' should be taught next, with a certain amount of E-commerce training built-in here. Some Database & 'SEO' knowledge is important, and an understanding of the programming-language PHP (instead of the more complicated ASP.NET) in order to create 'dynamic' web-sites. All of this is merely to reach a level of technical competence whereby you're able to work on a diverse enough array of websites. Much like learning to drive, you must first learn the physical skill-sets, before you effectively progress beyond them and gain a degree of 'finesse'. A comprehensive training-program like this would possibly involve around four to five hundred hours of part-time study (and practice) and can therefore be viably carried out part time over 12 months. As there are so many things to consider, it's worth finding the time to look carefully at any training programs that interest you. Talk to a person with industry knowledge who can help you put things together.

Web developers are members of the group, and also the most technically trained. In addition to being proficient in 'HTML', 'XML' and CSS, web-developers will know other highly regarded programming languages such as Visual Basic, PHP, Java, 'C#' & ASP.Net for example. They will generally also possess a good knowledge of SQL Database technology, as this is how the majority of large sites store their data. Most e-commerce internet sites are not the result of a sizable team of web-designers who have created countless web-pages in lay-out form. What usually happens is a place-holder template is created, and the contents are dynamically inserted from the Database to the web-site. So apart from far larger efficiencies with the site build, using this method also provides for a more consistent look and feel as well.

The design-environments employed by web designers are their key resources. 'Adobe Creative Suite' 4 is the most commercially popular in the market right now (as of 2010). The software which builds websites is Adobe Dreamweaver, and 'Adobe Flash' gives access to 'graphical' content material that can be animated and interactive. You might say that 'Dreamweaver' is the Word Processor of the Adobe CS range. Within specific rules and constraints, it enables you to display text & graphics, & then via a procedure called page linking you can develop basic inter-activity throughout the web site. 'Dreamweaver' (as with any web design environment) produces HTML (HyperText Markup Language) program code behind the scenes. It's the 'language' of web-browsers, & is a 'script' that in essence draws & controls the page you're looking at. Paired with 'HTML' are the lay-out 'tag' 'languages' like XML and CSS. Because these 'tag' languages are 'standardised', the streamlined and rather more efficient outcomes perform effectively on a number of different platforms. Therefore the web-page looks exactly the same on MS 'Internet Explorer', 'Mozilla Firefox', Opera, Safari and so on. (at least, that's the idea!) Consequently the graphic blocks you're placing & the text you are including is being converted into 'code' behind the scenes by Dreamweaver. A thorough understanding of these types of languages is essential if you're to be a commercially-viable web-designer.

The thing you must grasp is absolutely no training-course can make a web designer out of you. The actual training course will only teach all the techniques & skills. Put together as many web-sites as you possibly can as you go through your studies - the practice will be invaluable and you will have something to show what you can do. Your own sites can be about anything you like - the local music-scene, horses, a writer you enjoy or motorbikes. Create an interactive web site, and begin generating traffic towards it. This will all seem more constructive on your CV, and in your portfolio, than a qualification from 'Adobe' will!

Other skill-sets that are highly relevant to web-site designers in the commercial marketplace are an in-depth understanding of E-commerce & project-management. Another area - that isn't to be underestimated - is SEO ('Search Engine Optimisation'). This concerns how to optimise site listings on search engines like Google & 'Yahoo'. And whilst they technically come from a network administration background, we should remember the incredibly valuable role of the web server administrators and installers, who keep everything working behind the scenes.

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