Find Some Style

After a hiatus from web programming, I began trying out cascading style sheets (CSS) this afternoon. Thus far, I've created an external style sheet and tweaked the font type, background color, header properties and text alignment. This particular element of web programming seems daunting to me because I know that it can be very powerful and so I assume it'll be complex and subtle.

My goals for the weekend are to:
1) Review HTML Dog's CSS tutorial
2) Review and try every one of the basic style elements: box model, border, outline, margin, padding, list & table
3) Add all of these elements into a web page with a wedding theme, as a very first draft
4) Determine my next three steps to be completed before Wednesday

Resources:
Thus far, I'm using the w3schools CSS tutorial
Next up is HTML Dog - Apply CSS

Picture Perfect

This evening, I learned how to include images on web pages. This included specifying the size, alt text and alignment aka the basics. Then, I also tried out making the image a link and working with borders.

Of course, this is key... no one likes websites that feature "walls of text" but images need to be well-done to look good. I felt like the basic tutorials were too brief, and I ended up searching for additional resources, which included:
HTML Goodies - Basic HTML: Images
w3schools.com - HTML Images

I have one challenge left - to add a drop shadow and the basic tutorial didn't provide any resources, so I found:
Dynamic Drive CSS Library

Finishing Up Forms

This morning, I felt too tired to bike into work, so I decided to be productive with my morning and finish up my HTML Form Challenge. I resolved my issues with the text area input and discovered one small flaw from last night; I put a space between the two words when I named the input type "textarea."

I'm going to continue with the basic HTML tutorial but later one, I definitely need to return to the advanced form tutorials:
W3C Recommendations
HTML Dog - Advanced Forms

Forms Can Be Fun

Today ended up being much busier than I initially expected, so I was only able to devote about 45 minutes to my studying. I experimented with adding an image but was slightly confused by the file path... since I'm currently building html files on my hard drive, there is a lack of translation to a real webpage.

After putting it off last week, I finally tackled forms and was able to easily build a simple form with text boxes, radio buttons, drop downs and check boxes. However, the text area eluded me.

Building a form so easily was really exciting, because this may allow us to have our guests RSVP for the reception dinner electronically! Of course, there's another layer of complexity in actually receiving the data in a usable format. I'll probably end up asking my friends for help, but also - I am may intentionally choose a more friendly hosting site, so that I can rely on their tech support initially.

Link to pick up on tomorrow:
Form Challenge
Guide to Forms on HTML Dog