Talk:Web design

Note on the import: There was a bit of a scandal involving this on the IRC channels. On #wikiversity, people thought it was a textbook. On #wikibooks, people said it was a wikiversity course. As a compromise, the book was imported as a copy, and will probably end up getting merged into other books on the wikibooks side. --SB_Johnny | ^talk 09:50, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

Oh: red links on this topic page are due to depreciated naming of some pages. To fix red links, change "Web Design:Subpage" to "Web Design/Subpage". --SB_Johnny | ^talk 09:52, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

Scope of this subject

Should server side scripting be included in Web Design? Should exercises in a programming language (PHP) be included in a topic on markup? It seems to me that since the W3C recommends that the content and style of a page should be separated as much as possible, it would be in our interest to avoid including Web Application development in Web Design. Any other thoughts on this? Talonhawk 18:37, 13 September 2006 (UTC)

Hmmm... I guess I've been thinking about the skills that a Web Designer may need - and this includes basic server-side scripting (like handling forms - not really huge programming). But you're right, technically it's bordering on Web Application Development (or Web Programming). It's a fuzzy area... where would Javascript, XML (SVG etc) fit in?

Personally, I'd rather group the skills/tutorials to reflect how they are used by the learner... (ie, the logical pathway along which you might learn them) and very introductory form-handling kinda stuff is relevant to someone learning web design. If they were then to move into Web Application Development, it would be a whole other level. Perhaps we should start a Web Application Development course to eventually cater for this? What are your thoughts? Michaelnelson 03:51, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

Based on what I've read so far, it seems that Web Applications would be a sub-category that would relate both to Programming and Web Design. I'm currently of the opinion that a separate course with links to there from both here and from Programming as seems appropriate to the contributors there. This would allow contributors from both areas to contribute. My main concern was that we don't 'get to far ahaid of ourselves,' so to speak. In any case, it doesn't seem to be overly objectionable to create content before we know where to place it. -- Talonhawk 04:33, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

Just so you know

There's Topic:PHP for various PHP teaching. Just out of interest, are answers supposed to be supplied with PHP challenges? I'm happy to code basic prototypes for participants to compare their work against. --Draicone ^(talk) 13:47, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

Hi Draicone! Thanks for your work on the Web Design topics! RE the PHP Challenges - I was thinking that rather than providing answers, a series of progressive hints would be better. Some learners will tackle the challenges without the hints, others might need to peek at the first hint, others might need all the hints for a specific challenge. What do you think? (Sorry for the delay in responding - been away on hols!)

Professional

I think this is a highly professional article. Continous contributions are great as well. I believe that we should give the "student" many examples and a step by step example, and other things that will help them learn web design. For simply reading lines of code will be confusing. I myself have some things to add to the course. Good luck Kirby145 06:37, 9 November 2006 (UTC) November 08, 2006

Great to have your input Kirby! I agree, examples are soo important... and examples that gradually introduce new concepts, rather than overloading the brain! Michaelnelson 22:49, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

Moving some of the main pages

After using this wiki over the past year, I keep thinking about re-labeling the main sections in terms of what learners want to do... Would people mind if I moved the main pages as follows... or have any other suggestions?

• Building a basic web page instead of Basic HTML and CSS
• Building a small website instead of Intermediate HTML and CSS
• Building a website for a client instead of Developing a Client Project
• Introduction to programming with Javascript (any suggestions?)
• An introduction to dynamic websites

If we limit the scope to this, then people who want to learn more about web development might use a separate course "Web Development" as suggested by TalonHawk above. I think these new headings would be more descriptive of what the learner will actually do if they click.

I think that is a good suggestion. If we can get more input on your proposal by some of the other contributors to this section, it might help us be sure the layout would be easily understood by someone entirely new to learning from a wiki and the subject of web development. Talonhawk 01:26, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

Great idea (getting more feedback). In fact, I was surprised that there is feedback already! Is there a way to track changes via RSS/email or something that I'm missing (I just click on 'my watchlist' every few days). I renamed the links to try it out, but haven't moved the pages... so it's easy to change back if people don't like it. Michaelnelson 03:24, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

The course is looking good. I'm going to try to link related topics to some of the subpages. Examples: Topic:PHP, Introduction to Databases. Also I've proposed a phpMyAdmin learning resource *hint hint* but I'm not qualified to write it.

Are you going to simplify the names and move them to the main namespace (with no prefixes)? I think that would be best. Just use Category:Web Design and make sure they all have links on Topic:Web Design. We can make a template to navigate them, if you want to go that route. Just a thought. CQ 17:54, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

I was wondering about the namespace? Some have even two levels (like Web Design/Dynamic Pages/PHP Challenges) - which is a hang-over from when it was a book. Is the preference at Wikiversity to put most things (all things?) in the main namespace? I've got no problem with the change... others?

By the way CQ, the WebDesign book does have Creating DB Tables which links to a simple tutorial about creating tables in PHPMyAdmin. Michaelnelson 18:56, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the prompt reply Michaelnelson. I think placing learning materials in the main namespace is preferred (and certainly has advantages for outsiders searching Wikiversity content). See Wikiversity:Naming conventions. I've brought the subpage question up at Wikiversity:Colloquium#Subpages. Maybe we can get some advice there. CQ 21:02, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

Okay... sounds fair! Is there any best way to go about re-naming all the pages within Topic:Web Design? And is it safe? (All the old page names will re-direct right?) I'll get some time in a few weeks - but if anyone else would like to help, please do! Michaelnelson 05:31, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

As suggested by CQ and others, I'm gonna start moving the web design learning activities into the main namespace. I'll add links back to Topic:Web Design, and also add the UnderConstruction template to those pages that need work before learners can use them easily... I'll also try to edit a bit as I go... If anyone wants to join in, please do! Michaelnelson 03:06, 15 December 2006 (UTC)

MediaWiki Project

In addition to ground up HTML/CSS web design, I wanted to let participants here know about Topic:MediaWiki, the MediaWiki Project and the MediaWiki Engine learning resources that are under way. We'll be applying what we learn directly to immediate needs at Wikiversity:

• Wikiversity:Templates
• Wikiversity:Guided tour
• Wikiversity:Content development
• ...and many others...

The MediaWiki Engine course is going to be studying the back-end stuff in quite a hands-on way. We don't want to detract from the great course developing here, but we think the experience will be enlightening. Please have a look. CQ 07:27, 1 February 2007 (UTC)

sandbox server

I wanted to let participants here know about the "sandbox server" discussions Wikiversity talk:Sandbox Server.

Whether or not that sandbox server ever gets set up, I volunteer to host the first 10 web design students who ask me on my Talk page.

--DavidCary 04:07, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

getting a development space

I'm wanting to get into programming PhP, there seems to be a number of good open access courses for intro to PhP and further. What I am looking for is a course on how to set up the development environment. Can anyone point me to such a course? -- Prawstho 17:07, 8 March 2008 (UTC)

Hello Peter, I just searched here at Wikiversity, but didn't find info regarding this. But thanks to you I could point this page to the learning project which you started: Creating a Development Environment. ----Erkan Yilmaz Wikiversity:Chat 21:18, 10 March 2008 (UTC)

web utilities

It's becoming easier to use tools other people have provided on the web, without doing any programming.

These tools seem like they would be useful for "web designer"s to use, even though they seem to fall in the crack between classes on "HTML" (since they are CGI scripts) and "CGI" (since those classes focus entirely on writing your own CGI scripts, and neglect the CGI scripts that are already running online).

They seem especially useful for students who

• want dynamic effects, but is not a programmer; or
• want dynamic effects, but don't want to pay for a "premium" web server that would allow them to run CGI scripts; or
• want dynamic effects, but don't want to worry about the security implications of running their own custom CGI scripts.

I'm talking about web utilities such as:

• "I want to: Web 2.0 resources to help collaborate, communicate, discover, email, laugh, generate images, podcast, use multimedia, store photographs, use RSS, internet search, shop, create start pages, store information, time management, train, teach and do things with webpages and websites." by Phil Bradley
• hit counters (but see also "why are hit counters inaccurate?")
• wikibooks:GET
• Google maps mashups [1],[2], How to add a Google Map to any web page in less than 10 minutes

Where is an approprate place to talk about these tools and how to add them to web pages? --DavidCary 21:52, 16 July 2007 (UTC)

want to join this group

Hello: I am a participnt in the Wikiversity course "Composing free and open educational resources", which is currently in its second week. I am directed to locate a group or project where people are working on some learning resource or study project that I could assist with, and join the group or project by notifying the other editors of your interest. I am interested in joining this Web Design Group and Project. Please let me know whether I can. I am not a teacher or web designer. My knowledge of HTML and CSS is rudimentary, at best. Thanks. Stewjean 07:23, 10 March 2008 (UTC)

>Please let me know whether I can.

of course you can, this is a wiki.

>My knowledge of HTML and CSS is rudimentary, at best.

Well then one approach is to read the offered material and start from there if you can improve things, give feedback (e.g. I changed/added this paragraph, because ...). You can find people lately being active on the pages over the "history"-button on top of each page. Have fun, ----Erkan Yilmaz Wikiversity:Chat 07:37, 10 March 2008 (UTC)

Hello All: Thank you for accepting me in Web Design; I am learning a lot. However, I would also like to give or bestow something - as opposed to taking all the time [I am a participant in the "Composing free and open educational resources" course where I am essentially taking since I know very little about the subject - I am not even a Teacher in the proper sense]. I previewed the Wikiversity "To Do List" and I see there are a number of ways I could give, but none of the noted help areas relate to Web Design. In fact, they all entail more taking on my part, to the extent I would be getting more free learning.

Based on the above, I wonder whether Web Design needs links from Wikipedia pages, or whether the Web Design portal needs updating or, if neither of the above, please let me know if there are any administrative Web Design project(s) to which I can contribute. 69.86.164.141 14:19, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

It is great that you want to help out. A few pages here at WV have experimented with a new design to improve how readable and useable the pages are. For example, see Portal:Interdisciplinary Studies and compare to the old design that can be seen here. One project might be to use Template_talk:Box_portal_skeleton and try to create a new portal. If you are interested I can help. I'd like to create a Portal:Astronomy. Note that creating a design on a wiki is a little different than typical web design projects. If that is what you are interested in doing, then another place to explore is the Topic:Sandbox Server 0.5. You can experiment with web page design there. Please feel free to keep asking questions about where to work on projects that you are interested in. --mikeu ^talk 00:35, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

Standards!

You just have to love the irony of the fact that a page dedicated to teaching people how to write web pages doesn't even mention web standards. They are very fucking important. W3C!!!

Examples and Explanations

I'm trying to learn more about web design and am already familiar with the basic principles, I just have trouble figuring out how to make designs, patterns, etc. from scratch. Is there anyway there could be a section where several web designers show off some designs they've made and talk about all the details that went into it, what decisions they made, and why? Understanding a designer's thought processes would really be helpful.

Perhaps some of the designers here could post screenshots of web pages they've made, and students could come by and add questions to the wiki. --Sean T Hayes 06:07, 30 November 2009 (UTC)

Merge in material from Web Page course

There is a tree of material under Web Page which is old and should be merged in here. –SJ+> 00:01, 11 July 2011 (UTC)

Removal of link to W3schools.com

[3] (IP editor, summary:) (Removed W3Schools as a resource. Visit w3fools.com to know why.)

This is not adequate to justify removal here. Please discuss before removing established content. I'm not saying the link should remain, but links should be handled evenly. w3fools.com points out the w3Schools disclaimer that information is not guaranteed to be reliable, as if this were a problem with w3Schools. Neither is information here so guaranteed.

If users want to review sites, that's possible. It should be handled with care. I'm comfortable with logged-in users with substantial Wikiversity contributions making recommendations. I'm less comfortable with what appears to be an attack on a site.

The site appears to be commercial. That is, they sell a certificate of completion, of dubious value. However, the course material appears to be free, so that should not be a reason to not use the site. Beyond this, I'm not investigating at this time. --Abd (discuss • contribs) 18:50, 15 November 2013 (UTC)