U48 150 - Introduction to HTML
Washington University University College

Fall 2002
Saturdays 10:00 a.m. - 12:30 p.m.
7 September - 5 October 2002
Eads 14

Instructor: Scott Granneman
Senior Consultant in Internet Services
Bryan Consulting
scott@granneman.com
www.granneman.com

Course Description

This course teaches how to code HTML using a text editor, which is the foundation of all Web development. Within this broad framework, students will cover many topics, including good design principles, Cascading Style Sheets, server-side vs. client-side, Web browsers, and Web servers. The course will conclude with a brief overview of the future of Web development, including XHTML and XML. Familiarity with Windows, Mac OS, or Linux required.

Required Texts

There are no required books. Readings will consist of articles, analyses, & ephemera from the Internet. Most of what you need you can access through my Web site; however, each week I will recommend a book useful for further study and reference.

In addition, students will need to sign up with the following listservs:

• GranneClass, the class listserv, hosted by Yahoo Groups. To subscribe, send a blank email to granneclass-subscribe@yahoogroups.com. To review the home page and look at archived messages, go to http://groups.yahoo.com/group/granneclass; note, though, that you must be a Yahoo member (which is free and relatively painless) to use the group on the Web. To send and receive email, you do NOT need to be a Yahoo member.
• GranneNotes, an irregularly-published newsletter about interesting & important stuff in technology and on the Internet. To subscribe, send a blank email to grannenotes-subscribe@yahoogroups.com. To review the home page and look at archived messages, go to http://groups.yahoo.com/group/grannenotes.

Grading

Your grade will be based on the following factors:

• Class attendance and participation (25%): You are expected to attend class prepared to learn and discuss the topics with your fellow classmates. We may also work on in-class exercises, and you are expected to take an active part in those exercises.
• Quizzes (25%): We will have very short quizzes each week to review the things we covered the week before. Take good notes each week, and review those notes before coming to class.
• Web site project (50%): You will have a final Web site project due on 4 November 2002, one month after the last day of class. Your Web site does not have to be extensive, but it does need to be relatively complete. You do not need to hand-code the entire Web site; however, I will look at your code in determining the quality of the Web site, and if I see poor coding, or coding that is indicative of the unthinking use of WYSIWYG editors like FrontPage, your score will be lowered. I recommend that you do an actual Web site for a company or organization, or that your Web site focus on an interest you have. I also recommend that you start asking those whom you think may be interested in a Web site about it as soon as possible. Please note that your Web site address or content will be made available to all other students in the class as well.

Grades will be based on an average of the above as follows:

100 A+
94-99 A
89-93 A-
86-88 B+
83-85 B
79-82 B-
76-78 C+
73-75 C
69-72 C-
66-68 D+
63-65 D
59-62 D-
0-58 F

Policy regarding academic dishonesty: This course will follow Washington University's policies concerning academic dishonesty. Academic dishonesty will result in failure for the assignment in question and/or referral to the college's Academic Integrity Office, which has discretion to impose a stricter penalty. While academic dishonesty includes cheating on exams and quizzes, it also includes plagiarism in written assignments. Plagiarism is not only passing off someone else's work as your own, but also giving your work to someone else to pass off as their own. It also includes submitting work from another course. While I strongly encourage you to discuss your work with each other in and out of class, and while you may research issues together, your writing should be your own. The papers you submit must be your work alone, and must include citations to all references in your work. Please include the URL, or Web address, for articles and resources found on the Internet.

Accommodation of disabilities: If you have a disability that might affect your ability to complete the required assignments, please contact me during the first week of class to discuss an accommodation.

Netiquette

It is paramount that we respect each other online in our email listserv. Follow this simple rule: disagree with the idea, but not the person. In other words, it's OK to say "That's a bad idea, because ...", and it's not OK to say "You're a bad/stupid/inconsiderate person, because ...". If you have an issue with a classmate's behavior online, please bring it to me privately by emailing me at scott@granneman.com. If you'd like to find out more, please feel free to read The Core Rules of Netiquette, by Virginia Shea.

Tentative Schedule

Topic: Introductions & Beginnings
Date: Saturday, 31 August 2002
Software: TextPad, Mozilla
Book: Chuck Musciano & Bill Kennedy's HTML & XHMTL: The Definitive Guide, 4th Edition.
In class:

• Email Listservs
• Recommended Software
• Definitions

Readings for next class (unless otherwise stated, you will NOT be quizzed over the contents of these readings):

• HTML School ~ http://www.w3schools.com/html/default.asp
• HTML 4.01 Quick List ~ http://www.w3schools.com/html/html_quick.asp
• The Complete HTML 4.01 Reference ~ http://www.w3schools.com/html/html_reference.asp
• HTML 4.01 Entities Reference ~ http://www.w3schools.com/html/html_entitiesref.asp
• HTML Colors ~ http://www.w3schools.com/html/html_colors.asp
• HTML Color Values ~ http://www.w3schools.com/html/html_colorsfull.asp
• HTML Color Names ~ http://www.w3schools.com/html/html_colornames.asp
• HTML Examples ~ http://www.w3schools.com/html/html_examples.asp

Topic: Hand-coded HTML
Date: Saturday, 7 September 2002
Software: TextPad, Mozilla, Tidy
Book: Jennifer Niederst's Web Design in a Nutshell: A Desktop Quick Reference.
HTML: html, head, body, p, br, hr, ul, ol, li
In class:

• Definitions
• Greeking
• Configuring Windows To Show Extensions
• Simple Web Page 1
• Basic HTML
• TextPad Configuration

Readings for next class:

• Simple Web Page 2 ~ Look at the source code
• HTML ~ Lots of links to other HTML resources

Topic: Hand-coded HTML
Date: Saturday, 14 September 2002
Software: TextPad, Mozilla
Book: Louis Rosenfeld & Peter Morville's Information Architecture for the World Wide Web (2nd Edition), Jakob Nielsen's Designing Web Usability: The Practice of Simplicity, and Steve Krug & Roger Black's Don't Make Me Think: A Common Sense Approach to Web Usability.
HTML: a, img, ul, ol, li, b, i, center
In class:

• Simple Web Page 2

Readings for next class:

• Why is Dreamweaver the Best WYSIWYG Editor?
• Macromedia Dreamweaver MX ~ http://www.macromedia.com/software/dreamweaver/ ~ Especially check out the Feature Tour
• Dreamweaver 4 Overview ~ http://hotwired.lycos.com/webmonkey/01/01/index1a.html ~ It's a bit outdated now that Dreamweaver MX has come out, but it's still worth reading.
• Dreamweaver Walk-Through ~ http://hotwired.lycos.com/webmonkey/authoring/tools/tutorials/tutorial1.html ~ Outdated as well, but still worth a looksee.

Topic: Hand-coded HTML
Date: Saturday, 21 September 2002
Software: TextPad, Mozilla, Dreamweaver (demonstration)
Book: Eric S. Raymond's The Cathedral and the Bazaar: Musings on Linux and Open Source by an Accidental Revolutionary and Chris Dibona & Mark Stone's (Eds.) Open Sources: Voices from the Open Source Revolution.
HTML: table, tr, td, th
In class:

Readings for next class:

• Mulder's Stylesheets Tutorial ~ http://hotwired.lycos.com/webmonkey/98/15/index0a.html?tw=stylesheets ~ A really good tutorial through quite a bit of CSS. Highly recommended. And no, it's not that Mulder.
• CSS Tutorial ~ http://www.w3schools.com/css/default.asp ~ An excellent set of tutorials about all aspects of CSS.
• Linking Style Sheets to HTML ~ http://www.htmlhelp.com/reference/css/style-html.html ~ A clear explanation of the various ways to incorporate CSS into your Web pages. I recommend usually linking to an external style sheet.
• CSS - Cascading Style Sheets ~ Lots of links to great CSS resources. Dive in and explore.

Topic: Cascading Style Sheets (CSS)
Date: Saturday, 28 September 2002
Software: TextPad, Mozilla, TopStyle Pro (demonstration)
Book: Eric A. Meyer's Cascading Style Sheets: The Definitive Guide and Eric Meyer on CSS: Mastering the Language of Web Design.
HTML: id, class, link, style
In class:

Readings for next class:

• Introduction to XHTML, with eXamples ~ http://www.wdvl.com/Authoring/Languages/XML/XHTML/ ~ A very good overview of XHTML, including some easy steps you can use to transform your HTML into XHTML.
• XHTML: Past, present, and future ~ http://builder.cnet.com/webbuilding/0-3881-8-7080997-1.html?zd0114 ~ A very nice introduction to the subject by Ann Navarro, who has written a book on the subject.
• XHTML ~ A collection of links about XHTML.
• Why XML? ~ http://www.simonstl.com/articles/whyxml.htm ~ The always readable and intelligent Simon St. Laurent wrote this nice introduction to XML.
• XML for the absolute beginner ~ http://www.javaworld.com/javaworld/jw-04-1999/jw-04-xml.html ~ It's subtitled 'A guided tour from HTML to processing XML with Java', but it's a great overview. And it doesn't get to Java until 3/4 through the article, so it's still fine for those with no Java-knowledge -- just skip the Java parts.
• XML ~ A collection of links about XML.

Topic: The Future ... is here now: XHTML & XML, Content Management Systems (CMS)
Date: Saturday, 5 October 2002
Software:
Book: Elliotte Rusty Harold's The XML Bible, 2nd Edition.
HTML:
In class:

• XHTML and XML ~ A 159kb PDF of my presentation. To view this file, you will need the free Adobe Acrobat Reader.