CSS is a style language that defines layout for an entire web site or
any HTML document. For example, CSS covers colors, fonts, headings, margins, lines,
breaks, height, width,
background images, advanced positions and many other things. Just wait
and see in coming next!
HTML can be misused to add layout to websites or it can be create trouble for
layout. HTML can define layout for any page or website but
HTML is not for
layout designing. So Cascading Style Sheet offers
more options and is more accurate and sophisticated. Because the CSS is
exclusive for design layout of website. CSS is supported
by all browsers today.
I am sure after only a few guide line of this CSS Tutorial you will be able to make
your own style sheets using CSS to give your website a new great look.
CSS is used exclusively for formatting structured content of a single web
page or the entire web site. HTML is used to structure content or website.
Wait, it sounds a bit technical and confusing. But continue reading next. We will all make sense to you soon.
Back in the good old days when Madonna was a virgin and a guy called
Tim Berners Lee invented the World Wide Web, the language
HTML was only
used to add structure to text. An author could mark his text by stating
"this is a headline" or "this is a paragraph" using HTML tags such as <h1>
and <p>
.
As the Web gained popularity, designers started looking for
possibilities to add layout to online documents. To meet this demand,
the browser producers (at that time Netscape and Microsoft) invented
new HTML tags such as for example <font>
which differed from the original
HTML tags by defining layout - and not structure.
This also led to a situation where original structure tags such as
<table> were increasingly being misused to layout pages instead
of adding structure to text. Many new layout tags such as <blink>
were only supported by one type of browser. "You need browser X to view
this page" became a common disclaimer on web sites.
Cascading Style Sheet was invented to remedy this situation by providing web designers
with sophisticated layout opportunities supported by all browsers. At
the same time, separation of the presentation style of documents from
the content of documents, makes site maintenance a lot easier.
CSS was a revolution in the world of web design. The concrete benefits of CSS include:
- control layout of many documents from one single style sheet;
- more precise control of layout;
- apply different layout to different media-types (screen, print, etc.);
- numerous advanced and sophisticated techniques.
In the next we will discus
colors and
backgrounds and we will take a closer look at how Cascading Style Sheet actually works and how you get started.