WEB DESIGN, WEB PROGRAMMING AND WEB DEVELOPMENT, ARE THEY THE SAME?
WEB DESIGN, WEB PROGRAMMING AND WEB DEVELOPMENT, ARE THEY THE SAME?
We find that most of the time, we are talking about web design when in reality we are talking about web development. What are the differences between web design, web programming and web development?
Most people refer to web design when talking about the creation of a web page , however, web design is limited to that, to the design of the web page , at most and according to how strict we are in the terms, we would be talking about the design and web layout , that is, the visual aspect of the page or the web application in question, however, especially if we are talking about a web page created to measure , without CMS, we are talking about development web, which includes:
Web design.
Responsive web layout.
Front end programming, the visible part of the web.
Back end programming, the control panel from which the web administrator manages the contents and other functions of the web page.
Database development.
What we see in a web page is web design, the fact that this design is not merely static, it is provided by the web layout and that is why we speak here in a strict sense, of responsive web layout and not of responsive web design, A web design without templates, begins with Photoshop and / or Illustrator, and this is static, as it is, for example, a logo, that is, it is more a graphic design than something applied to a website, but how it is done thinking about a web or an APP, yes we are facing a web design.
The web layout is usually done with HTML5 and CSS3 mainly, and depending on the needs, also with Javascript . As you can see, on our website when we talk about web design, we are talking about web layout, but in order to understand each other with our potential clients, we explain it this way, since it is rare for the person who requests a dry web layout. For this reason, and because web design positions much better than web layout , since logically if clients look for web design when they refer to design and layout and in most cases in fact, they are referring to the integral development of a web application, we have chosen to adapt to your language, after all, the important thing is to understand each other, then it is our job to explain the steps that we are going to take when creating the web page.
The HTML is a markup language where the spaces where the content will be marked, but it is not a programming language. Arithmetic functions cannot be developed, it does not control any user action, they do not take variables into account, HTML only describes the basic structure of a web page and links to other pages or documents can be included.
The layout is completed with CSS , which is to make the content of the web “beautiful” and create the style of the web page, basically, so that it is not dull and ugly, so that we understand each other. Colors, indents, background images, sizes, fonts, rotate elements … we can modify all of that with CSS. And it is especially useful when creating responsive web applications through the use of Media Queries .
And within the web layout Javascript also comes into play , but we have already released a lot of roll for today;) In summary, we will say that it also works for certain animations on the web that can be done without having to go through the server, so that are done quickly. For example, if a menu is folded and unfolded or that we get a warning that a field is missing to fill in a form.
And what is web programming ? Here the provision of functions to the web or the application comes into play. The most common programming language is PHP , at Rana Negra we use the latest version of this language, PHP 7 . With web programming , the graphic elements of the web are provided with functionality.
And with PHP you can program both the front end and the back end of a web page.
With PHP we process the information, we add functions to the web page (when X passes, Y passes, when the user does this, the other is displayed …) When we need any dynamic function, beyond showing static content, we need a programming language like PHP.
Pages like Wikipedia are created with PHP, among many other technologies.
And to simplify and speed up work with PHP , there are a series of frameworks , such as Symfony and CodeIgniter , which are two of the ones we use here. These frameworks help with the most repetitive and common tasks of a web project, making there is less code, so the programmer programs faster and the web is created more stable.
And for any type of dynamic web application , we need to query a database, we work with MySQL . The databases of a web page contain a series of data organized and related to each other, being able to carry out complex queries thanks to them.
And also, depending on the specific project, there are as many technologies, APIS, etc.
If we add web design, responsive web layout, front end and back end programming and database development, we are looking at comprehensive web development , which combines design, layout and programming.
And then, to curl the loop, we use words like full stack development, back end development, front end development , of which in Rana Negra we are not very friends, because we want customers to understand us, not that they think we are very modern but do not know what we do.
But hey, a full stack development is a web programmer or a web developer , an expert in both the front end and the back end , being able to know or not about web design , but about layout and web programming . With this description, we all get an idea of what front end development and back end development mean , right?
Oh and in web design and layout we find UX (User Experience) and UI (User Interface) ! If you want to know more about the subject, we leave you our article The Importance of Having an Expert in Web Usability (User Experience – Ux)
