Other web design methods

XHTML

Introduction to XHTMl quote from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XHTML explaining what XHTML is

"Extensible Hypertext Markup Language (XHTML) is a family of XML markup languages that mirror or extend versions of the widely used Hypertext Markup Language (HTML), the language in which Web pages are formulated.

XHTML was developed to make HTML more extensible and increase interoperability with other data formats.[7] HTML 4 was ostensibly an application of Standard Generalized Markup Language (SGML); however the specification for SGML was complex, and neither web browsers nor the HTML 4 Recommendation were fully conformant to it.[8] The XML standard, approved in 1998, provided a simpler data format closer in simplicity to HTML 4.[9] By shifting to an XML format, it was hoped HTML would become compatible with common XML tools;[10] servers and proxies would be able to transform content, as necessary, for constrained devices such as mobile phones.[11] By using namespaces, XHTML documents could provide extensibility by including fragments from other XML-based languages such as Scalable Vector Graphics and MathML.[12] Finally, the renewed work would provide an opportunity to divide HTML into reusable components (XHTML Modularization) and clean up untidy parts of the language.[13]

Tutorial you can use to learn XHTML

http://www.w3schools.com/html/html_xhtml.asp

XML

Introduction to XML quote from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XML explaining what XML is

"Extensible Markup Language (XML) is a markup language that defines a set of rules for encoding documents in a format which is both human- readable and machine-readable. It is defined by the W3C's XML 1.0 Specification[2] and by several other related specifications,[3] all of which are free open standards.[4]"

Tutorials you can use to learn PHP

PHP

Introduction to PHP quote from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PHP explaining what PHP is

"PHP is a server-side scripting language designed for web development but also used as a general-purpose programming language. As of January 2013, PHP was installed on more than 240 million websites (39% of those sampled) and 2.1 million web servers.[4]Originally created by Rasmus Lerdorf in 1994,[5] the reference implementation of PHP (powered by the Zend Engine) is now produced by The PHP Group.[6] While PHP originally stood for Personal Home Page,[5] it now stands for PHP: Hypertext Preprocessor, which is a recursive backronym.[7]

PHP code can be simply mixed with HTML code, or it can be used in combination with various templating engines and web frameworks. PHP code is usually processed by a PHP interpreter, which is usually implemented as a web server's native module or a Common Gateway Interface (CGI) executable. After the PHP code is interpreted and executed, the web server sends resulting output to its client, usually in form of a part of the generated web page – for example, PHP code can generate a web page's HTML code, an image, or some other data. PHP has also evolved to include a command-line interface (CLI) capability and can be used instandalone graphical applications"

Tutorials you can use to learn PHP

PHP can be embed into HTML, but unlike HTML, PHP is a sever driven language so you need a web server such as Apache and php engine to make it work you can either put these on your computer, or get a web host, see CMS section which gives information on LAMP or WAMP

Content management system

Introduction to content management systems quote from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Content_management_system explaining what content management systems are

“A content management system (CMS) is a computer application that allows publishing, editing and modifying content, organizing, deleting as well as maintenance from a central interface. Such systems of content management provide procedures to” manage workflow in a collaborative environment.[5] These procedures can be manual steps or an automated cascade. CMSs have been available since the late 1990s.

Examples of CMSs

Wordpress http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WordPress
Manuel and site https://wordpress.org/
Joomla http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joomla
Manuel and site http://www.joomla.org/

Both of these are free and can can be downloaded, but you need PHP, MYSQL and Apache web server on your web host or on your own computer/server. PHP (see php above), Mysql (database) and Apache are free and can also be downloaded, but hard to set up if you want to set up your own server, check out the information and links below

On Linux its called a LAMP server (linux, Apache, mysql, php) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LAMP_ (software_bundle)
How to set one up http://www.howtoforge.com/ubuntu_debian_lamp_server
On Windows its called a WAMP server (windows, Apache, mysql, php) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LAMP_ (software_bundle)#WAMP
How to set one up http://www.homeandlearn.co.uk/php/php1p3.html

if you go the web host route these can be expensive because you can not use a free web host because they do not give to access to the server and are not WAMP or LAMP server compatible. there are lots of web hosts available just Google web hosting (check if they are a WAMP or LAMP compatible) and choose a web host in your budget range, you usually pay monthly or yearly

Blogging

What is blogging http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blog
Examples of blogging sites

Wordpress.com http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WordPress.com
Site http://wordpress.com
Blogger http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blogger_ (service)
Site http://blogger.com
Tumblr http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tumblr
Site http://tumblr.com

These are free services and you get everything you need to get started this is a good place to start, you can even use the blogging platforms web pages, you get a domain name such as http://wordpress.com/example in Wordpress, http://tumblr.com/example in tumblr and http://Blogger.com/example in blogger, however if you need a domain name such as example.com etc you need to pay, in wordpress you also pay to have access to css