Web programmers are required to be knowledgeable about the significant programming languages that aid the design process of a website. It is important to be conversant in HTML, PHP, ASP.NET and several others to create customized, dynamic and highly interactive websites for small to medium and large businesses.

The growth in the demand of interactive websites has led to the usage of more sophisticated languages. With them, database-powered and dynamic websites can be created easily. These advanced languages include PHP, ASP.NET, JSP, Perl, ColdFusion, and many more. They either fall in the category of proprietary or open-source languages, both enjoying own share of application in programming a site. They have actually descended from varied ancestors called shell languages, mark-up languages, scripting languages and conventional programming languages.

Languages That Have Shaped the Web
There are many programming languages which have created innumerable web pages and developed thousands of applications.

HTML, invented by Tim Berners-Lee is the first in the league of web programming languages. It is the primary markup language used in the generation of web pages. It is also the lingua franca comprehended by all World Wide Web (WWW) clients. The most important characteristic of this language is that it is compatible to all operating system (OS) platforms, such as Windows, Linux, Mac or Unix. The computational power of HTML is limited.

PHP is the most popular open source language which can create customized websites with user-friendly content management system (CMS). Being open source, PHP can be customized for any type of operating system.

ASP.NET (Active Server Pages The.NET Framework), the infrastructure for Microsoft.NET platform can be deployed for flexible running of web applications and web services. This language runs inside IIS and come free of cost with Windows servers. The language aids execution of script by Internet server. Another characteristic of ASP.NET is to utilize C# or VB.NET to develop web applications. The primary advantage is that ASP uses less amount of code to program, but is only restricted to Windows platform.

Java is a potent object-oriented programming language, which entails the execution of embedded Java code in the server; soon after it the page is returned to the browser for display. In modern context, lot of interactivity that can be found on a website runs through java scripts (change of image, text color change on mouse rollover). Read the rest of this entry »

Basic Computer Programing

In this article, we are going to present computer programing and discover how it may be applied to command the way your computer operates. Generally, computer beginners aren’t concerned in controlling the computer, new computer users are commonly concerned in learning more about how it all works. Nevertheless they may be surprised to learn that computer programing increases computer knowledge as a whole and it can assist to decrease the fearfulness and intimidation associated with using a new computer.

Computer programing is creating a succession of commands that enable the computer to do some actions. The people who program computers (called Computer Programers) use a programing language to communicate with a computer. You might have heard of some of these languages in the past such as Visual Basic, C++, or Fortran. There are hundreds of other programing language and neither one is best than the other. Just about all of them are capable of executing the same tasks and accomplishing the same goals. A programer chooses one language by a simple preference.

Each of these languages differ by the way they communicate with a computer, the commands that they abide by are very specific. Not a single command of one language can be exchanged with the commands or language of another. But all of them can be used to control a computer.

At present it would be impossible to teach you how to program any language in a single article or lesson. But we can still introduce you to some of programing’s most basic concepts – starting with the commands. Commands are the instructions that a computer conforms to perform an action. To make them work inside of a program, programers assign commands to objects like buttons for example.

The commands in a program are pretty worthless unless they have some data to pursue so programers either give the programs some information to work with (list of names or numbers for example) or they make the program generate it’s own data. Occasionally, the data comes from an outside source like the Internet or the computer that the program resides. The data that a program receives is called input and data that the program generates is called output.

Other times, the data is unknown. If the program were working with a simple algebra equation like, “x + 5 = y,” the variables “x” and “y” would be unidentified pieces of data. Or if a program were to calculate a date “x” days from now, the variable “x” would be an unidentified piece of data until we tell the program what “x” is. In programming, it’s sometimes required to work with unidentified pieces of data.

That’s when conditions are convenient,conditions allow a program to execute an action based on the event of a previous command. Using this type of command, we could instruct a program to do one thing if the “x” variable in our latter example turned out to be 9 days, and then do different thing if the variable turned out to be 31 days.

Commands, data, variables, and conditions help build the most simple programs and there are certainly more components of any programming language. But when they’re typed into a programing language and compiled to create an executable file (a file ending with the .exe extension), they turn into a software application. Read the rest of this entry »