history of web design

The history of Web Design.

In this essay I will write about the history of web design when it was first created to the point it’s at today, coincidently I will be using the web for research.

The internet began in the 1960’s. It was originally set up for US military purposes and scientists to communicate and transfer data to each other through computers using the telephone lines, for the 1960’s this was seen as efficient.

In the late 60’s and early 70’s some universities started using it. At that time the internet was specifically for exchanging important data between computers with the help of transmission control protocols. In 1969 a special Internet language was created, which was ARPANET and GML (General Mark-up Language). This way of communication was inconvenient and not user-friendly. Then in 1972, Ray Tomlinson created e-mail in which advanced the life of the Internet.

Then in the late 1980’s the internet was introduced as a means of communication for anyone with access to a computer and an internet connection, at this time one of the first freeware browser program called mosaic was developed  and became a very successful program, within the first year over a two million people across the world was using mosaic.

In the current situation there is a version 2, 3 and 4 and many other variations of web designs. The standards that are set by the W3C have made it very hard for large companies to create specific web browsers and develop a monopoly on web design codes. This is because if one company was allowed to dominate web design and browser technologies, it could have had a very detrimental effect on the Internet at the current.Shortly after the W3C was created, Microsoft released Windows 95, which featured a completely new user interface and a browser on the Windows platform, Microsoft Internet Explorer, which became very popular worldwide. A few months later, AltaVista, the first multi-lingual search engine, and Amazon.com, one of the first Internet companies to allow electronic transactions, were invented, and the World Wide Web began to grow rapidly. Database integration technologies such as server-side scripting and design standards like CSS were changed and provided more opportunities for web designers and web developers.

In 1996, there was the introduction of Macromedia Flash, with the introduction of flash its technology became a popular method to use to create animation. It was also used for various web page components and used to integrate videos into web pages and this further changed the face of the Internet. The use of Flash enabled designers to create interactive content with very little development knowledge, in its early versions it had very limited scripting capability. Flash continued to develop in the years following, gaining a scripting language based on JavaScript and other useful features that transformed it into a full presentation tool. Nowadays there are many web sites which use HTML entirely for Flash ignoring the fact that multiple flash elements decelerate the loading time.

Web design over the years has been divided into "different generations." The First-generation websites were originally text with very low graphics they; they contained a lot of text and used a linear layout. The size of the files had to be very small as the transfer rate was very small in which files were transferred using a telephone line or a modem. However the basic design of the first generation made it easier for modems to transfer the information in a small amount of time.

The Second-generation websites were more complicated, they had more available to them via html, In contrast to websites of the first period, the websites of the second period looked a lot more professional as they had new characteristics, including iconic images instead of words, buttons with fancy edges, banners, structural menu to present a hierarchy of information. The web sites created at this stage were over-crowded with icons, coloured graphics and backgrounds. Many of the site characteristics were driven by the development of technology that was constantly changing. An example of this is that there was need to adapt site designs to the certain screen resolution, so to 8bit or 24bit monitors.

The Third-generation website included colored backgrounds and animated images. And today’s web designs are classed as fourth generation, the Websites are vibrant and full of color.

Over the last few years XML, JavaScript and Flash have been just a few of the advanced techniques that allow each individual website to be completely unique. With the ability to use codes it means the ability to bring websites to life. As a result of the advance in technology, web designers can add interactive elements, produce videos or create games to include in any websites they design.    

World Wide Web Consortium, also known as the W3C, was established in 1994. Their Goals and standards were set for the future advance of web design. The HTML was designed as the primary coding for any future web designs. The first version of html was limited but could be advanced.

This generation of web sites tend to be similar to the sites of the previous 3 generations with some distinctive features such as a large quantity of multi-media content and unique web–driven selling propositions, which can only be delivered on the Internet.

Nowadays the 4^th generation of web designs are developed for ecommerce, government, education, entertainment, business, etc. with the main purpose to meet the user’s requirements.

The term web design implies the great range of activities such as;
web site planning,
web site creation,
web site modelling,
web site designing,
web site coding
programming
professional arrange the pages.

Being able to professionally arrange pages make it a user-friendly and easy-to-use site. The Internet has not got a large history, but it has developed heavily over the past 40 years and has become the essential part of every person’s daily life.

1996 was classed as the year of a new era. For many designers it was also shown to be a shameful period mainly because they were not fully aware of how websites worked and therefore there was not a proper construction system established.

Here’s an example of a McDonalds website back in 1996 in which the MacDonald designers were told that their salaries will be increased depending on the amount of red and yellow they used. This was because the yellow and red was there trademark colors however they were seen as using it in an abusive way. It was said that red and yellow are vibrant colors but they should have look for different tones and make the visual weight more even.

Google emerged in 1998 and although it has change their logo since then, the main idea remains the same, which is to provide us with a clean and useful design which will always work efficiently. Google was one of the first search engines available to the public as a means of effectively searching the web.

Then came 1999 in which web Designers began exploring new visual characteristics, trying to take full advantage of all the programs they can put their hands on. Color was taken to a more serious level, they started designing with proportions and therefore they also began considering the importance of layout and visuals and usability rather than just a lot of colorful and animated icons on screen. They increased the presence of interface elements as links to make the experience a lot easier and visual.

Nowadays the website is used for many different reasons, such as music and video downloads and sharing, advertising purposes. But the biggest use of the internet to date is for large global companies to sell and distribute products all over the world, an example of the in amazon or play.com. In which are website used for entirely selling purposes.

To date the World Wide Web continues to grow with the number of web users growing. Every year millions of web sites are added. The History of web design is a history of the 21st century; therefore each of us has a unique opportunity to contribute to its further development.

The graph on the left shows the usage of the internet across the world.