When I first started using the web in high school, I put absolutely no thought into how the web pages ended up on my computer screen or why they acted and looked they way they did. All I knew was that I could use them to answer my essay questions for Mrs. Hubbard’s English class without spending hours at the library. It wasn’t until years later that I started to wonder what was actually going on behind the scenes of a web page.
As I’ve worked, I found that many web design clients have a similar approach to the web as I did in high school. Most have found the web to be extremely useful for their business or at home but have not had the time nor the inclination to understand the web at any other level. A little working knowledge of the backend as always proved useful if you own a website for yourself or your business. Knowing your way around the backend can help you communicate with your designer, help you use some more advanced techniques within your Content Management System, and troubleshoot when things go wrong.
This article is the first of a series to help you understands some fundamentals of the web in a quick and easy way.