Web Design in 2013 … and Beyond!
February 1, 2013
I was meaning to write this in January, but things got in the way! Anyway, here are the web design trends for 2013 …
1. HTML 5
It think this one is a no brainer … everything and everyone is going HTML 5 and CSS 3:
- Android (Google)
- iOS / Mac OSX (Apple)
- Windows (Microsoft)
… This includes all the major web browsers of course.
When people talk about HTML 5, they are really talking about a group of technologies that work together:
- HTML 5
- CSS 3
- JavaScript
HTML 5 and CSS 3 are basically very powerful extensions to HTML and CSS … and so if you understand the basic principles and techniques of these two foundation web languages, HTML5 and CSS3 should be approachable. That said, the added power does present some head scratching challenges a long the way. No worries though, we have the easy to follow training for you.
🙂
 2. JavaScript
JavaScript will become the most important programming language over the next few years – if it isn’t already.
Why?
Because JavaScript is the language that glues all the HTML5 stuff together – it is essential and it is the only game in town. With other languages like Java, PHP and Ruby … there are many competing alternatives, and so their importance is diminished to some degree. JavaScript stands alone and is used anywhere where HTML5 is used … so that means everywhere. Learn JavaScript if you want to get ahead of the herd.
3. Adobe Flash .. he’s dead Jim!
As predicted a year or so ago, Flash continues to get marginalized … soon, Flash will only exist in the dark corners of the Web and in the tears of Actionscript programmers.
Everything you could do in Flash (just about) can be done with HTML5 … and without all the hassles you have with Flash. I am not going to get into why Flash is dying (I’ve written about it before) … Â it is enough to know that it is dying and that time spent on Flash is probably lost time. Move on …
4. WordPress
With all it’s warts, WordPress is still a hugely popular blog/CMS engine and many, many websites are built with WordPress. As a web designer, you will probably at some point be asked to work with it. As a site owner, you will likely want to use it because of all the advantages it provides:
- Easy updates of the site.
- Easy updates of the templates/themes … the entire look of the site can be changed easily.
- Easy to add functionality to the site: search, e-commerce, photo galleries etc …
WordPress in fact, is used by many web designers as the basis of just about every website they create! It is now one of the key tools of web design.
5. PHP
PHP was not the first language I learned (it was JavaScript) and PHP is not the prettiest language out there … but it is overall the most utilitarian. PHP is the most popular and the most approachable server-side programming language out there. It’s messiness and duct-tape like feel, has made it mega popular and today, you see many important tools (that you could use) are built using PHP:
- WordPress
- Drupal
- Joomla
- shopping carts
- forums
- social networking tools
… And much more. Â Learn PHP and you will see your pay shoot up and the number of jobs shoot up.
That’s all for now.
Stefan Mischook
killerSites.com
