Website Development: The Beginner's Guide

What is Website Development?

With thousands of developers evolving every year, website development is a growing field. From dial-up to now metaverse and IoT, the internet is constantly changing for the better. Whether to chat with a friend or to shop for your close ones, we all visit tons of websites every day.

Website development is the process of building a website from scratch and bringing it together. This is applied to anything, such as developing a simple web page to building a complex social media site like WhatsApp or Instagram. Website development majorly includes all essential development tasks such as server-side scripting, client-side scripting, e-commerce development, server and network security configuration, and (CMS) or content management system development.

If you’re reading this article, you must have chosen this website and used a web browser. Browsers such as Mozilla Firefox, Google Chrome, Apple Safari, and Microsoft Edge allow you to use the internet.

Why is Web Development Important?

Regardless of who you are or what you do, if you have a website, you know the importance of its development. Today, we are living in a technologically-driven world where innovation comes first. For any business to grow, regular improvements are necessary. The internet is here to stay. Whereas, after the outbreak of covid-19 and the world shifting to online or hybrid mode, the internet has become a way of living.

Here, you can learn, teach, make friends, build connections, research, and whatnot. According to a report released in 2019, there are more than 4.2 billion active internet users in this world. Do you know one fun fact? Every internet user goes through at least one website each day. Yes, that is why website development is exceptionally important. You survive in a market where there are thousands of others like you or better.

Standing out amongst them and converting visitors into actual leads requires dedicated efforts and great development strategies. Hence, each website owner requires a well-developed website developed by an expert web developer.

Web Development Requirements

1. Domain Name

As a website developer, you need a domain name while accessing your website. The domain name is a memorable name which your potential visitors use to access your website. Several service providers offer unique domain names. Once you have set up the domain name and it is linked to your host, you are all set to go.

2. Hosting

Web hosting is a crucial aspect of website development which allows you to publish content on your website that attracts users. Hosting your website offers a larger degree of control.

3. CMS

A content management system or CMS is a series of programs or a website application which is used for creating and managing content online. Although it is not essential while building a website; however, it makes the entire process smoother and better.

3. SSL Certificate

The SSL Certificate, also known as the identity certificate, is one of the most crucial things required to take your website to the web. It is a digital certificate which proves the validity of the website. It allows an encrypted connection.

4. Themes

The theme is the overall look and the feel of a website. It includes colour scheme, style elements and layouts. In short, the theme of your website directly impacts every user’s next move.

5. API Integration

API integration is a process of creating a means for two or more two APIs for data sharing and communication purposes without any human interruption.

6. Content

Content is the key highlight of your website. When you visit any website on the web, it is most possibly the content which attracts you to take further action. Content writing involves researching, gathering, and organising pieces of information to publish on the web.

Types of Web Development

1. Front-end Development

Front-end development can be described as developing the graphical user interface when developing a website through the extensive use of HTML, JavaScript, and CSS. Using innovative, cutting-edge tools, our team creates UX/UI that is aesthetic and intuitive and serves its intended purpose. Our singular goal is to ensure that your customers are enthralled in the experience you provide.

2. Back-end Development

For any website or application to function properly, its inner workings must be perfect. Therefore, your chosen website developer must entrust the work of creating a solid structure to their in-house experts to guarantee functionality and form. Developers should be trained and updated on upcoming tech, components, and approaches related to back-end web development services, enabling them to provide the most relevant services to you.

3. Full Stack Development

Full-stack development deals with the development of the computer system application in depth. It includes both front-end development and back-end development.

4. Desktop Web Development

Being a desktop web developer, you are expected to write easy-to-read, efficient codes to formulate software applications. These applications run locally on your devices rather than running on the web.

5. Mobile Web Development

Mobile web developers constantly build highly intuitive applications for mobile devices, including tablets or smartphones. The operation of mobile applications is way different from that of software programs. As a result, a unique set of skills is required to ace the field.

Web Development Tools

Here is the list of the most popular website development tools. Let’s have a look

Front-end Tools

Here is the list of the most popular front-end development tools. 

• Chrome DevTools
• HTML5 Boilerplate
• Sass
• AngularJS
• jQuery
• Visual Code Studio
• Git
• TypeScript
• Node Package Manager
• Grunt

Back-end Tools

Here is the list of the most popular back-end development tools.

• PHP
• Python
• JavaScript 
• Laravel
• Django
• MongoDB
• MySQL
• Apache
• NGINX
• Docker

Web Development Process

In the e-commerce era, both consumer and producer relationship is critical. Today, companies constantly strive to attract and retain consumers by putting their best foot forward. With a high focus on digitization, companies are busy creating aesthetically scalable, pleasing, and highly intuitive websites.

It boosts the brand’s overall visibility and reaches, leading to a competitive edge. Hence, it can be said that the path of website development isn’t the easiest. While focusing on your web development needs, having qualified and trained professionals help you with the process. Here is the complete website development process in detail:

1. Planning and Wireframing Stage

The first and the most important stage while developing a website is to formulate a plan on paper or your computer screens. Consider yourself asking certain questions such as what is the goal of this website, who is your targeted audience, what type of content you’re aiming to publish, what services are you thinking to provide, and so on.

Once you have the answer to these questions; the ride is pretty simple from here. After planning comes the wireframing. Make a rough blueprint of your website so that you’re not clueless. It gives an insight into your deliverables and goals.

2. Writing Codes for the Website

The second most important step as a website developer is to write easy-to-understand and efficient codes. There are tons of coding languages such as Python, HTML, JavaScript, CSS, and so on to write codes. Almost all website developers generally go for this language to formulate websites.

3. Building the Back-end and Front-end of the Website

Once the most complicated part is done, which is writing codes, it is also important to give enough time for building back-end and front-end site designs or templates. Starting from the theme of the website to fonts and the databases and servers, there is a lot which needs to be analysed properly.

4. Working with a CMS 

The technological world is ever-evolving. As trends change, coding trends also become outdated. That’s when CMS comes in handy. A CMS is way easier to use and offers tools to host a website. Also, it is less flexible; as a result, you tend to have less control over the front end.

5. Getting a Domain 

Till this point, you will have the IP address of your website. Along with the IP address, the domain name is exceptionally important. The domain name can be described as a memorable name which your audience will remember when they visit your website. There are websites like GoDaddy on which you can purchase a unique domain name.

6. Making the site live

Once your website’s domain name is ready and linked, you’re ready to go live. But before you actually launch your website, there are a handful of things which require your attention.

This includes distributing responsibilities among your team, SEO optimization, testing for glitches, and so on. Once it’s done, make your website live.

Web Developer Communities

1. Stack Overflow

Introduced nearly ten years ago, Stack Overflow is undoubtedly one of the world’s most popular programming communities. If you’re looking for answers, this place is a great way to go!

2. GitHub

With more than 73 million active developers, GitHub is another popular web developer community shaping the future of software.