I'm on a Highway to HTML

Website creation programs like Expression Web and Dreamweaver are fantastic. They allow one to quickly and easily design web pages and publish them on a website. A major advantage of such software is the ability to immediately view the effects of design changes on the page being created or edited. However, the greatest advantage of these programs is clearly the ability to design, create, and edit websites without having to write lines of code for each visual element one wants to present. No one wants to type line after line after line of HTML, repeatedly saving and refreshing to see how each line of command changes the look of the page.

While it is a great idea to utilize technology to our advantage, sometimes it is beneficial to retain the ability to accomplish tasks the "old fashioned" way. This is one of those instances. There are times when a design element cannot be created or edited correctly using these easier programs. In these cases, the ability to program using HTML code is essential. There are many times that the color, size, spacing, etc... of a line or body of text, background color, pcitures, links, and other visual elements will not appear as programmed in web creation software because the underlying HTML code dictates different formatting. These issues can only be resolved by altering the actual lines of HTML code associated with those elements.