Modern Web Design and Development
Although web development and web design are often used interchangeably, they are two logically distinct elements of a website. Web design involves everything related to its visual presentation. Web development relates to the code that makes it work.
The practice of website creation has grown from humble beginnings to an art form found in our pockets, commercial displays, and the office; at the intersection of information, commerce, and graphic design. New technologies continue to appear, along with new languages and tools for deploying them. In the end, we all want an enjoyable experience while connecting to the digital world. That can include entertainment, communication, and financial transactions; all at once, everywhere we go.
Web Development
Content Management Systems (CMS)
CMS are a popular choice for managing the creation and maintenance of digital content, typically in a collaborative environment. The CMS can be pre-configured with templates and also contains a Content Delivery Application (CDA) that makes publishing content similar in experience to using a word processor. The most popular CMS is WordPress, which is currently the way a majority of websites are built. However, Joomla, Magento, and Drupal are also widely used CMS platforms. These platforms allow individuals to build websites without requiring advanced developing and design skills. However, even when using a CMS, coding and design skills still comes in handy.
Besides the pre-built templates, WordPress sites are entirely customizable,? having premium plugins and extensions available. The Websites it creates are built on PHP with a MySQL or SQL database. JavaScript is also growing in importance, adding an interactive element to the page. For example, JavaScript can change the background color as you scroll down a page, or create reactions based on hovering over or clicking items on a page.
Core Developing.
Web development involves all the code that makes a website work. Front-end developing covers the code responsible for actually displaying the web design. Back-end or server-side developing manages the database, serving data to the front-end for display.
While using a CMS is cost effective, more powerful and\or complex projects can be built with programming languages such as Java, Python, PHP, HTML5, and CSS3. Creating websites directly with these languages can be more time consuming than using a CMS. However, core developing allows for much more freedom and versatility in design.
An example of our work with core developing, on asuebahamas.com
Frameworks
A web application framework is a set of libraries and tools that help developers build web applications. These allow for more freedom for implementation but create a lot of shortcuts by providing re-usable code for common functions and features. A framework we use is Node.js, which is perfect for building fast, scalable network applications.
An example of our work with frameworks, on csbtechinvestors.com
Web Design
Web design entails the visual aesthetics and usability of your color scheme, layout, information flow, and everything else related to UX (user experience). Web design specialists tend to be proficient with Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator, graphic design, layout, branding, color palettes, and typography.
The crucial element of web design is navigation. The menu items should be easily accessible, users should always know where they are on the site, and how to get where they want to be. Next is the visual presentation. Quality graphics and proper use of white space help to create a more enjoyable experience for the user. Our digital presence is judged in less than a second by the speed, look, and feel of our site. Having a beautiful, clean, intuitive site is only the first step,?content is king?and what keeps a visitor coming back.
This website project provided CSB Tech Emporium with a unique opportunity to showcase one of The Bahamas? healthcare gems.
Modern Design Trends
Flat Design
Clean and simple websites have become more popular for better mobile performance. Flat, minimalist design loads quickly for mobile users, and a better load speed yields a better SEO value. Search engines are requiring faster page loads, as time moves forward. This trend encourages designers to focus on the important parts of the website, and get rid of any unnecessary clutter.
Mobile First
Because of the increased mobile use, Google is now prioritizing sites that are mobile friendly. Since 2015,?mobile searches?outpaced desktop searching, and mobile use continues to rise. Mobile first design is now a necessity. Mobile first means that web-design begins with the mobile user in mind, with the desktop version considered afterward. This design trend is likely to continue into the foreseeable future.
Chatbots
Since the use of GPU for training neural networks sparked a revolution in our ability to train machine learning (ML) algorithms, AI inspired tech has dramatically improved. As a result, chatbots are becoming increasingly common on the web. These bots can answer questions from your documentation, gather important consumer data, generate sales leads, and give visitors an easy way to reach out. ML and NLP are continually refined, we will see more chatbots becoming more sophisticated as time goes on.
We Recommend
At CSB Tech Emporium, we recommend the WordPress CMS to our clients. Once we’ve built the site, as the owner, you will have more complete control over its content. WordPress is an open source project that began in 2003. It has many development tools and well-crafted plugins available, and is easily scalable with plenty of growth potential.
Our Work:
incudesk.com
tmp-bahamas.com
stamps.services
Resources
One comment on “Modern Web Design and Development”
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One thing I would really like to say is the fact that before buying more computer memory, take a look at the machine directly into which it can be installed. If your machine is running Windows XP, for instance, a memory ceiling is 3.25GB. Putting in greater than this would basically constitute a waste. Be sure that one’s motherboard can handle an upgrade volume, as well. Great blog post.