Love,
SheilaDog

HTML is the very basic language of nearly every page on the web. It is a simply code to be placed within the desired text of the page, which allows it to be seen in a browser.

A page, in HTML code, consists of a series of commands. Each command that you give is surrounded by TAGS, < and > . Every command must have both tags around it. Let's look at some simple ones.

Let's say we want to tell the browser to show our word as bold. Our word is "Bella". We tell the browser to make it bold by giving the command STRONG inside the tags, like this: <STRONG> . It will be written in our text code: <STRONG>Bella</STRONG> . Now it appears in our browser as Bella .

Notice that when we give a command, we must also turn OFF the command at the end of the text affected by the command. After "Bella" we turn off our STRONG so that the text coming after it doesn't appear bold as well.

Now here is another. Let us say we want "Bella" to be in italics. Our command for italics is always <EM> . So we will code it: <EM>Bella</EM> . It will appear in the browser as Bella .

What about if we want both STRONG and EM too, bold and italics?. We use both sets of tags, and we do something called "nesting". So we would write <EM><STRONG>Bella</STRONG></EM> . This will appear as Bella .

We can start with either command we want to, <STRONG> or <EM>. But whichever lies closer to the text we want to affect - in this case Bella - must also lie closest as we turn off the commands. Above both <STRONG> and it's turnoff command </STRONG> lie closer to our text. See?

Because nothing on our page can happen without first being given a command, even paragraph breaks need one. Paragraph commands, like only a few others, actually don't need a turnoff partner! Remember that there are only a few such commands. If you aren't sure, just throw in a turnoff command anyway - it won't hurt anything.

The dog ran good. Sheila bites. Sheila runs good, but cannot run and bite at the same time. Thank God!

Now I want the "Thank God" to be a new paragraph. So I code the piece above as:

The dog ran good. Sheila bites. Sheila runs good, but cannot run and bite at the same time.
<P>
Thank God &# 33

(Note the code for the exclamation point. The only punctuation that does not need a code is a period or a comma. Punctuation is not inside tags, it is just a code in place of the punctuation mark itself.)

As we said, these are just some basics to help you understand how it is done. Knowing some basics will help you put code into your Dogster page to make it fun!. (Yes, I coded that exclamation point. I am also coding the parenthesis.)

ONE MORE IMPORTANT NOTE! You may want to try to write a whole page for your personal website. I enjoy writing code from scratch because I am a control freak, but some people like to use a "Text Editor". You'll find one in your word processing package on your computer, or in the server - like Google or Yahoo - that offers your private web space. If you do this, please know that some small knowledge of HTML still makes it much easier - because you know how to change the code the Text Editor provides, and so you can control more. If you enjoy this, google HTML+tutorial on the web and you can find oodles of info! Or, better, pick up a copy of the book HTML for Dummies. It is easy to understand and fun to use . . . plus only about $ 20. (Dollar sign, &# 36.)