My site content is generated by a combination of html, scripting languages and a database engine. Click on the items in the following list if you wish to read more about them. Please note that all of the following are Open Source and free as is the #1 web server that I use: Apache.

What goes in:
• HTML
• CSS
• PhP
• Java
• Perl
• MySql

Using the above, the result is a secure, easily updated web application. As a designer I test most of the stuff to make sure that it actually does what I think that it should do, then I try to make it easy to understand how to do it, and straight-forward when comes down to actually do'n it. Once I have the code in place, I then ask a few friends to give it a go and see what falls out.

I do not use any special code generators to create this site. I understand how all of this works, and use very generic text editors to create and test code; whether HTML, CSS or script. Pico and Gedit are my favorites as both are really simple. Pico has been around for *years* and comes with UDub's Pine eMail client. I still use Pine to read Newsgroups, but not so much for eMail anymore. Gedit does global changes great and since I never could spell, it also has a spell checker AND when you are looking at code, it is somewhat easier to find syntax errors from the way it highlights different parts.

Uploaded images are checked for size, then a thumbnail is auto magically created and stored. There is no need to manually create a thumbnail from an original image, then store both on the site. Thumbnails make the web go faster. For instance, say I upload an Original image which has a file size of about 84K bytes ( 640 x 480 ) depending on the color depth and picture information in the image. The thumbnail that results is about 3.8K bytes ( 128 x 92 ). When showing multiple images for a surfer to choose, it makes it much much faster to get thumbnail images to the client system. The surfer then can click on one and make the image bigger and not have to wait for all the bigger pictures to load. Pain in the butt if you are dial up. Sure, you now have a couple of clicks to get to the result, but the overall speed of the site is faster and the surfer can get more looking done in the same amount of time.

The database is pretty simple, 5 or 6 tables to grab stuff from. I do not store pictures in the DB, but use the file system to do so. I do store file and path names, information about my pictures and parts of the menu system, along with 'Caption' information that is drawn upon when the 'big' picture is up. Doesn't make sense to me to add Captions on the thumbnails as that would clutter up the screen and possibly distract the surfer from seeing what there is to see. Of course nothing is caste in stone and could change at anytime!

• Html is a specification for creating web pages in standard form.
• CSS is also a specification for creating web pages in standard form.
• PhP is a server side scripting language.
• Perl is another server side scripting language.
• Java is a client side scripting language.
• MySql is a database application engine.
• Pico is part of Pine email MUA created by UofW.
• Gedit is a light-weight open source editing application.
• Apache is the #1 web server in the world.