Web development - The Chronicle

Web Development: A Chronicle

Web Development or website development is a broad term that engulfs all the activities involved in developing a website for the World Wide Web (Internet) or a private network (Intranet). It can range from a simple, static web page to highly complicated web-based applications, electronic businesses, and social network services. It can encompass web engineering, web design, web content development, client liaison, client-side/server-side scripting, web server and network security configuration, and e-commerce development. Web professionals, however, have always stressed web development to be associated with writing markup and coding. With the development of Content Management Systems, web development in many circles simply means creation of a CMS. With the commercialization of the web, web develop ment companies and web development as a discipline has grown by leaps and bounds. It has almost made mandatory for businesses to use websites to sell products and services to their customers.

The open source model has given a big boost to web development. Encouraging open collaboration, it has made source code, documentations, and blueprints freely accessible to the public.

The easy-to-use WYSIWYG web development software such as Adobe Dreamweaver and Microsoft Visual Studio have also led to the immense gro wth of web development.

A popular and pervasive growth of tools and technologies now facilitates building cutting-edge dynamic and interactive websites. The rise of web services and cloud computing allows users to interact with applications from any locati on. Gone are the days when applications were available only on a desk based computer tying users to a specific workstation.

Web development has dramatically transformed the communication and commerce industries. E-commerce allows consumers to find, bargain , and purchase goods and services from online e-commerce stores. Online interaction and communication has also been positively impacted with web development facilitating open source content management systems and enterprise content management systems and blogging platforms.

Personal networking and marketing have also been transformed by web development, serving as a communication and social networking platform.

Websites like Facebook and Twitter facilitate users to communicate, and organizations to promote their business in an interactive and engaging way.

How it all started?

In 1989, Tim Berners-Lee defined a concept for a computer platform that would facilitate collaboration between researchers based in different parts of the world.

This led to the development of HTML in 1990 which became the fundamental building block of the World Wide Web. The concept of Internet by then was not a new phenomenon since the first WAN was established in 1965 and the first LAN in 1983. Twisted-pair, coaxial, and fiber optic cable were also being developed for the telecommunication industry for many decades. When all these technologies converged with Berners-Lee model, the modern web was born with commercial web pages up and running by the mid-1990s.

The Intermediate Years Improvements in hardware led to broader networks and greater bandwidth. This led developers to incorporate multimedia into the web presentation. Cascading Style Sheets facilitated new ways to organize and display content. Flash video led to new ways of web art and animation, and video streaming changed the very concept of entertainment.

Latest Trends Technology has changed rapidly in the recent years. With new frameworks, tools and technologies it has become vital for web developers to stay up on their toes for developing powerful applications and constantly enhancing the UX. Artificial Intelligence is being used to create websites and apps. This technology allows developers to build software that can think and act as a human without actual human interaction.

Virtual Reality is another technology that will find a lot of space in the coming years. It has already swept the gaming industry and will continue to spread onto other domains of web development as well.

Internet of Things (IoT) connect non-internet-connected objects to send and receive data. These objects can be household appliances like toasters, or sensors on motors, and they will have a great impact on web development.

A special mention required here is that of the development of mobile operating system that has revolutionized web development like never. With mobile OS, the web page has gradually changed its shape to accommodate several contexts. The mobile app is on its way to displace the web page, who knows! But one thing is certain, the app on mobile platform has derived its basic properties from web development itself.

Rigel Networks provides the best in class web development services. With hands on experience and expertise, our team of web developers have a tradition of delivering cutting-edge solutions and services to our clients. You can get in touch with us to hire web developers and get the state-of-the-art web solutions .