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Show HN: HTML for People

htmlforpeople.com

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Re: Show HN: HTML for People

#111

Post by globular-toast »

blakewatson wrote: post #42
forbiddenvoid wrote: post #13

I love the idea and I'm thrilled to see more sites like this out there. But I do think this assumes a level of computer literacy that isn't consistent with typical, non-technical users. Step 1 starts with: > Pick a location on your computer and create a folder. Call it my-site or something similar. You've already lost the vast majority of people right here. There are a shockingly large number of people out there that…

OP here. Yeah, I was a bit worried about this, and even though I kind of mentioned it in the introduction, I think it deserves more attention. I'm not sure if I want to write something and host it myself, or maybe just point people to some kind of primer on creating files and folders.

If you're concerned about this I think the only solution is to get feedback from your audience somehow. Watching someone try to follow the instructions can be enlightening. I personally doubt it's that bad, I think people know how to create folders, but I might be wrong. If not, directing them to " for dummies" might be a good move.

Re: Show HN: HTML for People

#112

Post by thenameless7741 »

otteromkram wrote: post #22
mightybyte wrote: post #7

I think the fundamental approach being taken by this project is immensely valuable to the world. This kind of education about open standards might actually be the most powerful tool that can help us take steps in the direction away from giant opaque corporations and back towards the systems based on open standards that the internet originated from. I really hope this project continues to be updated and get more and m…

Mozilla has amazing documentation that's been around for years. Here's their basic html tutorial section: https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Learn/HTML No one is or has been stopping people from learning HTML.

As a technical person who recently taught myself frontend from scratch, I found https://web.dev/learn way more structured and thorough. The CSS lesson covers all the essentials and actually made me enjoy working with CSS.

web.dev doesn't get as much love as MDN, but it totally should!

Re: Show HN: HTML for People

#113

Post by lifthrasiir »

jraph wrote: post #107

Well done! I really like how you make people write bare text, publish it and bam, that works, just like this, and how you ease into html. The text is very well written, straightforward, welcoming, well structured. It seems easy and enjoyable to read. I believe that putting html in non professional hands is a good goal. Some feedback: - About , it seems to be introduced quite late. People comfortable with English but…

> People comfortable with English but wanting to write their website in their own language might be surprised.

A main complication here is that people don't even know about character encodings, so you can't reasonably expect them to save index.html in UTF-8 in the first place. (For example Windows notepad would use the active code page by default.) I agree that it should be featured prominently if that saving issue can be also addressed.

Re: Show HN: HTML for People

#114

Post by khafra »

tdeck wrote: post #101
treflop wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

With all due respect, it's not like your average person who drives all the time knows how their car works at all either.

This feels more like an apprentice mechanic not knowing what neutral is.

It should be like a physicist studying Carnot Engines not knowing what neutral is; but for some reason Computer Science degrees are also expected to be developer certificate programs.

Re: Show HN: HTML for People

#115

Post by crabmusket »

eviks wrote: post #110
jraph wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You need to learn WYSIWYG "codes" and "language" too. It's just that you probably already did so. "Select, then click on the B button to make it bold", or "click B, type, then click B again" is probably not straightforward at first. I don't know why people shouldn't be exposed to markup. I also don't see how HTML is a poor format. It has its issues but fundamentally? Seems fine. It's cool someone tries to make it rea…

First, it's not a "just", but a huge benefit for the audience of "everyone" Second, it's much more straightforward vs any tags (and remembering having to close them without any help in your plain text editor) And is also much more discoverable in the intuitive interface with the full list of available styles right there with styled buttons so you don't need to think whether is underline, underscore, or something else…

I'd really like for there to be a WYSIWYG editor that works on HTML, something the level of complexity of like WordPad (which can make RTF files). But supporting the full range of HTML tags like , etc.

Re: Show HN: HTML for People

#116

Post by lukan »

bo1024 wrote: post #69
giobox wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I try not to get overly-annoyed at this kind of thing too, but to me it just demonstrates an incredible lack of self-drive, or curiosity, especially in the CS domain. If the students are genuinely curious, there is nothing to stop them learning about pretty much any topic in CS - really. There are few university subjects where the entire syllabus is freely available online in almost every format imaginable the way CS…

Are you sure they have a computer (i.e. something with a keyboard and a filesystem that it is possible to write and run programs on) at home?

It is way harder, as those devices seemed designed for consumption, but also with smartphones and tablets, one can get under the hood.

(Hurrey for Termux)

Re: Show HN: HTML for People

#117

Post by maeil »

simonw wrote: post #8

This is great. The decision to skip CSS by depending on https://simplecss.org/ is smart - CSS is a whole other thing, and having that on top of basic HTML would be pretty intimidating. I did worry a bit about https://htmlforpeople.com/zero-to-internet-your-first-websit... - "Step 1. Create a folder on your computer" - because apparently a large number of people these days don't understand files and folders at all! ht…

> I did worry a bit about https://htmlforpeople.com/zero-to-internet-your-first-websit... - "Step 1. Create a folder on your computer" - because apparently a large number of people these days don't understand files and folders at all!

I'm probably around the average age on HN, so I grew up with early Windows. Yet after years of trying and failing to get into different note-taking/productivity apps, I finally found inner peace by using Obsidian and embracing the exact millenial "laundry basket" approach the article talks about. Maybe 10% of my notes are in a folder, the other 90% all together in the root. Turns out what mattered was 1. the lowest possible entry barrier to writing a note and 2. speed.

Re: Show HN: HTML for People

#118

Post by assimpleaspossi »

rapind wrote: post #75
simonw wrote: post #8

This is great. The decision to skip CSS by depending on https://simplecss.org/ is smart - CSS is a whole other thing, and having that on top of basic HTML would be pretty intimidating. I did worry a bit about https://htmlforpeople.com/zero-to-internet-your-first-websit... - "Step 1. Create a folder on your computer" - because apparently a large number of people these days don't understand files and folders at all! ht…

> apparently a large number of people these days don't understand files and folders at all! And here I am shaking my fist insisting these are “directories” not “folders”… ;)

This fundamental understanding is a widespread disease I've had to argue with people--some of whom should know better but allow it anyway.

Re: Show HN: HTML for People

#119

Post by psnehanshu »

Suppafly wrote: post #82
peterkelly wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Google drive follows the files and folders model that your father was expecting.

It gets confusing when you use all google services though, because while google photos technically use your drive space, they aren't really exposed that way. Android generally gives you a warning that when you delete a photo that it's also being removed from your cloud storage too though. But google photos will also constantly prompt you to let it delete your local copies and only have the cloud copies, so you end up…

Come on! Google Photos is not confusing at all. It is very clear on what it does, but I may be biased.

Re: Show HN: HTML for People

#120

Post by bob1029 »

al_borland wrote: post #62
stego-tech wrote: post #14

We sorely need more of this. HTML was the first language I actually understood (although BASIC was my first ever), and left me feeling empowered to carve out my own survival on the internet. While layering CSS and Javascript aren't bad decisions on their face, I do think they combine to create a steep barrier to entry for most newcomers as they're believed to be "Core" to the language of HTML itself. Kudos to the aut…

I think CSS and JS should be things the user graduates to when they decide they need them, if they ever do. Show someone basic HTML and most people will eventually look at their page and think, “this is neat, but how to I make this title red and change the background?” This is when to introduce the very basics of CSS. If someone has a goal the learning process is easier and more exciting, because it’s relevant and al…

I think teaching all 3 at once is better. You can take a really simple vertical slice to demonstrate how they interact to compose the DOM. Then, spend the next 2 weeks inside dev tools explaining how to navigate the DOM and browser state. Establishing mapping between dev tools and the examples is where self sufficiency becomes feasible.

I agree you can pretty much get there with plain HTML academically and in concept work, but this is not a helpful (or exciting) perspective for someone who is likely to be tasked with building non-trivial sites for others. A little bit of color and movement can go a long way in keeping the apprentice's attention.

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