<p>Let's say I woke up today and wanted to create a clone of StackOverflow.com, and reap the financial windfall of millions $0.02 ad clicks. Where do I start?</p>

<p>My understanding of web technologies are:</p>

<ul>
<li>HTML is what is ultimately displayed</li>
<li>CSS is a mechanism for making HTML look pleasing </li>
<li>ASP.NET lets you add functionality using .NET(?)</li>
<li>JavaScript does stuff</li>
<li>AJAX does asyncronous stuff</li>
<li>... and the list goes on!</li>
</ul>

<p>To write a good website to I just need to buy seven books and read them all? Are Web 2.0 sites really the synergy of all these technologies?  </p>

<p>Where does someone go to get started down the path to creating professional-looking web sites, and what steps are there along the way. </p>

[{'answer_id': 12680, 'author': 'Lars Mæhlum', 'author_id': 960, 'author_profile': 'https://Stackoverflow.com/users/960', 'pm_score': 0, 'selected': False, 'text': '<p>I would recommend this book:<br>\n<a href="https://rads.stackoverflow.com/amzn/click/com/0735623341" rel="nofollow noreferrer" rel="nofollow noreferrer">http://www.amazon.com/MCTS-Self-Paced-Training-Exam-70-528/dp/0735623341/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&amp;s=books&amp;qid=1218830714&amp;sr=8-1</a></p>\n\n<p>I have just read it to take the exam, and although I knew the web theory part, I found it to be of great value.<br>\nThis of course is a ASP.NET specific book, but that is what I would recommend learning anyways.  </p>\n\n<p>After you learn all the ASP.NET stuff, I would suggest reading up on <a href="http://jquery.com/" rel="nofollow noreferrer">JQuery</a>.</p>\n\n<p>Happy coding :)</p>\n'}, {'answer_id': 12686, 'author': 'Brian Warshaw', 'author_id': 1344, 'author_profile': 'https://Stackoverflow.com/users/1344', 'pm_score': 4, 'selected': False, 'text': "<p>While I have built my knowledge largely based on using the internet to search out what I want to know (w3schools.com helped a lot, as did A List Apart), a few good books have helped me along the way, though they have been platform/language-specific, so I'll avoid mentioning them unless someone is curious. For me, at least, having a book open so that I don't have to resize windows or switch between them is very valuable.</p>\n\n<p>The first part of your list is ok, but the last few items need tweaking. ASP.NET adds <em>server-side</em> functionality (for the most part) to your application. This lives outside of the browser and is thus quite powerful and easily shared with a variety of end-users.</p>\n\n<p>The problem (some say) with server-side processing is that your application must make a new HTTP request when you ask for an action to be performed. So if you click on a link to a page that yields a new set of data, you don't get instant results. The page reloads, or loads a separate page.</p>\n\n<p>Javascript solves this to a degree--it allows you to respond to user input instantaneously. Do you want to display the sum of two numbers when the user clicks a button? You can do it with Javascript.</p>\n\n<p>The problem with Javascript is that it can't talk directly to databases, or explore your server's file system, or other stuff like that. It lives in the browser--period.</p>\n\n<p>AJAX bridges the gap between your user's browser and your server. With AJAX, <em>Javascript</em> makes the HTTP request without refreshing your page or loading a new one. Javascript talks to a server-side script (not necessarily ASP, either--works with PHP, Rails, Coldfusion, etc.) and sends and receives information. And because Javascript isn't dependent on page loads, a quick, snappy AJAX script can almost give the feeling of a common desktop application, in which you don't have to wait for HTTP requests when performing simple actions on your application's data.</p>\n"}, {'answer_id': 12693, 'author': 'travis', 'author_id': 1414, 'author_profile': 'https://Stackoverflow.com/users/1414', 'pm_score': 4, 'selected': True, 'text': '<p>I think that this series of <a href="http://www.opera.com/wsc/" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Opera Articles</a> will give you a good idea of web standards and basic concepts of web development.</p>\n\n<p><em>2014 update</em>: the Opera docs were relocated in 2012 to this section of <a href="http://webplatform.org" rel="nofollow noreferrer">webplatform.org</a>: </p>\n\n<p><a href="http://docs.webplatform.org/wiki/Main_Page" rel="nofollow noreferrer">http://docs.webplatform.org/wiki/Main_Page</a></p>\n'}, {'answer_id': 12898, 'author': 'Ian Good', 'author_id': 1195, 'author_profile': 'https://Stackoverflow.com/users/1195', 'pm_score': 2, 'selected': False, 'text': '<p>You could go out and buy a bunch of books and start reading them and quickly get overwhelmed in the seemingly massive learning curve it takes to go from nowhere, which is where it appears you are, to a rich internet entrepreneur, which is where you want to be.</p>\n\n<p>Alternatively, and what I would suggest is, you could define a problem you want to solve, and then go about finding the solution to that problem. Start with something small. "I have a problem: I don\'t have a web site about myself.". Define what you need to do to solve that problem, learn the basics, and do it. Then, define a new problem, which probably relies on the solution to the first problem, find what you need to do, and do it.</p>\n\n<p>This is how all technology professionals evolve. My first website was a personal site with nothing but text. Then I added some jokes and some movie quotes. Then I got tired of man-handling all the updates to I learned how to put them into a database and retrieve them from the database for display. It goes on and on. </p>\n\n<p>Call me when you\'ve got more money from your financial windfall than you know what to do with.</p>\n'}, {'answer_id': 15121, 'author': 'mk.', 'author_id': 1797, 'author_profile': 'https://Stackoverflow.com/users/1797', 'pm_score': 2, 'selected': False, 'text': '<p>Ian\'s answer has a lot of weight. You could buy all those books and read them all and know nothing about web development. What you really need to do is start with something that is not nearly as big as Stack Overflow. Start with your personal site. Read some web dev/css articles on <a href="http://www.alistapart.com/" rel="nofollow noreferrer">a list apart</a>. Learn about doctypes and why to use them. Add some css and change the colors around. Go over to <a href="http://www.quirksmode.org/" rel="nofollow noreferrer">quirksmode</a> and peruse the site. Add some js. Follow some links on <a href="http://www.crockford.com/" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Crockfords site</a>. You will probably stumble across his awesome video lectures, which you should watch. Then after that go back to all the js that you wrote and rewrite it. Then pick a server side language that you want to learn. <a href="http://python.org" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Python</a> is pretty easy, but it really doesn\'t matter what you pick. Then come back and integrate all those together in your site. At this point you will at least be getting started with web development and will have worked with several different technologies. </p>\n\n<p><strong>EDIT:</strong> I forgot to mention. <strong>READ BOOKS</strong>. </p>\n\n<p>Many developers that I have worked with in the past have gotten through their career without really advancing after a certain point. I could be totally wrong, but I attribute it to not reading enough books and relying on using their same bad code over and over. </p>\n'}, {'answer_id': 15947, 'author': 'James Marshall', 'author_id': 1025, 'author_profile': 'https://Stackoverflow.com/users/1025', 'pm_score': 1, 'selected': False, 'text': '<p>I\'m with Ian on this one. Reading books is all well and good, but nothing beats getting stuck in. I actually started with a Dummies Guide to ASP (that\'d be "classic" ASP), back in 1999.</p>\n\n<p>If I was going to start from scratch today I\'d be looking at something that covered a full stack solution, whether Apache/PHP/MySQL, RoR or whatever.</p>\n\n<p>ATM I have no experience of Rails, but it might be a pretty good place to start as it includes a lot of stuff that you\'d have to figure out early on otherwise (integration with a Scriptaculous, a JS framework) - you can always learn what going on under the hood at a later date.</p>\n\n<p>.NET is always an option, and if you\'re comfortable with Visual Studio it may be the way to go, but it\'s not the easiest thing to pick up otherwise.</p>\n\n<p>If you know a bit of HTML but are basically new to server-side programming you might look at ColdFusion. It\'s actually extremely powerful and like Rails includes lots of "out of the box" benefits. There\'s a Swiss company called <a href="http://www.railo.ch" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Railo</a> who are currently in the process of releasing an Open Source ColdFusion engine that is affiliated with JBoss.</p>\n\n<p>Last and not least - don\'t forget databases! Sooner or later you\'ll need to get to grips with some pretty serious SQL...</p>\n'}, {'answer_id': 20277, 'author': 'anopres', 'author_id': 1537, 'author_profile': 'https://Stackoverflow.com/users/1537', 'pm_score': 2, 'selected': False, 'text': '<p>If you really just want to jump in with both feet, I would suggest looking at ColdFusion from Adobe.  The developer edition is free and runs on windows, os x and linux.  The documentation is authoritative and extensive, there is a very active developer community and only a few books you might want to dig into.  The definitive guide is a series of books that can be found on <a href="https://rads.stackoverflow.com/amzn/click/com/032151548X" rel="nofollow noreferrer" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Amazon</a></p>\n\n<p>The nice thing about ColdFusion is that you can use it as a stepping stone to other languages and remain productive along the way.  You can even mix it together with Java since it is itself written in java.  There are also lots of goodies built in that you would have to scour the web for or pay more for in other languages.  Things like full text indexing, graphing, server monitoring, ajax based controls, flash/flex integration, asynch os calls, etc.</p>\n\n<p>You even have the choice of building object oriented code or procedural code, although some people would not count that as a benefit.  Those people rarely agree on which style should win, though.</p>\n\n<p>Cheers!</p>\n'}, {'answer_id': 148378, 'author': 'Matt Woodward', 'author_id': 3612, 'author_profile': 'https://Stackoverflow.com/users/3612', 'pm_score': 1, 'selected': False, 'text': '<p>CFML (aka "ColdFusion" even though that\'s really an Adobe product, not the language) is definitely easy to learn, and if you want FOSS for CFML, in addition to Railo you can use <a href="http://openbluedragon.org" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Open BlueDragon</a> which is a GPL CFML engine.</p>\n'}, {'answer_id': 148394, 'author': 'olle', 'author_id': 22422, 'author_profile': 'https://Stackoverflow.com/users/22422', 'pm_score': 2, 'selected': False, 'text': '<p>I think sitepoint is the best resource for learning best practices in web development. They have <a href="http://www.sitepoint.com/recentarticles/" rel="nofollow noreferrer">great articles</a>, <a href="http://reference.sitepoint.com/" rel="nofollow noreferrer">good references</a>, and probably one of the <a href="http://www.sitepoint.com/forums/" rel="nofollow noreferrer">best forums</a>. However the people there can be a bit grumpy. ;)\nIf you are a real nerd, reading the specs for HTML 5 and CSS is also a good way to learn.</p>\n'}, {'answer_id': 148399, 'author': 'danpickett', 'author_id': 21788, 'author_profile': 'https://Stackoverflow.com/users/21788', 'pm_score': 1, 'selected': False, 'text': '<p>Designing with Web Standards is a great first read!</p>\n\n<p><a href="http://www.zeldman.com/dwws/" rel="nofollow noreferrer">http://www.zeldman.com/dwws/</a></p>\n'}]
['https://Stackoverflow.com/questions/12669', 'https://Stackoverflow.com', 'https://Stackoverflow.com/users/322/']