Web Technologies
What runs where on the web, what goes wrong, and what to ask: the course for people who brief, question and judge the people and AI agents who build it.
What a web page is made of: HTML says what each part is, CSS how it looks, and JavaScript how it behaves, all inside a browser that brings its own toolbox. You won't write any of it, but knowing which layer does what lets you judge a mockup, a quote or a bug report, and ask for the fix in the right place.
- Structure and meaningHTML labels what each part of a page is, and screen readers, keyboards, search engines and AI agents rely on those labels rather than on the look.
- Look and layoutStyle rules shared by every page set the look, so a well-built site changes everywhere from one place and adapts to every screen and to each visitor's settings.
- BehaviourScripts wait for events and change the page while it's open, and keeping the data in one place, with the screen redrawn from it, is what keeps a page consistent and what frameworks automate.
- When it breaksA page that relies on scripts can go blank, give wrong answers with no error, or run code a visitor typed in, and the browser's error messages show where to look.
- The browser's toolboxThe browser can fetch, remember, copy, watch, draw and animate on its own, but anything shared between visitors, secret or enforced needs a server, and a page has to be served, not just opened.
What runs where on the web: in your browser, on a company's servers, or at another service. Once you have this map in your head, you can tell when an AI's answer, an agency's quote or a colleague's plan doesn't add up.
- The request pathWhat happens between typing an address and seeing the page, and where along the way things can get slow or break.
- Front and backWhich parts of a site run in your browser and which run on a server, and which part each tool or service takes care of.
- Where data livesWhere information is kept, in a company's database, in your own browser or at another service, and what difference that makes.
- Public and secretAnything a site sends to your browser can be read and changed by whoever uses it, so secrets and rules have to stay on the server.
- What keeps runningWhat has to keep running, be renewed and be paid for once a site is live, and what breaks when one of those stops.
Slides for each session
- S1 · How the web worksWhat happens between typing an address and seeing a page, and who to ask when it goes wrong.
- S2 · HTML and CSSWhat a page is made of, and why its structure matters as much as its look.
- S3 · JavaScript and the browserWhat scripts add to a page, what the browser can do on its own, and what happens when a script fails.