I’m not suggesting you start a journey to becoming an expert web designer/developer here, but rather just suggesting that you learn some of the basics which go into the making of what is essentially a website in the blog through which you publish your content. Trust me, a basic understanding of web design principles will go a long way in making it easier for you to understand a little bit more of the technical side of what goes into the making, operation and maintenance of your blog, some knowledge which could very well come in very handy in saving you some costs whenever you might need to make decisions about the direction in which to take your blog as it grows.
Developers and even more so the technical support staff tend to take advantage of bloggers who are clueless about the technical side of things, so the support you subsequently have to pay for in making minor changes and updates could go on to cost you quite a bit of money. So it’s worth learning some basics, even if you really just seek to get a fundamental overview type understanding. You need to know what someone is talking about when they refer to the likes of some code which needs to be embedded and the likes.
Basic HTML
HTML stands for Hypertext Mark-Up Language and it forms the basic structure of a website. Really, all you need to do is pick up a web design book (it can even be an e-book) and just read through it like you were reading a novel. You’ll just learn the basic structure of how web page is marked up and some of the technical applications which form part of adding features to your blog will make a bit more sense to you.
For example, you might be integrating some e-commerce functionality into your blog so that you can sell stuff via something like PayPal as your payment processor. PayPal would require you to embed some HTML code (well it has some JavaScript to it as well) into the page where you want the “Buy Now” or “Pay Now” button to appear, and once you’ve learned just a little bit about HTML this becomes so much easier to understand.
Learning how to recognise other web design language coding
The same approach you take to skimming over an HTML book should be applied to learning the basics of the other languages which go into the making of a website or blog. This would be CSS (but that usually forms part of any HTML module you’d be completing), JavaScript and PHP. Beyond that, you’d be getting into SQL, which isn’t necessary since things get advanced here and you’ll never need to learn about MySQL commands as a front-end blogger.
So, if you are a blogger looking to learn the basics of a programming language, you can find some beginner-friendly video lessons on createwpsite youtube channel. There are also plenty of other online blogs and videos that you can refer to in order to grasp the basics.
If you are struggling to learn the language, at least learn enough to be able to recognise code as PHP, JavaScript or CSS when you look at it. You don’t need to know what it does or how it functions as your interaction with it will likely just be in embedding certain plug-ins and functions to your blog.
Ideally, as a blogger, you should make an effort to learn the basics as it can help improve the user experience and even empower you. Even a foundational grasp of programming concepts can foster innovation, boost creativity, and provide a competitive edge in the ever-evolving landscape of digital content creation. So make sure you take advantage of it by making an effort to learn.