Which Programming Language Should I Learn To Design My Website?

[Chewie]

Mines in HTML and CSS and a little JS, but thats cause I don't know PHP! lulz.

[xsonline]

I can get you started with a very easy to use CMS (Content Management System). Mostly the things you ask for already exist. So why reInvent the wheel? xhtml, css, Javascript, php and mysql still come in handy, but you should not spend too much time on writing everything by yourself.

Also, this doesn't have to cost anything, and it can save you a lot of time! Take a look at Joomla and Virtualmart. This is completely free. For only € 25 per year you can have a website put online and professionally hosted. But it's also possible for free.

[xsonline]

I'm planning to start a small business to sell my sewing (handicrafts like cosmetics cases, everyday bags, pencil cases, handphone cases, pouches etc.) I'm thinking of building a website/online store, to allow my business to appear in search listings, and help my sales.

The thing is, I don't know which programming language to learn, and would really like some advice

Some things I require from the website:
- I need to upload photographs of the items on sale. I'm thinking maybe a page showing all the thumbnails, and when you click on one the picture gets enlarged.
- I need to integrate Paypal, and credit card payment into the website.
- It needs to be aesthetically pleasing.
- Relatively small website.

I've done C and C++ in college, and I quite like programming. I just don't know which language I should learn for this purpose. I really don't mind any language, even if it is hard to learn, or very different from C and C++, or takes too long (I'll only be launching the website in about 12 months' time); as long as the end product is good. Also, I'm trying to cut costs, so it has to be free (or close to free) to learn it.

I don't know if this is a stupid question, but does the language used affect the speed of download? I don't want to lose views because of slow downloads...

Please advise me! Thanks!

No, the download speed will not be affected by the language you use. However it is affected by the distance from the server and more importantly, the connection speed of the server and the user (and offcourse the number of downloaders).

Like I said before, For what you want, you don't need to program 1 line of code. Many tools already exist and are free to download from the web. What you need is to choose a propper design for your site (have it made, or look for it online), and a good webhost.

Once your website is online, the work only starts. You need to promote your company online.

Depending on what you need, I'd say you could have your site up and running in 5 days with the propper guidelines.

[Kristian Finlay]

PHP is a widely-used, general-purpose scripting language that was originally designed for web development, to produce dynamic web pages.

If u want to develop a website u may approach web development companies to built u r website

[mdmichael]

Well if you want to make the site yourself you defiantly need html and some css. You could use dreamweaver or microsoft frontpage it will make things much easier.

[WingedPanther]

Ouch! Frontpage = Evil. Use Kompozer if you want a cheap/free WYSIWYG HTML editor.

[phillw]

I may be off topic here - In which case my apologies, but... If you are looking at a site for selling stuff on, oscommerce is a good engine - comes with paypal support. The default layout is not quite to my taste, but there is an excellent series of tutorials on altering how it looks, whilst retaining its functionaliity. Another option would be to design the web-site & use apps from the likes of google to put in the hooks for e-selling.
You are, as noted by others, going to have to get to grips with some HTML & CSS stuff, again, there are some excellent articles on that.
The engine of a web-site is pretty standard - it's how you make it look that takes the time !!!

If you're using a linux based machine, then Kompozer is a good choice, if you're on win based system then NetObjects have a pretty decent free version for you to play with.

Hope that helps.

Regards,

Phill.

[ma_la883]

Hey I want to read one useful article it will help you a lot...

You can read this article here

[kris]

you need to learn HtmL,PHP and java script

[Alex3k]

Hey, something i found kinda useful was w3schools. Its made my the world wide web consortium (people that make the internet i think :S) and it has LOADS of resources and guides how to acutally make websites, it covers all of the above languages mentioned.
Here is the link

http://www.w3schools.com/

Hope this helps