There is a wide range of web design languages that are now available to even the most amateur of web masters. Every major computer company has created some form of web design language; but despite this increasing competition, the market leader remains the highly efficient client-server model of HTML and PHP.

HyperText Mark-up Language (HTML) is a client-side web programming language and the simplest way to create a web page. It has minimum technical requirements and uses a series of ‘tags’ to delineate your text. These tags, which cover all eventualities from paragraph breaks to bold and italic formatting, then instruct the computer how to display your site.

Once you understand the tag format and the different symbols used, it is a remarkably easy language to use which can display your completed webpage instantly, allowing quick identification and implementation of corrections. The only downside is that HTML is quite limited in many respects and so it is often paired with the server-side language Hypertext PreProcessor (PHP) to create an efficient and flexible client-server model.

PHP is a more dynamic language which is compatible with all major operating systems and web servers. It opens many doors kept closed in a pure HTML site, with lots more opportunities for customised design. The combined effect of the languages is cost-effective, high impact and can handle pretty much anything an SME website could require. For these reasons, the HTML/PHP client-server model is the most popular around and likely to stay that way for the foreseeable future.