essay about being web designer

• Color Palettes
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What is Emphasis in Graphic Design:

Seattle Mariners Colors – Hex, RGB,

The SV Darmstadt 98 Logo History,

What is Baseline in Graphic Design

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Your Step-by-Step Guide on How to Become a Web Designer

• Bogdan Sandu

Picture this: the digital landscape, an ever-expanding cosmos, and you – wielding the power to craft worlds within it. That’s the life of a web designer.

You’re not just anybody. You’re the visionary who marries function with beauty, weaving usability into a tapestry of pixels and code. Here, I’ll chart the path to mastering this digital alchemy.

Topics like  UX/UI principles ,  responsive design , and  coding  are your stepping stones. I’ll guide you through  web design courses online , sifting through the  web design tutorials  that turbocharge skills from concept to launch.

This isn’t your run-of-the-mill walkthrough. With a mix of  design software  know-how and a flair for  interactive web elements , this journey into  how to become a web designer  is as layered as the websites you’ll soon create.

Navigate the nuances of  HTML and CSS , while  JavaScript  waits to high-five you at the finish line.

By the end, you’ll be equipped—not just with knowledge, but with a vision. Ready to claim your spot in the digital pantheon? Let’s weave your thread into the web.

Understanding Web Design

What is web design.

So, what’s web design, you ask? At its core, it’s about crafting the visual and interactive components of websites. Everything you see, touch, or interact with on a webpage, from buttons to banners, fonts to forms, colors to carousels, is a product of web design.

It’s like being the architect of a digital house, deciding how everything should look and where everything should go. But unlike a real house, a website is never really done. It grows, changes, and evolves. And as a web designer, you’re right there, making those changes happen.

The Role of a Web Designer

A web designer’s role isn’t just about creating pretty pages. It’s about understanding the client’s vision, the user’s needs, and finding a sweet spot where both meet. It’s about translating ideas into visuals, messages into mediums.

As a web designer, you play a crucial role in how people experience the web. Your choices decide whether a user stays on a website or leaves, whether they find what they’re looking for or get lost.

And while it can be a lot of pressure, trust me, it’s also a lot of fun. When you see your designs live, helping businesses thrive and users navigate with ease, it’s a feeling like no other.

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In today’s digital age, websites are the virtual front doors to businesses and organizations.Web designers are like the architects of the internet, crafting the digital spaces we navigate every day.

But what exactly do they do?

In this article, we’ll dive into the fascinating world of web designer roles and responsibilities, breaking down the jargon into simple terms.

Web designers are the creative minds behind the look and feel of websites.

They decide how a site should appear, making it visually appealing and user-friendly.

They choose colors, fonts, images, and layouts to create a seamless online experience.

It’s not just about aesthetics.

Web designers also play a crucial role in ensuring a website functions smoothly.

They work with developers to make sure buttons click, forms submit, and pages load quickly.

Accessibility is another key concern, ensuring that websites are usable by all, regardless of disabilities.

So, if you’ve ever wondered about the magic behind your favorite websites, read on to uncover the secrets of web designer roles and responsibilities.

Table of Contents

What does a web designer do.

A web designer’s job is to create and manage the visual elements of websites.

They work on how web pages look and feel, including things like text, pictures, graphics, and videos.

Web designers also work closely with clients and stakeholders to understand their website goals and needs.

Once they know what’s needed, web designers start making the actual designs for the website.

They make sure the website looks good and matches what the company wants to show its audience.

They pay attention to things like colors, layout, and fonts.

Web designers also make sure the website is easy for people to use.

To make their designs work online, web designers use web technologies like HTML, CSS, and JavaScript.

They work together with web developers to make sure everything runs smoothly.

A designer can work in different places, like design companies or big companies, with their own graphic design software, marketing materials, and web development teams.

Their jobs include user research, making website designs, making websites fast and easy to use, testing them, and adding in the company’s branding with the help of marketing and research teams.

Understanding User Experience (UX) and User Interface (UI)

Before diving into the core tasks of web design , it is essential to understand the concepts of User Experience and User Interface.

User Experience focuses on enhancing user satisfaction by improving the usability, accessibility, and overall positive user experience, of a website.

On the other hand, UI deals with the visual aspects of a website, including colors, layout, typography, and interactive visual elements.

A successful web designer must strike a balance between both UX and UI to create a seamless and engaging user journey.

Core Tasks of a Web Designer

Web designers are the architects of the digital world.

They are responsible for creating the look and feel of websites, ensuring they are visually appealing, user-friendly, and functional.

Here, we’ll explore the core aspects of web designer job description of their roles and responsibilities:

Conceptualizing Creative Website Ideas

One of the first things a web designer does is think of cool ideas for websites.

They have to come up with unique and interesting concepts that will catch people’s attention.

It’s important to be creative and think differently while also keeping in mind who will use the website and what it’s supposed to do.

Creating these exciting ideas is like building the starting point for a successful website.

After getting these initial ideas, top web designers do some research and find inspiration.

They might check out other websites from competitors, look at different web design and styles, and keep up with the latest trends in web design .

This helps them make sure their ideas are new and fitting for the times.

Design Engaging and Responsive Landing Pages

When someone lands on a website, the first thing they see is the landing page.

It’s like the website’s front door, and it’s really important.

As a web designer, your job is to make sure these landing pages are interesting and work smoothly.

To achieve this, web designers focus on user flows and creating visually appealing designs that are easy to navigate.

You should use colors, fonts, and pictures that make everything look good and easy to use.

Also, it’s crucial to make sure the landing page works well on different devices and screen sizes.

This way, people have a good experience no matter what they’re using to visit your website.

Employing Industry and Design Best Practices

To make great websites, web designers should follow the best industry design methods.

This means keeping up with the latest trends and techniques in web design and using them in their work.

Important things for web designers to think about:

• Simple Navigation : Make it easy for people to move around your website. If it’s hard to find things, visitors might leave.
• Clear Content : Use plain and clear words. Don’t make things too complicated. People should easily understand what your website is about.
• Search Engine Optimization (SEO) : This means making your website appear on search engines like Google. Use the right words and techniques to help people find your site.

By doing these things, web designers can ensure that their designs are easy for users, easy to access, and have a better chance of being successful.

Testing and Making Websites Better

One big job for a web designer is to test websites and make them better for users.

This means getting feedback from users and then making changes to make the website easier to use and work better.

Web designers can watch how people use the website and ask them questions through surveys, interviews, or testing sessions.

By listening to what users say, web designers can take user feedback to figure out what needs to be fixed or improved.

Then, they make those changes to make the website a better experience for everyone.

Integrating client CMS Programs and Data Feeds

Another important task for web designers is to make it easy for site owners to update their site’s content, even if they’re not tech-savvy.

They do this by integrating content management system (CMS) programs and data feeds into the website structure.

Web designers should understand different content management systems programs and how to use them in the website.

This means setting up the CMS, making templates, and making sure the website can connect to data feeds.

When web designers do this, they give website owners the power to control their website’s content without any technical skills.

Optimizing for Speed and Scalability

In today’s fast-paced digital world, speed and scalability are crucial factors in website design.

Web designers need to optimize websites to ensure fast loading times and the ability to handle increased traffic.

To achieve this, web designers need to optimize images and other media files, minimize code, and utilize caching techniques.

They also need to ensure that the website is hosted on a reliable and scalable server.

By optimizing existing websites for speed and scalability, web designers can create websites that are fast, efficient, and can handle high traffic volumes.

Creating Eye-Catching Website Images

Visual imagery plays a key role in creating engaging and impactful websites.

Web designers use their creative and technical skills to make visually appealing graphics, illustrations, and photographs.

Web graphic designers use special tools like Adobe Photoshop and Adobe Illustrator to create digital images.

They make sure to pick great colors, fonts, and how everything fits together to make designs that really pop.

When they make awesome visuals, it grabs people’s attention and makes the website better for everyone who visits.

Remember, great visuals are key to making websites stand out and making users happy.

Collaborating with Back-End Developers

Web designers often work closely with back-end developers or a web development team to turn their designs into a functioning website.

Good communication skills are key, as they need to collaborate effectively with developers to make sure the whole website function matches their design ideas.

By working closely with back-end developers, web designers can ensure web and app logic is properly integrated.

Front-end developers also help ensure that the user interface design functions as intended and is coded accurately.

This teamwork is vital for creating a website that looks great and works smoothly.

Ensuring Cross-Device Functionality

In today’s mobile-driven world, where mobile devices are so important, it’s really necessary for websites to work well on all kinds of screens and gadgets.

Web designers have to make sure that their designs can change and fit nicely on different devices.

To do this, they use something called responsive design.

This means they use clever techniques like flexible grids and images that can adjust to different screen sizes.

When they do this, the website will look and work great whether you’re using a phone, tablet, or a big computer.

This way, people will always have a good experience no matter what device they’re using.

Incorporating Brand Elements and Market Research

Web designers have an important job.

They make websites look good and match the brand.

To do this, they use things like logos, colors, and fonts that the brand likes.

A web designer creates a website that feels like it belongs to the brand.

They use the same consistent branding with things like logos, colors, and fonts to make the website look like it’s from the same brand.

And they also have to check what people want by doing market research.

This helps them make the website for the right people.

In simple words, web designers make sure the website looks like the brand and is liked by the people who visit it.

This helps the brand talk to its customers.

Communicating Design Ideas

Effective communication is a crucial skill for web designers.

They need to be able to effectively communicate their design ideas to stakeholders, clients, and other team members.

Web designers can use various tools and techniques to communicate their design ideas, such as wireframes, site maps, mockups, and prototypes.

They need to be able to clearly explain their design choices and justify them based on user experience principles.

By effectively communicating their design ideas, web designers can ensure that their vision is understood and implemented correctly.

Incorporating Functionalities and Features

Web designers have to think about what the website will do and how it will help both the people working inside the company and the customers outside.

To do this, they work closely with clients and others to understand what they need and turn those needs into design ideas.

Web designers also need to know about different web technologies and how to use them to make the website work well.

They have to think about things like online shopping, forms, things you can click on, and how the website connects to social media.

When they add these features, web designers make websites that look good and are easy to use.

Designing Sample Pages

Before they finish designing a website, most web designers make sample pages to show their design ideas.

This means they create pretend versions of different website pages to demonstrate how the final design will look and work.

Web designers must focus on how the pages are set up, how easy it is to get around the website, and how people will feel when using it.

They also have to ensure that all the sample pages look the same and show a basic understanding of what the website is about.

Making these sample pages helps web designers get feedback from clients and others involved in the project so they can make any needed changes before finishing the design.

Preparing Design Plans

Once the design ideas and sample pages for client websites are approved, web designers need to prepare design plans.

This involves creating detailed design specifications and guidelines that developers will use to implement the design.

Web designers need to provide clear instructions on color schemes, typography, spacing, and other design elements.

They also need to ensure that the design plans are properly documented and accessible to the web development team throughout.

By preparing design plans, web designers can ensure that the user interface design is implemented accurately and properly integrated ensuring the website matches their vision.

Providing Support During Launch

Finally, web designers need to provide support during the build and launch process of the website.

This means doing one last test, fixing any last problems, and making sure the website is ready for people to use.

Web designers need to work closely with the development team to make sure the website is set up correctly and everything looks and works the way it’s supposed to.

They also check if the website works well on different devices, loads quickly, and is easy for people to use.

By offering help during the website’s building and launch, web designers make sure it’s a success and meets the needs of its users.

What Makes a Web Designer Effective?

In the vast field of web design, certain characteristics set the best web designers apart from the rest.

While skill sets may vary, effective web designers tend to share common traits that contribute to their success.

These key characteristics and delve into why they are essential for web designers to excel in their craft.

Passionate about their Portfolios

One of the defining features of a good web developer or designer is their passion for their work, which is often reflected in the time and effort they invest in creating a standout portfolio.

Your portfolio is like a showcase of your best work, and it’s important to make it look professional and attractive.

This helps you impress potential clients or employers by proving that you can create great websites.

To make a lasting impression, web designers should curate diverse work samples that highlight their versatility.

Quality should always take priority over quantity when it comes to web design skills portfolio curation.

Possessing Good Business Sense

Web and graphic designers, especially those who are just starting out and working as freelancers, need to know about business stuff, too.

This means they should understand how much other people charge for similar work and how to tell others about their skills based on their experience and where they live.

A successful web or graphic designer also needs to be good with money.

They should be able to figure out how much a project will cost, how to charge for it, and when it will be done.

This shows they know how to handle the financial parts of their job.

If you’re freelancing, it’s also important to be good at making deals.

This means you should read and understand the contract before you agree to it.

That way, everyone knows what to expect.

Organized and Deadline-Oriented

Experienced web designers have learned a lot from working on many website projects.

They’ve become really good at both the technical stuff and making websites look great.

They know how to work efficiently and avoid common mistakes.

This helps them spot and fix problems before they mess up the project timeline.

Time management is super important in web design projects.

Good web designers give their clients a clear plan of how they’ll make the website, showing that they can finish it on time.

In the event of unforeseen challenges that may affect deadlines, they communicate proactively with stakeholders, offering transparency and explaining any delays.

Adaptability and Flexibility

While meeting deadlines is of utmost importance, it is essential for web designers to be flexible and adaptable when unexpected circumstances arise.

They might have to change the design based on what the client wants or deal with unexpected technical issues that the development team faces.

Being ready to adjust the project’s size or content when needed is a big part of the job.

Also, it’s great if web designers are open to doing more than just design.

They can be really helpful by taking on tasks like creating content or working on SEO.

This way, they offer a broader service to their clients and make the user experience even better.

Excellent Communication Skills

Great communication skills are a must for top-notch web designers.

They need to be able to explain complicated web tech and design ideas in a way that anyone can understand.

Being able to talk with clients, whether in person or through writing, is super important to make sure the design matches the company’s message.

Web designers work with lots of different people on multiple projects.

They all have their own jobs and backgrounds.

So, it’s really important for web designers to work well with all these people and collaborate effectively.

Openness to Ideas

Great web designers recognize the value of client input and stakeholder feedback.

While not every idea may be viable or aligned with best practices, a skilled web designer listens attentively and takes these ideas into consideration during the design process.

Inspiration can come from unexpected sources, and web designers should actively seek out fresh ideas and stay updated on the latest design trends.

When web designers remain receptive to new concepts and explore diverse sources of inspiration, they create creative skills that can elevate their work to new heights.

Proficiency with Design Tools

The constantly evolving landscape of web design introduces new tools that streamline the design process.

A good web designer recognizes the importance of staying up-to-date and harnessing these tools to enhance efficiency and effectiveness.

Continuous learning is key to mastering these tools.

Web designers can upskill through online courses, workshops, and boot camp programs.

They can also leverage webinars, YouTube tutorials, and design blogs to stay informed about the latest innovations.

Embracing new technologies, helps web designers focus on the bigger picture and allocate more time to strategic design decisions.

A Keen Eye for Design and User Understanding

An inherent sense of design aesthetics and a deep understanding of user experience (UX) are essential qualities for web designers.

Designers must possess the ability to incorporate brand elements to create visually appealing websites while adhering to fundamental design principles such as color theory and structure.

Incorporating UX design principles into their work allows designers to empathize with users, anticipating their needs and preferences.

Leveraging user research and- relevant market research findings and data analysis allows designers to make informed decisions about website design and structure, resulting in an intuitive and engaging user experience.

In conclusion, web designers have a wide range of tasks and responsibilities when it comes to creating interfaces, layouts, and visuals for websites.

From conceptualizing creative ideas to coding knowledge and providing support during launch, web designers play a crucial role in creating visually appealing and user-friendly websites.

By focusing on these core tasks, web designers can create websites that look great and provide a seamless and enjoyable user experience.

Are you looking for a web designer to create a user-friendly website for your business?

Contact us today to discuss your requirements and see how we can help you achieve your online goals.

Brody Quail

Maven Marketing Group

We hope this article helps you out! If you want more advice for expanding your reach, getting leads, & growing your business — let us know in the comment section below!

Or if you’d like help implementing any of these tactics into your business – drop us a line! We’d love if you left a comment/question for us to answer below!

At Maven Marketing Group , we have evolved into a comprehensive digital marketing agency specializing in top-tier web development , web design , web management , SEO , and PPC services.

Could we assist you with your project?

Digital Marketing Pros – Dedicated to creating stunning websites and delivering top-notch online solutions.

Our Mission: To empower you to combat the challenges of the digital landscape, ensuring your online presence stands out.

Maven provides the best web design , development , and management services to achieve real results for your business.

Whether it’s through our expertly crafted websites or by enhancing your business online, we always deliver.

No one else offers this level of expertise!

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What Is Web Design: An Introduction to the Basics

A variety of skills are needed to create a great website

• PHP Programming
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• Visual Basic

Jennifer Kyrnin is a professional web developer who assists others in learning web design, HTML, CSS, and XML.

• University of California
• University of Washington

Web design is the planning and creation of websites. This includes a number of separate skills that all fall under the umbrella of web design.

Some examples of these skills are information architecture, user interface, site structure, navigation, layout, colors, fonts, and overall imagery. All of these skills are combined with the principles of design to create a website that meets the goals of the company or individual from whom that site is being created.

This article will take a look at the basics of website design and the various disciplines or skills that are a part of this industry.

Design Is Key Part of Web Design

Design, obviously, is a key part of "web design." What does this mean exactly? Design includes both the principles of design —  balance , contrast, emphasis , rhythm , and unity — and the design elements — lines, shapes , texture, color, and direction .

By putting these things together, a web designer creates websites, but a good web designer understands not only the principles of design but also the constraints of the Web. For example, a successful web designer will be skilled in typographic design principles, while also understanding the challenges of  web type design  and specifically how it differs from other kinds of type design.

In addition to understanding the limitations of the Web, a successful web professional also has a firm grasp of the strengths of digital communication.

Web Design Has Many Different Roles

When you work as a web designer, you may be tasked with creating (or working on) entire sites or just individual pages and there is a lot to learn to be a well-rounded designer, including the following:

• HTML — This is the structure of web pages, creating the foundation of all websites
• CSS — This is how web pages are visually styled. CSS (Cascading Style Sheets) handles the entire look of sites, including layout, typography, colors, and more
• JavaScript — This governs certain behaviors on websites and can be used for a variety of interactions and features
• CGI programming — CGI, and the next few entries (PHP, ASP, etc.) are all different flavors of programming languages. Many sites do not require any of these languages, but sites that are more feature-rich will certainly need to be coded using some of these languages
• PHP , ASP, ColdFusion scripting
• Information architecture — The way a site's content and navigation is structured and presented helps make for a successful site that is easy and intuitive to use
• SEO — Search engine optimization ensures that websites are attractive to Google and other search engines and that people looking for the products, services, or information features on that site can find it once they look for it online
• Server management — All websites need to be hosted. The management of the servers that host those sites is an important web design skill
• Web strategy and marketing — Having a website is not enough. Those sites will also need to be marketed with an ongoing digital strategy
• E-commerce and conversions
• Design — Creating the visual look and feel of websites has always been an important aspect of the industry
• Speed — A successful site is one that loads quickly on a wide variety of devices, regardless of a visitor's connection speed. Being able to tune the performance of sites is a very valuable skill
• Content — People come to websites for the content that those sites contain. Being able to create that content is a critically important component in the world of website design

There's also so much more areas and skills that cross into the field of web design, but most designers don't try to cover all of them. Instead, a web designer will generally focus on one or two areas where they can excel. The other items in web design that are needed are ones that they can partner with others one as part of a larger web design team. 

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My journey to becoming a web developer from scratch without a CS degree (and what I learned from…

by Sergei Garcia

My journey to becoming a web developer from scratch without a CS degree (and what I learned from it)

First, let me introduce myself. My name is Sergei Garcia, and I’m a full-time front end developer with 2 years experience. In that time, I’ve worked as a front-end developer for both a Forbes 500 consulting firm and a small company.

This may not sound like a lot of experience, but finishing my second year as a developer has been a huge milestone for me. This is because I had no real experience doing web development — and not much programming experience in general beyond some basic C# and Java training I got from a few online courses. I also didn’t have a computer science degree since I graduated with a degree in IT project management.

I’d never written about my experience despite all the help I’ve received from wonderful resources like Medium, Stack Overflow, and Reddit’s programming subreddits. So today, I decided to change that. Today I’m going to fill you in on what went right, and what didn’t, so that if you’re embarking on this journey, you’ll have better luck than I did.

I know that there are a lot of articles like this, but not very many of them discuss the process with the benefit of an extra two years of hindsight.

I’ll start off with my journey, including what went wrong along the way. If you just care about what my suggestions for the shortest possible route to becoming a web developer from scratch are, feel free to skip to the last section: The shortest route .

So, without any further ado, Let’s get started!

Getting the Basics

After deciding I wanted to get into web development the first question on my mind was “What do I learn?” After doing some research, I ended up making my learning path based on what most entry-level web developer positions asked for, which was:

HTML & CSS

• CSS Preprocessors (Less & Sass)

Responsive Design

Design patterns.

• Task Runners

Here’s how it went.

I began my Journey learning JavaScript through CodeSchool (paid) and Codecademy (free). If you don’t know about these, they’re great websites that allow you to learn to code by coding inside the browser.

I found learning resources like this were the best when you are just getting started. Just be advised that this method of learning gets tiring quickly once you get into more advanced stuff, since their algorithms for checking whether you solved the code example correctly have some accuracy issues. Both of their introductory courses to JavaScript were outstanding and I highly recommend them.

Once I got the basics out of the way, I proceeded to get a stronger JavaScript foundation by reading the Eloquent Javascript: A Modern Introduction to Programming book by Haverbeke (free).

This book was recommended to me by a lot of people in the JavaScript forums as a must read, and for good reason. That book was tough — especially if you’re just learning programming like I was back then. But I’m glad I didn’t give up and kept at it. It was phenomenal due to the vast scope of programming concepts it covers, even if it was a bit ruthless at times. Whatever you do, don’t skip the code challenges. Once you finish this book, then you can finally say with confidence that you have a good grasp on JavaScript.

You can also optionally learn jQuery (though I really don’t recommend learning it yet — more on this later). You can learn it through CodeSchool’s Try jQuery course.

After learning JavaScript, I proceeded to learn the fundamentals of HTML & CSS and web design through CodeSchool’s HTML & CSS learning path . These courses are still my favorites today, since the pacing is great, and the overall scope of what they cover allowed me to acquire a stronger foundation to this.

You could also switch this out easily for something like Codecademy’s HTML & CSS course and still get similar results. Or if you are up for a challenge, Udacity’s course Intro to HTML and CSS is far more complete, and slightly more challenging.

Bonus : If you can get your hands on Jon Duckett’s HTML and CSS: Design and Build Websites book, it’s also a rock solid starting point for learning HTML & CSS (with a sprinkle of web design). It’s highly rated (4.7/5 on Amazon), offers a solid introduction to the world of web development. It’s a beautiful book thanks to it’s clean design with big letters and colorful pages. I often come back to it just to admire it.

Less / Sass

For those unfamiliar, Less & Sass are CSS transpilers that allow you to write CSS in a more elegant manner. This lets you do things that aren’t normally supported, like nesting CSS rules. Once finished, these CSS transpilers “compile” your code and convert it to normal CSS.

There are 2 major CSS transpilers right now: Less and Sass . Sass is the more popular one, but I found learning Less first to be easier, mainly because using Sass on your computer requires also installing Ruby, which I wasn’t fond of.

You can get a quick, yet complete overview of Less using WinLess’s Online Less Compiler and it’s code examples to see how your Less code would turn into CSS. You can also try Sass online using SassMeister (though this doesn’t include code examples).

It doesn’t matter whether you learn Less or Sass first. They’re extremely similar, so once you know one, you pretty much know the other. You can find a great quick comparison between Less and Sass on Shelby Moulden’s article Comparison between LESS & SASS .

I originally learned about responsive design and Bootstrap using Codeschool’s HTML & CSS path, but I recently found Udacity’s course by Google on Responsive Web Design Fundamentals to be fantastic at covering the basics and beyond in a far more complete manner than Codeschool did.

You can do responsive design without any additional framework, but it’s far easier with the help of a responsive framework like Bootstrap. Bootstrap’s official documentation is very well made so you should have no problem at getting started with it.

If you are having trouble grasping it’s basic principles, read Froont’s blog post on 9 basic principles of responsive web design . It has beautiful clean & simple animations that help illustrate visually the principles of responsive web design.

I didn’t really know what exactly AngularJS was back then, but I knew everyone was talking about it, and that if I wanted to become a web developer I needed to learn it. I found Google Developer’s Design Decisions in AngularJS to provide the best general overview of what AngularJS was and how it improved making web applications.

I first thought of learning AngularJS through their official documentation, but this turned out to be a terrible idea. The documentation wasn’t very easy on beginners, and the cluttered formatting made it hard to read and understand.

I then proceeded to learn AngularJS through Codeschool. With my positive experience on the JavaScript and CSS courses also from there, I expected nothing less than a great course. I was wrong. The course was a disaster from the get go, since the algorithm used to check if you got the code example right sometimes didn’t work right and marked your clearly right solution as incorrect. There were even times where all it took to fix the broken validation system was a page refresh. As for the course’s content, it wasn’t great either. It did an ok job at explaining the basic components of an AngularJS application, but it did a terrible job at integrating these into a real application, leaving me with far more questions than I started with.

After some searching around forums, I stumbled upon Egghead.io (free / paid) where I had much better luck. Their course material was a lot cleaner, more concise, and more complete, making for a far better experience. Not to mention that apart from their courses, they have bite-sized 2–5 minute lessons that cover important topics. (For example: What is a controller? What is a filter? What is $scope?) These make it really easy to understand the basics. They also have some videos that require payment, but they are usually the ones covering more advanced angular topics you will not need until later on. I took their AngularJS Fundamentals course and I was fully satisfied with the results (and also became a big fan of Egghead.io’s courses in the process).

Design patterns are basically reusable code solutions that can be repeatedly used to solve common software problems. Having a foundation on this will make you far more competitive software developer in any programming language. This will also make it easier for you to understand other people’s code, since you’ll quickly identify what design pattern they used on their code to better understand it.

I found the 2 best sources to learn this are doFactory’s JavaScript Design Patterns and Addy Osmani’s Learning JavaScript Design Patterns . I found doFactory a lot easier to understand, while Addy Osmani’s book was a lot more complete.

Chrome DevTools

Chrome is one of the most powerful tools for a web developer. The sooner you master it, the more time you can save later on. Codeschool’s free course Explore and Master Chrome DevTools does a great job at introducing them.

Git (Version Control)

Ah, Git — the tool I never knew I needed until I discovered what it could do. Git basically it lets you keep a track of the changes you make to your code so that if things go wrong, you can roll back to a previous point in time. It also lets you see your code’s history.

I found CodeSchool’s free Try Github course to be a friendly way to get started. Atlassian’s Git training was superb at covering the more advanced commands available. Codeschool’s Git Learning Path is also great at covering Git’s fundamentals.

It didn’t take long before I learned that having a basic understanding of NodeJS would help me greatly in my quest of becoming a web developer (more on this soon).

I tried Codeschool’s courses on Node, but I found them really lacking in content. I found NodeSchool.io to be a far better teacher at getting the basics right, and it was fun! I loved the hands-on approach it offered, which was similar to Codeschool and Codecademy — with the added improvement that I was really running NodeJS.

Task Runners (Grunt & Gulp)

Grunt and Gulp were quite a big surprise to me in that I had no idea tools like that even existed — but I’m extremely glad they do! Basically, these task runners allow you to automate common tasks. For example, remember Less/Sass? Normally you would have to manually run the CSS compiler every time you make an edit for it to compile the CSS, and then update the browser. Using a task runner, you can set it up to watch your Less/Sass files for changes, and when it detects a change, compile your CSS, and automatically refresh the browser. This is immensely useful at reducing your development time.

There are 2 main task runners right now: Grunt and Gulp. While they do the exact same thing, they work in very different ways, with Grunt being a lot more verbose and configuration oriented, and Gulp being shorter to write and preferring code over configuration.

Knowing NodeJS will help you write better Grunt and Gulp files since both of them run on NodeJS . You can pick whichever you want, but I found Gulp to be far easier to learn and write. I still today prefer it because of its minimalist — yet powerful — pipe-based approach.

I found Scotch.io’s courses on Grunt and Gulp to be among the best out there.

Challenges I faced on my first job

Once I covered the fundamentals of web development, I was ready for my first web development interview for an entry level position. I won’t go into details about the interview since this isn’t this article’s main focus. But I will say that I was told my relatively strong JavaScript knowledge help me secure the position. (Thanks, Eloquent JavaScript!)

I have to say, I was quite nervous on my first project. It involved making reusable web components with HTML, CSS and JavaScript, along with Bootstrap, Sass, Grunt as tooling. T

he two biggest mistakes I found at first were:

• Fear of failure. Because I was the new guy, I was constantly in fear of my code being wrong or poorly made, so I spent a lot of time double-checking everything and adhered to coding best practices. Because of this, I rarely attempted solutions in creative new ways because of my fear that it might not work correctly at the end. This effectively shut down my drive to learn new things.
• Doing things because “X” person who knows better than me said so. I did this a lot at first. While not completely wrong, doing things in a certain way only because “X” expert on the matter said so — without knowing why — lead to me not really knowing when to why things were done the way they were. I soon learned that there were exceptions to everything, and that you always should know the reason behind best practices.

Thankfully, I had an understanding team lead during my first project who helped me overcome these issues. He constantly motivated me to try new things, even if things went wrong sometimes. He also told me to question everything — even his teachings.

In time, I learnt my lesson. From then on, I’ve always been a person that looks forward to trying new things. I always try to understand why best practices exist, when they’re right, and when they don’t apply to a situation.

Using AngularJS in an actual project also posed quite a big challenge for me. This was mainly because a lot of the things I did with it, I did without fully understanding why they happened. I thought of it as “angular magic.”

There were many times that I wished I knew how Angular actually worked, but it was scary looking at the documentation.

I eventually stumbled upon an amazing book called Build Your Own AngularJS . I didn’t read all of it, but reading the section on Scopes and Watchers and how they worked really unveiled how the magic behind angular, wasn’t really magic. It was just a clever way of maintaining data-binding using dirty checking and nested scopes. I highly recommend this book to anyone seeking to fully understand AngularJS.

The other challenge I faced a year later was how fast web development progressed. I had just mastered AngularJS and Grunt, and was feeling all proud and mighty — only to soon find out Gulp and ReactJS were on the horizon. And a year later after learning them, Webpack started gaining ground, and I had to learn that too. As you can imagine, a big part of me was pretty disappointed with how quickly some of my knowledge became obsolete. But a coworker soon enlightened me by telling me something that changed how I viewed libraries and frameworks forever:

“Libraries and Frameworks may become obsolete, but the concepts and solutions they propose often survive the test of time.”

He was right. AngularJS may have become obsolete, but fully understanding the magic behind it helped me better understand React’s web component architecture, which improved upon Angular’s Directives concept. It also helped me understand how ReactJS gained so much popularity, as well as what kind of future awaited.

I don’t recall facing any other major challenges on my subsequent projects. But what I will say is that over the course of the 2 years I’ve been doing web development, the #1 thing that has helped succeed (according to my own coworkers) was my excitement and my powerful drive to always be on the lookout for new things to learn. I soon found out this was a winning combination with web development since things over here change really, really fast, with new frameworks and libraries constantly emerging.

On the flip side of the coin, the other thing that helped me a ton — and something I found out quite recently actually — was understanding what not to learn. This became critical to my process of becoming a better web developer.

It’s not uncommon to see people criticizing the abnormally fast pace of evolution of web technologies, or how a new JavaScript library or framework comes out nearly every day. But in time I saw the light and finally understood:

You don’t have to learn every new library or framework that comes out.

Often it’s a great idea to do a simple hello world example app so you can see what a framework offers. Then you can move on. But usually, you should try to focus on what best suits your project’s needs. This can be hard at first, but thankfully great places like Stack Overflow, Medium and Reddit exist where you can find useful discussions between frameworks, and figure out which ones fit your specific use cases the best.

Going Further

In the upcoming years, I proceeded to continuously improve in the following ways

Once you finish Eloquent JavaScript, it’s rather easy to say and feel like you’ve mastered JavaScript, but then comes You Don’t Know JS and it absolutely destroys you (or at least it did to me). This book series (free by the way) was mentioned to me several times by a few senior web developers in the office as the book to read, and that only until I’ve read it can I say I fully know JavaScript. They were right, since page after page it continuously blew my mind as to how truly complex JavaScript really was, as well as many, many common pitfalls un-experienced & experienced people without a proper JavaScript understanding may have.

Reading that book series really opened my mind, and I also highly recommend it to anyone wanting to call themselves an expert JavaScript developer. Once you got that out of the way, there are 2 extra resources I highly recommend to get an even further, more advanced JavaScript knowledge;

• JavaScript, The Better Parts : An amazing talk by D. Crockford that talks about JavaScript’s biggest weaknesses, it’s “Foot Guns,” and how to utilize them as its strengths.
• The Two Pillars of JavaScript : a solid article by recognized JavaScript Medium writer Eric Elliott that talks about the 2 great pillars of JavaScript: Prototypical Inheritance and Functional Programming

Once you have a profound understanding of JavaScript, proceed with ECMASCript 2015 (also known as ES6), the latest, and current JavaScript standard. Smashing Magazine’s article ECMAScript 6 (ES6): What’s New In The Next Version Of JavaScript is a great short review of what’s new in ES6. You can try ES6 in the browser using Babel’s online transpiler .

CSS can get messy and disorganized very, very quickly. There have been quite a few different methodologies proposed to write cleaner CSS, but 2 stand out which I highly recommend you read about ASAP to stay competitive:

• SMACSS : Scalable and Modular Architecture for CSS. A flexible guide to developing sites small and large.
• BEM : a methodology that helps you to achieve reusable components and code sharing in the front-end.

I personally prefer SMACSS because of it’s cleaner look, but some companies and CSS Frameworks still use BEM, so it’s worth knowing both.

You should also start focusing on your CSS’s performance. Smashing Magazine’s article Managing Mobile Performance Optimization and HTML5 Rocks’s article High Performance Animation did a solid job at providing a head start on this. A quick read through both articles should give you a solid foundation.

JavaScript Bundlers

By now you should have strong understanding of Grunt or Gulp. The next step is adding a JavaScript bundler to your task runner, which will allow for a more modular organization of your JavaScript application.

The two biggest players right now are:

• Browserify : lets you require modules in the browser by bundling up all of your dependencies.
• Webpack : basically Browserify on steroids. Harder to configure and set up.

Scotch.io’s mini-course Getting Started with Browserify can provide you a jump-start with browserify, while David Fox Powell article Why Can’t Anyone Write a Simple Webpack Tutorial ? is a great, fun to read introduction to webpack.

Personally I haven’t spent a lot of time using webpack, but in my time with it, I have to say it’s been amazing — even if it’s slightly harder to set up. If you are just getting started, I’d go for Browserify since it’s a lot simpler to set up. Just be aware that webpack is the future, and what bigger projects are starting to use.

ReactJS is quickly gaining popularity, and it doesn’t seem to be slowing down — to the extent that people are asking “Is React killing Angular?”

Scotch.io’s Learning React.js: Getting Started and Concepts provides a solid overview of React. Once you got that out of the way, continue with Egghead.io’s course on React Fundamentals where you will build a fully working ReactJS app and then migrate it to ES6 syntax. You can follow up with the official ReactJS documentation which is very well made and will allow you to fully master it.

Since React is only the view, it’s highly recommended you learn Redux. Most courses on Redux are a bit complex in my opinion, but CSS Tricks Leveling Up with React: Redux does score a great balance between simplicity and being informative at getting started with Redux.

You might have also heard of Flux at this point, but if you’re wondering why you should use Redux over Flux, check out the question on Stack Overflow Why use Redux over Facebook Flux? which was answered by Redux’s creator!

Looking back on my mistakes and what I learned

I made a lot of mistakes in my 2 years of learning web development. Overall, I think my biggest mistake was not mastering the basics before moving on to libraries and frameworks. I guess this applies to almost every programming language out there, but in my opinion it applies even more to JavaScript. This is because in many ways, JavaScript is a broken language and contains a lot of “Foot Guns” (you should have heard of this if you watched D. Crockford’s talk on “JavaScript, the better parts” I mentioned earlier). These can make life insufferably hard if you don’t fully understand them.

I recall once having gotten stuck in an AngularJS issue with $scope which took me 3 days to debug, only to find it wasn’t even an AngularJS issue, but a JavaScript issue that I caused myself because of failing to understand how this works.

It’s strange that I don’t see this talked about as often. I didn’t always care for writing clean code, but honestly it’s one of the things I’m most proud of having learned. This is because everyone loves to complain how their last place had one of the worst, ugliest code base in the world. So why can’t anyone talk about how great their last one was? How their code ended up so clean and well made they were proud of it?

This is a trend I’d like to change, and I believe a difference can be made if enough people push for it. Strive to make variable and function names understandable in English, even if you have to write a bit more. Not doing so will only lead to you having to manually document it sometime in the future to make it clearer. This will also cause your overall codebase to become harder to understand by new developers and yourself. Yes, yourself. Why yourself? Because if you’re not enforcing clean code, what makes you think your coworkers should enforce it and write clean code for you to easily understand? Let’s lead by example.

And if that isn’t a good enough incentive, people very often recognize and value clean code writers. You’ll find that by writing clean code your coworkers and friends will enjoy working with you even more, and in turn, you’ll live a happier life.

Some of you might notice I also didn’t make much of an emphasis on jQuery. This is because in my experience, I found jQuery did me more harm than good at first. Some of you may not agree, but please let me explain: When I first learned it, the general idea I understood was that jQuery was everywhere and that you could use it for pretty much everything. Because of this, I got used to using jQuery for pretty much anything, and for any problem I encountered, I looked for a solution for it that used jQuery.

Don’t get me wrong, jQuery was awesome in my time using it, so awesome in fact, that I blindly ignored that 90% of what I did with jQuery could be done natively in modern browsers in a similarly easy syntax.

You may now be thinking: “So what’s wrong with that? jQuery doesn’t weight all that much anyway and using it you still end up writing less code than if you did things natively.” But using jQuery over native APIs wasn’t the problem. The problem was that my entire way of thinking and all the solutions to common problems I knew up until that point required jQuery to work. And this became a huge problem when I got my first project and was told jQuery wasn’t a dependency.

Using jQuery made me useless without it, and made me completely ignore the native methods and solutions that have always existed. It made all my solutions less portable too, since using them required jQuery.

Since then, I’ve strived to not use jQuery unless it is absolutely necessary and truly provides big improvement in efficiency and readability to our codebase (for example, heavy DOM manipulation).

Once again, don’t get me wrong, jQuery is great, but if I could go back in time and meet my past self that was just learning web development, I’d heavily advise myself against learning jQuery altogether until I’ve learned how to do things without it. If you are having trouble doing the switch like I did, check out You Might Not Need jQuery .

As for course material; while a lot of CodeSchool’s courses were outstanding (The HTML & CSS branch was specially fantastic), even if a few of their courses on frameworks fell flat a bit flat (AngularJS, BackboneJS, etc.).

I also took quite a lot of Pluralsight courses, which I didn’t mention because after all this time, I’ve reached the conclusion that picking their learning path is overall a bad idea and unreliable . Since their courses are made by teachers who aren’t always (in my opinion) very good at teaching, I found their course quality fluctuates wildly since their course quality standards are non-existent. I’ve had courses where even the person giving the course sounded like he was falling asleep. And I honestly don’t have the attention span to keep paying attention on a 6–10 hour course — and a lot of them last that long, if not longer.

I spent a good 80–100 hours of training in Pluralsight, and I honestly want a good part of it back. Don’t get me wrong, I had a few amazing courses on Pluralsight, but their focus on quantity over quality really made me waste my time. I could have learnt so much more if I had taken courses from better sources like Egghead.io and CodeSchool, where they value more quality of quantity.

The only reason I could ever think of someone using Pluralsight is to take a course that no other website has in some more obscure technology (like Installshield, or Xamarin), or to take a few very specific courses that they know were very well received and reviewed (For example, John Papa’s Angular Fundamentals).

Overall, if you want to use Pluralsight, be sure that you are taking courses hand-picked by someone that took them first and that are recognized as high quality and useful.

I also recently tried Team Treehouse training and I’ve got to say, I’m amazed at the quality that went into their courses, even rivaling that of CodeSchool, and their course material is highly extensive.

After skimming through the HTML, CSS and JavaScript learning paths there, I see you could easily acquire the foundation of pretty much everything. Don’t believe me? Just look at their learning tracks and tell me it’s not amazing. Sure, it’s a bit expensive at $30 USD a month, but in my opinion it’s incredibly worth it. (I’m paying for it right now to learn WordPress since I need it for a freelance project and the material is great).

A word on paid courses

I felt a need to speak about this since I’ve noticed the general consensus that you can learn programming without paying a dime and be as competitive as one that paid for a course. While true, I cannot stress enough the value paying for the right course has. Sure, quite a lot of the most valuable course material I’ve written about is free, but a lot of it is also paid. Mainly because sometimes you just can’t beat having someone carefully explain things to you in a visual way.

Yes, there are terrible learning paid courses which I would advise against since their value proposition is questionable (see Pluralsight), but others like Egghead.io, CodeSchool, and Team Treehouse offer outstanding bang-for-your-buck, despite their relatively costly monthly subscription ($25-$30 a month). Plus, they all have free 7–15 day trials so you can see which one works best for you.

If you play your cards right, paying 1–2 months of either of them can easily net you knowledge you would only otherwise get after stumbling upon countless of articles and blog posts over a year. They’re honestly that good.

So yes, they are not necessary, but if you can afford at least one month, you can be sure it will give you a strong edge.

The secret sauce for success

I’ve met a lot of developers over the past 2 years I’ve been a web developer. Along my journey, I’ve met a few developers who really stood out — developers who were clearly in a league of their own, and to whom me and everyone else looked up to. I found these individuals shared quite a few characteristics, which I’d like to share with you right now. These are in my opinion the secret sauce to being a successful web developer:

• Love what you do. This is simply the most important characteristic of them all. If you don’t love what you do (be it CSS Styling or JavaScript), it will truly show in what you do. Those who are passionate about what they do often clearly stand out from the crowd.
• Be generous and share your knowledge . It’s very easy to want to keep that new CSS/JavaScript hack you found that solves the project’s issues a secret, but please don’t. The people who share their knowledge the most are often the most valuable, since they can be placed in any kind of team and improve it’s quality by a huge margin.
• Always be on the lookout for new things . Most of the successful developers I’ve met share this common trait. Whether it be by reading blogs, spending lots of time in programming related discussions, or even talking about what’s new in web development during lunch breaks. Being on the lookout for new things all the time allows the best developers to always stay ahead of the curve.

The shortest route

Whew, this article took a while to finish (6 hours and counting). We’re almost done! You may be wondering: “Ok, cool story, but what’s the quickest route?” And so, here it is.

I’ve organized this in the way that I would take it if I could go back and do things right. I also added a few bonuses, which I would have loved to have had back then. Enjoy!

• CodeSchool or Treehouse’s Javascript learning path (paid) OR Codecademy’s Javascript course
• Eloquent JavaScript
• You Don’t Know JS
• JS: The Right Way
• Learn ES6 by Egghead.io
• CodeSchool or Treehouse’s HTML & CSS learning path(Paid) OR HTML and CSS: Design and Build Websites by John Ducket OR Codecademy’s HTML & CSS course .
• Specifics on CSS Specifity by CSS Tricks
• Learn CSS Layout
• 9 basic principles of responsive web design by Front
• Responsive Web Design Fundamentals by Google on Udacity (Take if you didn’t use CodeSchool or Treehouse learning path)
• Managing Mobile Performance Optimization by Smashing Magazine OR Browser Rendering Optimization and Website Performance Optimization by Google on Udacity
• Web fundamentals by Google

Developer Tools

• Explore and Master DevTools by CodeSchool
• Learn Git by Codecademy and Try Github by Codeschool
• Introduction to Linux Commands by Smashing Magazine
• Automate Your Tasks Easily with Gulp.js by Scotch.io
• Design Decisions in AngularJS by Google Developers (Intro to AngularJS)
• AngularJS fundamentals by Egghead.io
• John Papa’s Angular Styleguide
• Creating a Single Page Todo App with Node and Angular (MEAN) by Scotch.io
• AngularJS application structure by Egghead.io (Paid) OR Scotch.io’s Angular Courses
• Learning React.js: Getting Started and Concepts by Scotch.io
• Intro to webpack by Egghead.io
• React Fundamentals by Egghead.io
• Leveling Up with React: Redux by CSS Tricks
• NodeJS tutorials by NodeSchool.io
• How I explained REST to my Wife
• Creating a Single Page Todo App with Node and Angular by Scotch.io (Node, ExpressJS, MongoDB, Angular, REST)

Bonus: Resources

Completely optional, but some of my favorite articles and resources which I’ve found over the years which you will probably love if you are interested in their respective topic.

• Web Design in 4 minutes . A very creative and original interactive tutorial that teaches you the fundamentals of web design.
• Awwards . Looking for web design inspiration? Look no further.
• Why Hiring is so hard in tech by Eric Elliott. Here Eric is does an amazing job at summarizing how it’s surprisingly hard to find great developers, and how to become one.
• NoSQL database systems mega comparison by Kristof Kovacs. This is a superb comparison between the most popular NoSQL database systems out there. MongoDB, Redis, CouchDB, Cassandra, ElasticSearch, they and more are all here.
• XSS Game . Cross-site scripting (XSS) bugs are one of the most common and dangerous types of vulnerabilities in Web applications. Using this awesome resource you can learn how to find and exploit XSS bugs, and how to prevent them from happening to your web application.
• How To Write Unmaintainable Code . Hilarious article on how not to write maintainable, clean code.

Bonus: My tools

I thought it’d also be nice to share some of the tools I discovered (some well known, some not so much) that have made my life easier as web developer so here they are.

• Jetbrains Webstorm : Full featured Web Development IDE. (My editor of choice) Paid, but offers a 1 year free license for students.
• Atom.io : Highly extensible text editor with IDE like features rivaling Webstorm. Free.
• Sublime Text : Lightning fast text editor with plugins support and an aesthetically pleasing look. (I normally keep Webstorm/Atom installed as IDE for serious work, and Sublime Text installed for quick edits to files.)
• caniuse.com : Browser support is critical for websites, and this is the #1 resource at figuring out what features are supported by which browser version and which are.
• Cloud 9 : Cloud based development environment and IDE with Git support that runs on Linux. Great for programming remotely and testing out NodeJS or other server side things without needing to install anything on your machine
• CodePen , Plunker and JSFiddle : Great cloud based front end playgrounds that let you do quick HTML/CSS/JS demos you can share, or work on later on if you create a free account. CodePen is often best for CSS related things because of it’s minimalistic interface and plethora of CSS related features, Plunker for JavaScript demos because of it’s powerful JS features, and JSFiddle for demos that you wish to collaborate with others in real time thanks to it’s live editor sharing collaboration feature.
• Vanilla List : A repository of JavaScript plugins and libraries using only vanilla JavaScript (meaning they require no libraries to work, like jQuery)
• YouMightNotNeedjQuery : You probably don’t. See for yourself.
• PublicAPIs : Ever wondered what public APIs exist? Look no further!
• Gravit.io : Cloud based design application rivaling adobe illustrator. (Free!) Useful for quick mockups and web design.
• Adobe Kuler : Webapp to help you create harmonious color combinations for any website. Also has an “Explore” showcase of color palettes built by other designers as well as a ranking system to help inspire you.
• Name that color : Stop spending lots of time figuring out how to name your color variables in less/sass and just use their rightful name with this webapp

I’d just like to say I really enjoyed writing this, and it makes me really happy to have been finally able to give something back to the incredibly supportive programming community everywhere.

As some of you already noticed, this is my first blog post, but you can be sure I plan to write more. Just don’t expect one every week. Remember: quality over quantity!

If any of you have any questions left, feel free to leave a comment and I’ll do my best to get back to you ASAP.

I hope this was useful to you guys, until next time, Best!

March ’18 Update : For those curious as to what I’ve been up to, here’s a quick status update!

https://medium.com/@sgarcia.dev/status-update-im-still-here-with-cool-stuff-incoming-f031bab49eca

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What is a Web Designer?

A web designer specializes in creating the visual aspects of websites. Their primary focus is on designing the layout, user interface, and overall aesthetic appeal of web pages. This involves conceptualizing and crafting elements such as color schemes, typography, images, and graphics to create a cohesive and engaging user experience.

Web designers often work closely with clients to understand their goals and requirements for the website. They use their creative skills, knowledge of design principles, and familiarity with industry trends to translate these requirements into visually compelling designs. Additionally, web designers may collaborate with other professionals, such as web developers and content creators, to ensure that the design aligns with technical requirements and content strategy.

What does a Web Designer do?

Duties and Responsibilities The duties and responsibilities of a web designer can vary depending on the specific job role, company, and project requirements, but generally include the following:

• Understanding Client Requirements: Web designers initiate projects by meeting with clients to grasp their objectives, target audience, and specific website requirements. This involves gathering comprehensive information about the client's brand, products/services, and desired website features.
• Research and Planning: Thorough research into industry trends, competitor websites, and established web design best practices is conducted to inform the project plan and timeline. This phase includes outlining the design process, milestones, and deliverables to ensure a clear path forward.
• Conceptualization and Wireframing: Web designers brainstorm concepts and ideas for the website's layout, structure, and navigation. Through wireframing and low-fidelity prototyping, they visualize the skeletal framework and user flow of the website to refine the design concept.
• Visual Design: Visual designers meticulously craft the visual elements of the website, such as the layout, color scheme, typography, and graphical assets. Using design software, they create high-fidelity mockups and visual designs that align with the client's brand and project goals.
• Responsive Design: Ensuring a seamless user experience across different screen sizes and devices is paramount. Web designers meticulously test and refine the design to ensure responsiveness and compatibility across various devices and browsers.
• User Experience (UX) Design: Web designers focus on optimizing the overall user experience of the website by designing intuitive navigation, clear calls to action, and user-friendly interfaces. This involves understanding user behaviors and preferences to create engaging interactions.
• Accessibility Considerations: Web designers prioritize accessibility, ensuring that the website design complies with accessibility standards and guidelines. Features such as alternative text for images, keyboard navigation, and color contrast ratios are implemented to ensure inclusivity.
• Collaboration and Communication: Effective collaboration and communication are essential throughout the design process. Web designers work closely with clients, project managers, developers, and other stakeholders to articulate design ideas, incorporate feedback, and align on project objectives.
• Prototyping and Testing: Interactive prototypes or clickable mockups are created to demonstrate website functionality and user interactions. Usability testing and feedback gathering from users inform iterative improvements to the design.
• Handoff to Development Team: Web designers prepare design assets, specifications, and style guides for handoff to the development team. They collaborate with developers to ensure accurate implementation of the design and address any design-related issues during development.
• Quality Assurance: Rigorous quality assurance checks are performed on the final website to ensure it meets design standards, functionality requirements, and client expectations. Any bugs, errors, or inconsistencies are identified and addressed before launch.
• Post-Launch Support: Web designers provide ongoing support and maintenance for the website post-launch, addressing any design-related issues, updates, or enhancements as needed. Continuous monitoring of website performance and user feedback informs iterative improvements to the design and user experience over time.

Types of Web Designers Web design is a broad field that includes various specializations and roles. Here are some common types of web designers:

• E-commerce Designer: E-commerce designers specialize in designing websites and user interfaces for online stores and e-commerce platforms. They focus on creating intuitive navigation, clear product presentation, and seamless checkout experiences to drive sales and conversions.
• Graphic Designer : Graphic designers specialize in creating visual assets such as logos, icons, illustrations, and images used in web design. They have expertise in graphic design software and principles to produce high-quality visual content that aligns with the brand identity and enhances the overall design of the website.
• Interaction Designer: Interaction designers focus on designing the interactive elements and behaviors of a website or application, such as buttons, menus, forms, and animations. They ensure that interactions are intuitive, engaging, and contribute to a positive user experience.
• Motion Graphics Designer: Motion graphics designers specialize in creating animations and dynamic effects to enhance user engagement and interaction on websites and applications. They use animation software and techniques to bring designs to life and create memorable user experiences.
• Responsive Web Designer: Responsive web designers specialize in designing websites that adapt and respond to various screen sizes and devices. They use techniques like fluid grids, flexible images, and media queries to create a consistent user experience across desktops, tablets, and smartphones.
• User Interface (UI) Designer : UI designers focus on designing the visual elements and interactive features of a website or application. They create layouts, color schemes, typography, and design elements to ensure a seamless and visually appealing user experience.
• User Experience (UX) Designer : UX designers concentrate on the overall experience of the website or application users. They conduct user research, create wireframes and prototypes, and optimize usability, accessibility, and interaction design to enhance user satisfaction and achieve business goals.

Are you suited to be a web designer?

Web designers have distinct personalities . They tend to be artistic individuals, which means they’re creative, intuitive, sensitive, articulate, and expressive. They are unstructured, original, nonconforming, and innovative. Some of them are also enterprising, meaning they’re adventurous, ambitious, assertive, extroverted, energetic, enthusiastic, confident, and optimistic.

Does this sound like you? Take our free career test to find out if web designer is one of your top career matches.

What is the workplace of a Web Designer like?

Web designers can work in a variety of settings, including offices, agencies, freelance studios, or remotely. Within office environments, they may be employed by companies of all sizes, ranging from small startups to large corporations, across various industries such as technology, marketing, e-commerce, education, and healthcare. In these settings, web designers collaborate closely with colleagues, including project managers, developers, marketers, and clients, to conceptualize, design, and develop websites and digital experiences.

Many web designers also choose to work as freelancers or independent contractors, allowing them the flexibility to work from home or remote locations. Freelance web designers often manage their own schedules and client relationships, working on a project-by-project basis for a diverse range of clients and industries. Additionally, some web designers may opt to join specialized design agencies or studios, where they work on a team with other creative professionals to deliver high-quality design solutions for clients.

Regardless of the specific workplace setting, web designers commonly use a range of tools and software, such as design software (e.g., Adobe Creative Suite, Sketch, Figma), project management tools, communication platforms, and version control systems, to collaborate with team members and deliver exceptional design work. The work environment for web designers is often dynamic and fast-paced, with projects varying in scope, complexity, and timelines. Adaptability, creativity, and strong communication skills are essential for success in this field, as web designers navigate the ever-evolving landscape of digital design and technology.

Frequently Asked Questions

Ux designer vs web designer.

The roles of UX (User Experience) designer and web designer share commonalities yet encompass distinct focuses and responsibilities:

UX Designer: UX designers prioritize optimizing the overall user experience of digital products, including websites and applications. They conduct user research, analyze user behaviors, and create wireframes and prototypes to design intuitive and user-friendly interfaces. Their responsibilities revolve around understanding user needs, defining user journeys, and ensuring that interactions with digital products are efficient, enjoyable, and aligned with user goals. UX designers collaborate closely with stakeholders, including clients, developers, and product managers, to translate user insights into actionable design decisions that enhance usability and satisfaction.

Web Designer: Web designers specialize in creating the visual and interactive aspects of websites. They focus on crafting layouts, typography, color schemes, and graphical elements to deliver aesthetically pleasing and engaging user experiences. Web designers combine creativity with technical skills to design user interfaces that not only attract attention but also guide users seamlessly through the website's content and functionalities. Their responsibilities encompass conceptualizing design concepts, producing mockups and prototypes, and collaborating with developers to ensure accurate implementation. While web designers may consider usability principles, their primary focus is on the visual and aesthetic aspects of website design.

In summary, while UX designers concentrate on optimizing the holistic user experience, including usability and functionality, web designers primarily emphasize the visual and interactive elements of websites. While there may be overlap in some tasks, such as wireframing and prototyping, each role requires a distinct set of skills and expertise to deliver effective digital solutions.

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Web Designers are also known as: Website Designer

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What is Web Design?

Web design refers to the design of websites. It usually refers to the user experience aspects of website development rather than software development. Web design used to be focused on designing websites for desktop browsers; however, since the mid-2010s, design for mobile and tablet browsers has become ever-increasingly important.

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A web designer works on a website's appearance, layout, and, in some cases, content .

Appearance relates to the colors, typography, and images used.

Layout refers to how information is structured and categorized. A good web design is easy to use, aesthetically pleasing, and suits the user group and brand of the website.

A well-designed website is simple and communicates clearly to avoid confusing users. It wins and fosters the target audience's trust, removing as many potential points of user frustration as possible.

Responsive and adaptive design are two common ways to design websites that work well on both desktop and mobile.

What is Responsive Web Design?

© Interaction Design Foundation, CC BY-SA 4.0

Responsive Web Design (a.k.a. "Responsive" or "Responsive Design") is an approach to designing web content that appears regardless of the resolution governed by the device. It’s typically accomplished with viewport breakpoints (resolution cut-offs for when content scales to that view). The viewports should adjust logically on tablets, phones, and desktops of any resolution.

In responsive design, you can define rules for how the content flows and how the layout changes based on the size range of the screen.

Responsive designs respond to changes in browser width by adjusting the placement of design elements to fit in the available space. If you open a responsive site on the desktop and change the browser window's size, the content will dynamically rearrange itself to fit the browser window. The site checks for the available space on mobile phones and then presents itself in the ideal arrangement.

Best Practices and Considerations for Responsive Design

With responsive design, you design for flexibility in every aspect—images, text and layouts. So, you should:

Take the mobile-first approach —start the product design process for mobile devices first instead of desktop devices.

Create fluid grids and images .

Prioritize the use of Scalable Vector Graphics (SVGs). These are an XML-based file format for 2D graphics, which supports interactivity and animations.

Include three or more breakpoints (layouts for three or more devices).

Prioritize and hide content to suit users’ contexts . Check your visual hierarchy and use progressive disclosure and navigation drawers to give users needed items first. Keep nonessential items (nice-to-haves) secondary.

Aim for minimalism .

Apply design patterns to maximize ease of use for users in their contexts and quicken their familiarity: e.g., the column drop pattern fits content to many screen types.

Aim for accessibility .

What is Adaptive Web Design?

Adaptive design is similar to responsive design—both are approaches for designing across a diverse range of devices; the difference lies in how the tailoring of the content takes place.

In the case of responsive design, all content and functionality are the same for every device. Therefore, a large-screen desktop and smartphone browser displays the same content. The only difference is in the layout of the content. 

In this video, CEO of Experience Dynamics, Frank Spillers, explains the advantages of adaptive design through a real-life scenario.

Adaptive design takes responsiveness up a notch. While responsive design focuses on just the device, adaptive design considers both the device and the user’s context. This means that you can design context-aware experiences —a web application's content and functionality can look and behave very differently from the version served on the desktop.

For example, if an adaptive design detects low bandwidth or the user is on a mobile device instead of a desktop device, it might not load a large image (e.g., an infographic). Instead, it might show a smaller summary version of the infographic.

Another example could be to detect if the device is an older phone with a smaller screen. The website can show larger call-to-action buttons than usual.

Accessibility for Web Design

“The power of the Web is in its universality. Access by everyone regardless of disability is an essential aspect.” —Tim Berners-Lee, W3C Director and inventor of the World Wide Web

Web accessibility means making websites and technology usable for people with varying abilities and disabilities. An accessible website ensures that all users, regardless of their abilities, can perceive, understand, navigate, and interact with the web.

In this video, William Hudson, CEO of Syntagm, discusses the importance of accessibility and provides tips on how to make websites more accessible.

The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) lists a few basic considerations for web accessibility:

Provide sufficient contrast between foreground and background . For example, black or dark gray text on white is easier to read than gray text on a lighter shade of gray. Use color contrast checkers to test the contrast ratio between your text and background colors to ensure people can easily see your content.

Don’t use color alone to convey information . For example, use underlines for hyperlinked text in addition to color so that people with colorblindness can still recognize a link, even if they can’t differentiate between the hyperlink and regular text.

Ensure that interactive elements are easy to identify . For example, show different styles for links when the user hovers over them or focuses using the keyboard.

Provide clear and consistent navigation options . Use consistent layouts and naming conventions for menu items to prevent confusion. For example, if you use breadcrumbs, ensure they are consistently in the same position across different web pages.

Ensure that form elements include clearly associated labels . For example, place form labels to the left of a form field (for left-to-right languages) instead of above or inside the input field to reduce errors.

Provide easily identifiable feedback . If feedback (such as error messages) is in fine print or a specific color, people with lower vision or colorblindness will find it harder to use the website. Make sure such feedback is clear and easy to identify. For example, you can offer options to navigate to different errors.

Use headings and spacing to group related content. Good visual hierarchy (through typography, whitespace and grid layouts) makes it easy to scan content.

Create designs for different viewport sizes . Ensure your content scales up (to larger devices) and down (to fit smaller screens). Design responsive websites and test them thoroughly. 

Include image and media alternatives in your design . Provide transcripts for audio and video content and text alternatives for images. Ensure the alternative text on images conveys meaning and doesn’t simply describe the image. If you use PDFs, make sure they, too, are accessible.

Provide controls for content that starts automatically . Allow users to pause animations or video content that plays automatically.

These practices not only make a website easier to access for people with disabilities but also for usability in general for everyone.

Learn More about Web Design

Learn how to apply the principles of user-centered design in the course Web Design for Usability . 

For more on adaptive and responsive design, take the Mobile UX Design: The Beginner's Guide course. 

See W3C’s Designing for Web Accessibility for practical tips on implementing accessibility.

Questions related to Web Design

Designing a web page involves creating a visual layout and aesthetic.

Start by defining the purpose and target audience of your page.

Understand the type of content and what actions the user will perform on the web page.

Sketch ideas and create wireframes or mockups of the layout.

Select a color scheme, typography, and imagery that align with your brand identity.

Use design software like Figma or Sketch to create the design.

Finally, gather feedback and make necessary revisions before handing off the development design.

In each step, remember to keep the user experience and accessibility considerations foremost. Here’s why Accessibility Matters: 

The salary of web designers varies widely based on experience, location, and skill set. As of our last update, the average salary for a Web Designer in the United States is reported to be approximately $52,691 per year, according to Glassdoor. However, this figure can range from around $37,000 for entry-level positions to over $73,000 for experienced designers. It is crucial to mention that salaries may differ significantly by region, company size, and individual qualifications. For the most up-to-date and region-specific salary information, visit Glassdoor .

To become a web designer, you should start by understanding design principles, usability best practices, color theory, and typography. Next, learn the essential tools like Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator, and Sketch. Familiarize yourself with web design languages such as HTML, CSS, and JavaScript. It's important to create a portfolio of your top work to impress potential employers. Additionally, consider taking online courses to enhance your knowledge and skills. 

Interaction Design Foundation offers a comprehensive UI Designer Learning Path that can help you become proficient in user interface design, a key component of web design. Lastly, continuously practice web design, seek feedback, and stay up-to-date with the latest trends and technologies.

The role of a web designer entails the task of designing a website's visual design and layout of a website, which includes the site's appearance, structure, navigation, and accessibility. They select color palettes, create graphics, choose fonts, and layout content to create an aesthetically pleasing, user-friendly, and accessible design. Web designers also work closely with web developers to verify that the design is technically feasible and implemented correctly. They may be involved in user experience design, ensuring the website is intuitive, accessible, and easy to use. Additionally, web designers must be aware of designer bias, as discussed in this video. 

Ultimately, a web designer's goal is to create a visually appealing, functional, accessible, and positive user experience.

Web design and coding are closely related, but they are not the same. Web design involves creating the visual elements and layout of a website, while coding involves translating these designs into a functional website using programming languages like HTML, CSS, and JavaScript. Typically, dedicated web developers translate the designs to code. Several design tools can also export code directly.

Although some web designers also have coding skills, it is not a requirement for all web design roles. However, having a basic understanding of coding can be beneficial for a web designer as it helps in creating designs that are both aesthetically pleasing and technically feasible.

Responsive web design guarantees that a website adapts its format to fit any screen size across different devices and screen sizes, from desktops to tablets to mobile phones. It includes the site to the device's resolution, supports device switching and increases accessibility and SEO-friendliness.

As Frank Spillers, CEO of Experience Dynamics mentions in this video, responsive design is a default, and not an optional feature because everyone expects mobile optimization. This approach is vital for Google's algorithm, which prioritizes responsive sites.

To learn web design, start by understanding its fundamental principles, such as color theory, typography, and layout. Practice designing websites, get feedback, and iterate on your designs. Enhance your skills by taking online courses, attending workshops, and reading articles. 

Consider the Interaction Design Foundation's comprehensive UI Designer learning path for essential skills and knowledge. If you're interested in expanding your skill set, consider exploring UX design as an alternative. The article " How to Change Your Career from Web Design to UX Design " on the IxDF Blog offers insightful guidance. Start your journey today!

Absolutely, web design is a rewarding career choice. It offers creative freedom, a chance to solve real-world problems, and a growing demand for skilled professionals. With the digital world expanding, businesses seek qualified web designers to create user-friendly and visually appealing websites. Additionally, web design offers diverse job opportunities, competitive salaries, and the option to work freelance or in-house. Continuously evolving technology ensures that web design remains a dynamic and future-proof career.

Web design and front-end development are related but distinct disciplines. Web design involves creating the visual layout and aesthetics of a website, focusing on user experience, graphics, and overall look. Front-end development, on the other hand, involves implementing the design into a functional website using coding languages like HTML, CSS, and JavaScript. While there is overlap, and many professionals have skills in both areas, web design is more creative, and front-end development is more technical.

In this Master Class webinar, Szymon Adamiak of Hype4 shares his top tips for smooth designer-developer relationships, based on years of working as a front-end developer with teams of designers on various projects.

Yes and no! A web page is a type of user interface—it is the touchpoint between a business and the user. People interact with web pages. They may fill out a form, or simply navigate from one page to another. A web designer must also be familiar with UI design best practices to ensure the website is usable.

That said, in practice, the term UI is most often associated with applications. Unlike web pages, which tend to be more static and are closely related to branding and communication, applications (on both web and mobile) allow users to manipulate data and perform tasks.. 

UI design, as explained in this video above, involves visualizing and creating the interface of an application, focusing on aesthetics, user experience, and overall look. To learn more, check our UI Design Learning Path .

A modal in web design is a secondary window that appears above the primary webpage, focusing on specific content and pausing interaction with the main page. It's a common user interface design pattern used to solve interface problems by showing contextual information when they matter. 

The video above explains the importance of designing good UI patterns to enhance user experience and reduce usability issues. Modals are crucial for successful user-centered design and product development like other UI patterns.

In web design, CMS refers to a Content Management System. It is software used to create and manage digital content. 

The video above implies that the content, including those managed by a CMS, is crucial in every stage of the user experience, from setup to engagement. The top 10 CMS in 2023 are the following:

Magento (more focused on e-commerce)

Squarespace

Shopify (more focused on e-commerce)

The popularity and usage of CMS platforms can vary over time, and there may be new players in the market since our last update. 

Answer a Short Quiz to Earn a Gift

What is primarily the responsibility of a web designer?

• They design the visual layout and user experience of a website.
• They implement server-side functionalities.
• They program the website using coding languages.

What is a key feature of responsive web design?

• It adjusts the website layout based on the device’s screen size.
• It requires a separate website version for each device type.
• It uses fixed layouts that do not change across devices.

Which design approach allows for custom experiences based on the device?

• Adaptive design
• Fluid design
• Static design

What elements are vital for a responsive web design?

• Fluid grids, fluid images and media queries
• High-resolution graphics and video content
• Static images, GIFs and fixed-width grids

What approach should designers use to start the design of web applications to improve accessibility?

• Content-first
• Desktop-first
• Mobile-first

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Literature on Web Design

Here’s the entire UX literature on Web Design by the Interaction Design Foundation, collated in one place:

Learn more about Web Design

Take a deep dive into Web Design with our course Mobile UX Design: The Beginner's Guide .

In the “ Build Your Portfolio” project, you’ll find a series of practical exercises that will give you first-hand experience with the methods we cover. You will build on your project in each lesson so once you have completed the course you will have a thorough case study for your portfolio.

Mobile User Experience Design: Introduction , has been built on evidence-based research and practice. It is taught by the CEO of ExperienceDynamics.com, Frank Spillers, author, speaker and internationally respected Senior Usability practitioner.

All open-source articles on Web Design

Repetition, pattern, and rhythm.

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Adaptive vs. Responsive Design

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How to Change Your Career from Web Design to UX Design

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• 4 years ago

Emphasis: Setting up the focal point of your design

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Accessibility: Usability for all

How to Design Great 404 Error Pages

Emotion and website design

Parallax Web Design - The Earth May Not Move for Us But the Web Can

Fitts’ Law: Tracking users’ clicks

10 of Our Favorite Login Screen Examples

The Best UX Portfolio Website Builders in 2024

Video and Web Design

• 7 years ago

What is Eye Tracking in UX?

Web Fonts: Definition and 10 Recommendations

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Essay: Web Design

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Web design encompasses many different skills and disciplines in the production and maintenance of websites.[1] The different areas of web design include web graphic design; interface design; authoring, including standardised code and proprietary software; user experience design; and search engine optimization. Often many individuals will work in teams covering different aspects of the design process, although some designers will cover them all.[2] The term web design is normally used to describe the design process relating to the front-end (client side) design of a website including writing mark up, but this is a grey area as this is also covered by web development. Web designers are expected to have an awareness of usability and if their role involves creating mark up then they are also expected to be up to date with web accessibility guidelines. ‘ History 1988’2001 Although web design has a fairly recent history, it can be linked to other areas such as graphic design. However web design is also seen as a technological standpoint. It has become a large part of people’s everyday lives. It is hard to imagine the Internet without animated graphics, different styles of typography, background and music. The start of the web and web design

In 1989, whilst working at CERN Tim Berners-Lee proposed to create a global hypertext project, which later became known as the World Wide Web. Throughout 1991 to 1993 the World Wide Web was born. Text only pages could be viewed using a simple line-mode browser.[3] In 1993 Marc Andreessen and Eric Bina, created the Mosaic browser. At the time there were multiple browsers however the majority of them were Unix-based and were naturally text heavy. There had been no integrated approach to graphical design elements such as images or sounds. The Mosaic browser broke this mould.[4] The W3C was created in October 1994, to "lead the World Wide Web to its full potential by developing common protocols that promote its evolution and ensure its interoperability."[5] This discouraged any one company from monopolizing a propriety browser and programming language, which could have altered the effect of the World Wide Web as a whole. The W3C continues to set standards, which can today be seen with JavaScript. In 1994 Andreessen formed Communications corp. That later became known as Netscape Communications the Netscape 0.9 browser. Netscape created its own HTML tags without regards to the traditional standards process. For example Netscape 1.1 included tags for changing background colours and formatting text with tables on web pages. Throughout 1996 to 1999 the browser wars began. The browser wars saw Microsoft and Netscape battle it out for the ultimate browser dominance. During this time there were many new technologies in the field, notably Cascading Style Sheets, JavaScript, and Dynamic HTML. On a whole the browser competition did lead to many positive creations and helped web design evolve at a rapid pace.[6] Evolution of web design In 1996, Microsoft released its first competitive browser, which was complete with its own features and tags. It was also the first browser to support style sheets, which at the time was seen as an obscure authoring technique.[6] The HTML markup for tables was originally intended for displaying tabular data. However designers quickly realized the potential of using HTML tables for creating the complex, multi-column layouts that were otherwise not possible. At this time, as design and good aesthetics seemed to take precedence over good mark-up structure, and little attention was paid to semantics and web accessibility. HTML sites were limited in their design options, even more so with earlier versions of HTML. To create complex designs, many web designers had to use complicated table structures or even use blank spacer .GIF images to stop empty table cells from collapsing.[7] CSS was introduced in December 1996 by the W3C to support presentation and layout; this allowed HTML code to be semantic rather than both semantic and presentational, and improved web accessibility, see tableless web design. In 1996 Flash (originally known as FutureSplash) was developed. At the time it was of a very simple layout basic tools and a timeline but it enabled web designers to go beyond the point of HTML at the time. It has now progressed to be very powerful, enabling it to develop entire sites.[7] End of the first browser wars During 1998 Netscape released Netscape Communicator code under an open source licence, enabling thousands of developers to participate in improving the software. However they decided to stop and start from the beginning, which guided the development of the open source browser and soon expanded to a complete application platform.[6] The Web Standards Project was formed, and promoted browser compliance with HTML and CSS standards by creating Acid1, Acid2, and Acid3 tests. 2000 was a big year for Microsoft. Internet Explorer had been released for Mac, this was significant as it was the first browser that fully supported HTML 4.01 and CSS 1, raising the bar in terms of standards compliance. It was also the first browser to fully support the PNG image format.[6] During this time Netscape was sold to AOL and this was seen as Netscape’s official loss to Microsoft in the browser wars.[6] 2001’2012 Since the start of the 21st century the web has become more and more integrated into peoples lives, as this has happened the technology of the web has also moved on. There have also been signifigent changes in the way people use and access the web, this has changed how sites are designed. The Modern Browsers Since the end of the browsers wars there have been new browsers coming onto the scence, many of these are open source meaning that they tend to have faster development and are more supportive of new standards. The new options are considered by many to be better that Microsoft’s Internet Explorer. New Standards The W3C has released new standards of HTML (HTML5) and CSS (CSS3), as well as new JavaScript API’s each as a new but individual standard, however while the term HTML5 is only used to refer to the new version of HTML and some of the JavaScript API’s, it has become common to use it to refer to the entire suite of new standards (HTML5, CSS3 and JavaScript) Tools and technologies Web designers use a variety of different tools depending on what part of the production process they are involved in. These tools are updated over time by newer standards and software but the principles behind them remain the same. Web graphic designers use vector and raster graphics packages for creating web formatted imagery or design prototypes. Technologies used for creating websites include standardised mark up which could be hand coded or generated by WYSIWYG editing software. There is also proprietary software based on plug-ins that bypasses the client’s browsers version, these are often WYSIWYG but with the option of using the software’s scripting language. Search engine optimisation tools may be used to check search engine ranking and suggest improvements. Other tools web designers might use include mark up validators[8] and other testing tools for usability and accessibility to ensure their web sites meet web accessibility guidelines.[9] Skills and techniques Typography Usually a successful website has only a few typefaces which are of a similar style, instead of using a range of typefaces. Preferably a website should use sans serif or serif typefaces, not a combination of the two. Typography in websites should also be careful the amount of typefaces used, good design will incorporate a few similar typefaces rather than a range of type faces. Most browsers recognize a specific number of safe fonts, which designers mainly use in order to avoid complications. Font downloading was later included in the CSS3 fonts module, and has since been implemented in Safari 3.1, Opera 10 and Mozilla Firefox 3.5. This has subsequently increased interest in Web typography, as well as the usage of font downloading.[10] Most layouts on a site incorporate white spaces to break the text up into paragraphs and also avoid centre aligned text. [11]

Page layout Web pages should be well laid out to improve navigation for the user. Also for navigation purposes, the sites page layout should also remain consistent on different pages.[12] When constructing sites, it’s important to consider page width as this is vital for aligning objects and in layout design. The most popular websites generally have a width close to 1024 pixels. Most pages are also centre aligned, to make objects look more aesthetically pleasing on larger screens.[13] Fluid layouts developed around 2000 as a replacement for HTML-table-based layouts, as a rejection of grid-based design both as a page layout design principle, and as a coding technique, but were very slow to be adopted.[note 1] The axiomatic assumption is that readers will have screen devices, or windows thereon, of different sizes and that there is nothing the page designer can do to change this. Accordingly, a design should be broken down into units (sidebars, content blocks, advert areas, navigation areas) that are sent to the browser and which will be fitted into the display window by the browser, as best it can. As the browser does know the details of the reader’s screen (window size, font size relative to window etc.) the browser does a better job of this than a presumptive designer. Although such a display may often change the relative position of major content units, sidebars may be displaced below body text rather than to the side of it, this is usually a better and particularly a more usable display than a compromise attempt to display a hard-coded grid that simply doesn’t fit the device window. In particular, the relative position of content blocks may change, but each block is less affected. Usability is also better, particularly by the avoidance of horizontal scrolling. Responsive Web Design is a new approach, based on CSS3, and a deeper level of per-device specification within the page’s stylesheet, through an enhanced use of the CSS @media pseudo-selector. Quality of code When creating a site it is good practice to conform to standards. This is usually done via a description specifying what the element is doing. Not conforming to standards may not make a website unusable or error prone, standards can relate to the correct layout of pages for readability as well making sure coded elements are closed appropriately. This includes errors in code, better layout for code as well as making sure your IDs and classes are identified properly. Poorly-coded pages are sometimes colloquially called tag soup. Validating via W3C[8] can only be done when a correct DOCTYPE declaration is made, which is used to highlight errors in code. The system identifies the errors and areas that do not conform to web design standards. This information can then be corrected by the user.[14] Visual design Good visual design on a website identifies and works for its target market. This can be an age group or particular strand of culture thus the designer should understand the trends of its audience. Designers should also understand the type of website they are designing, meaning a business website should not be designed the same as a social media site for example. Designers should also understand the owner or business the site is representing, to make sure they are portrayed favourably. The aesthetics or overall design of a site should not clash with the content, making it easier for the user to navigate and can find the desired information or products etc.[15] User experience design For a user to understand a website they must be able to understand how the website works. This affects their experience. User experience is related to layout, clear instructions and labelling on a website. The user must understand how they can interact on a site. In relation to continued use, a user must perceive the usefulness of that website if they are to continue using it. With users who are skilled and well versed with website use, this influence relates directly to how they perceive websites, which encourages further use. Therefore users with less experience are less likely to see the advantages or usefulness of websites. This in turn should focus, on design for a more universal use and ease of access to accommodate as many users as possible regardless of user skill.[16] Occupations There are two primary jobs involved in creating a website: the web designer and web developer, who often work closely together on a website.[17] The web designers are responsible for the visual aspect, which includes the layout, colouring and typography of a web page. A web designer will also have a working knowledge of using a variety of languages such as HTML, CSS, JavaScript, PHP and Flash to create a site, although the extent of their knowledge will differ from one web designer to another. Particularly in smaller organizations one person will need the necessary skills for designing and programming the full web page, whilst larger organizations may have a web designer responsible for the visual aspect alone.[18] Further jobs, which under particular circumstances may become involved during the creation of a website include: ‘ Graphic designers, to create visuals for the site such as logos, layouts and buttons ‘ Internet marketing specialists, to help maintain web presence through strategic solutions on targeting viewers to the site, by using marketing and promotional techniques on the internet. ‘ SEO writers, to research and recommend the correct words to be incorporated into a particular website and make the website more accessible and found on numerous search engines. ‘ Internet copywriter, to create the written content of the page to appeal to the targeted viewers of the site.[2] ‘ User experience (UX) designer, incorporates aspects of user focused design considerations which include information architecture, user centred design, user testing, interaction design, and occasionally visual design.[19]

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Simple web design tips for beginners: A complete guide

Just getting started in web design? This guide will get you ready to tackle your first project as a beginner.

From 101 to advanced, learn how to build sites in Webflow with over 100 lessons — including the basics of HTML and CSS.

Web design is a crucial component of the web development process.

If you're interested in web design, we're guessing you have a creative streak. And how could you not be excited about jumping in and making your first website? Web design is about crafting a functional piece of art — but where do you start? If you're wondering what you need to know before you begin, this is a simple web design guide that will help you start.

Choose something basic for your first site design

This seems like a no brainer, right? But sometimes we can get overly ambitious and end up discouraged. For your first project, it’s a good idea to choose something simple and fun. An ecommerce site is more complicated and would be better to tackle once you have more experience. 

A blog is a great place to start. It will be a good design exercise and you’ll learn how a Content Management System (CMS) works, which will be important to know for future site designs. Best of all — you don’t have to start from scratch. There are plenty of blog templates that make it easy to put one together.

Templates are a valuable learning tool. Watching how HTML, CSS, and Javascript elements are styled and come together will give you deeper insight into what makes a design work. You can use templates as a foundation to make changes and customizations.

Maybe you don't want to start a blog — try pulling from your creative pursuits or hobbies. How about building a showcase for your photography skills or for your collection of short stories? Creating a design to feature a passion of yours makes for an enjoyable first project.

Find inspiration from other designers

You've no doubt come across websites that have wowed you with their stunning design.

Create an inspiration doc with links to sites you love, or bookmark them as you go. Pinterest is a great place to find great site design — you can find and pins illustrations, book covers, posters, blogs, and other types of design work to refer to. Designers use the term "mood board" for these collections. Mood boards are a quick reference resource if you find yourself stuck. Which you will.

Outside the discoveries you make on your own, there are some curated collections you should check out. 

• Awwwards always has new and fresh work and a variety of themed collections 
• Behance is a fantastic compilation of website design work, where the focus is on quality and creativity
• Dribbble focuses on individual designers, providing a forum to get feedback and communicate with others about their work

And of course, head over to Made in Webflow to see the variety of ways people are using our design platform. There’s so much cool stuff to check out and so many templates available to clone as your very own.

Look outside the web for sources of inspiration

Web design is informed by a visual language that can be found anywhere, like the cover of a graphic novel or the digital kiosk at your bank. Develop an eye for recognizing good design and start analyzing why something works or doesn’t work, whatever the medium.

Pay attention to typography 

We often read without even being aware of typefaces. Pay attention to the effect type has on as you consume content. Is that font on the menu readable? What makes that hand-lettered sign for the local business work so well? Letters are everywhere. Make note of both good and bad uses of typography. 

Typewolf is an excellent resource to keep tabs on popular fonts. It has plenty of lists to explore, a featured site of the day, and lookbooks that have spectacular font combinations. It’s helpful to see actual examples of typography being used, and websites like Typewolf are a great place to see their practical applications. Getting familiar with different fonts will help you pick the right type for your first site design.

Let the fine arts influence you 

Oh, did we mention there’s an entire history of art to draw from? So many movements and artists still shape the work of creatives today — especially web designers. Take a stroll through our Web design and art history piece to discover many monumental artistic achievements. Not only is filled with valuable information, it’s an excellent example of how content and artistry can come together to tell a story.

Research different types of design

There are so many disciplines of design to be familiar with. A knowledge of product design, illustration, and even branding can further develop your creative senses.

For inspiration that goes beyond web design, Abduzeedo offers brilliant examples. Whether it’s poster art, luggage, or furniture, you’ll see fantastic examples of design done right. Be open to different types of design and actively seek out inspiration . The more knowledge you have, the easier it will be to design your first website . Education informs intuition.

Have content ready before you start 

Putting content first means having content ready to work with before you start designing your first website.

It doesn’t have to be perfect. You can always edit and optimize for Google SEO (search engine optimization) later. But having at least a rough draft of what will go live will help make sure the design is laid out to accommodate it. Designing with real content gives you a better representation of how the website will look and function. It also gives you the opportunity to make changes earlier in the design process.

For blogs, you’ll need to have a post ready to test in the CMS. Having a couple posts written before you launch will save scrambling to write something after the fact. 

Keep your design simple and intuitive

Whether it's writing, navigation, or CTAs, no one wants to struggle with your design.

Your design approach should be rooted in simplicity and order. Logic should guide someone through the site with ease. And since we’re talking about those people who will interact with what you’ve created, this is a good place to introduce UX.

Understand user experience (UX) basics

A website is more than just floating text in space. The color scheme, content, typography, layout, and imagery all come together to serve your audience and stir emotion. Someone wandering through the digital space you’ve created should have a clear path free from obstacles.

UX focuses on understanding your audience. What are they looking for — and how will your design make finding it easy? UX is about getting into the heads of your audience and seeing your design through their eyes.

When building your first website, keep these guiding UX principles in mind:

• Make things simple and intuitive
• Communicate concepts in a logical succession
• Meet your audience’s needs and resist the temptation to showboat your skills at the expense of usability

Learning about your audience will help you craft a design that’s tailored to their wants and needs. Check out our Beginner’s guide to user research for more insights on how to do this.

Understand user interface (UI) basics

If you’re new to web design, you might be confused by the difference between UI and UX . Most of us were. Know this — they’re two distinct concepts.

Where UX is concerned with the overall feel of a design, UI is about the specifics. If you were in an elevator, UI would be the size and arrangement of the floor buttons, while UX would encompass the colors, textures, and other interior design choices of the elevator space. UI is about giving someone the tools they need to experience your website free from complications. 

When constructing your first website, keep these UI principles in mind:

• Functionality of interactive elements should be obvious
• Uniformity must guide usability — actions should follow logical patterns
• Design choices should be made with a clear purpose

Take a look at 10 essential UI design tips for a deeper dive into UI.

Introducing The Freelancer’s Journey: a free course that teaches you how to succeed as a freelance web designer — from getting clients to launching their websites.

Use the principles of design for web starters

Effective design is guided by certain rules and it’s important to understand essential web design skills before you start. There are standard practices that will simplify the process and make for a more refined final product. 

If you want to design and build websites, understanding good layout is key. We suggest keeping things minimal and working with only a few elements to focus on the perfect placement.

When you first start designing, think grids. Grids align elements, like div blocks and images on a web page, in a way that creates order. 

The structure of a layout should follow a visual hierarchy. What are the important ideas you want people to see and in what order? Visual hierarchy needs to adhere to the common patterns people use when reading. There are two paths people’s eyes generally follow on the web: the F-pattern and the Z-pattern. Being familiar with how these patterns work will help you organize your own content. 

The F-pattern is more common for designs with dense blocks of content. People’s eyes will scan down the left side of a layout until things catch their attention and then read from left to right. Imagine looking through the menu at a restaurant — you may skip over the bold names of dishes aligned on the left until you come to something that grabs you, which will prompt you to read the supporting details explaining that specific dish.

Most people will read through something like a blog post in this F-pattern. With left-aligned text and bulleted sentences, Nelson Abalos takes advantage of this design technique, making his posts easy to navigate and follow.

The Z-pattern is associated with less text-heavy design. Many landing pages conform to this pattern. All the major elements on the Conservation Guide site adhere to the Z-pattern. If you’re a beginner web designer, this is a simple layout trick to help usability.

You have the colors of the rainbow and beyond available to you. And we all know that "with great power comes great responsibility." The power of the color picker can be wielded for good or evil.

Here are a couple straightforward approaches in choosing a color scheme for your first website.

Use a single color as the base, vary the amount of saturation, include lights and darks, and play with various hues for a uniform color scheme. Regardless of your niche, a monochrome site is a smart design choice. And remember, whatever color you choose for the text, make sure you’re thoughtful about readability .

In this example from Unique , each section is delineated by a monochromatic color scheme. You don’t have to get this fancy in your beginner designs, but it’s nice to see their use of different monochromatic color variations. Notice how each section is made of colors related to the featured bags? This is a nice design trick that makes for a harmonious color scheme.

Complementary

Take colors that are opposite on the color wheel and combine them. Easy enough, right?

Use complementary colors with care. In this design below from the Ignisis website, the designer used blue and orange in different combinations along with whitespace and greys for a layout that never tires the eyes. The contrast feels crisp and refreshing.

Typography is two-dimensional architecture, based on experience and imagination, and guided by rules and readability.

-Hermann Zapf

So what are the rules that you, the neophyte designer, need to know?

Typography informs tone

Think of a wedding invitation or a funeral announcement. Both are profound life events — one a joyful celebration and the other typically more somber. Where an ornate flowery typeface works well for a wedding, it’s not well-suited for a funeral. 

When designing your first website, keep tone in mind. If you’re going for a lighthearted vibe, like a food blog, weaving in playful fonts makes sense. But if you’re crafting a website for a law firm, stick to more professional typefaces .

Serifs versus non-serifs

A common mistake of new designers is to mix up serif and non-serif fonts. You can tell them apart because the ends of serif letters have an extra line or stroke added vertically or horizontally. 

Check out the differences between PT Serif and PT Sans (without the serif).

Here’s PT Serif:

And here’s PT Sans:

Serifs are an artifact from the time of printing presses when most of the words we read were printed with ink on paper. Serifs anchored words onto the page and made them easier to read. In the earlier days of the web, serifs were shunned by web designers because lower screen resolutions diluted them. Now that screens are better optimized for typography with serifs, they’ve made a comeback.

Those small lines make a huge difference. You’ll notice the above PT Serif typeface feels more formal and the sans-serif version seems lighter and looser. 

Since serif fonts are more complicated, they’re best used in moderation. Headers are an ideal place for serif fonts, and larger blocks of content benefit from a more simplified font without serifs.

Ornamentation versus practicality

The loops and whorls of a flourished font will add personality and elegance to a design, but don’t overuse frilly fonts. A website is about communicating to an audience through content. As Hermann Zapf said, readability is one of a font’s most important characteristics. 

Typography technicalities

There’s a lot to learn with typography. As you progress as a designer, you’ll need to know how to use line height, kerning, and different weights in your typography. But don’t get too caught up in tweaking all the intricacies for your first site. Focus on making sure everything is readable — you can experiment fine-tuning the details later. 

Start designing 

Tutorials and research are invaluable to your learning, but you’ll eventually just need to dig in and get designing. Even if you create something no one will ever see, it's still an exercise problem solving and applying what you've learned. Don't worry if it's not amazing. But be proud of crossing that threshold from aspiring designer to actually being one — you’re on your way! 

Get feedback 

You finished your first design — congratulations! You worked hard and you’re ready to show it to the world. But before you hit publish, get some outside perspective on what you made.

Getting constructive criticism can be uncomfortable. Creating something, whether it’s an essay, a painting, or a website is an act of vulnerability. The things you put into the world are an extension of who you are and what you’re capable of. To be told what you made could be better or is wrong might feel like a personal attack.

In web design, feedback is a normal and necessary part of the process. Learn how to set your ego aside and separate the feedback from your self-worth. As you gain experience, you’ll be able to identify and implement practical, useful feedback and let go of the rest. You’ll find that more experienced designers know what it’s like to be a beginner — they’re excited to see less-experienced designers succeed.

If you’re designing with Webflow, share your work in the Webflow Showcase or request help in the Webflow design forum . As you progress, you’ll want to submit to places like Dribbble and Behance to get more eyes on your work. Not only will you get constructive criticism, you’ll get feedback on what you’re doing well — which always feels great.

Webflow makes web design for beginners accessible

Gone are the days of having to learn complex front-end code to build a website. In the past, you had to depend on a developer to bring your designs to life. Today, you can design, build, and launch complex websites in just a few hours using Webflow . 

Knowing a few key concepts, and being able to know the difference between good and bad design will give you the confidence and skills to craft your first website. Webflow frees you up from having to code, opens up your creative bandwidth, and let’s you start designing immediately. 

Build completely custom, production-ready websites — or ultra-high-fidelity prototypes — without writing a line of code. Only with Webflow.

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My career goal - web designer.

• Word Count: 752
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• Grade level: High School
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            When I was in high school, I remember the first time I learned what a blog was. I remember spending more time with how the blog should look than actually making posts or talking to people. But it wasn't until recently that I became very interested in the web designs. With time the more I learned about computers, the more curious I became on how websites were designed. My goal now is to become a Web designer. Web designers must code programs to properly format and add content pages for websites. Using the following skills; remain up to the task with technology, creativity, communication, and concentration. I will complete my goal. I am currently in my first semester of web design but I still have a long way to go.              A web designer has remained up to the task with technological advances because new tools are being developed very frequently. Nowadays, since the web is being accessed by a number of wireless devices such as the cell phone and Bluetooth enabled computers, the web designer has to work more towards optimization of the web pages. Via social media and news sites, books and magazines I have found out many new technology and new gadgets. Also I can keep up with technology based on my needs. Over the years every time new technology devices are out, I probably need it. New phones with new features, new programs that make work or school work easier to do, or a new camera with updated features to record funny memories. Web design requires creativity to interpret ideas and concepts and to then apply them. Web designers not only add to the creative front of the website, but also make sure the needs of .              the costumer's ideas are met. They create animations; determine the visual elements such as the font and style. They also change the style of the website frequently and created new ideas. In the past I have played with a program called Photoshop which is photo editing software. I learned how to use the program watching tutorials on YouTube.

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Essays Related to My Career Goal - Web Designer

1. career goal narrative.

A few things I am interested in are television commercials, magazine advertisements, and web design. ... I believe this is the right career choice because after researching the benefits of a graphic designer, I recognize that it is a very rewarding and high paying job. ... A few reasons that I think I would be good at this career are: my artistic skills, creative mind and interests in technology. ... Later, when I was at school, I learned that it was created by graphic designers. ... In order to become better prepared for my future goals involving this career, I can get into more art classes ...

• Word Count: 626
• Grade Level: High School

2. Career Research Essay

The desire to be an adman has crept up on me unexpectedly when thinking about what major will fit me to attend my future career. I need to accomplish my goal through education. In order to be a professional Adman in the advertising field, gaining education, enhancing job skills, and getting the internship experience are the most important factors that will contribute to my career path successfully. ... After getting AA degree, I will continue to get my bachelor degree to go further my career. ... This is mentioned in Education Portal webpage, "Students may have chances to intern w...

• Word Count: 1431
• Approx Pages: 6

3. Deceiding on a Career Choice

(Williams 16) Experienced designers in large firms may advance to chief designer, design department head, or other supervisory positions. Some designers even decide to open their own firms. ... (Octogram 33) Along the aspect of money and need for jobs, graphic designers are rising throughout the United States. ... Demand for graphic designers should increase because of the rapidly increasing demand for Web-based graphics and the expansion of the video entertainment market, including television, movies, videotape, and made-for-Internet outlets. (Octoram 151) During my Focus II session I rese...

• Word Count: 2820
• Approx Pages: 11
• Has Bibliography

4. Education Or Certification

Since there are so many different positions, so many divisions of the IT field, I have narrowed my research down to three in demand fields; Database administration, Web Design Specialists, and Networking Professionals. During my search for post-graduation employment, database administrator positions seemed to outnumber all others. ... Database designers and administrators are responsible for developing physical database designs and logical data models. ... Internet developers or web developers, also called web designers, are responsible for day-to-day site design and creation (Bureau of ...

• Word Count: 2510
• Approx Pages: 10
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

5. Certification Vs. Education

6. gender and computers: who uses computers, and how do they fe.

Are you planning (or do you have) a career that requires you to use computers? ... Yes I know what I need to know for my personal uses. ... Yes, but these differences are attributed to what the users needs and goals are when using a computer, not all users must be programmers or visual artists. ... In their choice of career it was evident that computers would be a big part of their curriculum and future careers. ... It is not often that we see a female programmer or graphics designer in the computer industry. ...

• Word Count: 1795
• Approx Pages: 7

7. Jon Maeda: A visonary in experimental graphic design

Maeda describes himself as both a researcher and a designer. ... Maeda is currently Sony Career Development Professor of Media Arts and Sciences and Director of the Aesthetics and Computation Group (ACG) at the M.I.T. ... In his earlier years, Maeda had no intentions of becoming a designer. ... My interest in art and design began with the foundations of fine art. I then expanded my knowledge of design to include graphics, but I was very removed from the use of technology to create. ...

• Word Count: 3425
• Approx Pages: 14

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Tuesday, March 6, 2018

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Hackers may have stolen the Social Security numbers of every American. Here’s how to protect yourself

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About four months after a notorious hacking group claimed to have stolen an extraordinary amount of sensitive personal information from a major data broker, a member of the group has reportedly released most of it for free on an online marketplace for stolen personal data.

The breach, which includes Social Security numbers and other sensitive data, could power a raft of identity theft, fraud and other crimes, said Teresa Murray, consumer watchdog director for the U.S. Public Interest Research Group.

For the record:

2:39 p.m. Aug. 15, 2024 A previous version of this article identified Teresa Murray as the consumer watchdog director for the U.S. Public Information Research Group. She works for the U.S. Public Interest Research Group.

“If this in fact is pretty much the whole dossier on all of us, it certainly is much more concerning” than prior breaches, Murray said in an interview. “And if people weren’t taking precautions in the past, which they should have been doing, this should be a five-alarm wake-up call for them.”

According to a class-action lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., the hacking group USDoD claimed in April to have stolen personal records of 2.9 billion people from National Public Data, which offers personal information to employers, private investigators, staffing agencies and others doing background checks. The group offered in a forum for hackers to sell the data, which included records from the United States, Canada and the United Kingdom, for $3.5 million , a cybersecurity expert said in a post on X.

The lawsuit was reported by Bloomberg Law .

Last week, a purported member of USDoD identified only as Felice told the hacking forum that they were offering “ the full NPD database ,” according to a screenshot taken by BleepingComputer. The information consists of about 2.7 billion records, each of which includes a person’s full name, address, date of birth, Social Security number and phone number, along with alternate names and birth dates, Felice claimed.

Data of nearly all AT&T customers downloaded in security breach

Information on nearly all customers of the telecommunications giant AT&T was downloaded to a third-party platform in a 2022 security breach.

July 12, 2024

National Public Data didn’t respond to a request for comment, nor has it formally notified people about the alleged breach. It has, however, been telling people who contacted it via email that “we are aware of certain third-party claims about consumer data and are investigating these issues.”

In that email, the company also said that it had “purged the entire database, as a whole, of any and all entries, essentially opting everyone out.” As a result, it said, it has deleted any “non-public personal information” about people, although it added, “We may be required to retain certain records to comply with legal obligations.”

Several news outlets that focus on cybersecurity have looked at portions of the data Felice offered and said they appear to be real people’s actual information. If the leaked material is what it’s claimed to be, here are some of the risks posed and the steps you can take to protect yourself.

The threat of ID theft

The leak purports to provide much of the information that banks, insurance companies and service providers seek when creating accounts — and when granting a request to change the password on an existing account.

A few key pieces appeared to be missing from the hackers’ haul. One is email addresses, which many people use to log on to services. Another is driver’s license or passport photos, which some governmental agencies rely on to verify identities.

Still, Murray of PIRG said that bad actors could do “all kinds of things” with the leaked information, the most worrisome probably being to try to take over someone’s accounts — including those associated with their bank, investments, insurance policies and email. With your name, Social Security number, date of birth and mailing address, a fraudster could create fake accounts in your name or try to talk someone into resetting the password on one of your existing accounts.

“For somebody who’s really suave at it,” Murray said, “the possibilities are really endless.”

It’s also possible that criminals could use information from previous data breaches to add email addresses to the data from the reported National Public Data leak. Armed with all that, Murray said, “you can cause all kinds of chaos, commit all kinds of crimes, steal all kinds of money.”

Phishing attack hits L.A. County public health agency, jeopardizing 200,000-plus residents’ personal info

The personal information of more than 200,000 people in Los Angeles County was potentially exposed after a hacker used a phishing email to steal login credentials.

June 14, 2024

How to protect yourself

Data breaches have been so common over the years, some security experts say sensitive information about you is almost certainly available in the dark corners of the internet. And there are a lot of people capable of finding it; VPNRanks, a website that rates virtual private network services, estimates that 5 million people a day will access the dark web through the anonymizing TOR browser, although only a portion of them will be up to no good.

If you suspect that your Social Security number or other important identifying information about you has been leaked, experts say you should put a freeze on your credit files at the three major credit bureaus, Experian , Equifax and TransUnion . You can do so for free, and it will prevent criminals from taking out loans, signing up for credit cards and opening financial accounts under your name. The catch is that you’ll need to remember to lift the freeze temporarily if you are obtaining or applying for something that requires a credit check.

Technology and the Internet

Are you the victim of identity theft? Here’s what to do

If you’re a victim of identity thieves or a data hack, you need to act quickly. Here’s what to do to protect yourself.

Oct. 26, 2022

Placing a freeze can be done online or by phone, working with each credit bureau individually. PIRG cautions never to do so in response to an unsolicited email or text purporting to be from one of the credit agencies — such a message is probably the work of a scammer trying to dupe you into revealing sensitive personal information.

For more details, check out PIRG’s step-by-step guide to credit freezes .

You can also sign up for a service that monitors your accounts and the dark web to guard against identity theft, typically for a fee. If your data is exposed in a breach, the company whose network was breached will often provide one of these services for free for a year or more.

If you want to know whether you have something to worry about, multiple websites and service providers such as Google and Experian can scan the dark web for your information to see whether it’s out there. But those aren’t specific to the reported National Public Data breach. For that information, try a free tool from the cybersecurity company Pentester that offers to search for your information in the breached National Public Data files . Along with the search results, Pentester displays links to the sites where you can freeze your credit reports.

As important as these steps are to stop people from opening new accounts in your name, they aren’t much help protecting your existing accounts. Oddly enough, those accounts are especially vulnerable to identity thieves if you haven’t signed up for online access to them, Murray said — that’s because it’s easier for thieves to create a login and password while pretending to be you than it is for them to crack your existing login and password.

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Of course, having strong passwords that are different for every service and changed periodically helps. Password manager apps offer a simple way to create and keep track of passwords by storing them in the cloud, essentially requiring you to remember one master password instead of dozens of long and unpronounceable ones. These are available both for free (such as Apple’s iCloud Keychain) and for a fee .

Beyond that, experts say it’s extremely important to sign up for two-factor authentication. That adds another layer of security on top of your login and password. The second factor is usually something sent or linked to your phone, such as a text message; a more secure approach is to use an authenticator app, which will keep you secure even if your phone number is hijacked by scammers .

Yes, scammers can hijack your phone number through techniques called SIM swaps and port-out fraud , causing more identity-theft nightmares. To protect you on that front, AT&T allows you to create a passcode restricting access to your account; T-Mobile offers optional protection against your phone number being switched to a new device, and Verizon automatically blocks SIM swaps by shutting down both the new device and the existing one until the account holder weighs in with the existing device.

Your worst enemy may be you

As much or more than hacked data, scammers also rely on people to reveal sensitive information about themselves. One common tactic is to pose as your bank, employer, phone company or other service provider with whom you’ve done business and then try to hook you with a text or email message.

Banks, for example, routinely tell customers that they will not ask for their account information by phone. Nevertheless, scammers have coaxed victims into providing their account numbers, logins and passwords by posing as bank security officers trying to stop an unauthorized withdrawal or some other supposedly urgent threat.

People may even get an official-looking email purportedly from National Public Data, offering to help them deal with the reported leak, Murray said. “It’s not going to be NPD trying to help. It’s going to be some bad guy overseas” trying to con them out of sensitive information, she said.

It’s a good rule of thumb never to click on a link or call a phone number in an unsolicited text or email. If the message warns about fraud on your account and you don’t want to simply ignore it, look up the phone number for that company’s fraud department (it’s on the back of your debit and credit cards) and call for guidance.

“These bad guys, this is what they do for a living,” Murray said. They might send out tens of thousands of queries and get only one response, but that response could net them $10,000 from an unwitting victim. “Ten thousand dollars in one day for having one hit with one victim, that’s a pretty good return on investment,” she said. “That’s what motivates them.”

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ZDNET's editorial team writes on behalf of you, our reader. Our goal is to deliver the most accurate information and the most knowledgeable advice possible in order to help you make smarter buying decisions on tech gear and a wide array of products and services. Our editors thoroughly review and fact-check every article to ensure that our content meets the highest standards. If we have made an error or published misleading information, we will correct or clarify the article. If you see inaccuracies in our content, please report the mistake via this form .

Was your Social Security number leaked to the dark web? Here's what to do first

You've likely never heard of  National Public Data , the company that makes its money by collecting and selling access to your personal data to credit card companies, employers, and private investigators. It now appears that the  hacker group USDoD snatched about 2.9 billion of its records . Odds are that your records -- including, possibly, your Social Security number (SSN) -- are in those databases. 

USDoD wanted to sell this data for the low price of $3.5 million. Ironically, before USDoD could profit from the theft, another threat actor, Fenice, swiped the data and released it on the dark web.

Also: The best VPN services: Expert tested and reviewed

How bad is it really? According to the security organization Vx-Underground , the stolen data includes 

• Address history (three decades' worth)
• Social Security number

Vx-Underground also found that "the database does not contain information from individuals who use data opt-out services."  These are sites or services that allow you to say no to a company or group that wishes to keep your records. 

That's good to know, but for many of you, it's probably a little late. 

The leaked data, totaling 277GB, can be used for identity theft and fraud. Although the breach does not necessarily affect 2.7 billion unique individuals (due to multiple records per person), it still poses a significant risk. The information can be used to open fraudulent accounts, apply for loans, or even commit tax fraud.

What to do first 

First, check to see whether your data is actually out there. The easiest place to start is with the Have I Been Pwned website. This should be your first resource to find out which breaches you and your data have been involved in and how extensively your data has been leaked. To use Have I Been Pwned, all you need to do is give the site your email address, and in less than a minute, you'll get the bad news.

That said, Have I Been Pwned won't tell you exactly what of your information has been leaked. It's a warning system, not a dark web data directory. So, even if, as is likely, your data is in there, it won't tell you if your SSN is in the data. 

There's also no guarantee that your leaked data is actually correct. Take me, for example, I have an unusual last name and companies are always misspelling it. Troy Hunt, the person behind Have I Been Pwned, said in his report on the NPD breach that while his email was in there, "clearly, none of the other data is mine. Not my name, not my address, and the obfuscated numbers definitely aren't familiar to me."

Hunt also added, "There were no email addresses in the social security number files. If you find yourself in this data breach via HIBP, there's no evidence your SSN was leaked, and if you're in the same boat as me, the data next to your record may not even be correct." That doesn't mean a hacker couldn't draw a link from your email address to your SSN, but it does mean that someone can just look up email and find your SSN as easily as looking up your name and phone number in an old-fashioned telephone directory.

Also: Delete yourself from the internet with these online data removal services

Notice, I didn't say if  your data has been leaked above. I can guarantee that your data has been leaked. With one data breach following hot on the heels of another for decades now, there's no question that some of your personal data is out there. 

For example, I take security more seriously than many people do, and I'm better equipped than most of you to deal with security and privacy issues. Nevertheless, my data has been ripped off in no fewer than 34 data breaches, according to Have I Been Pwned. 

Now, the vast majority of these breaches are relatively harmless. For example, my chess.com account's email address was revealed. I can live with that. But the USDoD data drop is another matter. 

Next, you need to determine just how bad the news really is. Check your credit reports for any unauthorized activity (and do so regularly!). Report any suspicious transactions to the credit bureaus (Experian, Equifax, and TransUnion) and consider  placing a credit freeze  to prevent new accounts from being opened in your name.

If you're concerned that your data's been being used against you, it's time to use an identity theft protection and credit monitoring service to protect yourself. ZDNET recommends Aura as the best overall such service. 

Also: The best identity theft protection and credit monitoring services

It's not enough to have these services, though. 

You should also stay vigilant against phishing attacks . Be cautious of emails, texts, or calls that attempt to solicit personal information. Scammers will use your leaked data to craft convincing phishing attacks. For example, I recently got an email purporting to be from my bank, which included my address, warning that my account had been hacked and that I needed to change my password from the included link Right Now .

Also:  Stop paying for third-party antivirus software. Here's why

Anytime you get a message like that, whether it's warning you of something dreadful or promising you something that sounds too good to be true, don't trust it. Never click on links from such emails or text messages. 

What to do if you've clicked on a phishing link

If you've clicked on a phishing link, don't panic. Do, however, take these steps immediately: 

Disconnect from the internet and your local network immediately. This prevents any potential malware from spreading or communicating with malicious servers.

Back up important data to an external hard drive or a USB stick. This safeguards your information in case of data loss or corruption. 

Run a thorough antivirus check . Don't have one on your device? Then, you should download an antivirus program to another computer, transfer its installation program to a USB stick, and install it on your affected machine.

Change passwords for all your online accounts, especially important ones such as banking and credit card accounts. Use strong, unique passwords for each account, and consider using a password manager.

Enable multi-factor authentication . Activate multi-factor authentication (MFA) on your accounts whenever possible. This adds an extra layer of security.

Watch your important online accounts. If you see any suspicious activity, contact the company as soon as possible. 

Also: How to freeze your credit (and why you might want to)

What to do if your SSN is compromised

Let's suppose, however, you have reason to believe that your SSN has ended up in the hands of crooks. In this worst possible scenario, you should take the following steps:

• File a report with the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) at IdentityTheft.gov . This website will guide you through the process and provide a personalized recovery plan.
• File a police report with your local law enforcement agency. While they may not be able to investigate immediately, having a police report can serve as important documentation.
• Check your credit reports for any unauthorized accounts or activity]. You can get free weekly credit reports from AnnualCreditReport.com .
• Place a credit freeze on your credit reports with all three major credit bureaus (Equifax, Experian, and TransUnion). This prevents new accounts from being opened in your name. You can also place a fraud alert on your credit reports, which requires businesses to verify your identity before issuing credit in your name.
• Review your Social Security Statement for any suspicious activity, such as unreported income.

Next, contact the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) to prevent potential tax-related fraud. Here's what to do: 

• Contact the IRS : You can reach the IRS Identity Protection Specialized Unit by calling 1-800-908-4490. This line is dedicated to assisting individuals who believe they are victims of identity theft involving their tax accounts.
• Submit an Identity Theft Affidavit: Complete IRS Form 14039 , the form used to report suspected identity theft to the IRS. You can submit it online via IdentityTheft.gov , which will forward it to the IRS, or you can download the form from the IRS website and mail it along with your tax return to the address specified on the form.
• Respond to IRS Notices: If you receive a notice from the IRS indicating that your SSN has been used fraudulently, follow the instructions provided in the notice. Typically, such notices come by snail mail. You may then be required to submit a Form 14039 or other documentation to verify your identity and resolve the issue.

This can be a long, tedious process. But, if you don't check and -- if necessary -- protect your accounts, your identity can be stolen. Recovering from identity theft is much more painful than preventing it.

Afterward, stay vigilant and continue monitoring your accounts and credit reports regularly. If you notice any suspicious activity, report it immediately to the relevant authorities and financial institutions. This is not a threat you can deal with once and then ignore. It's one that will continue for the rest of your life. 

Yes, I hate that too. 

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• Copy URL https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/fact-checking-attacks-on-walzs-military-record-by-vance-and-other-republicans

Fact-checking attacks on Walz’s military record by Vance and other Republicans

This fact check originally appeared on PolitiFact .

Republican vice presidential nominee and Ohio Sen. J.D. Vance sought to negatively frame the 24-year military career of newly minted Democratic vice presidential candidate Tim Walz, Minnesota’s current governor.

“When the United States Marine Corps, when the United States of America, asked me to go to Iraq to serve my country, I did it,” Vance  said  Aug. 7 at the Shelby, Michigan, police department. Vance  served  as a combat correspondent for the U.S. Marine Corps from 2003 to 2007 and deployed to Iraq for six months in 2005 but  did not experience combat .

Vance continued, “When Tim Walz was asked by his country to go to Iraq, do you know what he did? He dropped out of the Army and allowed his unit to go without him. … I think it’s shameful.” At a different event, Vance used the phrase “ stolen valor ” to describe his accusations against Walz.

On X, Rep. Ronny Jackson, R-Texas, made a  claim similar to Vance’s,  writing, “Tim Walz TURNED HIS BACK on the soldiers in his unit because he was TOO afraid to deploy to Iraq!!”

READ MORE: Democrats defend Walz’s military record as Vance, GOP begin attacks

Walz retired from the Minnesota National Guard in May 2005. He had submitted retirement paperwork five to seven months beforehand, Fox News  reported , citing the Minnesota National Guard.

In March 2005, Walz’s battalion had been notified about a possible deployment to Iraq within two years, Walz’s congressional campaign said in a  news release  that month, citing the National Guard Public Affairs Office. The Minnesota National Guard said the battalion then received an official order about mobilizing for deployment to Iraq in July 2005, after Walz retired.

Vance’s statement misleads by distorting the timeline. Walz had not been “asked by his country to go to Iraq,” as Vance said. He had been given a two-year window for a potential, not definite, deployment. And the official deployment notice came after Walz’s retirement.

Walz has said since before his Army retirement that he left to run for Congress. He filed his candidacy paperwork in February 2005, before the March 2005 notification about the potential deployment.

This is not a new line of attack. When Walz ran for a second term as Minnesota governor in 2022, his Republican opponent, who did not serve in the U.S. military,  criticized  Walz for leaving the National Guard before his unit deployed to Iraq.

Two retired Minnesota National Guard command sergeant majors also  penned a paid letter  to a Minnesota newspaper in 2018 claiming Walz “embellished and selectively omitted facts” about his military service. This letter resurfaced on X after Vice President Kamala Harris tapped Walz as her running mate. Other  guard   members  who served with Walz have defended him.

Walz’s spokesperson in the Minnesota governor’s office did not respond to a request for comment, and the Harris-Walz campaign declined to comment.

When reached by  The New York Times , a Harris-Walz campaign spokesperson didn’t provide new details about Walz’s retirement timeline and instead highlighted Walz’s record advocating for veterans and their families.

When contacted for comment, Vance’s campaign spokesperson sent links to the 2005 Walz campaign news release about the potential deployment and several news stories that quote former members of Walz’s battalion who were upset with him for not deploying to Iraq.

Walz’s military timeline

Walz enlisted in the Nebraska National Guard on April 8, 1981, two days after his 17th birthday. In 1996, Walz transferred to the Minnesota National Guard, where he served in the 1st Battalion, 125th Field Artillery until he retired May 16, 2005, Army Lt. Col. Kristen Augé, Minnesota National Guard’s state public affairs officer, told PolitiFact in a statement.

During his service, Walz responded to floods and tornadoes, specialized in heavy artillery and was recognized for his proficiency in sharpshooting and hand grenades, Minnesota Public Radio  reported .

On Aug. 3, 2003, Walz and his battalion were deployed to Italy to support U.S. operations in Afghanistan under Operation Enduring Freedom. Walz returned to Minnesota in April 2004, Augé said.

WATCH: A look at Walz’s record and how he could bolster Democratic support in the Midwest

In May 2005, Walz, then 41, officially retired from the Minnesota National Guard to campaign for Minnesota’s 1st Congressional District. He  filed  his statement of candidacy paperwork with the Federal Election Commission on Feb. 10, 2005. Walz was elected to Congress in November 2006.

Al Bonnifield, who served with Walz in the Minnesota National Guard, told  Minnesota Public Radio  in 2018 that Walz weighed his retirement from the guard and congressional run “very heavy.” Bonnifield reiterated this to  The Washington Post  on Aug. 7.

“Would the soldier look down on him because he didn’t go with us? Would the common soldier say, ‘Hey, he didn’t go with us, he’s trying to skip out on a deployment?’ And he wasn’t,” Bonnifield said in 2018.

Doug Julin, who served as a more senior command sergeant major in Walz’s battalion, said Walz went over his head to get retirement approval before the unit’s deployment was official, because Julin would have “analyzed it and challenged him,” the  New York Post  reported Aug. 8.

Others who served in Walz’s battalion have said he “ditched” them and his actions were “dishonorable,” Fox News  reported .

Battalion’s deployment to Iraq

Walz’s unit received an “alert order” for mobilization to Iraq on July 14, 2005, Army Lt. Col. Ryan Rossman, Minnesota National Guard’s director of operations, told PolitiFact in a statement.

The unit received the official Department of the Army mobilization order Aug. 14, 2005, and mobilized Oct. 12, 2005, Rossman said.

The unit deployed to Iraq in March 2006 and was deployed for 19 months, according to an October 2007  congressional resolution .

The two retired Minnesota National Guard command sergeant majors who wrote the 2018 letter said the battalion received a “warning order” in early 2005 “to prepare to be mobilized for active duty for a deployment to Iraq.” They did not specify the warning letter’s date. Augé of the Minnesota National Guard told PolitiFact the agency doesn’t have information about any unofficial orders that might have been sent to the battalion.

An  archived March 20, 2005, press release  from Walz’s congressional campaign website said the National Guard Public Affairs Office announced March 17, 2005, “a possible partial mobilization of roughly 2,000 troops from the Minnesota National Guard.” The announcement said a portion of Walz’s battalion could be mobilized to serve in Iraq within the next two years.

Walz said in his campaign’s press release, “As Command Sergeant Major I have a responsibility not only to ready my battalion for Iraq, but also to serve if called on. I am dedicated to serving my country to the best of my ability, whether that is in Washington, D.C., or in Iraq. I don’t want to speculate on what shape my campaign will take if I am deployed, but I have no plans to drop out of the race.”

Although Walz had been  promoted  in 2004 to command sergeant major, he retired in 2005 as a master sergeant,  one rank below  command sergeant major, “for benefit purposes because he did not complete additional coursework at the U.S. Army Sergeants Major Academy,” Augé said.

Joseph Eustice, a 32-year military veteran who served in and led the same guard unit as Walz, told  The New York Times  and  NewsNation  in Aug. 7 interviews that when Walz decided to retire in May 2005, their unit had heard rumors of a potential deployment to Iraq, but had not received official orders.

Vance said, “When Tim Walz was asked by his country to go to Iraq, do you know what he did? He dropped out of the Army and allowed his unit to go without him.”

Vance’s statement ignores that Walz’s unit was not officially ordered to go to Iraq until July 2005, two months after Walz officially retired.

After 24 years of military service, Walz said he retired from the Minnesota National Guard in May 2005 to run for Congress. He had submitted retirement paperwork five to seven months beforehand. He filed candidacy paperwork in February 2005.

READ MORE: 5 things to know about Tim Walz, Kamala Harris’ VP pick

There’s an element of truth in Vance’s statement because in March 2005, before Walz officially retired, his battalion was notified of possible deployment to Iraq within two years. Walz was aware at the time of his retirement that deployment could be possible and one of his fellow guard members described Walz’s retirement decision as “very heavy.”

But the March 2005 notification gave a time frame of two years for a possible — not definite — deployment that would not occur immediately, which is the way Vance’s statement framed it.

At PolitiFact, the burden of proof is on the speaker, Vance, who did not provide details to support his statement. We rate it Mostly False.

PolitiFact Researcher Caryn Baird contributed to this report.

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More From Forbes

Trump 2024 campaign hack explainer—what, how, who and why.

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Trump 2024 campaign hacking explained

Confirmation from the Trump 2024 election campaign regarding the theft of internal communications, including a dirty laundry dossier about JD Vance ahead of the vice-presidential pick, only emerged during the afternoon of Saturday, August 10. Lots of questions regarding the hacking incident remain unanswered at this early stage of investigations, but enough information has been released to analyze the who, what, how and why of the Trump 2024 presidential campaign hack.

Trump 2024 Campaign Hack—What Has Happened?

Reporters at Politico said that they had started receiving emails on July 22 from an anonymous AOL email account, signed by someone only calling themselves Robert, which contained “ what appeared to be internal communications from a senior Trump campaign official .”

The person sending the emails went on to state that they possessed a variety of different documents pertaining to internal campaign discussions including Trump’s legal and court documents. The full details of what is available to the emailer have yet to be confirmed, although a research file dated February 23 and apparently comprising a dirty laundry dossier compiled about JD Vance ahead of the vice-presidential pick is known to be among them. Politico has said that two people familiar with the dossier, granted anonymity by the publication, have confirmed it as being authentic.

On being asked how the documents had come into their possession, the person told Politico that it shouldn’t be curious about that as answering the question “will compromise me and also legally restricts you from publishing them.”

Best High-Yield Savings Accounts Of 2024

Best 5% interest savings accounts of 2024, how did a hacker infiltrate the trump 2024 campaign.

Robert’s responses to Politico’s questioning regarding the source of the provided documents suggest that they were obtained illegally. This was quickly confirmed after Politico reporters contacted the Trump 2024 campaign about the leaked information. Trump's campaign communications director, Steven Cheung, said that the documents had been obtained illegally. Although it is very early days of the investigation into a security issue such as this, there are already quite compelling clues emerging as to the how of the hacking incident.

The clue that is sitting front and center currently comes from a Microsoft threat intelligence report dated August 9 . Cheung himself references this in his response to Politico, saying that it refers to hackers breaking into “the account of a ‘high ranking official’ on the U.S. presidential campaign in June 2024, which coincides with the close timing of President Trump’s selection of a vice presidential nominee.”

The Microsoft threat intelligence report provides the best indicator of the “how” of this hacking incident, stating that a threat actor “sent a spear-phishing email to a high-ranking official of a presidential campaign from a compromised email account of a former senior advisor. The phishing email contained a fake forward with a hyperlink that directs traffic through an actor-controlled domain before redirecting to the listed domain.” What Microsoft has not done is confirm if the attack described in the report was directed at the Trump 2024 campaign or not. However, the timing fits nicely with the timeline of the hacking incident as far as we know it.

Who Is Behind The Trump 2024 Campaign Hack?

It must be stated here and now that accurate attribution of this hacking incident can only ever be a “best guess” speculation based on what is known at this point in time. Politico has a Trump 2024 campaign source saying that “foreign sources hostile to the United States” are responsible, but Cheung declined to tell the publication if there was any information to substantiate suggestions that the attacker was sponsored by the Iranian state. What Cheung did say, however, was that the previously mentioned Microsoft report referred to Iranian hackers being behind that June 2024 phishing attempt which “coincides with the close timing of President Trump’s selection of a vice presidential nominee.” Indeed, the report in question attributes that attack to a group called Mint Sandstorm, which operates under the direction of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps intelligence unit.

Why Was The Trump 2024 Campaign Hacked?

The why is likely the easiest thing to determine. The Microsoft threat intelligence report already mentioned points to the same Mint Sandstorm group as being behind campaigns targeted at presidential campaigns some five or six months ahead of the 2020 presidential elections. Cheung has stated that Trump’s 2024 campaign hacking was executed with the intention to “interfere with the 2024 election and sow chaos throughout our Democratic process,” a conclusion that is hard to argue with.

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Watch CBS News

Tim Walz's military record under scrutiny as he joins Kamala Harris on Democratic ticket

By James LaPorta

Updated on: August 9, 2024 / 12:40 AM EDT / CBS News

Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz 's military record has come under renewed scrutiny following Vice President Kamala Harris' announcement of Walz as her running mate on the Democratic ticket. 

On Wednesday, former President Donald Trump's running mate, Sen. JD Vance of Ohio, who is an Iraq War veteran, seized the opportunity to target his opponent's military record, resurfacing claims about his deployments and his retirement from the guard.

Walz served honorably in both the Nebraska and Minnesota Army National Guards, earning medals and deploying in support of Operation Enduring Freedom. But his final days of service have been called into question, centering on his rank and if he retired to avoid a 2005 deployment to Iraq. 

A CBS News review of Walz's military record and statements from the Minnesota Army National Guard show Walz achieved the rank of command sergeant major but was reduced in rank to master sergeant after retirement since he had not completed coursework for the U.S. Army Sergeants Major Academy. 

On Iraq, records show Walz had retired before his battalion was mobilized and deployed to Iraq. A 2005 statement from his website indicates Walz was initially prepared to deploy to Iraq amid his bid for Congress. CBS News has asked Walz for comment on when he decided to retire. 

A snapshot of Walz in the military

Walz retired from the Minnesota Army National Guard's 1st Battalion, 125th Field Artillery in 2005 after more than 24 years in service, the Minnesota Army National Guard told CBS News. 

Walz first enlisted in the Nebraska Army National Guard in April 1981, serving as an infantry senior sergeant and administrative specialist. In 1996, Walz transferred to the Minnesota Army National Guard, where he first worked as a cannon crewmember and field artillery senior sergeant. 

Minnesota National Guard spokesperson Lt. Col. Kristen Augé told CBS News that Walz "held multiple positions within field artillery such as firing battery chief, operations sergeant, first sergeant, and culminated his career serving as the command sergeant major for the battalion." 

Walz earned several Army commendation and achievement medals during his more than 24 years of service. 

Walz deployed in August 2003 in support of Operation Enduring Freedom. The Minnesota National Guard told CBS News the battalion supported security missions at various locations in Europe and Turkey. Walz was stationed at Vicenza, Italy, at the time and returned to Minnesota in April 2004. 

Controversy over a 2005 Iraq deployment

On Wednesday, Vance resurfaced claims that Walz retired from the National Guard to avoid deploying to Iraq. 

"When the United States Marine Corps, when the United States of America, asked me to go to Iraq to serve my country I did it. I did what they asked me to do, and I did it honorably and I'm very proud of that service," said Vance. 

He added: "When Tim Walz was asked by his country to go to Iraq, you know what he did? He dropped out of the Army and allowed his unit to go without him — a fact that he's been criticized for aggressively by a lot of the people he served with." 

The Harris-Walz campaign responded with a statement saying: "After 24 years of military service, Governor Walz retired in 2005 and ran for Congress, where he [served as the ranking member] of Veterans Affairs and was a tireless advocate for our men and women in uniform — and as Vice President of the United States he will continue to be a relentless champion for our veterans and military families." The statement incorrectly stated Walz chaired the Veterans Affairs committee. 

The campaign also said, "In his 24 years of service, the Governor carried, fired and trained others to use weapons of war innumerable times. Governor Walz would never insult or undermine any American's service to this country -- in fact, he thanks Senator Vance for putting his life on the line for our country. It's the American way."  

The claims raised by Vance first gained prominence when Walz ran for governor of Minnesota in 2018. At the time, retired Army veterans Thomas Behrends and Paul Herr, who both served as command sergeant majors, posted on Facebook a lengthy letter accusing Walz of "embellishing" his military career and abandoning his Army National Guard battalion ahead of a 2005 deployment to Iraq.

In the letter, Behrends and Herr write that in early 2005, Walz's unit — 1st Battalion, 125th Field Artillery — was slated to deploy to Iraq. At the time, Walz was serving as the unit's command sergeant major. 

Behrends and Herr claimed that from the time the unit was told to prepare for an Iraq deployment and when Walz retired, he told other Army leaders he would be going to Iraq but later resigned his position before the deployment to avoid going to a combat zone. 

Walz has said he left the guard to run for Congress, according to the Star Tribune . In 2006, Walz won his election to Congress against a six-term Republican incumbent. 

Records show Walz officially filed paperwork with the Federal Election Commission on Feb. 10, 2005. 

In March 2005, the National Guard announced a possible partial mobilization of roughly 2,000 troops from the Minnesota National Guard, according to an archived press release from Tim Walz for U.S. Congress.  

"I do not yet know if my artillery unit will be part of this mobilization and I am unable to comment further on the specifics of the deployment," said Walz in the March 2005 statement . 

The statement continued: "As Command Sergeant Major I have a responsibility not only to ready my battalion for Iraq, but also to serve if called on. I am dedicated to serving my country to the best of my ability, whether that is in Washington DC or Iraq," said Walz, who indicated at the time he had no plans to drop out of the race. "I am fortunate to have a strong group of enthusiastic support and a very dedicated and intelligent wife. Both will be a major part of my campaign, whether I am in Minnesota or Iraq." 

The Minnesota Army National Guard told CBS News that Walz retired on May 16, 2005. CBS News has asked Walz to clarify when he submitted his retirement papers. 

The Minnesota National Guard told CBS News that Walz's unit — 1st Battalion, 125th Field Artillery — received an alert order for mobilization to Iraq on July 14, 2005 – two months after Walz retired, according to Lt. Col. Ryan Rossman, who serves as the Minnesota National Guard's director of operations. The official mobilization order was received on August 14 of the same year, and the unit mobilized in October. 

CBS News reviewed the deployment history for the Minnesota Army National Guard which shows that in the fall of 2005, 1st Battalion, 125th Field Artillery was mobilized in preparation for a deployment in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom. The battalion trained at Camp Shelby in Mississippi and deployed to Iraq as a motorized security task force. 

In 2018, Tom Hagen, a military reservist who served in Iraq, wrote a letter to The Winona Daily News claiming Walz was not being candid about his service record and wanted people to know that the future Minnesota governor did not serve in Iraq or Afghanistan. 

Walz responded in the same newspaper and criticized Hagan as dishonoring a fellow veteran, according to MPR News. Walz wrote: "There's a code of honor among those who've served, and normally this type of partisan political attack only comes from one who's never worn a uniform."

Joseph Eustice, a 32-year veteran of the guard who also led Walz's battalion, told CBS Minnesota that while he doesn't agree with Walz's politics, he does believe Walz's record in the military is sound.

"Tim Walz as a soldier, he was a good soldier. I don't think anyone can honestly say that he wasn't," Eustice said. "...He was a good leader in those 24 years that he served."

Walz's rank as a command sergeant major

Official biographies on the Minnesota government website and Vice President Kamala Harris' website  have described Walz as a "retired Command Sergeant Major." However, documents reviewed by CBS News show this is not accurate; while Walz served at one point as a command sergeant major, he retired at a lower rank. 

Army veteran Anthony Anderson, who routinely obtains military records from the Defense Department using the Freedom of Information Act and has worked with CBS News on similar stories, provided Walz's records for review. CBS News has also requested the documents from the National Guard. 

One of the documents shows Walz reverted back to master sergeant from command sergeant major when he retired from the Minnesota National Guard in May 2005. 

Army soldiers promoted to the rank of sergeant major or command sergeant major are required to attend the Sergeants Major Course, or what was formerly known as the U.S. Army Sergeants Major Academy.  

Lt. Col. Augé, the Minnesota National Guard spokesperson, told CBS News that Walz retired as a master sergeant in 2005 for "benefit purposes" because he did not complete additional coursework at the U.S. Army Sergeants Major Academy.

While Walz can say he served as a command sergeant major in the Minnesota Army National Guard, his official biographies are incorrect in referring to him as a "retired Command Sergeant Major."

On Aug. 8, the campaign website updated its description of his service. It omits his rank upon retirement and now reads, "The son of an Army veteran who served as a command sergeant major, Walz was the ranking member on the House Veterans Affairs Committee, where he passed legislation to help stem veterans' suicides."

Editor's Note: This story has been updated to address an error in the statement from the Harris-Walz campaign.

Caroline Cummings contributed to this report.

• Minnesota National Guard

James LaPorta is a verification producer with CBS News Confirmed. He is a former U.S. Marine infantryman and veteran of the Afghanistan war.

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Passenger Plane Crashes in Brazil, Killing 61 Onboard

The Brazilian authorities said no one survived the crash, outside São Paulo on Friday afternoon. The airline, VoePass, said the cause was unknown.

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By Jack Nicas Paulo Motoryn and Niraj Chokshi

Jack Nicas reported from Rio de Janeiro, Paulo Motoryn from Brasília and Niraj Chokshi from New York.

Above the small city of Vinhedo, Brazil, on Friday, a passenger plane was falling from the sky. Residents began filming.

Those videos show the horrifying moment when an 89-foot-long plane, carrying 61 people and slowly spinning in circles, plummeted to earth. A moment after the plane disappears from view near a gated community, an enormous black plume of smoke rises from the spot.

One video then shows a house on fire, a swimming pool full of debris and a group of men peering over a scene of carnage in a yard: a shredded fuselage, twisted metal and, several yards in front of the cockpit, a body.

VoePass Flight 2283 crashed Friday toward the end of a scheduled two-hour flight from Cascavel, Brazil, to São Paulo. VoePass, a small Brazilian airline, said all 57 passengers and four crew members died in the accident.

The airline and Brazilian officials said they did not know why the plane had crashed.

The plane, an ATR 72, had all systems operating correctly when it took off, the airline said. The pilots did not signal any emergency, officials said. The aircraft, a twin-engine turboprop plane, was built in 2010 and was in compliance with Brazilian regulations, they added.

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