Nerdy Times with CSS/HTML

My experiences with HTML and CSS are largely a result of my current job, where I now deal with both concepts on a daily basis. When I began the job, I only had a passing knowledge of how either worked, and most of my previous knowledge was from a course I had taken in high school that, unfortunately, I had not followed up on.

However, I’m pretty impressed with how far I have come with working with CSS/HTML. The company I work for does almost all of its marketing, lead generation, and selling on the internet, so I was expected to pick up the needed skills without taking too long to do so. Over the course of several months, I picked up the basics using a combination of continuous trial and error, internet research, and help from co-workers. Whenever I ran into a problem, I would always first try to troubleshoot the problem firsthand. This included a great deal of tinkering within Dreamweaver (which is what I have almost exclusively relied on, even until now) and looking up FAQs or tutorials online. Most of the time, this approach was very effective. If I couldn’t work through it myself, I would turn to my nearest co-worker, who was far more knowledgeable on the subjects and was always willing to lend a hand. Well, most of the time; sometimes I couldn’t help but feel a slight sense, “Another f-in question?” coming from her direction.

Nonetheless, this mix of self-learning and outside assistance has proven very effective, and I feel confident now working within the basics of HTML and CSS. I would like to invest even more time to develop CSS style sheets of my own, as I find their application far more exciting than basic HTML. Unfortunately, most of the CSS files at work have been deemed “official”, meaning that I have very little room to go in and modify existing styles or create new rules of my own. I imagine this will be an intriguing aspect of my own personal website when the time comes to begin building that.

I find it especially ironic that now I’ve become the CSS/HTML mentor to a more recent hire in the company, a position I have been relishing when I remember how much of a noob I originally was.

Some particular problems that stick out in my mind over the course of learning CSS/HTML on the job: CSS rules that affect text and table margins, “default” HTML properties for things like cellspacing and cellpadding, and learning the standard format for how CSS rules should look and be referenced. I even remember the day, long ago, that I stumbled upon the target=“_blank” command for links. Good times. Good, nerdy times.

I still have a good deal of intricate things to learn however, and even now I still get a slight thrill whenever I am able to solve a problem on my own. Kinda lame, but those “Aha!” moments at work are what I consider the most rewarding aspect of my job, because every time it happens I know I’ve just learned something that will help me indefinitely.