Color Settings

It is possible for you to set certain page settings that will effect the entire document. These elements need to be placed in the body settings tag at the beginning of the document. For example:

Each of these elements is explained below.

Choosing Colors

A quick note about choosing colors. The break down of how HTML codes colors is either printing the name of the specific color (as in “darkorchid”) or the hexidecimal number (as in "#9966CC") which has to do with how much RGB (Red, Green, Blue) it uses in each color. There are many colors that you can use in your Web page. However, not all of them may appear to your user, the way that would like. There are about 216 “safe” colors from which you can choose.

There is an excellent resource where you can get downloadable and on-screen references of this list at (http://html-color-codes.com). However, one of the best resources I have found is at (http://catless.ncl.ac.uk/Lindsay/colours.html). This page allows you to select colors for background, text, and links from scrolling lists, shows you how your choices look on screen, and provides the HTML code you need to generate those colors.

Background Color

You can set the entire background of your page to a solid color by placing the background tag in the body settings tag at the beginning of your document.

Background Image

Instead of having a solid background color, you can use an image instead. However, you will most likely want to make sure that your image is lightened, so that text will be readable over the top of the image. You may also wish to keep in mind that your image will be tiled (repeated) down the page.

Fixed Background Image

One neat effect that you may wish to use is the fixed background image. In most cases, when a user scrolls down the page, the background scrolls also. However, it is possible to have the image stagnant, while the text scrolls over it. This acts like a watermark, however, it is important to make sure the image is light enough for the text to be read over the top of it.

Background Codes

Here is a list of the codes mentioned above. Although they are listed separately here, you will want to place them all in one tag (between one set of brackets>.

Tiled Bkground - <BODY BACKGROUND="URL">
Watermark - <BODY BGPROPERTIES="FIXED">
Bkground Color - <BODY BGCOLOR="#$$$$$$"> (2 digit order is red/green/blue)
Text Color - <BODY TEXT="#$$$$$$">
Link Color - <BODY LINK="#$$$$$$">
Visited Link - <BODY VLINK="#$$$$$$">
Active Link - <BODY ALINK="#$$$$$$">

Click HERE to proceed to the Lists Tutorial.

Lessons