AWS Internet -

Custom Programming:
A guide to choosing languages and hosting platforms

Does your business need specialized programming? Is your site woefully static, in need of interactive or database-driven content? AWS can help:

Custom programs designed specifically for your business
Pre-designed website systems that help you save money
Platform-specific coding (IIS, Apache, etc.)
Small solutions or large

Today's Internet is no longer made up of "static" HTML pages. Rather, most of the pages you see as you browse are dynamic, meaning they are actually "buckets" of sorts, into which designers put information according to the requests you make. This interactivity makes the Internet what it is: it drives business, entertainment, information transfer, searches, and is growing daily in scope and capability.

No website development firm would be complete without dynamic coding in its suite of abilities, and naturally, AWS can do this too. We code mainly in PHP/MySQL on the Apache server, but are well versed in other scripting languages such as ASP.NET, XML, and on the client side, JavaScript and CSS. We also take advantage of this technology to make your data-driven website as search engine friendly as it can be (see below for details).

Click on the images below to see how AWS can help your site take full advantage of each of these languages. You'll also find a primer on what each one does and what operating systems it works with, for use as you research your company's needs.

	PHP is an open-source, highly versatile and very popular server-side coding language.
	ASP is a Microsoft-developed server side coding language, usually used on Microsoft's IIS or Server2000 servers.
	Java is one of the most powerful programming languages out there today. It is cross-platform, which means it works on PC's, Macs and all other computers, and can interact with all major computer resources to create full-featured, rich applications.
	CSS ("Cascading Style Sheets") are what make websites look really spiffy. They are responsible for everything from the underlines that appear on links when you mouse over them, to accessibility features, to special display of tables and backgrounds.
	JavaScript is quite handy, allowing for different types of interaction with a user's browser, including popup alerts, form validation for accurate content, and graphical manipulation.
	Perl allows a programmer to control email, page content, and pretty much every other aspect of a site and server--and it's cross-platform.
	XML ("Extensible Markup Language") is the basis for CSS and fuels RSS feeds (news content generated dynamically and spread to partner websites), AIML ("Artificial Intelligence Markup Language", used, for instance, to create AOL Instant Messenger bots), and also for database integration.
	ColdFusion was developed by Macromedia and is integrated with its StudioMX suite of web development programs. It is a coding language similar but quite different from ASP and PHP.

Will my website still be search engine friendly if it's dynamic?

Dynamic websites face a problem. Pages on dynamic sites are not actually separate, distinct pages that a search engine can index. Each acts as a container for the information it must display based on the user's input or navigational choices, so the data can change all the time. Because of this state of constant change, search engines do not want to try indexing all the information these pages could possibly provide: their indexing spiders could become bogged down in one site just trying to track down those thousands of "pages" of data.

This is the reason AWS uses a tool called Mod-Rewrite to create dynamic websites that are also search engine friendly. Mod-Rewrite fools the search engines into believing a dynamic page is several different pages based on what data it is displaying. If you've been reading about our Internet Marketing solutions, you might at this point think, "Isn't fooling search engines bad?" Your gut is right, but in this case the deception is actually a good thing. It makes it easier for spiders to crawl a site, while also giving users a better, easier URL to remember (instead of "http://www.example.com?article=12345&title=Internet%20Solutions" we can use "http://www.example.com/article/12345-Internet-Solutions.html"). The search engine sees this as a static HTML page in a subdirectory of the website, rather than a dynamic page that it will only partially index. Content is better organized, and search engines like this.

Contact us today to find out how custom programming, Mod-Rewrite and our Internet Marketing management can benefit your site and your business.