What is 3rd Generation Web Design?

By Tyler Downer
3/22/08

3rd Generation(gen) Web design is becoming more and more popular on the web today, but most people who use it do not know that they are. SOS Web Design, our sponsor, specializes in 3rd gen design. The SOS InfoCenter web site is a 3rd generation web site But what exactly does the term mean? That is what you are going to find out.

1st, 2nd, 3rd, and 4th

The Internet was originally a text only interface, most computers were too. This means it looked something like the Linux shell or MS-DOS. The web sites, if you want to call them that, did not have any graphics, color or layout. It looked almost like a black and white printout. Than came graphical browsers, like Mosaic, which slowly began to allow you to use color and images in your pages. These sites often did not look very good and had minimal functionality, but we were only beginning the art.

Next came 2nd gen sites. These looked a lot better than 1st generation developments, but had very messy code and were often products of the Browser Wars. However, these 2 generations had taught us what we needed to do to produce high quality web sites that looked great and served their purpose.

3rd generation is where web design comes into it's own. This generation of sites uses the successes and mistakes of the past to make good looking sites that emphasize ease of use, accessibility, and use stricter and stricter internet standards .

Last is 4th gen. These sites look visually stunning. They use lots of technologies such as Flash and are fast becoming like desktop computing applications. These sites will eventually be the new standard. However, there are so many problems, internet speed, interoperability and more, standing between them and widespread use, that it will be several years before they become very heavily used.

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