Web Applications are like web sites but often have a certain purpose. An example of a web application is an online calendar or task manager. Although they are websites they are functional and act as any other computer program. The advantage of web applications are that they can be accessed from anywhere, can be used by multiple users, and there is more flexibility as to exactly what you want the program to do. Almost anything you need or want to be done can be captured in a web application. You can customize and build a web application to use to automate some of your work, organize your work, use as a communication portal between partners, or any other service you need. Web applications often employ a number of client and server side programming languages. Some common terms that come up in web application development are listed below.

SQL/MS-Access/Database - MySQL, MS-Access are two popular database applications used is web design. A database allows you to store information

CSS (Cascading Style Sheet) - CSS used to control the style and layout of multiple Web pages all at once. You can save a lot of work in updating websites by using CSS as a layout tool.

Javascript - JavaScript is used to improve page design, validate forms, detect browsers, create cookies, and much more. Its the most popular scripting language on the internet, and works in all major browsers. It is most useful for creating interactive websites.

DHTML - Dynamic HTML is the art and science of making web pages dynamic. It is a combination of technologies used to create interactive and dynamic websites. The most popular combination is to use a combination of HTML, CSS, and Javascript.

.NET/ASP (Active Server Pages) - ASP is a Microsoft technology and is a server side scripting language. It allows you to dynamically edit, change or add any content of a Web page, respond to user queries or data submitted from HTML forms, access any data or databases and return the results to a browser, and customize a web page to make it more useful for individual users.

PHP (Hypertext Preprocessor) - A server side scripting language much like ASP, but runs on different platforms unlike ASP which runs only on Windows Servers. Like ASP PHP allows you to dynamically edit, change or add any content of a Web page, respond to user queries or data submitted from HTML forms, access any data or databases and return the results to a browser, and customize a web page to make it more useful for individual users.

Java/C/C++ - These are software development applications used to develop software on and off the web.

Perl/CGI - A powerful server side scripting language used to develop interactive websites and web applications. Predecessor to ASP and PHP.