what do i use?

Hello to you all.
Firstly a fantastic site that i'm sure will help me in my quest...
I'm Andy and i would like to basically like to learn to use my computer for both personal and career reasons.
so, i expect that this question has been used many times, for which i apologise now.
I am a complete newbie to this world but i am interested in learning web design / programming / macromedia flash....
My problem is that i have no idea what would be the best package / programme to use and learn with. There are plenty of people giving advice,for which i thank but who do i listen to?
Also, do i need to learn Web design before i learn Flash?
Can someone please help me in my quest.
Regards and Thanks
Andy

Hi Andy....

I would most definitly recommend you start with HTML, as every other web technology relies on it to be displayed.

You can learn HTML at www.w3schools.com

Once you have a VERY SOLID grasp of HTML, then you can move on from their.

Don't worry yet about which direction you are heading as that will probabally unfold as you walk this route.

Good luck!

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Many Thanks for the reply...
will do.

Thanks
Andy

Yeah, I'd learn HTML first... It wouldn't hurt to start looking into CSS (which can also be learned at www.w3schools.com . As for the programs to use... Too many people rely on programs to design websites these days... I was heading down that path myself and then I was forgetting what the code even was. So I had problems editing the code I used to do by hand. So now I do use Dreamweaver for fast and easy tables... but the rest is hand coded. Hand coding just makes site's look better after your done. I think you can really tell who hand codes and who uses an editor.

personally, i hand code EVERYTHING i do

When I was learning I hand coded everything in notepad or a similiar program. Nowadays I use dreamweaver simply because clients want faster results and notepad can't always offer that. Dreamweaver offers me colour-coded code which is more useful than any other feature in my opinion because I can skim through code much faster when it's colour-coded.
I'll also create table layouts in Dreamweaver. Once I have the basic layout I want (Always viewed from an external browser and not relying on the internal Dreamweaver browser, because quite simply, it isn't reliable!) I'll edit the code and use the gui to get what I want.
I always have Dreamweaver on the half-code half-design view... I think if you're serious about design then you need to do that... I also don't use it's CSS tools because I don't think they're powerful enough, but the newest Dreamweaver has some fantastic autocomplete functions. If you're typing out CSS and hit a new line, dreamweaver has a list of all the css properties you can put in... extremely handy for that one you want but haven't used for a few months and can't quite remember the name.

However, is Dreamweaver the best to learn on? No, I don't think so. I think you'll be best with notepad to learn because it forces you to think and try and visualise the code as a design and also remember the code you're trying to learn. Once you know what you're doing, a program like Dreamweaver is a good move in my opinion.

I do have Dreamweaver, and also HTML-Kit (which is free) but I don't use either - HTML-kit colour codes the code, and also supplies you with a list of attributes once you type the first tag etc.. It also finishes tags for you. But I agree with Sirkent - start on Notepad, it's always handy to know the code - imagine being a mechanic but not knowing how a car worked!

Once again thank you all for your input to help me.
I appreciate the direction i need to go towards now.

Regards
Andy