Content and Presentation

While content (aka data - text, video, audio, graphics) lives in a database, it gets 'dressed up' to come out on display. A simple and popular way of dressing up content for display on the web is HTML (hypertext markup language).

When you leave your home you might dress according to the function you will be attending - in athletic clothes to go play sports, in a suit to go to a formal, in your jeans to visit a good friend, etc..... Well content gets 'dressed up' (aka formatted) differently depending on how it's being presented/accessed. HTML is a simple way of presenting content on the web but there are more appropriate techniques for presenting content on a mobile phone, pager, bank machine, mp3 player, digital TV or stereo for example.

Sometimes you'll come across the word 'encoded' which, for our purposes, is just another term for formatting data for the appropriate context. A video game gets 'encoded' differently for an arcade, for a playstation, and for a game-boy for example. A piece of text might be encoded differently from another for security reasons (i.e a password).