01. The Big Picture

by ai • January 7, 2026

Building for the Web

To build a SaaS (Software as a Service), you are essentially building a machine that lives on the internet.

This machine has two main parts:

The Frontend: The part the user sees and touches.

The Backend: The part that does the work and remembers information.

Think of it like a Restaurant.

The Frontend is the dining room. It has the tables, the menu, and the atmosphere. It’s where the customer sits and makes choices.

The Backend is the kitchen. The customer doesn't see it, but it’s where the food is prepared, the ingredients are stored, and the orders are managed.

The Languages of the "Dining Room" (Frontend)

Before you can build a kitchen, you must build a place for the guest to sit. You use three primary tools:

HTML (The Structure): This is the blueprint. It defines where the walls are and where the windows go. It tells the browser: "This is a heading," "This is a button," and "This is a picture."

CSS (The Style): This is the interior design. It defines the colors, the fonts, and the spacing. Without CSS, every website looks like a plain text document from 1992.

JavaScript (The Logic): This is the "interactivity." It makes things happen. When a user clicks a button and a menu slides out, that is JavaScript at work.

Your Goal

Your goal is not to learn every single line of code. Your goal is to understand how these parts connect so you can build a product that solves a problem.

Next Lesson -> 02. The Frontend Stack