Web pages, which are the building blocks of websites, are documents, typically composed in plain text interspersed with formatting instructions of Hypertext Markup Language (HTML, XHTML).
Static websites can be edited using four broad categories of software: Static websites may still use server side includes (SSI) as an editing convenience, such as sharing a common menu bar across many pages.
Websites are written in, or converted to, HTML (Hyper Text Markup Language) and are accessed using a software interface classified as a user agent.
Web pages can be viewed or otherwise accessed from a range of computer-based and Internet-enabled devices of various sizes, including desktop computers, laptops, tablet computers and smartphones.
Although the website owner may make updates periodically, it is a manual process to edit the text, photos and other content and may require basic website design skills and software.
Simple forms or marketing examples of websites, such as classic website, a five-page website or a brochure website are often static websites, because they present pre-defined, static information to the user.
Before the introduction of HTML and HTTP, other protocols such as File Transfer Protocol and the gopher protocol were used to retrieve individual files from a server.