Web 2.0 is an expression coined by O'Reilly unfolding the new trends in design and development appearing transversely a flood of innovative websites. Designing for the web, today requires leveraging knowledge and well-tested design principles while escalating the amount of interaction and "social" components accessible to your users.

The Web 2.0 has apparently brought major design innovation in the form of rounded corners, pastel colors, 3D embossed shiny buttons, floor reflections and large text captions and many, a designer have quickly adopted and made theirs this new simpler, more visually impactful and highly intelligible 2.0 technique.

Web 2.0 Design principles

1. Keep it Simple - Include only necessary functionality and provide a clean efficient design. 2. Make it Social - Meet users expectations by enabling connections through social tools. 3. Offer Alternate Navigation - Reflect the Zeitgeist of the website community and embrace alternate pathways to information including utilizing visual tools.

Web 2.0 Website Examples -

We keep these in our mind while design a web 2.0 layout

• Centered Design - Compatible with various browsers, screen sizes and resolutions.
• Graphics - Rounded Edges, Drop Shadows, Gradients and Reflective Surfaces.
• Fonts - San Serif, Lower Case, Large Fonts.
• Simple Persistent Navigation - appears on each page throughout the website
• Logos - Which represent brands.
• Strong/Complementary Colors - Emphasize important concepts as well as for creating distinction between areas of a page.
• Simple Icons - Representing actions which can be taken by the user.
• Whitespace - Focusing on the essentials, and producing clean and fresh pages.
• Advance User Interfaces - AJAX, Large Tabs, Drag & Drop, AutoComplete, Maps, WYSIWYG, and other "Social" features.