Question about using free webspace

pernes

Hi, I have 15mb of webspace with my broadband account I would like to set up a page that would have a interactive calendar on it, that would indicate when my apartment would be available to rent, but I have no idea how to go about it!

My theory is I would give people the link to the page, they key in the dates for when they want to stay at the apartment and it would confirm to the person if it is available or if they need to search again.

So is this possible?
Where would I get an interactive calendar from?
How would I update it to block out weeks which have already been taken?
Can I put links to other sites on the page ie: airlines, or do I need there permission.

Many thanks

tigermatt

Unless you plan to do this by using a third party tool and then put a link on your website, the easiest and best way to accomplish this is to use a server-side scripting language like PHP or ASP in conjunction with a database, e.g. MySQL or SQL Server. This would allow you to generate a calendar and store dates when your apartment is booked.

However, your free webspace probably doesn't allow you to run anything such as PHP or ASP - it is most likely HTML only. This means you would have to purchase some other webspace to use, or use the free one that was on here a while ago that gave you free PHP and MySQL support in return for some small text adverts at the bottom.

If you aren't sure what you are doing, I would search for a third-party tool which runs on someone else's site and you just create a page with a link to the other person's site. I haven't searched for one, but there are probably tools to do this with, some are probably free and others may be commercial tools/web software - it is possible!

Darksun

php+SQL is the best way to do this, there are some very competitivly priced hosts that provide these services.

As for linking to other people's sites, there's not really any reason to ask them for permission (although it's generally considered bad practice to 'hotlink' - linking to a file or image directly, rather than a web page)

tigermatt

Darksun wrote:

As for linking to other people's sites, there's not really any reason to ask them for permission (although it's generally considered bad practice to 'hotlink' - linking to a file or image directly, rather than a web page)

I meant they provide the service and you have some sort of JavaScript code or frame etc. that pulls the data off of the other site. There are loads of sites that provide such services for people who don't have PHP, ASP, MySQL/SQL Server, CGI/Perl support or people who don't want to make their own web programs. A common example: Bravenet.com.