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Setting up a website
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charlies_mum
Posts: 8,120 Forumite
in Techie Stuff
I want to have a go at setting up a website, but don't know where to start. Are there any step by step guides that I could follow, and will I have to pay for a domain name ?
You're only young once, but you can be immature forever 
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Comments
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No you dont need a domain name but then again,it depends what the websites for? If its hobby/local community type stuff,you could just get some free webspace at lycos or via your isp. If your talking small business/newstart,you may well be advised to get professional advice.
The other thing is,assuming its the former,how do you author it?
Well again,you could use websites own sitebuilder type software or you could do design with pc based website software and upload it.
Again the former is easier for those with no knowledge.
So the question is,whats it for and how much time/knowledge do you have?0 -
If you are starting from absolute scratch I would suggest learning to type in HTML.
Google for HTML code - type it into a notepad document - save it as ***.html and you basically have your first webpage which you can view in Internet explorer. Very basic but its a start.
Then you can move onto setting up IIS on your PC and hosting your webpage!0 -
pm me for some free hosting and a free subdomain name. Then you can have a play for nothing.
i would recommend a wordpress site for a beginner.0 -
A good site for learning HTML is http://www.w3schools.com/htmL/0
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A website can be categorised into three main areas:
- A domain (SOMETHING.co.uk etc)
- A hosting account (which "stores" website files)
- The website files themselves
You can get free bannerless hosting accounts. An example is FreeHostia.com. They (by default) give you a domain for free - but this is SOMETHING.freehostia.com rather than SOMETHING.co.uk --- as you can see, it gets them some advertising. However, they also allow you to associate a domain name (such as if you registered one outlined in the above paragraph) with their free hosting account. This means there will be NO advertising whatsoever... and viewers won't be able to tell that FreeHostia has been involved at all. (I won't go into detail about how to associate a registered domain with a free hosting account, but it involves changing something called "nameservers"). The drawbacks for using a free hosting account are mainly 1) concern for "downtime" (the name when a website simply 'doesn't load'). FreeHostia are very good for reliability. The biggest drawback however is undoubtedly storage space. FreeHostia impose a maximum size for files on your website - which is ample unless you want to upload videos and music. Bandwidth (essentially how many people are 'allowed' to view/download your site) USED to be a concern on free hosting accounts, but that should not be a problem unless you will be having thousands of views per month.
The website files themselves are the most customisable bit. As suggested by an above poster, you could code a website yourself in Notepad. Unless you become an expert, however, notepad-created-websites will be very limited. As an example of a very simple website created in notepad, copy and paste this code into Notepad:
<html>
<title>Test Webpage</title>
<body>
<center><b><font face="Arial">A test page</font></b></center>
</body>
</html>
Then click File, Save As, and type in "index.html". Wherever you save it will now be a webpage file. As you can see by the naming convention in the code... the HTML tag identifies the file as a webpage. The title tag is what's displayed as the title. "Body" is code for the main content of the page. Center is centre, b is bold, font face is font. And as can be seen, it is important to "close" all of these tags by rewriting the tag with a forward slash in front of the word.
If coding yourself doesn't sound viable, you could try some website creation software such as Dreamweaver (a 30 day free trial on the Adobe website). This essentially writes the code for you. Alternatively some online companies create webpages for you, but they often include many advertisements in the code.
Hope this is enough info to get you started!0 -
If you're looking for a program to help build your site have a look at Kompozer (http://kompozer.net/) it's free and allows you to either enter the raw html code or use a WYSIWYG creation.0
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You could also try out the free Serif WYSIWG jobbie, depending what you are after
http://www.freeserifsoftware.com/software/WebPlus/default.asp?SP=FSS-G800&gclid=CO7ExMOh0JoCFQ0FZgod-xhI2QEight out of ten owners who expressed a preference said their cats preferred other peoples gardens0 -
Apparently rvsitebuilder is easy and quick to get a site up. I would probably go down the Kompozer route myself, as you have more control.
http://www.rvsitebuilder.com/
http://ezinearticles.com/?Using-RV-Sitebuilder&id=2286155GOOGLE it before you ask, you'll often save yourself a lot of time.
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SteveCutler wrote: »A website can be categorised into three main areas:
- A domain (SOMETHING.co.uk etc)
- A hosting account (which "stores" website files)
- The website files themselves
You can get free bannerless hosting accounts. An example is FreeHostia.com. They (by default) give you a domain for free - but this is SOMETHING.freehostia.com rather than SOMETHING.co.uk --- as you can see, it gets them some advertising. However, they also allow you to associate a domain name (such as if you registered one outlined in the above paragraph) with their free hosting account. This means there will be NO advertising whatsoever... and viewers won't be able to tell that FreeHostia has been involved at all. (I won't go into detail about how to associate a registered domain with a free hosting account, but it involves changing something called "nameservers"). The drawbacks for using a free hosting account are mainly 1) concern for "downtime" (the name when a website simply 'doesn't load'). FreeHostia are very good for reliability. The biggest drawback however is undoubtedly storage space. FreeHostia impose a maximum size for files on your website - which is ample unless you want to upload videos and music. Bandwidth (essentially how many people are 'allowed' to view/download your site) USED to be a concern on free hosting accounts, but that should not be a problem unless you will be having thousands of views per month.
The website files themselves are the most customisable bit. As suggested by an above poster, you could code a website yourself in Notepad. Unless you become an expert, however, notepad-created-websites will be very limited. As an example of a very simple website created in notepad, copy and paste this code into Notepad:
<html>
<title>Test Webpage</title>
<body>
<center><b><font face="Arial">A test page</font></b></center>
</body>
</html>
Then click File, Save As, and type in "index.html". Wherever you save it will now be a webpage file. As you can see by the naming convention in the code... the HTML tag identifies the file as a webpage. The title tag is what's displayed as the title. "Body" is code for the main content of the page. Center is centre, b is bold, font face is font. And as can be seen, it is important to "close" all of these tags by rewriting the tag with a forward slash in front of the word.
If coding yourself doesn't sound viable, you could try some website creation software such as Dreamweaver (a 30 day free trial on the Adobe website). This essentially writes the code for you. Alternatively some online companies create webpages for you, but they often include many advertisements in the code.
Hope this is enough info to get you started!
Hi
I had set up a web-site on web.com when I spotted this thread.
I have now purchased a co.uk domain from 123-reg.
So do I go onto webs.com and add my domain name or transfer webs.com to 123-reg. ? (I can be a bit of a techno phobe at times):o0 -
Hi
I had set up a web-site on web.com when I spotted this thread.
I have now purchased a co.uk domain from 123-reg.
So do I go onto webs.com and add my domain name or transfer webs.com to 123-reg. ? (I can be a bit of a techno phobe at times):o
i think webs.com charge for using an external domain (or used too) but you would login into 123-reg and change the nameservers to those hosted by webs.comSilenced by the Gestapo :rotfl:0
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