would like to make a website

You want to create a website but you don't know where to start. This tutorial shows you what software you need, a list of useful resources and how the web fits together.

Tutorial

Introduction

This tutorial does not teach you HTML, CSS or Javascript. There are tutorials on this site that already perform this task.

This tutorial tells you how you physically get the site onto the net so that people can actually view it.

The Web Host

You maybe reading this tutorial because you have been given free webspace from your Internet Service Provider and you have decided to use it to create your own web site.

You may also be reading this article because you want to create a web site but have no idea how to begin. Maybe you have the idea for the next Ebay but don't know how to get it out there. In this case I would probably recommend getting some web designers involved but read on anyway so that you get a fundamental idea how it all fits together.

First of all you need a web host. If you are using the free web space your Internet Service Provider has given you then you can skip to the next section.

A Web Host is a company that hosts web sites (obvious I know). There are thousands of machines linked together in the world called Web Servers. A Web Host will have a minimum of 1 web server but will most likely have a number of them.

A Web Host will allow you to store your pages on their machine so that other people can view them. (When I say other people I mean the world).

How much does a Web Host cost? Well if you are just starting out I would recommend getting a Web Host who will allow you to host your site for free.

A free web host obviously has greater restrictions than a paid host as follows:

• You are limited to the amount of physical disk space
• You are limited to the number of people who can view the site every month. (This is called bandwidth usage).
• File Size Limits on the files you upload
• Your web site may contain the Web Hosts own adverts.
• You may not have databases or scripts.

Don't be discouraged though as you need to learn a lot before you can even worry about most of these constraints.

Software

Ok so you have a host who is willing to host your site. Now all you need to do is create some files to put on the site.

You can if you like use the site builders that come with some of the free hosts but if you do you are missing out on everything web design has to offer.

For a little bit of your time you can create nice pages for yourself and it is very interesting.

You may or may not know this but web pages are created using HTML which stands for Hyper Text Markup Language.

Before you can write HTML though it would be good to get some software to help you.

It is possible to write web pages using Windows Notepad but it is very cumbersome and even if you have no money there are free tools out there that will help you on your way.

To find a good editor visit this link A guide to HTML Editors.

As well as a HTML editor you might wish to think about getting some graphics software.

The professionals use either Fireworks from £249 at http://www.macromedia.com or Adobe Photoshop from http://www.adobe.co.uk for £143.99.

Of course there are cheaper products used by enthusiasts such as JASC Paintshop Pro from £60 at http://www.jasc.com/en.

Then there are the freebies available at

http://www.ded.com/nonags/gredit.html

The best one is probably The GIMP which works very well indeed.

Finally you will need an FTP client to copy the files from your machine to the web server.

You can download one free from

http://www.ded.com/nonags/ftpc.html

I highly recommend FTP Surfer but everyone has their own favourite.

Creating a folder for your website

Before you do anything else create a blank folder for your website under the C: drive.

Do not place it on the desktop or in My Documents or anything like that because of the long filenames. It makes it much harder to navigate if you place your directory here.

To create a directory double click "My Computer" and then the "C" drive.

Now press the right mouse button and select New and then Folder.

Now rename the folder to something useful such as mywebsite.

Underneath this folder create another folder called images.

To do this double click with the left mouse button on the folder you just created. Then press the right mouse button and select New and then Folder. Rename the folder to images.

Also under the mywebsite folder create a folder called css.

To do this press the right mouse button and select New and then Folder. Rename the folder to css.

Manipulate your graphics

All your website graphics should be in either gif, jpg or png format. It is recommended on free web hosts to remain with gif and jpg as some free web hosts do not support png.

At this point you need your image editing software. Open the software and for each image you want on the site open the image file and save it to the images folder that you created. Make sure the format is either jpg or gif.

The images for your site need to be fairly small in file size (not physical size). If the graphic is bigger than 100k try compressing it within your image editor (The help file of the editor should be able to help you with this).

The graphics editor can also be used to create a banner and logo for your site. Again make sure you save these in the images folder you just created as either a jpg or gif file.

Time for the nitty gritty of HTML

HTML forms the building blocks of creating web pages and you cannot create a web site without knowing the very basics of HTML.

Its very easy to learn HTML and you don't have to be a computer programmer to learn it.

Uploading your site

Congratulations.

You have written your site have you and you are happy with what you have got and you want the whole world to see it.

This is where you will need your ftp client.

The ftp client is used to connect to your web host. You then upload the files from the c:\mywebsite folder to the web host.

The best thing to do is to read the help text of the ftp client that you are going to use.

Getting a domain name

Some of the professionals out there may think this is back to front and that I should have told you about getting the domain name first.

The reason I haven't is I suspect most of you are using a free web host and you probably now want to use a paid host to host your web site as they are more reliable.

Therefore I have left the get a domain name bit until now.

The above box will take you to lycos domain name page. You can buy web hosting cheap with a domain name there. Ideal for personal and small business pages in the UK.

Alternatively if you are happy with your host or have another one in mind you can by the domain name by itself from Lycos.

You can also by the domain names from a number of other pages on the web. Type domain names into google and go from there.

Once you have registered your domain if you haven't gone for the all in one solution provided by Lycos then you will need to point your domain to the server where your website is held.

Your web host should have a section where it tells you what its domain name servers are.

You need to change the name server at the place where you registered your domain to point to one of the named servers.

It may take up to 72 hours before your domain is recognised but then you should be up and running.