Five Checks for Web PagesWritten by Dianne Reuby
There are a few essential checks that you must make before uploading your pages.Check basics - spelling, grammar, terminology. I've seen a lot of arguments for and against using only US spelling on web sites - I think this is a personal choice, but having made your decision, be consistent! Terminology - don't use words or phrases that aren't common around world. I read a software review recently - sadly, I didn't understand phrase used to describe program, so I don't know if reviewer was recommending it or condemning it! Check your coding. It's easy for little mistakes to creep into your HTML - especially when your tags are nested, or when you copy and paste from another page of your site. There are several free programs available - I use CSE Lite from http://www.htmlvalidator.com which also has a paid professional version. Check your links. Again, it's easy to make a slight mistake in typing a URL, or getting confused between relative and absolute references, leading to well-known **404 page not found** message! Use a link check program to find all these little errors before you launch your page on world. I use Xenu's Link Check which I downloaded from http://www.completelyfreesoftware.com/ - you'll find many other freeware link checkers.
| | GETTING YOUR OWN WEB SITE QUICKLY AND CHEAPLYWritten by Gini Graham Scott
Today, it is possible to create your own Web site in minutes and at no cost. Then, when you are ready, you can get your own domain name and Web hosting service. But first, you can experiment, develop what you want to say, and put up a site with 20-50 pages - about 5-50 MB - absolutely free. To get started, you can get a free site at many different services. These include a site through an on-line service provider, like AOL. Or you can sign-up with any number of web-based servers, generally in return for allowing for some ad banners or links on your site. Some of these servers even have their own Web building software to help you get started. Some of servers I've used myself are www.geocities.com, which is connected to Yahoo, and www.xoom.com. You can also find over 200 free Web site hosts if you go to www.freewebspace.net. Typically, if you use a free sites, you choose a name, if available, and then your name follows address of site, such as www.geocities.com/changingworld - name I used for one site. And if you want another site, come up with another name and sign on again. Once you have your site, you can easily start building your first pages in one of latest word processing programs, like Word 2000, which already have coding to turns a word processing document into a Web page. The coding is called HTML (which stands for hypertext mark-up language), but when you're just getting started you don't need to know this. Just save your document as an HTML document. If you are only going to create a few pages, a word processing program is fine. Just create your first page as index.html or index.htm, which is understood as first Web page on most servers. Then, as you create and name additional documents, add in hyperlinks to these pages, so you can move to these pages by clicking that hyperlink. Add a hyperlink on each of linked pages to take you back to your first index page and call it "home". Once you start each new page, put in your copy and any graphics just like in any word processing program. And for more control, use tables. Start with a table for your whole page and divide it table into three columns. Use first column for narrower navigator section, second for a very narrow separator column, and third for bulk of your copy. Make as many rows as you want, and use these sections to put your copy and images where you want them.
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