How to make your own website

[stealthify]

$79 a year for the Domain

Is that for a .com.au domain? Or just a .com?

If that's just a .com, that's a bit steep. Alternatively, I do know that .com.au's are a bit pricier ($65+/year).

[DrGonzo]

Justhost.com - Unlimited everything, 3 free domains, Joomla, Wordpress, OSCommerce already installed. and only $6.95 a month.

Web Hosting : Just Host

I have been using them for years now and never had any issues with them at all.

[IPD]

becoming fluent in HTTP is your friend.

[NickS VR4]

becoming fluent in HTTP is your friend.

My new friend is CSS and <div>

[Jimvr4]

I setup my web site with a CMS. I still have no clue on HTML and frankly I don't need it. I sell a few Spyder related things using Paypal buttons. I renewed my domain for around $120 for ten years directly with a registrar and I pay $4 per month for web hosting. My traffic is increasing though and I might have to pay more for bandwidth.

[J-Groove]

First off stay away from those damn website builder programs. The code they generate is shit and it always looks like crap in the end. A real developer would not be caught dead using Dreamweaver and a newbie should stay the hell away from it and learn the core language first.


Start by going here: HTML Tutorial

Download notepad++ Notepad++ Home Great tool for editing all types of files.

A basic webpage is nothing more that a bunch of text "HTML" files that the browser reads. You can create them right on your computer using any notepad/textpad program, save them on your desktop, and open them on your browser.

Start with the W3 Schools tutorials. The start you off small and build you up. plus their tutorials have a built in interface that lets you type code on the webpage and see how it will be displayed.

once you have the basic HTML down, move on to the CSS tutorials, than the Javascript tutorials.

Want to get real fancy move onto learning PHP "Server Side Scripting"and SQL which will allow connection to a database and store information, but you will need to run LAMP "Linux,Apache,MySQL,PHP" to work with it all. You can download the environment and run it on any machine for free. XAMPP is my personal choice as it bundles them all together into one but also includes an Email server and FTP server.

While I agree with everything you said with the exception "a real developer would not be caught dead using Dreamweaver"

Really?

While yes, I can see your point to some extent, especially from a beginner's standpoint, but for more experienced dreamweaver is a great tool.

If anything just for the easy of setting up a nice color coded system in the source view. Any site I am coding I'm working within dreamweaver, all of my CSS pages are nice an color coded for ease of finding the line I'm looking for months later. Also a person can follow behind me and easily figure out what I did and why. Yes all the code is the same, but it is nice when you have your comments in a different color instead of all black in notepad where you need to pray that the person used tabs correctly.

-John

[Alan92RTTT]

Why is everyone paying over $10/yr for a domain? Hosting costs money, not the domain.

Some of the prices listed are not in USD some are in AU.

[DrGonzo]

While I agree with everything you said with the exception "a real developer would not be caught dead using Dreamweaver"

Really?

While yes, I can see your point to some extent, especially from a beginner's standpoint, but for more experienced dreamweaver is a great tool.

If anything just for the easy of setting up a nice color coded system in the source view. Any site I am coding I'm working within dreamweaver, all of my CSS pages are nice an color coded for ease of finding the line I'm looking for months later. Also a person can follow behind me and easily figure out what I did and why. Yes all the code is the same, but it is nice when you have your comments in a different color instead of all black in notepad where you need to pray that the person used tabs correctly.

-John

Notepad++ does the same thing for color coding without the hefty price tag. Plus Notepad++ works with 99% of the languages out there.

Granted Dreamweaver has a lot of features packed into it like FTP, Check-in/Check-out, Auto building CSS, build in web service and drop down functions listing but it was all derived from already existing open source projects/software. I've been Developing/programming now for 12+ years and have yet to meet one core developer that uses Dreamweaver and that is usually cause their all a bunch on Unix/Linux guys who have gotten used to working with open source platforms.

[J-Groove]

Notepad++ does the same thing for color coding without the hefty price tag. Plus Notepad++ works with 99% of the languages out there.

Granted Dreamweaver has a lot of features packed into it like FTP, Check-in/Check-out, Auto building CSS, build in web service and drop down functions listing but it was all derived from already existing open source projects/software. I've been Developing/programming now for 12+ years and have yet to meet one core developer that uses Dreamweaver and that is usually cause their all a bunch on Unix/Linux guys who have gotten used to working with open source platforms.

That is true, now that I think about it all of our in house programers use notepad++ and 2/3rds of them are on Linux.

I'm a sr. graphic designer, so with living all things Adobe for all my life just about Dreamweaver is just par for the course for me and my team.

Also...I'm on a Mac...runs away and hides. Textwrangler is supposed to be similar to Notepad++ for Mac, but I haven't tried it.

In your original post I miss read notepad++ and just notepad. I learned to code HTML and C++ in notepad, but that is something I never want to go through again. haha

-John

[stealthify]

While I agree with everything you said with the exception "a real developer would not be caught dead using Dreamweaver"

Really?

Dreamweaver can be a useful tool. However, what hasn't been mentioned, and a large reason that many developers turn their nose up at it, is because it can easily be abused (more specifically with the WYSIWG design editor). Sure, it may save you from having to really learn HTML/CSS, but it also has been known to write sloppy, non-standards compliant code. It's deceptively easy to fall into this bad practice when you're first starting out, and most 'professionals' would agree that you'd do a much better job if you just take the time to learn the language and construct it in text-based editor instead.

Text-based editors (like Notepad++) have come a long way over the years. I suppose the reasons professionals prefer them (beyond the bad stigma associated with Dreamweaver), is because they're more lightweight, packs in a lot of useful features (FTP, subversioning, multi-language capabilities, terminal integration, better commenting system, adjustable syntax color highlighting, etc), and for the most part are pretty bug-free.

For the Mac users, I would suggest looking into Espresso, TextMate, TextWrangler or VIM. Alternatively and personally, I've been using Panic's Coda for most of my work over the years, and I love just about every bit of it.

Ultimately, the choice is yours. But hopefully that explains things a bit better.