Web design
GnomeWizardd
Member 4 LifeAkron, PA Icrontian
I am going to try and learn how to build a site for a friends band of mine. Whats the best software to do this with?
all she really wants is a front page with a guest book. BUT she wants her own registerd addy. so i am gonna register her web address tonight and start construction when i get the program needed to do it. And of course I am gonna have sarcnet host it!
all she really wants is a front page with a guest book. BUT she wants her own registerd addy. so i am gonna register her web address tonight and start construction when i get the program needed to do it. And of course I am gonna have sarcnet host it!
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Comments
two things to note:
Intra-site refs on Sarcnet's non-Windows server(I asked to run on a non-Windows host server) are DEFINITELY case-sensitive. The path /articles/Articleindex.html does NOT EQUAL /Articles/ArticleIndex.html -- so, since doofus (ME!) made a capitalization error on ONE of my NAVbars and then saved it as a template and then pasted the NAVs to all new pages, I got to fix 20 pages....
Please watch out for this, I ran into it on a BBS I ran way back when (another operating system entirely) that proceeded to do exactly the same thing and some browser anti-spoofing and re-direct security can also make for situations where this happens also (browser might not let some surfers go there if case is not perfect throughout URL) if the server allows non-case sensitive feeding. Lesson, quintuple check your templates if you hand code and want common NAVs cut-n-pasted from a template, and DOUBLE-CHECK every URL link.
Second thing is this:
IF you get into PHP, use PHP 5+ dev tools. PHP 4+ has multiple vulns in it. AND if you use Javascript of Microsoft kind, validate it against Jscript 5.5 AND 5.6. I have commercial apps here that error against Microsoft's Javascript 5.6 which is an update for XP SP2 and WORK with MS Jscript 5.5 running. MS Jscript 5.6 uses stricter parsing technology. Something looser that runs in 5.5 might NOT work with 5.6. I will be using Sun Java applets instead if I need that kind of thing.
Last thing, and this is my GENERAL rule for sites, is to KISMIF the site (keep it simple, make it fun). In my case, I do not run out graphics, simply do not want to have to have to track graphics vulns to keep my site clean. Thus I use real simple technology.
There are some free Java (Sun) guestbooks out there, BTW. Fairly easy to code, essentially a form and a table if you keep it simple-- I have not built one of those on my site yet, too busy trying to dodge hurricanes and repair computers trashed in Charley. IN FACT I use pure HTML 4.01 for the most part on my sites now. It works in Mozilla, IE, and Opera, and a few other browsers in Linux also.
Dreamweaver 4 is actually servicable, if you can find one at discount via a software closeout broker, for basic sites. One way to get software cheap is to sign up at the community college for WebDev courses, like a site coding class. Then you will get to build a site for credit and hopefully have someone who actually can help you debug as well as get Academic discounts on the software also.
That is a few basics for beginners, and a couple of the obvious but often pitfallen things that happen. One way around this is a DOM tree analyzer or a WEBBOT driven against YOUR site with error reporting feedback features. The nice little DOM analyzer+reporting bots will exercise a site and let you see where you fubarred links quite fast. http://www.w3c.org should also have lots of tiplets for you, and Amaya (sp? this is w3C.org's baby browser plus DOM analyzer) can crawl a site tree locally for you and yell if it hits a link it cannot get to. OH! Forgot something, on the left simple NAV menu on w3c.org's site, click on the Validators link. This gives you code checking if you decide to roll your own stuff from Mozilla's composer to start with. (Lot's of folks do JUST that.)
Ask if you get stuck, there are a few of us here that can talk you through parts and details better than an overview maxi-post can begin to touch.
I have been doing web design for a while now. I have a good site now. Now on my site i am trying to get it so you have to be a member to use my site. I have been searching on google for a while and can not find anything good and free for me to use. I want to use a program becasue i am not really good at laugne. Plus i want to make it so it is hard to hack. o yea and also i want to have a username for me where i can look at the all the usernames and passwords and what they are doing on my site. So that it will have to be seperate from other user names.
please help me thanks,
Jeremy
http://www.thegamerguyonline.tk
I've been Graphic/Web Designing since 2002, I guess not that long. I've used HTML coding before, it was a hassle. Then I switched to Dreamweaver, where it lets you code and design together, code alone or design alone. Then after that, I switch to Flash for a more flashing site...hehe...there's another program..I think it's called Swish
My site is all build in Flash, the guestbook part is hosted by Geocities (except the part where it has the message board) I did that in Dreamweaver.
That brings up the topic of hosting. With most web hosts you have to pay a little extra to use a dynamic web language and/or a database. In some cases you can get these for free, more often if you use free software like PHP and MySQL (a free database). However, after a quick glance over 50megs.com's features I don't see that they offer support for ANY dynamic language, no matter how much you pay.
If you decide to change web hosts (assuming it's necessary) in an effort to utilize a dynamic language, www.hotscripts.com has plenty of prewritten code in PHP and ASP. You'll still need a reasonable understanding of the language to use them.
My recommendation: instead of spending time/money to have people log into your personal site, just get a webhost/domain that doesn't force (popup) ads down your throat.
Gnome, for some of the bells and whistles, and for not a lot of site detail work, try CoffeCup's web dev applets plus editor.... Reasonably cheap, apps that do single parts (like flash compatible NAV bar buttons, and like that). The WHOLE CUP is not bad, and some of them also have trials. http://www.coffeecup.com/ , IIRC.