How to design a website

[Jacklynn]

So I have been thinking of purchasing a domain name. They actually are pretty cheap. Godaddy has them starting at like 10.00 a year.

My question is... if I do buy one... like how do I actually design the website. As a teen I had one of those geocities websites and had lots of fun playing around with that, but when you purchase a domain does it come with software or something to put stuff on it, or how do you make it? Do you have to upload your own software?

If any of you have your own domain like www. yourname.com and know anything about it let me know! I figure mrs. weblady will be able to help :) but I figured she wasn't the only thing who would know anything about it.

Thanks!

[DaisyBride08]

I'm not much help with your questions, but I do know http://www.mywedding.com provides completely *free* wedding sites. That's where I did mine a few weeks ago and I was really happy with the way it turned out. If you want to take a look at mine it's http://mywedding.com/nicholleandjoshua

That might save you money! Good luck! :D

[Jacklynn]

Thanks, but I don't need a wedding website, that time has come and gone, and I did have one that was matthewandjacklynn.com for that, but that came with a program that you could input the info.

Will I need like frontpage or something?

[LVBride2Be]

I think you would need frontpage.

[DaisyBride08]

Oh, oops, sorry! I thought you meant you needed one for your wedding.

[SerendipityCrafts]

You can design it yourself using software meant for this or you can also purchase pre-made templates.

[Jacklynn]

You can design it yourself using software meant for this or you can also purchase pre-made templates.

software such as frontpage? or is there different kinds?

[RevMatty]

You can try Office Live Online. Designed by Microsoft, It's the program I use for my site. Plus they host it on their own server. Many a diffrent options, including one that is free, including the regestering your domain name.
Click Here to take a look (http://officelive.com)

[WebLady]

Like Elizabeth said, there are template designs you can purchase (might be able to find some with adds for free) and just drop in your info and pictures.

There are some hosting places that will give you a web creator thing; I think Yahoo and Google offer something like this. The few that I have seen I don't care for as they are limited and I can do better ;)

You can always try to create the site yourself if you know basic HTML code. Me; I use FrontPage most of the time. I will also use Photoshop for graphics and such.

ETA - Other popular html editing programs are DreamWeaver and GoLive.

[frenchie]

My personal take on this would be don't use frontpage, don't use dreamweaver or any of those expensive softwares.
Install a CMS. There are tons of free, effective, open-source CMS, which come with nice templates you can use or create yourself, if you know basic HTML and CSS (it took me a day of reading CSS tutorials to start designing some pretty nice ones).
The CMS will take care of putting all of your site content in a database or in text files on your server and organizing them nicely.
A wiki is also nice for that (pmwiki stores everything in text files and is fully customizable - if you password protect editing it's the easiest CMS you'll ever use).
The nice thing is that it's all free. And you don't have to worry about code or formatting once you've selected a template : it's all done for you. Kind of like a blog (a blog is really a special kind of CMS).
They generally are pretty easy to install, too (especially pmwiki, if you do choose to go by that route I have several templates I made for it that I can give you, in addition to the ones you can download on the website).

There's also some pretty cool photo album software out there you can install on your server and it takes care of the photos for you. Plogger is one that comes to mind, but there are others.

The problem with FrontPage is that it creates code that isn't valid, and that makes your page horrible looking on any browser other than Internet Explorer, and it's not accessible to people who have screen readers or the like. It's not a very efficient way of coding.

If you give more info on what kind of site you want, I can better advise you as to what CMS to pick out.

The difference between a CMS and all the other software mentioned is that Dreamweaver, Golive, etc... will generate HTML pages you can upload to your server, and you have to change them in your software and re-upload them everytime.
A CMS is installed directly on the server (usually you upload a directory containing the software) and then you go through an install form in your web brower and you're done. Kind of like signing up for a blog.

[SerendipityCrafts]

software such as frontpage? or is there different kinds?

Yes there are a few different ones. We use Dreamweaver but you might already have one which came with your computer software.

In that most people don't want to pay DH for the time that it takes to properly design a site & build a site, he normally recommends the templates - they can be of nice design & tweaked to suit your needs.

If you don't already know a bit of HTML by now, you will once you start in on this web page. It's always a learning process.

[frenchie]

I would be "careful" with templates, though. Lots of sites advertise their templates, but either they are templates made to work with a particular CMS (in which case, take it by all means, if you like it - after going to the demo page and viewing it in different browsers and using the w3c validator to check that it's properly done)

Or they can be templates made to work with a particular software. In which case I don't really know how to use them. I always hand-code my sites if I'm not using a wiki or a CMS of some sort.

Recap : before choosing a template :

1. enter the url of the "demo site" into the w3c validator to see if the code is valid. A few minor errors MAY be acceptable to you. Just so you know if it's ok or if it's badly designed "under the hood".

2. Validate the css too. There's a seperate css validation form on w3c. This is slightly more difficult to do, as css can be embedded in the html.

3. check it in several web browsers (Firefox, Internet Explorer, Safari and Opera are all free and available on Windows, except Internet Explorer but you paid for it when you bought Windows).
If you like it in all 4, chances are it will be fine with other browsers which tend to use similar rendering. Those are the main ones anyway.

4. Before downloading (especially if it costs money) make sure you have the right CMS or software to use it. And that there are installation instructions that you think you can follow.

5. Before downloading, connect to the internet without broadband and see how fast it loads. (the demo site) Most users have broadband nowdays, but some don't and you don't want to leave them too frustrated.

6. Avoid flash at all costs. Flash takes long to load, looks nifty but in most cases annoys visitors. It does not look pro in general. And it makes your site harder for google to index, and impossible for people with screen readers to view (generally people who have eyesight problems).

7. Don't use animated gifs, marquees or blinks. They annoy visitors making them want to leave your website immediately.

8. Don't have popup commercials, especially ones that follow your mouse as you navigate, or any of those annoying talking smilies. If you want ads, get text ads that stay where they are and people can easily ignore if they want to or click on if they want to. People ignore banner ads. Avoid popup windows - most people block them, and for good reason.

Those are the main tips I can think of.

[hummingbird521]

My daughter has a domain name through yahoo and has a forum on it. i will ask her if they had templates and such.

[*Tara*]

I'm not much help with your questions, but I do know http://www.mywedding.com provides completely *free* wedding sites. That's where I did mine a few weeks ago and I was really happy with the way it turned out. If you want to take a look at mine it's http://mywedding.com/nicholleandjoshua

That might save you money! Good luck! :D

thats defiantely handy for me though!! thanks!!! :D