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Publishing Your Webpage
So, you want
to publish your own webpage? Well, that is simple enough, just follow along as I lead you through the process. Soon, with a little work, you can have your very own webpage on the World Wide Web.
1.) In the Beginning...
The first step is getting the page created. If this is your first time creating a page, then read on. If you have already created a
page and know what I'm talking about, then you may skip this section.
WebPages are created in a 'language' called Hypertext Mark-up Language, or HTML for short. Using HTML, you
will define how your page will look, what text and images go where, and other assorted stuff along those lines. The basics of HTML are simple, con sisting of mostly formatting and
layout instructions called 'tags'.
If you are unfamiliar with HTML, there are many places on the Web where you can get tutorials and instructions on making webpages, but I
highly
recommend visiting your local library and bookstores, as they are sure to offer more in-depth books than you wi ll find on the Web. Finding a good book on HTML can save you a lot of time and effort in the long run, especially if you are new to page making.
For now, the following two places are pretty good to learn the basics of HTML:
- The Bare Bones Guide to HTML is a very well laid out guide, and comes in several languages, several formats, to fit your needs. Here is the plain text, E nglish version which contains a lot of the basics to get you started.
- Sizzling Jalfrezi HTML is a bit more advanced, but it also covers a lot more. It also lists HTML tags in an alphabetical order.
Once you get your webpage created,
you'll be ready to place it on the web!
2.) Moving In...
To place your webpage out on the web here at MIDMI.NET, you will need to upload it to your "home
directory" on our server. This is a relatively simple process, which I will now walk you through. To start, you need to have some FTP Client software. FTP i s short for
File Transfer Protocol, or what the Internet uses to move files from one server to another. You will be using your FTP software to move your webpage files (The actual pages, plus
any graphics you might place on there.) from your computer to o ur server here. Some common FTP clients are FTP Explorer for Win95/NT, WS_FTP for Win3.x, and Fetch
for the Macintosh. Here is where to get these:
Now that you also have your FTP software, you will want to use similar
settings to connect to your server to upload your pages:
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Server Name
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: users.midmi.com
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Username
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: (Your hosting Username)
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Password
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: (Your hosting login password)
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Initial Directory
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: www/ (normally)
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If everything works correctly (and it should ;-) you should be presented
with a list of your Home Directory, or if you used the Initial Path option, a blank directory listing. This is assuming that this is your first time, so there
should be nothing in y our 'www' directory on the server. If you are not in your 'www' directory, then you need to change your directory so that you
are. Usually this is done by double clicking on the icon representing the directory. If you don't have a 'www' directory withi n your Home Directory,
you will need to create one using your FTP client software.
It is in the 'www' directory that you need to copy your webpage files. This
usually consists of .htm and .html webpage files, and .gif and .jpg image files. Once you get the files in place on the server, you will want to rename
your opening page (the one people will see upon first accessing your page) to index.html so that it automatically loads when you have visitors. If you
don't, visitors will instead get a listing of your directory and you do not want that.
3.) Things to Take Note of...
When you create and copy your files, take note of how the files are named and if they are in UPPER or lowercase. Our server is very case-sensitive to
file names, so if your webpage is looking for 'myface.jpg' but it is called 'myface.JPG' on the server, it will not be able to find it. A very common
practice is to keep all your files in lowercase, as well any references to them in your webpages. This will save you a lot of troubleshooting in the long run. :-)
When you transfer your files, you may have to tell your FTP client how to transfer it, either in ASCII or Binary mode. Most of the time, you will not
have to worry about this, as darn near all modern FTP clients automatically 'know ' which m ode to transfer a file in. However, you might sometimes
have to choose. For instance, if you want to make a certain word processing (like WordPerfect or Word97) file available for download, you
would think that you would transfer it in ASCII (text) mode , but really, you would want it to be transferred as Binary. FTP clients might not know how
to determine this, so you have to tell them. Check the Help menus in the client for more info on this.
4.) The End is just Another Beginning...
Now that you have the basics, you will soon be ready to move on to more and more creative, innovative webpages. Since the web is an ever evolving
place with newer and newer technologies, you may want to keep looking for places to learn more.
Looking to add a Web Counter to your webpage?
Good Luck and Have Fun!!!
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