Browsers

The top browswers include Internet Explorer, Firefox, Opera, and Chrome.There is conflicting data about which browser is most widely used. Explorer has always been number one but Firefox use has graduated to a near tie in popularity. The changing useage makes it important that proper testing is done before a site is launched. Internet Explorer renders certain CSS and HTML differently than Firefox. If you test your pages in Chrome and Firefox, then it should be ok with Opera,without many differences, but certain versions of Explorer may be different. One way to work with the differnt style rendering is to publish different CSS files for each browser. Specify in the head tag which CSS to load in relation to the broweser accessing the page. The code that tells the page to load a specific CSS is a conditional comment.

Templates vs Originality

There are two basic foundations in the structure of websites, style and functionality. The developer who can logically flow through lines of code without stopping very often to see what it looks like could be classified stronger in the area of funcionality. Those who take into consideration the color scheme and layout without regard of how it will fit programmically into the implementation are stronger in aesthetics. For a balance, logical thinker will benefit greatly from templates. Any search engine will bring up a multitude of choices to consider. Usually the person purchasing the template can choose between a one time use fee and to purchase the template outright. The aesthetically talented will know what they want the site to look like, and can breeze through css layout and color coordination but may face a hiccup when it comes to elements like data access and javascript. There are a multitude of programming discussion sites with everything from asp to Ruby on Rails. The choices are endless, just Google what your looking for whether templates or code snippets to get impressive balanced results.

Business Cards

As an individual selling services, which is what someone designing and publishing websites for small businesses does, there will be a fair amount of marketing to keep the job inquirys coming in. A business card can go a long way for a small cash outlay. There are several online vendors that allow designing remotely over the internet. A few thing to take into consideration include color, graphics, and what informnation to include. Always have a website, phone number, and email along with the name of yourself as well as the company represented. A basic statement such as "We sell for less" or "Quality is our focus" is fine. Color and graphics play a role as well. By Googling "how to choose a business card", a list of business card printers as well as tips and tricks will be available. For as little as $5.99 for 250 cards vistaprint.com can get the process started.
By purchasing a few holders and setting them in a business you frequent it is a good way to get your name out,and leads will slowly trickle in.

Abbreviations

There are times when trying to carry on an intelligent conversation that the eyes loose focus and the head tilts. A common time for this to happen is when the person engaging in a conversation does not know what the heck the other person is going on about.
When it comes to IT acronyms and abbreviations,these may help.
BLOG - Web Log
CGI - Common Gateway Interface - Scripts are processed serverside, can be used with a few different languages. Used with HTML forms.
CIO - Chief Information Officer - Head of IT for a company.
COBOL-Common Business-oriented Language
CONFIG - Configuration
CPU - Central Processing Unit
CSS - Cascading Style Sheet
GIF - Graphics Interchange Format (image file name extension)
HDD - Hard Disk Drive
SaaS - Software as a Service
ICANN - International Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers
HTTP - HyperText Transfer Protocol
RoR - Ruby on Rails
SEO - Search Engine Optimization
SQL - Structured Query Language
AVI - Audio Video Interleave

Small Business Statistics

It's always a good idea to stay on top companies and individuals who work with web development.Velvet Blues,a web development company, posted in their blog that "According to a joint study conducted by Nielsen and WebVisible, 44% of small businesses do not have websites". That is and incredible statistic. They go on to name 4 of the biggest myths that are primarily to blame. I agree with Velvet Blues that these are myths and would like to consider Myth#4, Traditional ads are more effective. Traditional ads are considered newspapers and phone books. Consider phone books for a moment. They sit in the closet, get dusty, and sometimes may be utilized as a boost to an office chair facilitating use of a computer to search for a business.Consider the ads themselves, not just the container the ads are distributed in. Advertisements contain websites. A good reason to have a website address in your ad is content. To publish half of the information most websites deliver in a newspaper or phone book would involve full page ads with astronomical rates. Thank you for posting these myths and proving them bogus, Velvet Blues. Hopefully it will help business owners to stop advertisement budget bleeding. Maybe a few trees will be saved in the process as well.

.doc ? .txt ? wysiwyg?

The only tools needed to publish a simple web page is a browser and Word Pad, the default text editor that comes with Windows. It is possible, but not as easy as a wysiwyg,What You See is What You Get, program. Considered by many as a top program on the market is Adobe Dreamweaver. The most current available is CS4 version but every rose has a thorn and this software retails around $400. Amazon.com did have CS4 for $359 with free shipping,and CS3, which is a great program as well, for only $99.For a highly rated open source wysiwyg editor, try xstandard. X Standard Lite is freeware, which means there is no cost. There is Xstandard Pro whick does have a fee and the specific differences are listed on the website. Do not try to publish an html page with Microsoft Word, It fills the html with program specific code that enabled Word to create the page.

Plan it Out

Organizing and planning a website thoroughly is essential. By keeping a dedicated flash memory, it reduces the risk of loosing files. A theme tablet is useful for recordings ideas, hours spent on the job and resources.For a small business website, even a one gigabyte flash storage will usually suffice, and Amazon has two gigabyte USB flash drives for under eight dollars with shipping included. Keep the flash drive in a clasp type folder with a notebook. By keeping good notes in a centralized location it makes updating the website much easier in the future.Commenting notes in the actual code is good too but all the text loads when a page is requested and it may not be wise to let the comments get too large. When it is time to invoice for the job, the hours will already recorded and can serve useful for compiling estimates on similar projects. Organizing and planning properly will ensure that one project will be a foundation for another.

Personal Web Server

It is a good idea to setup a personal web server on your machine. I am working only with Microsoft for the basic reason that it is all I know. If anyone has information on Mac or Linux, please, by all means share with us. IIS stands for Windows Internet Information Services and is the software to use for setting up your personal web server. With IIS (Internet Information Services) you can put together your website, see how it looks and functions, then upload the polished version of your web application to your virtual host. Microsoft has information on it's MSDN website about how to load IIS to your machine and which operating systems work with which version. MSDN stands for Microsoft Developer Network. The Operating Systems of Windows XP Professional, Windows Server 2003, and Windows 200 Server Professional all have IIS ready to install through add new programs in the control panel. Have your Windows CDs close by because sometimes it asks for you to insert the original program CD. The root directory for your web application will be the wwwroot directory. That wwwroot directory can be found at C:\Inetpub\wwwroot.
Next Post we will learn a bit about FTP transfer to get your files from your computer to your host server.

From Your Computer to Your Virtual Host

When the website is running on the personal web server and has been checked for errors it can be transferred to the virtual host. The transfer of the information is done through FTP, File Transfer Protocol. There is software to ease that process available for purchase but there is also an excellent open source software that you will not be charged for. The open source ftp client software is called Filezilla. Once downloaded and installed files can be transferred from the personal web server to the host server by simply dragging and dropping the files from the window showing the PWS, personal web server to the one showing the virtual host.

Search Engines

Once the site is put together and ready to go online there will ultimatiy be questions from the client on where the site will show up in serarch engine inquirys. There are a few baics of search engine optimization rules that can bring results when followed. Keep in mind the head on every page, that's where you'll want to have meta tags. Spiders crawl the internet and look for the meta information. If the site is constructed with frames, the head of each frame document should have it's own meta information. Keywords, descriptions, and text are all contributing factors. Keywords are best utilized when they are relevant to the content in that particular page. In the head of your document put the keywords in a meta tag < meta name = "keywords" content = "...." />. The description of your page is the blip of information that will accompany your search engine results. Write down a few descriptive sentences that best describe that page. The tag for enclosing this information is a meta tag in the head as well and has a similar format to the keyword tags. < meta name = " description" content = "...." />. This is a key place where the person will decide to click on the results or not. Google does not get information from the meta tags, it uses text in the page. Use keywords wherever you can, and make sure there are keywords in your alt property of your image tag. Use keywords in their natural flow of language, that's where you will get the best results.

Your Bit of Real Estate on the Internet

Websites are connected by a network of larger networks of networks. Websites are published on a computer connected twenty four hours a day, seven days a week to that network. You can rent space on computers that will stay connected with your website all the time. The process of renting the space is called virtual hosting. There are quite a few companies that offer this service but the best thing is to go with an established, well rounded one. I prefer Network Solutions. They have been around for awhile and offer nice combination plans for start ups. If you host with them for a one year contract, ask about how you can get your domain registered free. Another nice perk is their customer service. If tech support can't answer your question, they get someone who can. Most providers of hosting packages will include an email account (or 100) so that you can receive email with the format of yourname@yourdomain.com. Network Solutions offers 300 Gigabytes of space for $10 a month. That includes 25 email addresses and free registration of your domain. We will review a sample of hosting providers in another post and should you decide you were not happy with your hosting, it is not difficult to switch.
In our next post we will discuss how to setup a virtual server on your desktop

Register Your Dot Com

The Keeper of the Names
The address of your website is registered with a domain name server to allow user friendly names. ICANN is the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, a non profit organization that oversees the registration of top level domains. Those registrations for names can be done through companies with more well known names like Yahoo, Go Daddy and Network Solutions. I personally like the service at Network Solutions and would recommend them for domain registration and server space. There are several suffixes to choose from and are not limited to .com. Organization is represented by ".org", network ,".net", and governmental agencies by ".gov".
The name you want to use is subject to availability and may require a creative thought process to find a name that is not taken with the suffix you want.
Trial and Error
A good way to approach trying name availability is with ten names to try at first instead of just one. For example, if you want autoparts.com, make a list that would include variations of that like easyautoparts.com, ezautoparts.com, netautoparts.com.
Once you have a list you can try it out at Network Solutions for free. They will also let you know what is available in .net, .org, .biz and others.

Free School

In the last post we talked about setting up a work space  with a computer, internet access, and a filing system based on paper.  Here we will discuss a learning option that is thorough and free of charge. There are many different ways to approach publishing a website, but all are based on  the cornerstone of HTML. HTML stands for Hyper Text Markup Language.  HTML can be formatted on the screen in different ways but the universal approach is with CSS. CSS stands for Cascading Style Sheets. Founded in 1994 by Tim Berners-Lee the international organization that standardizes the World Wide Web is the WC3.  WC3 stands for the World Wide Web Consortium. The WC3 offers free tutorials that are well constructed and are useful to both beginners and seasoned developers alike.
 W3C Schools are step by step.  You do not need to have any knowledge before you start the HTML, and you do not need any special tools. They have quizzes where you can test what you have learned at each level. In addition to the quizzes they offer an application where you can test out what you are being taught. Once you know the fundamentals of HTML, CSS, and XHTML you’re given an option to take an exam and get certified as an HTML Developer.  There is a $59 fee to take the test but all the learning materials are free of charge.

Next post we will look into registering a name for the website.

 

 

Setup - Equipment and Foundations

To get started developing websites there are a few basics you will need just to get going.

Pencil, Notebook, and Filing System.

This could be one of the most overlooked but important set of tools when developing for the web. Though it may sound irritating or unnecessary to those of you who want to dive in and create it can save you hours of misdirected work. The notebook and pencil work well for taking client notes and sketching your project. Filing may sound like common sense but don't ignore setting up a system. It can be irritating, to say the least at 11 pm when you want to work for a few hours, have the design you sketched out, but can't locate brochures you're using as reference.

Computer With a High Speed Connection

Hopefully, this is a no brainer. It would be prudent, however, to keep a few of the following things in mind. You will want a computer with enough power to run some significant programs. These programs including image editing and WYSIWYG development will need a bit of processing power. There are some good buys right now on basic desktops that will suit the purpose fine so unless you really love to put them together, buy a computer. Buying a computer usually has the added bonus of a support contract. Good PC support can be a lifesaver. A high speed cable or DSL connection should have a decent speed for downloading as well as uploading.

Next post we will explore what type of language to begin with and where you can learn it online for free.