Making A Webpage...

cgannon64

cgannon64

BOB DYLAN'S ROCKIN OUT!
Joined
Jun 19, 2002
Messages
19,213
Location
Hipster-Authorland, Brooklyn (Hell)
Yes, I'm going to try to make a webpage. I'm wondering, is there any way I can learn the basics of making one? What code do I have to learn, if any? I'm totally new at this, so...any basic intro stuff there is online would be extremely helpful. I'd also going need to know all about paying for it, getting it on search engines, etc.

I don't want help, I'd just like someone to point me in the right direction. I might need help with code, if that is required...:o

(Maybe I shouldn't do it after all...)

CG

EDIT: The various typos that occur at 11:41pm. You know how it is.
 
do you have microsoft word ? if yes make some document and save it as web page. that would be your first web page :goodjob:
add some more stuff into it and you have your best web page yet :goodjob:

just see how thing works. you don't need any coding at all for basic-to-medium page.

If you have MS Front Page, even better.Very easy to use. Making simple web page = making document in word.
 
HTML is awesome, its so easy. Here's an example

<html>
<head>this is a webpage</head>
<body>
Write whatever you want here, you
can
skip lines
or skip spaces
and it still comes out beautiful.
A simple HTML book with teach you everything you need to know about tables, lists, images and basic formatting.

Shoot, I barely know any HTML I just copy and paste from previous pages I've made. Good luck, designing web pages is alot of fun! :goodjob:

- Narz :king:

</body>
</html>
 
Don't quit. Let us know how you web designing is going! I wish I had started at your age!
 
http://www.pageresource.com/html/index2.htm

Go there, read up, learn :) It's fun and it's easy.

I really don't reccommend using Microsoft Front Page unless you want to get a bunch of rambled out code. But if you're new at it and just want to do it as easily as possible I suppose you will be alright using Front Page.
 
Frontpage will allow you to make a basic webpage with out any fancy graphics, buttons or drop down menus etc.

Html is the basic code that is used in websites, other codes are used to make the more complex stuff. You don't really need to know all this if you are only starting off, as the programs or software usually do it all for you.

If you want to make a nice looking web site you should look up Macromedia software, their state of the art and pretty user friendly.

Thier lattest 'Fireworks' and 'Dreamweaver' programs while allow you make a cool looking website. They are very expensive, but there are ways of getting them for free and lots of tudorals on the net.
'Fireworks' on it's own would even be good enough for creating a cool looking interface and it is easy to get the hang off. I think Fireworks 6 is the latest one.

You could get Macromedia studio MX, if you have the resources, this containes all of thier lattest programs together.

Stick at it, i'm only going through the process of learning it now and believe me it looks more complicated than it really is.
 
You sound like you "only" want to make a webpage and not the learn the accompanying languages. If that is so, then you may as well use any webpage composer like FrontPage or the Netscape Composer. :eek: :ack:

If you really want to learn HTML and later other languages for webdesign as PHP and Javascript, the best would be to use a simple text editor. I can only recommend TextPad, it comes with predefined configuration files that mark up your code so that it´s better viewable, just like the "PHP" tag here in the forum marks PHP code in an appropriate way. :mischief:
http://www.textpad.com/

The marking looks similar to this and let´s you easily browse through the code:
PHP: 
echo('blah');
$x = 0;
if( $x != 0 )
{
    echo('bleh');
}

When starting to code in HTML, you should use the verification means available on the net to check your code. HTML unfortunately is very weak at precisely telling you what´s wrong in the code, since it´s written to accept more or less everything.
So use the official HTML validator to browse through the code:
http://validator.w3.org/

Not only will you gain compatibility with ALL browsers, unlike most websites, the validator also quickly cracks down on simple syntax errors, like forgotten closing tags or so. :yeah:

Of course there are also several good webpage editors out there where you only need a minimal amount of programming knowledge, yet they still create a proper code unlike FrontPage or the like.
:D
 
One thing to add when making a htm(l) file DONT use word use notepad. Word puts some uhgly stuff in there and it often wont display properly. Frontpage is hard enough to learn for the little help it provides. I'd suggest just using html or get some sorta portal that would be best.
 
:hmm: I guess I'll look through the sites you guys linked but...don't expect anything soon. I don't want to use any of those programs you all reccomended; it will be too easy and I've seen some of them, they look like crap. :) Don't expect my website to be up soon, as I have to look through those HTML code tutorial things and I have alot of work, but learning the basics of HTML would be a start, right? :D

CG
 
Just a quick question: Does capitalization matter in HTML? I don't think it does (it said it didn't on some site) but I went to that validator, and they said my little HTML test wasn't even HTML! Huh? :confused:

CG
 
Thanks for all the help. I have one last question: Is there a reason NOT to use the <pre> tag? I mean, it pretty much eliminates the need for <br> and <p>...surely it must have SOME bad side-effect, because if it doesn't...:D

CG

EDIT: I put that line at the top, Unknown Soldier, and it still gave me the same response. Maybe you put a typo, I don't know. But anyway, I'd really like if that thing worked, because its features (finding missing tags, etc) would really help a noob like me...
 
Thanks, Unknown Soldier, it worked now. Damn, I have alot of errors...:eek: Alot of them confused me too. In the document I uploaded, it was a direct copy (pretty much) of what was on that website Jeratain posted. This is what I had:

<html>
<head>
<title>Test Page</title>
</head>
<body>
This is my first test page. Hey, I can to HTML! Sort of...
</body>
</html>

And this is the errors it gave me:

1. Line 4, column 5: document type does not allow element "HEAD" here (explain...).

<head>
......... ^

2. Line 7, column 5: document type does not allow element "BODY" here (explain...).

<body>
..........^

3. Line 10, column 6: "HEAD" not finished but containing element ended (explain...).

</html>
..........^

4. Line 10, column 6: end tag for "HTML" which is not finished (explain...).

</html>
..........^

What's up with that? Mine is almost exactly like Narz's, so I don't see whats wrong...:confused:

CG

Damn you HTML Validator...

EDIT: Ugh, my placeholders came out wrong. I'm too lazy to fix them, but they are all supposed to be pointing to the ^
 
Not your fault, it´s Unknown´s error (sorry soda ;)).

Every META tag belongs INTO the head, not before it, so:
Code: 
<html>
<meta ...>
<head>
...
will consequently give you those errors.

The correct code for your example would be:
Code: 
<!doctype html public "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN">
<html>
<head>
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=ISO-8859-1">
<title>Test Page</title>
</head>
<body>
This is my first test page. Hey, I can to HTML! Sort of...
</body>
</html>

This will give you no errors at all (it should :p).
But things like where META tags belong to are covered in every good tutorial.

W3C also supplies with much more info on all things concerning webdesign.
For reference to HTML tags and attributes, consult the latest recommendation. Maybe it´s best to start here:
http://www.w3.org/TR/1999/REC-html401-19991224/cover.html#minitoc

For an overview of HTML file structure (i.e. what belongs) where, read this:
http://www.w3.org/TR/1999/REC-html401-19991224/struct/global.html


But keep in mind that this is the official recommendation and not really intended for beginners. If you feel comfortable with this, very goog, but it might be best to read a few "simpler" tutorials first.
:D
 
Originally posted by cgannon64
Thanks for all the help. I have one last question: Is there a reason NOT to use the <pre> tag? I mean, it pretty much eliminates the need for <br> and <p>...surely it must have SOME bad side-effect, because if it doesn't...:D

CG
Click to expand...
Let me quote from W3C:
The PRE element tells visual user agents that the enclosed text is "preformatted". When handling preformatted text, visual user agents:

May leave white space intact.
May render text with a fixed-pitch font.
May disable automatic word wrap.
Must not disable bidirectional processing.

Non-visual user agents are not required to respect extra white space in the content of a PRE element.
Click to expand...
Note the use of the word MAY, meaning the browser does not have to respect the PRE tag.
But more important is the second line. Word wrapping adjusts the line length to the users screen resolution if possible. If that is disable and say you create a webpage that looks good for you in 1600x1200 using the PRE tag, it will give horizontal scroll bars for every smaller resolution, which is VERY annoying for the viewer.
Just like my code tag above "breaks" this page in my browser, too. ;)

There are of course other issues. With PRE you format your text with spaces and newlines only. This way it is much more complicated to make several columns for example or boxes and the like.
And when a viewer has set his own font display option for his browser, the spaces and newlines will most likely not fit at all anymore. :rolleyes:

One important thing to keep in mind is that not every viewer uses the same screen resolutions. Websites announcing they are "optimized for blahxblah" are generally ill designed.
Of course you will most likely not be able to fulfill the dreams of a 640x480 user when at the same time making your page look perfect for 1600x1200. But do not concentrate on one resolution, check the others out, too.
:D
 
Thanks Lucky. I knew <pre> would have been to good to be true. I was also wondering when you arrive, as it seems you are the first to answer every code-related question I have...:mischief:

So far I haven't even started on my website yet, but I will probably soon. Before I do anything complex, I just want to learn how to write a regular paragraph like this one, and I'm happy to report that I'm getting along fine. It will probably be a week or two before I actually start: right now I'm just reading through the tutorial posted. They have a good amount of things that I needed to know, like making an image a link, email links, etc. I just have to get comfortable with basic HTML before I can start writing my own page.

I have one random question: HTML recognizes up to one space inbetween letters/words, but past that, it ignores, right? And it ignores lines, right? So if I had:

<body>Blah Blah Blah

Blah
</body>

It would come out like this, right?:

Blah Blah Blah Blah

and if I wanted to make it look like that, I would do this:

<body>Blah Blah *nbsp;*nbsp;*nbsp;Blah<br><br>Blah

Right?

CG

EDIT: Replace all * with &.

Code is fun!
 
I shouldn't have to many basic questions from now on. I just discovered something: I can answer most of my questions just by experimenting and opening up stuff in Netscape to see how it looks. :D

CG

EDIT: Typo that misinterpreted what I was trying to say. Back into the breach, my friends. (aka HTML)
 
Yep, that´s more or less correct. Except the 3rd blah would be more indented with the & nbsp; ´s. ;)

And yes you can. You should always have a browser ready to check the effect of any changes you make in the code.
:D
 
Everything is going pretty well. I have a rudimentary "Links" and "Interests" pages in progress now. Nothing special, just testing out my skills in a useful manner. I'm running into problems making different colored, different sized titles however. I'll put in the green tag for the title, and the whole page comes out green, the title disappears, and everything changes size. Maybe I'm messing up the tag, I'll have to check.

I have a buisness-related question about a website: How much does it cost to buy a domain (www.blah.com)? Is it a monthly cost? I guess, if I have to, I'll go to GeoCities or something, but I really don't want to. Is there some way I can make a site for free but have ads (sort of like what we have here)? I am totally clueless as to the actual website part of a website, if you get what I mean...:)

CG

EDIT: Fixed it. Forgot a </font> tag. Silly me.
 
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