Download Storm Water Permit Training

Web Sites
for amateur radio
So You want to make a Web Site?
• There are several things you need to know
about web sites before you start to think
about making one:
– Free Hosting or paid hosting company?
– Domain Name – is the www. XXX.UUU (this
is the part after the www.) it will be
determined by the kind of hosting you are
going to use.
– How many pages are you going to have?
• Some of the answers will determine how
you are going to make your web site.
Hosting
• There are Free and paid hosting accounts.
• The Free hosting will have some strings
attached – so read the Fine Print
– May have Ads posted on your web pages
– Will have limitation on how to program site
etc.
– May have a limitation on number of pages etc.
– Free hosting may restrict your domain name
Hosting cont’d
• Paid Hosting will give you a lot more
flexibility (but it has costs)
• Most Hosting companies will have several
levels of hosting (for most of us – the entry
level will be adequate)
• The cost is ~ $ 4 - $ 7 a month
• This will get you 100 Gb storage, large
bandwidth, 10 - 100 email addresses, 2 –
10 SQL databases
Hosting cont’d
• SQL Data bases – these are used for data
storage and programs.
• Joomla & Drupal uses a SQL data base as
the source of the program.
• If you want to use forms, this may require
a data base.
• Some free hosting don’t have SQL data
base.
There is also Google, QRZ, others. Your service provider may also give
you some space.
Paid Hosting
• Most will have web-building software that
you can use (free).
• You will have to register your domain name
(www.wb5cxc.com etc.) – registration varies
depending on type .com, .net etc. ~ $ 13 /
year – depending on type
• Some will have ‘build site tonight’ (these will
have a limited number of pages and usually
cost more).
Domain Registration
@ GoDaddy
I did a search for wb5cxc.com – it is already used, but I can get
others domains with wb5cxc
Paid Hosting cont’d
• The hosting company will have web
design programs that you can install –
WordPress, Joomla, Drupal, etc. (these
are free web software programs)
• With paid hosting you will probably use a
software program to program your site.
Hosting@ GoDaddy
New customers
Control Panel for Linux hosting (GoDaddy)
Most of the hosting companies will have Linux or Window
(you can use Linus hosting – has better stuff)
Web Configuration Software
• These programs will take your
configuration and make the HTML & other
code needed for the web site.
• For our purposes the software ranges from
~ $ 50 to $ 300. The most popular
programs are $ 100 - $ 200. Some have
discounts for teachers and seniors. Some
will discount the software when new
versions come out.
Software cont’d
• For Windows – Web Design Studio 5
($ 150) – Xara Web Designer Pro ($ 99)
• For MAC you can use Sandvox ($ 80) or
Freeway 5 ($ 150).
• These programs are WYSIWYG, have
menu development, picture handling, etc.
• Most of these programs will have Demo
version that you can download and try.
Software cont’d
• The Xara Web Designer site has some
very fine video tutorials on how to use their
software.
• You can see how this kind of software
works.
• Most of the software programs that are
listed work about the same.
Software cont’d
• The software will also upload your web
configuration to your hosting company.
• There are several folder in a standard web
site (your pages, all the pictures and files
etc.)
• Your software will arrange all this data for
you and make it easy for you to upload it
to the server.
Web Site Structure – www.wb5cxc.com
Design of Your Site
• You should start with an outline of the
pages you want to build.
• If you have a lot of pages (> 5), then you
will need to put them in categories so you
can do a menu. The menu can have submenus etc.
Design Your Site cont’d
• On my program you can make a change to
the menu on one page and it will change
all the menus on every page (not all
software will do this – this is a very good
feature when you have quite a few pages
and want to add pages etc. – that way you
don’t have to change every page).
Design Your Site cont’d
• On my software (each software program is
different) I picked a layout from the gallery
– changed the colors and made some
modification. This is used as the base and
when I start a new page I would duplicate
the standard page and then save it with
the new page name.
• When I got all my pages done I started on
the menu.
Menu configuration screen
Design Your Site cont’d
• Your program should be able to insert
HTML code from other programs into the
your page. There are all kinds of small
HTML modules that you can insert into
your web site (like the current propagation
etc.)
• These programs have all kinds of things to
help make your web site.
This is an example of what you can insert into your web site.
You can go to WWW.HAMQSL.COM/SOLAR.html to get the
code for this. They have many different types/styles of data.
Part of page off www.hamqsl.com/solar.html
Design Your Site cont’d
• Pictures can be a major problem to include
on your web site. Pictures get changed
when they are added to your website. The
resolution is changed to web standards (to
reduce your load time).
• Each program will handle pictures
differently. My old program was a little
harder to size the picture etc. The new
program is really easy to work with pictures.
Design Your Site cont’d
• Each program will have advantages and
disadvantages. My current program
handles pictures good, but don’t have
tables.
• There is a learning curve on the software.
So be prepared to put in some time in
learning it.
Design Your Site cont’d
• The software program should have the
capability to view your page.
• Your web page may display differently in
other browsers.
• It should also be able to display the whole
web site so you can test it out.
• The software should allow you to upload to
your hosting server.
Web Site Page
• Each browser displays your page differently,
that is because it doesn’t display your page,
it is an interpretation of the source code for
your page.
• About the only thing that will be the same is
the text.
Part of my Home Page.
Part of the Code for my Home Page – there are 216
lines of code for this page!
View Source Code
• To View the Source Code – on your
browser click ‘View’ and then select
‘Source’
• The page will probably different languages
on the page – JavaScript, HTML, CSS,
etc.
Keeping Web Site Up to Date
• Depending on your web site – keeping it
up to date – can be a major problem.
• If it is a site that has activities, then it will
need to be updated weekly and/or monthly
• This can be a very time consuming job if
the site was not built with this in mind, or is
not made to update easily, even so it will
take some time to modify it each time.
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