Building a website???

You actually dont need a domain you could go with geocities or something but I would recomend going with a domain name. I recomend 000domains.com (recomended to me by Ryan Paige and we all know that he knows a lot about registering domains ) they are only $13.50 a year as apposed to register.com's $35 a year. You'll also need a place to host all of your files and I've found some really good deals on hosting plans (under $5 a month) and I'll try and dig you up some links for those.

Now you'll need something to help you make your site. You could always do it the fun way and learn HTML and write your pages in Notepad or you could get a WYSIWYG (What You See Is What You Get) Editor the most popular 3 are Microsoft Frontpage, Macromedia Dreamweaver, or Adobe GoLive.
Frontpage is a very basic one and easy to use because it is part of the Microsoft Office Suite that you might already use.
Dreamweaver is my favorite because it writes the best code in my opinion.
GoLive is also very good and widely used by professionals who dont like writing out all of the code by hand. I havent used this one much but would probably say it is on about the same level as Dreamweaver.

 

http://www.webhostlist.com/html/aisles/Most_Popular_-_Hosting_Plans.asp

 

for domain names, i use
http://www.stargateinc.com/ $8.95 for .com, .net, and .org.

for webhosting services, i can recommend these three webhosting companies. i have work with them in the past and i know they offer great support if you need it.
http://www.mastersites.com/
http://www.nhhosting.net/
http://www.host24.com/

 

I'm also a big fan of Dreamweaver... As someone who'd never even written a line of code, it was really easy to get started. I'm sure you can do this same thing on some other programs, but Dreamweaver lets you split the windows so you can see the code-building while you're working with the Dreamweaver tools... That's was a really user-friendly way of learning to do some basic coding.

 

http://www.findahost.com/
http://www.hostsearch.com/

Both great places for finding hosts. I use http://www.1planhost.com/ for only $100 per year and $25 extra for SQL server. They are fast and consistent.

Also, try http://www.mydomain.com/ for domains. Really cheap domain names plus they give you a free control panel so you don't have to go through all the email crap with Network Solutions if you move to a new ISP.

As for development tools, Dreamweaver is awesome. You might consider starting with something like Microsoft Frontpage or even Adobe Go Live first because they are a little less complex.

If you want to learn online, I HIGHLY recommend http://www.mindleaders.com/ . They offer online HTML, Javascript and other classes. You owe it to yourself to learn basic coding because the code generators like Go Live, Frontpage and Dreamweaver are great but will almost always have elements in them that create issues that can only be solved with hand coding.

MindLeaders.com was great and not expensive at all.

Good luck!

 

That's a really nice feature of Dreamweaver.

In frontpage there are tabs at the bottom of the screen which allow you to pick either the basic editor, HTML view, or Preview. But not more then one.
In GoLive it has a similiar tab system but you can also view both the basic editor and the HTML if you are viewing the basic editor and then go up to window and then click Source Code another little window will pop up containing the HTML.

 

Another thing I like about Dreamweaver (if you work with lots of photos) is how well it works with Fireworks and some of the other Macromedia products. The gallery-building feature is cool. Kind of similar to what you can do with the Photoshop galleries, but easier to mess around with and customize afterwards.

 

All pages are made up of HTML code which you can see by right-clicking in an empty part of a website and clicking view source. A WYSIWYG editor will write that HTML code for you (some better then others). Frontpage writes some truly horrible code especially when copy and pasting text in from Word. But if you just want to create a simple site with not to complex of a layout go ahead and use frontpage (JUST NOT THE THEMES!! ).

 

Pun: Also, you should really consider getting a book or two on HTML or taking a class. HTML is always needed even when using a WYSIWYG editor like Dreamweaver or Go Live.

BTW: You can download trial versions of either of those from Macromedia and Adobe respectively.

 

Two questions:

1) What is your goal for this web site?

2) Could you give us the address of a web site that you wish to model your site after?



Mango

 

Hey, I only have like 40 domains right now. I let a lot expire (though I saw that NameZero was letting some names go, and there were a few that I thought I would like. But since they're going to be like $75 per, I figured I could do without owning such domains as CrapZone.com or CrappyMovies.com)

 

I tried to register a domain with them last March but it never worked and not is showing up as an expired domain and asking if somebody would like to buy it. Do you think they will just let it lapse if nobody makes on offer on it?

 

Front page is an easy alternative too.

DD

 

Lil Pun,


Seems like a straightforward site.

Do you plan on having the advertising that site has?



Mango

 

Having used several WYSIWIG progams, I feel Dreamweaver is the best.
Of course, you should take the time to learn HTML. I believe the Idiot's Guide to HTML is about $15.00, and completely opposite to most people's opinions on books about coding, it's really easy to understand.

HTML really helps if there's something that you want to do in Dreamweaver that isn't supported (sometimes it screws up on table widths, so you can fix that in the HTML code)

 

Who? NameZero? I don't know. My guess is that they're going to keep as many as they can. I did get an email from SnapNames talking about how they were deleting a whole bunch of domains next week and that SnapNames members would have first shot at them if we ordered before December 15. The price was $49 with another $25 fee for something that I don't remember. I deleted the email, though.

I wish they would let them go. I'd sure like to have CrappyMovies.com. I think that would fit my filmmaking ventures better than FilmDallas.com does.