RE: Website Creation Question

Hi, and welcome to HWG...

There are so many opinions on what to use to make a website that we can
fight wars over what is best.
But since you are asking "how to begin to plan the process," I would suggest
going to a room where there is no computer, and to take out a paper and
pencil, and sketch in what you want your website to look like. Obviously you
will want to work on a small personal site first (and forget the fact that
you run a small business or something, and what you really want is a nice
business WebPages.) and one that you do not mind spoiling a few times as you
learn your way around.

Sure, I admit it, I didn't do it this way, and have never done it this
way... but I always think that I would have been better off doing it this
way. So a separate sheet of paper for each page that you want to display.
Lay them out on the kitchen table so you can see how you will navigate
between them.

I liked Adobe PageMill 3.0 as my first website manager... I have since
started using Adobe GoLive 4.0, and really am still learning that. It is
true that you can use "Netscape Composer" or "Microsoft FrontPage Express"
to create these individual pages, but these freebies do not relate the pages
to each other or maintain links. I have used FrontPage2000, it has lots of
fancy do-dads that I neither understand nor really care to use. Unless you
*KNOW* HTML coding, you really cannot make use of an editor that does not do
a lot to help you along, so you will likely want to use a WYSIWYG (What You
See Is What You Get) program, but remember, the fancier your program, the
more code it automatically writes for you, and the less control you have.

OK, so you have a plan, next get all of your graphics together, correctly
size your photos in advance, create any buttons you want to use, set up any
other graphics and stuff, and put them all in a folder labeled "images".
Next try your hand at making the pages. You can use a freebie, such as
Netscape Composer if you do not have anything else, play with it. Make
several efforts for your first page. Learn what you can do with it, to make
the page look like what you want. But always remember, you cannot control
how someone else will see it, so  regardless of what you have seen on the
web, keep your pages simple!

As you work through this process, you will discover a whole host of other
questions that you would like to ask. And, oh yes... thanks for writing,
this is the correct list for discussing basics, and I am happy to find a
question that is basic enough for me to answer.

Elias

-----Original Message-----
From: owner-hwg-basics(at)hwg.org [mailto:owner-hwg-basics(at)hwg.org]On
Behalf Of Steven_Gara(at)ultimatesoftware.com
Sent: Tuesday, October 12, 1999 07:01
To: hwg-basics(at)hwg.org
Subject: Website Creation Question


Hello,

    I'm a trial member of the guild and don't know if this is the correct
e-mail to send this question (the guild has so many e-mail addresses) so if
it's not, can you forward it to the proper individuals?  I just simply want
to know (as a novice) how to begin to plan the process of creating a
website.  Is there a list that can be e-mailed to me that could serve as a
general "project blueprint"?

HTML: hwg-basics mailing list archives, maintained by Webmasters @ IWA