Starting a Website

SomethingElse

Hi, I need help with a few questions I have about setting up a website. I am looking into getting a domain and web hosting at the moment. I am planning on using Dreamweaver software to design the website. Is there anything I need to look out for compatibility wise?
Also, I need to direct an existing site to my site. Is there anything that my web host needs to have to allow me to do this? If a web host says it supports one domain does this mean this isn't possible with them?

Liam Byrne

All of the above depend on two main questions :

1) What is your level of expertise ?
2) Is it a hobby site or a professional/business site ?

Because "compatibility wise" could mean anything from server-side technologies (PHP vs ASP vs CF) to browser or screen size compatibility.

A lot of people seem to think that it's a doddle to throw a decent site together.

SomethingElse

I'm a beginner and it is a business site. By "compatibility wise" I'm referring to using Dreamweaver - is there any minimum requirement? Or would it work even on a web host which has no SQL or PHP support?

OFlaherty

I don't mean to sound condescending, but your answer shows that you have little to now experience with this and Dreamweaver is the last thing you should be worrying about.

Answer these questions and it may help us point you in the right direction.

What kind of website do you want to build?

Will it be interactive?

Will it require forums, a blog, or a use login?

How much traffic are you looking to do?

What programming languages (HTML, PHP etc..) do you have skills in?

Anything else you can thing of that may help us offer you some advice.

It may be that you'd be better off investing in a developer rather than investing in Dreamweaver

SomethingElse

It is for a local business - traffic will be low. I only know html but learning others such as PHP is something I will do if I find I need to. My main question is with regard to Dreamweaver - I won't be getting a developer - Is it simply a program that helps design a site so you can ftp across the finished files - or do setup files need to be uploaded to the host?

nellyshark

You should look up the basics of HTML and CSS before you even consider looking at Dreamweaver. There are some decent tutorials out on the web also. The tool isn't as important as knowledge of design and site architecture, as well as some understanding of code that you will be using. Plus it costs a bomb, from the website € 543.29 inc vat. At the end of the day it is just a glorified WYSIWYG editor and if you have a good understanding of code etc one of the open source editors (Kompozer for example) will suffice. Also you can really tell when a website has been developed by an amateur (absolutely no offence intended). Especially for a business orientated website it HAS to be professional. Even if only one page. So to reiterate again, get a good knowledge of what you will be doing before even dreaming of using Dreamweaver

bigjohnny80

Lads, OP is looking for a little help - not another thread of snide remarks about how he should go to a professional. Do ye ever stop?

nellyshark

bigjohnny80 wrote: »

Lads, OP is looking for a little help - not another thread of snide remarks about how he should go to a professional. Do ye ever stop?

Snide remarks?

The information provided so far has been bang on the money.

Close to €550 is a serious expense that could be avoided with a little knowledge of the codes involved.

Remember traffic will be low so the OP will have to look at ways of increasing traffic and site rank. Essentially it’s the person, not the program, who dictates how good the website is, but the OP needs to realise what involved

Liam Byrne

Dreamweaver is a program that runs on your own computer in order to develop the site; it has nothing whatsoever to do with your web server itself.

In fact, as pointed out above by nellyshark, Dreamweaver is simply a WYSIWYG with an FTP backend; it's a good one (as such things go), but over the years I've gone from being a serious fan of it to using use just text editor and an FTP program, since you get better (and less bloated) code, and have more control.

That's the basic answer; but the fact that you were wondering whether Dreamweaver needs to be on a website (and are considering paying €550 for a computer program) would make me wonder whether you'd be better off spending that €550 on the website itself.....you'd be well on your way to having a decent small site for that money.

SomethingElse

There has been a lot of responses but most of them are unhelpful. I asked two questions in the OP, one of them has been answered.

Liam Byrne wrote: »

Dreamweaver is a program that runs on your own computer in order to develop the site; it has nothing whatsoever to do with your web server itself.

That's the basic answer

Thanks Liam.

nellyshark

Adobe Website wrote:

Windows
1GHz or faster processor
Microsoft® Windows® XP with Service Pack 2 (Service Pack 3 recommended) or Windows Vista® Home Premium, Business, Ultimate, or Enterprise with Service Pack 1 (certified for 32-bit Windows XP and Windows Vista)
512MB of RAM
1GB of available hard-disk space for installation; additional free space required during installation (cannot install on flash-based storage devices)
1,280x800 display with 16-bit video card
DVD-ROM drive
Broadband Internet connection required for online services

Mac OS
PowerPC® G5 or multicore Intel® processor
Mac OS X v10.4.11–10.5.4
512MB of RAM
1.8GB of available hard-disk space for installation; additional free space required during installation (cannot install on a volume that uses a case-sensitive file system or on flash-based storage devices)
1,280x800 display with 16-bit video card
DVD-ROM drive
Broadband Internet connection required for online services

Regarding redirect the very first result on google for 301 direct is http://www.webconfs.com/how-to-redirect-a-webpage.php which will outline some of the steps to you. Seeing as you haven't even told us what language you are using and still call our responses unhelpful thats the best I can do for you. Further research by yourself will unearth a lot more

Axwell

Who are you quoting there and why???

StupidLikeAFox

Another option is to use a content management system like Joomla (which is free). Im messing around with setting up a website and find that you can throw together something decent with a little bit of work. Plenty of tutorials online for it too.

nellyshark

Axwell wrote: »

Who are you quoting there and why???

The requirements to run Dreamweaver

LowOdour

The problem with dreamweaver is that you will have the tendency to drag and drop items (tables,etc) and resize, style etc manually.

In my experience, dreamweaver tends to add a lot more to the page than is needed. What I would recommended is you fiugre out your main page layout and styles....do it on paper if need be. Code your html by hand, do the styles in a css class...in notepad if you want. Even if you are 10% right in what you have...you can then start using dreamweaver and starting editing the html code and css syles with the habit of doing it by code instead of using the design/drag-drop options.

If you do decide to go down that route....then you wont need to fork out for dreamweaver, there are plenty of free editors for html/css.

drogsnookerclub

My brother created a website for my Dad's business using this tutorial

http://www.thesitewizard.com/gettingstarted/dreamweaver1.shtml

Tutorial 1 - 6 will walk you through creating a website.

Then it has loads of more tutorials for every aspect of dreamweaver

Might help ya.

sheesh

SomethingElse wrote: »

Hi, I need help with a few questions I have about setting up a website. I am looking into getting a domain and web hosting at the moment. I am planning on using Dreamweaver software to design the website. Is there anything I need to look out for compatibility wise?
Also, I need to direct an existing site to my site. Is there anything that my web host needs to have to allow me to do this? If a web host says it supports one domain does this mean this isn't possible with them?

ok lets see if I can answer your questions

ok so you are getting hosting and all that, good, that is quiet easy you just need an email address and a credit card go onto blacknight or letshost for hosting.

Compatibility wise ? thats a bit of a head scratcher of a question as you do not tell what you want dreamweaver to be compatibile with but safe to say that with dreamweaver you will be able to produce a html file that can be viewed on most browsers it won't be standards compliant code but it will work. You can get Dreamweaver for mac and pc although make sure that if you have a mca that you check what kind of chip is running your mac as I know someone that has a adobe creative suite for mac but he has a mac with a dell chipset and it will not work on it. so maybe that answers your compatibility question.

second question: so you need to transfer an existing site to your new domain

I am going to assume that the existing site has content (words and pictures)
and a domain name (www.thenameofthesite.com) that means its hosted somewhere so you can either transfer the site to your new site and transfer the old domain to your new account.

Clear?

basically I would pay someone to do it if I were you.

cormee

I'm not trying to be mean but, given your evident knowledge on the subject, you really shouldn't attempt to build a business website. You're better off having no site than you are having a bad site, a bad site will make your business look unprofessional and your competition is only a click away.

People can advise you on what html editor to use, what sort of hosting to get, what sort of CMS to use but at the end of the day there are hundreds of other considerations, each one of which is potentially a stumbling block for you.

Do yourself a massive favour and shell out the €500 you were going to spend on Dreamweaver and get someone with design and coding skills, SEO experience and scripting ability to build you a small but professional looking site. It's better for you and your business.

If you want to learn how to build sites start with something simple - do a personal homepage or something but don't experiment when your company's reputation could be at risk.

10 years ago you might have got away with something whipped up in a wysiwyg editor with bad code, forms that don't work etc.etc. but that time is long gone - people expect a business website to look professional and function correctly - regardless of your good intentions you're not going to be able to provide that experience.

mahamageehad

Hi op

I know this isn't something you want to hear but it's so not as easy as you think it'll be! Take it from me, I took on a website a few months ago and still haven't finished it. I thought it would be no problem- i had a little experience with html css and javascript.

It's easy now when you think about it but first draw it out on paper. Create a flowchart. Mock up some screen shots.

next thing- dreamweaver costs a fortune as you've learned by now. you'd be better off with a free text editor (i use textwrangler) and internet tutorials. Or invest in a beginners book.

As for the redirect google 301 redirect. Hope that helps. I just wanted you to know by a noob that it's seriously hard work and a serious learning curve.

SomethingElse

Thanks to those who helped. I ended up taking the easy option and installed Wordpress. I would definitely recommend it. I'd say it's putting a lot of web designers out of business.

sheesh wrote: »

basically I would pay someone to do it if I were you.

:rolleyes:

sheesh

ah no I was thinking of the transfer of the domain and stuff. I was going to suggest using modx CMS it makes creating templates really easy. Wordpress is fine in that so many people are using and there are loads of resources out there for it.

Good luck with the site

nellyshark

Another good CMS is Pixie

Bob_Harris

SomethingElse wrote: »

Thanks to those who helped. I ended up taking the easy option and installed Wordpress. I would definitely recommend it. I'd say it's putting a lot of web designers out of business.

Not really no.

Liam Byrne

SomethingElse wrote: »

Thanks to those who helped. I ended up taking the easy option and installed Wordpress. I would definitely recommend it. I'd say it's putting a lot of web designers out of business. :rolleyes:

Thankfully not, because just like electricians, carpenters, accountants and photographers, many people realise that there's a massive difference between a professional site and a home-made one, and the long-term value offered by a properly-designed website is well worth it.

Not to mention that it experience and knowledge allows us professionals to offer advice to newbies for free, so that they don't splash out €550 on software that they end up not needing!

But many thanks for your obvious concern for peoples livelihoods as indicated by the "rolleyes".....hope there's no chance of that attitude in your new business.

And do come back to show us the end result.......sure if Wordpress does everything that you say, we'll have lots of free time on our hands to look through the site and offer you more free advice on how to show up in search engines, etc!

SomethingElse

Liam Byrne wrote: »

don't splash out €550 on software that they end up not needing!

Where did this notion come from? I never mentioned spending €550 on software.

Liam Byrne wrote: »

But many thanks for your obvious concern for peoples livelihoods as indicated by the "rolleyes".....hope there's no chance of that attitude in your new business.

The "rolleyes" are aimed at the quote in the post.

Liam Byrne

SomethingElse wrote: »

Where did this notion come from? I never mentioned spending €550 on software.

You mentioned using Dreamweaver. Dreamweaver costs €550.

SomethingElse wrote: »

The "rolleyes" are aimed at the quote in the post.

OK - apologies if I misread this, but immediately prior to the quote you said "I'd say it's putting a lot of web designers out of business", and the quoted post suggested that paying someone would be the recommended route, which given your original post and the level of knowledge indicated therein was definitely good advice.

And I'm not being lousy in saying that; if I needed a business card printed for a business, I'd send it to an experienced printing shop and not run it off DIY on a home inkjet - because it will be representing my business.

Finally saying that something like basic Wordpress that you've only just discovered (and therefore don't yet know its capabilities and limitations) is putting experienced people out of business would also indicate a lack of knowledge of what a proper website should involve.

Design and implementation of a proper website doesn't just involve coming up with the code; it's about analysis, structure, navigation, optimal display, handling screen resolutions and browsers, usability, database design, ease of update, identifying and highlighting key points, and much more.

In many cases, the code is one of the most minor parts of the site (although proper coding and CSS and content structure is important in itself).

Nulty

Liam Byrne wrote: »

You mentioned using Dreamweaver. Dreamweaver costs €550.

You can get Dreamweaver shipped for €435 (Best I've found).

Dreamweaver is a LOT more than just a html editor/WYSIWYG editor. The FTP, snippets, related files, template updates, support, extensions etc. It's amazingly useful and if you plan to build many websites it worth the money.

TBH, I dont have any experience of their competitors but Dreamweaver is the industry standard. (AFAIK)

SomethingElse

Liam Byrne wrote: »

Dreamweaver costs €550.

There's a free 30-day trial, that's what I was looking at.

I'm surprised nobody here recommended wordpress.

cormee

SomethingElse wrote: »

I'm surprised nobody here recommended wordpress.

Don't be surprised. It wasn't recommended because you never mentioned CMS's in your original posting.

lostprophetsie

SomethingElse wrote: »

I'm surprised nobody here recommended wordpress.

You had said you were looking into using Dreamweaver so people gave you advice on that. Wordpress is nothing like Dreamweaver as it is a content management system so realistically there is numerous content management systems you could use. I'm sure if you had asked for advice on content management systems, Wordpress would have been one of the first ones mentioned along with Joomla, Drupal etc.

nellyshark

SomethingElse wrote: »

I'm surprised nobody here recommended wordpress.

IF that had been your original questions, and IF you had given some requirements in the OP then you would have got lots of recommendations for Wordpress AND other CMS but that wasn't what you asked was it?

SomethingElse

SomethingElse wrote: »

I'm surprised nobody here recommended wordpress.

I was being sarcastic. The majority of people here are just interested in selling their professional services, so why would they recommend something that might help me to do it on my own?

Bob_Harris

SomethingElse wrote: »

I was being sarcastic. The majority of people here are just interested in selling their professional services, so why would they recommend something that might help me to do it on my own?

Actually nobody can "sell" themselves here, it's against the rules.

What you got was good free advice which in the long term you may, or may not, regret not considering in a more reasoned manner.

You should really come back with the finished result. At the very least posting a link here will help generate traffic and search engine indexing.

If you can get wordpress to look like anything other than a Web2.0 fad blog then fair play to you.

Liam Byrne

SomethingElse wrote: »

I was being sarcastic. The majority of people here are just interested in selling their professional services, so why would they recommend something that might help me to do it on my own?

Why would they recommend anything ? You asked about Dreamweaver compatibility.

And in my defence, I did - apparently - offer "the answer" that you wanted, without trying to sell "professional services". I'm also not that unique on boards in doing so, with lots of advice from Tony on the Satellite forum (just an example, because there's lots of people that do).

Add in the fact that part of your reason for posting here would have been to get advice from experts, and can you see the issue with having that attitude ? If we were only interested in selling professional services, there would be no free professional advice whatsoever......we'd have posted "ring a pro for a consultancy, and get charged a fee".

Can I ask you if your new business that you're doing the site for will involve anything that you could offer free advice for ? And would you do that ?

Would you do it partially in the hope that if someone was biting off more than they could chew that they might remember who gave them free advice ?

Because while I'd love to have enough money to help loads of people out with various things free of charge, we all have to make a living, so any altruistic ideals would partially factor that in - it's human nature and it's required in order to be able to pay for a house, food, etc.

Liam Byrne

Nulty wrote: »

You can get Dreamweaver shipped for €435 (Best I've found).

Dreamweaver is a LOT more than just a html editor/WYSIWYG editor. The FTP, snippets, related files, template updates, support, extensions etc. It's amazingly useful and if you plan to build many websites it worth the money.

I'm not sure how to answer this without seeming to name-drop! :P

I've been involved with Dreamweaver in a couple of serious ways over the years - books, extension writing, training and more - and I used to swear by it.

I still do, for people with very little experience who want to get stuff done.

But when you're building many websites you end up finding better ways of doing things with include files and less bloated scripts.

cormee

SomethingElse wrote: »

I was being sarcastic. The majority of people here are just interested in selling their professional services, so why would they recommend something that might help me to do it on my own?

I've just re-read the thread and not one person has tried to sell you their services, some have been giving you sound advice - you have little or no web experience so get a professional to do it for you - ignore that advice if you want, at the end of the day it's your business so it's your decision.

Have a read of the other threads where the OP actually specifies they are looking for a CMS and you'll see WordPress mentioned repeatedly. WordPress is great software and most people here are advocates, and no, it's not putting web designers out of business, if anything it's helping us produce standards-compliant, usable and SEO friendly websites in a fraction of the time it would normally take, and given that most designers will charge a set price for building a site (rather than charging by the hour) it's a win-win situation for both us and our customers.

cormee

Liam Byrne wrote: »

I'm not sure how to answer this without seeming to name-drop! :P

I've been involved with Dreamweaver in a couple of serious ways over the years - books, extension writing, training and more - and I used to swear buy it.

I still do, for people with very little experience who want to get stuff done.

But when you're building many websites you end up finding better ways of doing things with include files and less bloated scripts.

I know it's off topic but I find this is exactly what Dreamweaver is perfect for - productivity, given that a lot more people are on broadband and faster computers than they were a few years ago bloated code isn't that big a concern on a brochure site or the likes. It's not ideal from an SEO point of view but the time I save by using Dreamweaver to create the pages more than covers the time it takes to manually strip down the code.

On anything more complex than a brochure site I'm happy to use the dw code view, it has a few shortcomings but Dreamweaver's other features - associated files, live view, live code, browser compatibility checks, link checker, server debug,compatibility with other Adobe products etc - make up for it.

At the end of the day the business of web design is about productivity as well as other factors like bloated code.

mahamageehad

SomethingElse wrote: »

I was being sarcastic. The majority of people here are just interested in selling their professional services, so why would they recommend something that might help me to do it on my own?

I think that this is very unfair. Again I'm only building my first website and I have three or four different threads on boards asking advice about various problems I ran into on the way. Nobody ever told me to give up and contact the professionals and nobody ever charged me for their advice. This is more than likely because i asked specific questions that I wanted the answer to. Not just...I'd like to build a website tell me how.

I have found people on both the design and development forums extremely helpful and honest, and their advice is invaluable.

Not kissing ass but someone needed to say it!

nellyshark

Just to get this thread back on topic, has the OP any questions regarding the redirect of the existing site? If you do please ask and give some detail to what you want? Failing any further question I would like to see this thread closed

Chet Zar

mahamageehad wrote: »

I think that this is very unfair. Again I'm only building my first website and I have three or four different threads on boards asking advice about various problems I ran into on the way. Nobody ever told me to give up and contact the professionals and nobody ever charged me for their advice. This is more than likely because i asked specific questions that I wanted the answer to. Not just...I'd like to build a website tell me how.

I have found people on both the design and development forums extremely helpful and honest, and their advice is invaluable.

Not kissing ass but someone needed to say it!

+1 it's just a case of a poster being too proud to admit he doesn't know what he's at.

ocallagh

What a farce of a thread... sick of this 'cowboy industry' tone that seems to linger in practically every business related thread on this forum. It nearly always emanates from individuals and small companies with very little experience who reckon they can get it done cheap themseslves..

If you want to dabble in it yourself then fire away, you might get lucky. However if you (representing a company) come looking for advice, don't be surprised and certainly don't make snide comments or remarks if people recommend you get a developer. It is the best advice for you and your company given your clear lack of experience.

Chet Zar

ocallagh wrote: »

What a farce of a thread... sick of this 'cowboy industry' tone that seems to linger in practically every business related thread on this forum. It nearly always emanates from individuals and small companies with very little experience who reckon they can get it done cheap themseslves..

If you want to dabble in it yourself then fire away, you might get lucky. However if you (representing a company) come looking for advice, don't be surprised and certainly don't make snide comments or remarks if people recommend you get a developer. It is the best advice for you and your company given your clear lack of experience.

Funny stuff....funny how 0% of the same people would ever contemplate fixing their own pipes or rigging up their electrical system at home - but when it comes to something as complex as web design/dev anyone who knows a bit about what html is reckons they can sign up for Wordpress and crack out a lovely looking site!

And I'm saying that as a n00b!!

ocallagh

Exactly, if web design was such a doddle then all these companies have made a grave error and should fire their HR team, install wordpress and give it a bash themselves

http://www.irishjobs.ie/ShowResults.aspx?Recruiter=Company&Keywords=web+design&I7.x=31&I7.y=10

Nulty

I have learned html, css and am pretty proficient in Dreamweaver. I'm learning php now and using includes myself.

Anyone who thinks they can decide to build a decent website from scratch needs a year or twos experience. Especially if it any way big, or needs to be professional. Theres just no way you sit down and go "I'll give it a go"

If you want to build one yourself CMS is the way to go, otherwise you'd better set the next *year aside to learn how to build websites.

*At Least

cats.pyjamas

jeeze the guy only wanted some advice...... I really don't see the problem with someone trying to learn a new skill, you just spent three pages calling him an idiot and saying how great ye are....amazing. ..and he admitted he did not know anything about web development, hence the name of his thread.

I find it fascinating how on many web design forums I have read where web developers consider themselves higher beings because the know how to code. Someone wants help give them a break

lostprophetsie

cats.pyjamas wrote: »

jeeze the guy only wanted some advice...... I really don't see the problem with someone trying to learn a new skill, you just spent three pages calling him an idiot and saying how great ye are....amazing. ..and he admitted he did not know anything about web development, hence the name of his thread.

I find it fascinating how on many web design forums I have read where web developers consider themselves higher beings because the know how to code. Someone wants help give them a break

He was given advice, if you are reading the same thread as me? The problem was his dig at web designers who he feels were keeping the holy grail from him (Wordpress)

*Edit, had a quick read back through the entire thread and cannot see where the OP was called an idiot?

sheesh

SomethingElse wrote: »

I was being sarcastic. The majority of people here are just interested in selling their professional services, so why would they recommend something that might help me to do it on my own?

I'm genuinely miffed by that comment I spent over 5 mins writing answering your questions as you asked them in good faith. The reason i suggested you pay someone was that there was a transfer of domain and content involved. In the original post you mentioned a second site and you didn't appear to have much technical expertise. I wouldn't be using an obscure username like 'sheesh' If i was looking for sales contacts.

to be frank I have no interest in doing your self designed 5 page website that will probably drag on over a month for about €200

I was honestly trying to help

Again good luck with website