Tech: Narding Nuts batman I gotta do a website

Subject: Narding Nuts batman I gotta do a website
From: Hyperabid
Date: 28 Mar 00 - 04:21 AM

Well whilst I will admit that this has nowt to do with music whatsoever...

(Grovel, apologise etc.)

After all the great help I received here on HTML I have taken to looking at / reading into the whole HTML SGML VGML Java and Script thing and messing about wiht some free webspace to see what can be done with it.

Of course I made the mistake of mentioning this to my girlfriend's retired mother who turns out to be the chairman of some dog breed society who needs a website and despite a whole weekend of excuses and dissembling...

(You can guess the rest)

Sites, hints tips or anecdotes greatfully received from all you kindly catters.

Hyp.

Subject: RE: Narding Nuts batman I gotta do a website
From: alison
Date: 28 Mar 00 - 07:57 AM

Easy to use... just fill in the info

homepage.com

that's how I did mine.. then fiddled about with the html afterwards, & I am a computer dummy ... if I can do it......

slainte

alison

Subject: RE: Narding Nuts batman I gotta do a website
From: MK
Date: 28 Mar 00 - 08:03 AM

-Keep the graphics small, and convert them (using an image viewing program) to 256 colors, so that they load fast, for those with slower internet connections (56K, etc.)

-make the pages easy to navigate, with clicable links for email, more info, back to home page, etc....on every page of the site...or accompish this using frames...(lot of people hate frames though)

-avoid using ''cookies'' if at all possible. (A lot of people hate them, consider them an invasion of privacy, and tend to delete them daily.)

-use a ''Feedback Form'' where you can get input from visitors, and the submitted info can be sent directly to you via your email (requires the use of CGI scripts)

-if you're creating this website on a PC, get a copy of Microsoft Front Page 98. It will make your life so much easier.

Best of luck!

Subject: RE: Narding Nuts batman I gotta do a website
From: Hyperabid
Date: 28 Mar 00 - 08:13 AM

Cheers Alison

I am pleased to become the 21st visitor to your home page.

Good luck with it.

Thanks also Michael K for your sage words - stuff in that vein is really useful. It was kind of you to take the time to share

I'd love to hear more ideas from anyone who cares to comment on experiences such as:-

Links / webrings Accesibility Interactivity Useful JAVA Applets Any good old fachined advice.

Cheers

Hyp

Subject: RE: Narding Nuts batman I gotta do a website
From: katlaughing
Date: 28 Mar 00 - 08:53 AM

A really easy place to build one is at looksmart.com Don't even have to know all of the html, java, etc. AND, if her dog group ever wants to see any crafts, etc. it allows you to accept credit cards etc. without any hassles of a merchant account etc.

Subject: RE: Narding Nuts batman I gotta do a website
From: Hyperabid
Date: 28 Mar 00 - 09:05 AM

Where exactly on the site does one go pls kat?

Hyp

Subject: RE: Narding Nuts batman I gotta do a website
From: Peter T.
Date: 28 Mar 00 - 09:17 AM

Hyperabid, by far the most important thing is none of the above good ideas. What you have to do is very carefully consider the taste/style of your girlfriend's mother. You are in the business of showcasing her to her friends (and showcasing your own sensitivity to her image). A Web page is the projection of her self-understanding onto the world, especially if she is the president or whatever of this dog society and wants the site to reflect her friends' views of things properly. If she is very refined (or thinks that her group wants to think itself refined), and wants to make the site refined, keep it very, very simple, clear, use a little colour with a lot of black and white, and use a graceful font. Don't clutter it up. If she wants dancing dogs, then you can do that instead. 99% of a site is how it looks when you open it up: what visual signals does it give off. Everything else is a minor mechanical detail.

The trick to learn is that even people who want elegance have a secret desire for looking at pasted pictures of Muffy in a Marx brothers outfit. So you might create an auxiliary page that is for something like that -- it will, I assure you, be the most looked-at page, but no one has to know that. You can absolve yourself of blame if everyone gives it the thumbs down, because you can take it immediately off the site as "just an idea I had".

yours, Peter T.

Subject: RE: Narding Nuts batman I gotta do a website
From: GUEST
Date: 28 Mar 00 - 09:27 AM

Dark lettering on a pale or white background is much easier for most people to read, so make any large blocks of text like that. Use pale or bright letters (if you wish to use them) on dark for shorter pieces of text.

Subject: RE: Narding Nuts batman I gotta do a website
From: katlaughing
Date: 28 Mar 00 - 09:33 AM

Good advice, Peter.

Hyperabid, just go to http://shops.looksmart.com/isroot/orbitres/look/apps/marketing_website/center/ or, click here. Then choose FREE E-STORE up at the top of the menu bar OR, you can choose WEBSITE over on the left.

For an idea of what you can do there, click here.

Hope that helps. When you get done, please be sure to let us know so we can all go take a look! just adding to the pressure a little**BG**

kat

Subject: RE: Narding Nuts batman I gotta do a website
From: Alice
Date: 28 Mar 00 - 09:33 AM

Hyperabid, I have a page of tips on my website. It reflects the fact that I am an artist, so the visual impression of a site is most important to me, not the bells and whistles. I also LIKE to have detailed illustrations, so a slow loading graphic, IF it's worth it, doesn't bother me as much as it does some people who don't care about art. I also prefer scrolling to frames (hate frames) but some people hate scrolling and prefer frames or small linked pages or pop ups (I don't like pop up pages). There are lots of different tastes in how sites are done, and you won't please everyone. So, please the person whose site it is and as many of their visitors as possible. There are lots of free guestbooks and counters out there that can provide feedback. I used to use Superstats to get marketing info, such as keywords used to find me, but their cookies became too annoying. Here are suggestions from my point of view Alice's design tips. Max would be the real expert here for advice if she wants a professional site created by Onstage Media

alice flynn

Subject: RE: Narding Nuts batman I gotta do a website
From: Hyperabid
Date: 28 Mar 00 - 09:51 AM

Thanks kat, Thanks alice

Links all clicked and All looks very good to me.

I have thought of max but as usual with society's of this nature, wringing money out of them is somewhat like trying to extract pleasure from a brussel sprout.

I think their b(u)yword here is "Aha! We don't have to pay him."

They do however want a proper phantom site which I'm not sure some of the prividers suggested can provide. You know the www.mysite.co.uk kind thing...

Anybody know of any decent phantom site providers????

Hyp :-)

Subject: RE: Narding Nuts batman I gotta do a website
From: Amos
Date: 28 Mar 00 - 10:04 AM

Hyper --

Are you sure you want to do this favor? I detect a certain...enforced cheer here? I think itmight be wise to let them know that you're willing to throw up a home page for them but if they want fancy features, they'll need to go to a pro. Not because you couldn't work it out over time, but because as an obligation, it kind of ruins the learning pleasure, and puts you in a really awkward position of being endlessly visited with new and changing requirements at the same time as you're trying to get your arms around the technology in the first place!

First law of development work: freeze the damn requirements!

Seriously though you might be happier if you made the dog breeders shell out for a good job and purused your own research at a pace you were comfortable with.

Well, you asked...sorry for sticking in my oar.

A

Subject: RE: Narding Nuts batman I gotta do a website
From: Hyperabid
Date: 28 Mar 00 - 10:14 AM

y-oar always welcome m8

Hyp ;-P

Subject: RE: Narding Nuts batman I gotta do a website
From: Alice
Date: 28 Mar 00 - 10:58 AM

Hyperabid, to follow up on Amos' message, the web design business has many facets, and those who make their living, pay their bills, buy their groceries from their skills in doing web design, really need to be taken into account. The illustration and photography industry is really going through a challenge at this time because of companies that are buying up images and then selling them at low ball prices, giving squat to the illustrators and photographers who have signed up with the "stock" houses. My profession is in danger of being eliminated and replaced by free clip art. The profession of high quality custom illustration is already being eroded. Among professional graphic artists and illustrators, and now photographers, there is a growing movement to unite and protect our livelihoods from being destroyed by auction websites that pomote lowest bid work and stock houses that pay royalties of $29. a month. Who can support a family on $29 a month, or compete against free design?

In the interests of educating the public, I'm going to pass on some thoughts to you. Your friend doesn't realize that every time work that is worth compensation is given away for free, there are skilled designers (and musicians!) that have their income threatened. If you make it clear that you are learning from scratch with the project of doing their website and they can't expect a professional job, then they will hopefully realize they get what they "pay" for. Every time it has to be changed or updated, it will be your time and frustration that will be free, and another person who makes their living doing this type of work misses another opportunity to earn some income.

I hope you will tactfully share these ideas with your friend and make it clear that there are people who have spent time and money to learn web design and make a living from it. If you had a paid music gig and someone else came along and told the proprietor that they could do it for free, how would you feel about that? I think doing your own website would be a better place to start, then when you have your skills up to speed, charge a fair per-page fee that would not undercut others who do this for a living.

alice

Subject: RE: Narding Nuts batman I gotta do a website
From: Hyperabid
Date: 28 Mar 00 - 11:14 AM

Fair point Alice

However, I would still like to benefit from the experience of the mighty. Whilst no one thread is going to give away all the secrets of the industry it should prove useful to 'catters and myself whatever projects they are planning to pursue.

Helping us less web aware produce better quality web-sites on our limited budgets helps raise the overall standard of the web as a medium. The better the medoium - the more users. The more users - the better the opportunity for...

I guess you follow the logic.

Hyp

Subject: RE: Narding Nuts batman I gotta do a website
From: Alice
Date: 28 Mar 00 - 12:18 PM

Any help to educate, I think, is laudable. After all, that is what we try to do here for each other with music. My point, I hope you can see, is to educate not only in how to create your own website, but also to respect the fact that people have to make a living and to not undercut those workers.

alice

Subject: RE: Narding Nuts batman I gotta do a website
From: Hyperabid
Date: 29 Mar 00 - 03:35 AM

And in the meantime I get to learn nothing... Well I suppose that is the true advantage of the knowledge based economy.

Anyway I'm just off to burn some books...

Hyp >:-P

Subject: RE: Narding Nuts batman I gotta do a website
From: Brakn
Date: 29 Mar 00 - 03:56 AM

I started a web site to let people know where I was playing and also what sort of songs I sing etc.

I then thought, what else can I put on it? Family Tree. OK.

Well what has happened is that the Family Tree has taken over. My original intention has been over shadowed. 90% of the people that look at it are relations! It's turned out to be great fun. I've even found cousins in America that have been lost for 100 years. I'm glad I did it.

Subject: RE: Narding Nuts batman I gotta do a website
From: Hyperabid
Date: 29 Mar 00 - 04:02 AM

Sounds an excellent site Brakn - what's the address?

Hyp

Subject: RE: Narding Nuts batman I gotta do a website
From: Brakn
Date: 29 Mar 00 - 04:24 AM

Hyperabid, it's not that professional but it doesn't have to be does it.

http://mikbrakn.com/index.htm

or here Blue Clicky Thing

Subject: RE: Narding Nuts batman I gotta do a website
From: Hyperabid
Date: 29 Mar 00 - 04:55 AM

A fine site and a fine piccy of you and the missus.

Congrats...

Hyp