Although our services are available at an hourly rate, there is absolutely no reason why you can’t design, code, and upload your own Web pages. Check back here frequently to see the newest links and recommendations. At the risk of putting high-priced Web site designers out of business, CejCo doesn’t use the trademark demystifying technology™ for nothing!

Learn Basic HTML

The first step is to get comfortable with HTML, the language Web pages are written in. HTML stands for Hypertext Markup Language, which will make sense once you get a better idea of what it looks like and what it does.

For those who do well with books, the best I have found so far is Elizabeth Castro’s HTML for the World Wide Web with XHTML and CSS: Visual QuickStart Guide, Fifth Edition (ISBN 0321130073).

Perhaps a better place for most people is a visual Web-based tutorial. A good place to start is PageTutor. The only downside is all the ads, but you can learn some solid fundamentals here. You do not need to pay for anything, so ignore the pleas to become a member or purchase a CD—unless you want to!

Use FTP to Upload Your Files

Your Web site will consist of one or more .html (or .htm) files, plus whatever graphics (.gif, .jpg, etc.) you refer to. All of these files will now need to be uploaded to your server.

Note: CejCo uses UNIX-based servers, and file names are case-sensitive on UNIX. Therefore, it is strongly recommended that you (1) use all lower-case file names and (2) replace all embedded spaces with underscores. In other words, change “My Photos.html” to “my_photos.html” as an example.

To upload your files, you’ll need to install some FTP (file transfer protocol) software on your computer, if you don’t already have any. Contact me for more information on this, or refer to the recommendation in PageTutor.

In your FTP software, your FTP site name is ftp.yourdomain.com. You should already know your account name and password. The top level of your files (e.g., index.html) needs to be loaded into the public_html folder.

Once you’ve uploaded your files, open your browser (Internet Explorer, Netscape, et al.) and go to http://yourdomain.com with or without the www. prefix. If your page is already in your browser, click Refresh/Reload to see the updated copy.

Happy coding!

Last updated: Tuesday, October 16, 2007