From Chapter 1 Preparing for the Web, of Creating Web Sites; The Missing Manual, by Matthew MacDonald, October 2005, Pogue Press/O’Reilly Media, Sebastopol, CA

The beginnings of the Internet are found on these two web pages: http://www.isoc.org/internet/history and http://www.walthowe.com/navnet/history.html

The Internet and the Web are two different things; the Internet is a network of connected computers that spans the globe and the World Wide Web is one of the many ways to exchange information across the Internet. People use Web Browsers to visit Web sites and Web pages. The most popular browser is Internet Explorer (IE). Others are Firefox, Netscape Navigator, Opera, Safari (Apple designed for Macs), and Lynx (text-based).
Web servers are the more powerful (industrial strength) computers that can handle multiple browsers requesting Web sites/pages. Web servers receives browser requests and sends back the correct Web page. People rent space on Web servers to host their sites.

IP addresses are numeric address that identifies your computer on the Web.

Planning a Web site
Types of Sites
Decide what your Web site is for:
-Personal sites all about you.
-Online diaries or blogs (be sure to keep these up to date if you choose to start one). http://www.opendiary.com, http://www.spaces.msn.com
You may want a blogging tool, which makes it easy to post quick updates even when you aren’t at your computer.
-Resume sites can be powerful career-building tools. This can be a substitute for paper resumes; more details can be added to resume Web sites.
-Topical sites focus on a particular subject that interests you.
-Event sites aren’t designed to weather the years–instead they revolve around a specific event (i.e. wedding sites)
-Promotion sites are ideal when you have a personally produced CD or hot-off-the-presses book to promote.
-Small business or e-commerce sites show off the most successful use of the modern Web–selling anything from portable music players to prescription drugs. These Web sites need the support of complex applications and computer-genius-level programming languages. PayPal and Yahoo provide subscription services that can help you build shopping-cart-style Web sites and accept credit card payments. (Google AdSense ads can start raking in the cash.)

Understand Your Audience
Knowing and understanding your audience is crucial to making sure your Web site is effective. Single out the lowest common denominator in the audience. (Good Web designers avoid using fancy frills unless everyone can experience them.) Keep your visitor’s PC capabilities in mind as you build and improve your Web pages.
It’s best to try out your Web site on different computers; paid services that do this for you such as http://www.netmechanic.com , which test your Web site with different browsers and sends you pictures.
Design tips are throughout the book. Watch out for these problem areas:
-Computer monitors are not all equal. Smaller screen resolutions can’t show much content.
-Colors cause similar problems; graphics that look rich and nuanced on your computer might turn ugly on computers that don’t support many colors.
-Non-standard fonts are another headache. Choose basic fonts that are visible on all computers.
-Large graphics are another trap that is easy to fall into; if you test your Web site on a speedy computer with a fast Internet connection, when dial-up Web surfers try to see your work, they’ll be stuck waiting for the goods and may just give up.
-Plug-ins, movies, and browser-specific features are temptations you need to treat with caution. In the world of the Web, anything that limits how many visitors can enjoy your work is danger. Steer clear of cutting-edge features that aren’t widely supported.

Creators of the most popular Web pages have carefully considered all the above issues.

The average Web designer goes through three stages of maturity:
1. “I’m just learning, so I’ll keep it simple;”
2. “I’m a Web guru, and I’ll prove it by piling on the features;”
3. “I’ve been burned by browser compatibility problems, so I’ll keep it simple.”

The Lifespan of A Site
The Web constantly changes; it’s not the same as last year or 15 seconds ago.
Two valuable truths about Web site lifetimes:
-The best Web sites are constantly improving.
-When a Web site stops changing, it’s on life-support.
Making a Web site is hard enough, and keeping it up to date is even more challenging. Here are a few tips:
-Think in stages. When you first put your Web site online, it won’t be complete. Instead, think of it as Version 1, and start planning a few changes for the next version. Bit by bit, and stage by stage, you can add everything you want to your Web site.
-Select the parts you can modify regularly and leave the rest alone. There’s no way you can review and revise an entire Web site weekly or even monthly. Instead, your best strategy is to identify the sections that change regularly. Examples: On a personal Web site, you might put news on a separate page, and update just that page; on a small business Web site, you might concentrate your changes to the home page to advertise new products and upcoming specials.
-Design a Web site that’s easy to change. THIS IS THE HARDEST PRINCIPLE TO FOLLOW, because it requires not only planning but experience as well. As you become more experienced, you’ll learn how to simplify your life making it easier to update pages. One method is to start out by separating information into several pages, so you can add new content without needing to reorganize everything. Another technique is to use STYLE SHEETS to separate the formatting from your content (Chapter 6). This way, you can easily insert new material without having to reformat it from scratch to make sure it matches the rest of your page.

Practice Good Design
One commonality of most Web sites is that they are bad. Flashing backgrounds, poor choices of color, and animated graphics contribute to bad design.
See http://www.angelfire.com/super/badwebs or http://www.webpagesthatsuck.com or http://www.worstoftheweb.com
This book will guide you in the time-honored Art of Not Making Bad Web Sites. Look for tips, suggestions, warnings about usability and design. Look for “Design TIme” boxes.
-Stay simple and don’t annoy your visitors.
-Be consistent. No matter how logical you think your Web site is, the majority of visitors probably won’t think the same way. To cut down on the confusion, from one page to another, use similar organization, similar headings, similar graphics and links, a single navigation bar, etc. These touches will make your visitors feel right at home.
-Know your audience. Every type of Web site has its own unwritten conventions. You don’t need to follow the same design in an e-commerce Web store as you do a promotional page for an experimental electric harmonic band. To help decide what is suitable, check out lots of other sites that deal with the same sort of material as yours.

The Ingredients of a Web Site
The trickiest part about building a Web site is coordination. To get it right, you not only need the right tools to create Web pages, but you need to coordinate with other companies to get your Web site onto the World Wide Web and to give it a catchy address like http://www.stylinviolins.com
Web Shopping List:
-Web pages. Every Web site is built with individual pages. In order to create a basic Web page, you need to understand HTML (Hyper Text Markup Language), the language of the Web.
-Web space. Creating Web pages is fun, but in order to let other people take a look at them, you need to put them on a Web Server. Chapter 3 you’ll consider your options for getting your first Web page online, either through a fee-based service or free alternative.
-A domain name. There’s a world of difference between the Web site address http://www.inetConnecitons.com/users/~jmallone012/web and http://www.jackiemallone.com. You can get your own personalized domain name, if it’s available. Chapter 3 explains how to buy your own domain name. (The domain name is the first part of the Web address, which identifies the Web server that’s storing and serving your site. Chapter 3 goes into domain names and URLs-Universal Resource Locators and how they work.
-Web design tools. Creating Web pages from scratch is a great way to learn, but it’s far too slow and painful to create a complete Web site this way. To get to the next level, you’ll need to step up to a professional Web design tool. (FrontPage, Dreamweaver, etc.). Even if you don’t there are many good free and shareware products that help you out. Chapter 4 explains your options and helps you get started.
-Hyperlinks. On its own, a Web page can only do so much. The real magic begins when you bind multiple Web pages together using links. Chapter 8 introduces the versatile hyperlink, which allows visitors to surf around your Web site.
-Indispensable extra. Once you’ve mastered the basics of Web pages and Web sites, there’s still more ground to conquer. You can get your site listed in a search engine catalog (Chapter 11), establish your own forum (Chapter 12), and sell items (Chapter 13). Want more frills? Chapter 14 covers JavaScript, Chapter 15 create eye-catching buttons, Chapter 16 add audio and video. All these features take you beyond ordinary HTML and well on the road to becoming a genuine Web guru.
End of Chapter 1