You could spend hours browsing the web, and some of those websites are really neat. If you've ever thought to yourself, "I'd like to build my own website," this program is for you.
Guests
Margaret Miller
Margaret Miller
Margaret Miller is a senior information technology professional from the University of Minnesota's Academic and Distributed Computing Services (ADCS), Office of Information Technology (OIT). She specializes in teaching Web development courses; she also designs Web sites, writes technical documentation, and answers consumers' questions on the campus computer helpline.
Scott Wilson-Barnard
Scott Wilson-Barnard
Scott Wilson-Barnard is an instructional technologist and special projects coordinator at the Digital Media Center, OIT, University of Minnesota. He helps University faculty members, graduate students, and staff members effectively use technology when they teach. Scott manages faculty enrichment programs; teaches short classes on interactivity, animation, and Web design; and consults one-on-one with faculty members. He was a fine artist for several years before working at West Group as a multimedia designer and has been at the University for five years.
For Your Files
Margaret Miller, a University of Minnesota Web design instructor, said check with your Internet service provider for Web space: "A lot of people have Web space available to them [that] they may not be aware of, so you can check there to see if [you] have that. And [the service provider] might have some tools and other things that you can use to create a Web site."
Margaret also said Web development tools are available on the Internet. For example: "Mozilla has a browser that's free on the Internet and they have what's called a Web editor that you can use to create your Web site. It's very much like working with a word processor."
Scott Wilson-Barnard, A University of Minnesota Web design instructor, said: "A well-designed Web site communicates it's content but beware of clip art. The more clip art you use, especially if you get it from different places, the [more likely it is that the] pictures might not go well together, and so what you want to really think about is making a harmonious whole. You want to make the whole thing look nice and clean. I would say if you're going to make a mistake one way or another, make your site a little bit simpler as opposed to a little bit more complex."
Once your Web page is done, Scott suggests: "Find someone [who] has a different type of computer than you have and uses a different browser than you use and take a look at your Web page. See how it looks. See if the words are sort of in the same place. See if the colors look the same. Basically [Web pages viewed in different] Web browsers look generally the same but there are slight [display] differences between browsers and between MACs and PCs."
And finally, Scott said to remember: "Some people see less of the screen than other people depending on how they've set their screen resolution. What you want to do is probably when you create your site, set it for a screen resolution of 800 pixels by 600 pixels. Every one should be able to see your Web site if you set it at that resolution."
Links
See a Macromedia Flash-based basic Web design elements tool Scott created and the Crazy About Cows pages he discussed during the episode:
FTP
File Transfer Protocol. FTP software enables you to transfer Web page files from your computer to a Web server.
HTML
Hyper Text Markup Language. Markup symbols or code that indicates to a Web browser how to display a Web page.
Hyperlink
Text or a graphic that takes you to another Web page or file when you select it.
WYSIWYG
What you see is what you get. When using a Web editor like Composer, what you see when creating a Web page is what the page will look like in a Web browser.