Planning

Developing a web site for personal or professional use can be easy and rewarding.  Prior to developing your web page, you will need to answer a few questions.  These are:

1. What is the purpose the page?
2. Who is the web page intended for?
3. What features are essential for this page?
4. Which features would be nice to have?
5. How much do you want to spend on the web sitego with the free site and tolerate ads or pay a monthly fee to avoid them?  Most sites charge $5-7 per month for 50-200 megabytes of web space.  Free web pages have only 10-20 megabytes of space and limit traffic on your site.
6. Are you going to buy software to help right HTML code or use the web site tools for developing the features?

Analysis

After answering these questions, draw the web page(s) that you want on the web site.

After answering these questions, select a service provider.  The service provider maintains the web site on their server.  Most of these sites allow you to either utilize web development tools on the site or use other software (e.g. Microsofts Frontpage is popular) to create your site features.  A sample of these providers is listed below:

• Netfirms.com
• Yahoo! Geocities
• Builder.com
• Tripod.com

Design

After you have registered with one of the service providers, you can start to explore ways placing your desired features.  Many of these features can be found on the Internet free of charge.  Be aware that by utilizing certain free (or even pay) features may result in your Internet traffic being monitored by the firm providing the service. 

Most of the web sites have useful help sections that you can search or just review the frequently asked questions before you start to implement your designs.

Some of the features you might choose are:

·        Display pictures

·        Automatic link to your email address

·        Weather forecast in a particular area

·        Search engine (for your site and/or the internet)

·        Download files (e.g., Microsoft Office document and Adobe Acrobat files)

A helpful technique while designing a web site is to sketch the features you would like to have on the site.  This will help you to orient the features on the screen to be most visually organized and useful for your intended audience.

Implementation

After placing all of the desired features on your web site, you will need to publish the site to the Internet.  Most of the web space providers will inform you how to do this on the site.

Frequently check your web site for links that might no longer work.  Web site links are not static, addresses are continually changing, so you will need to monitor for these changes.