Everything to do with using your own website to advertise your rental property. Design, usability, hosting, getting listed on the search engines, optimising your site, pay-per-click, etc, etc.
The Dentdale run is a gorgeous run - apart from the hills in the second half and the fact that the race is a more or less a figure of 8 which starts from the middle of the 8 ... which means it can be tempting to say "sod the second half" and head back for a early shower!
No website about our fell races, I'm afraid, but full details will be on the Fell Runners Association site (www.fra.co.uk) or else I can send a map of the course. If you want the map, let me have your contact details via email (johnvarley@patterda.globalnet.co.uk).
Cheers
Christine
Now, back to the serious business of letting a holiday cottage ...
You design your own website from templates - the last time I looked there was a free option, it has availability calendar etc. If you don't have the time or money to pay a webdesigner I would check it out.
The general topic of web sites is developing into a huge subject with threads running all over the Forum.
I wonder if you, or another knowledgeable member, could find the time to consolidate all the accumulated information into one posting or one Topic, particularly with regard to Private Web Sites?
A “dummies guide� might be very useful, covering such things as: -
Why create a Private Web Site in the first place?
How to go about designing Web pages?
What programs/tools are needed?
How to go about publishing a Private Web Site?
How to maintain a Private Web Site?
How to ensure that people get to see your Site when they search the Internet for information?
That might keep you busy during the quiet winter evenings.
That might keep you busy during the quiet winter evenings.
I wish you could see my quiet winter evenings! They are not spent with feet up in front of the telly any more. One of the joys of working from home with small children is that my working day starts at about 7pm.
I can't promise anything, what you suggest would be useful, it would almost be a small book. Maybe this forum needs better organising because the idea behind it is two-fold:
- live, ongoing discussions with other owners;
- an information resource, where people can refer to past discussions for advice and ideas.
So you should be able to pull the info you need by going to the relevant sections. I know some threads have exploded into all sorts of directions, so the information is not as neatly sorted as it might be. I'll try to keep it more ordered.
So you should be able to pull the info you need by going to the relevant sections.
That’s all very well for those lucky folk who have ADSL, 24/7 connection time included. It’s not so good for those whose ISDN contracts include maybe 20 or 30 hours a month and not at all good for those who have dial-up modems and pay for all their on-line time.
Maybe this forum needs better organising……..
I'll try to keep it more ordered.
Please! No! We don’t want it, we don’t need it! One of the beauties of a Forum like this is that it is disorganised and that it is not kept in order from “on high�. In our daily lives we already have far too many agencies (most of them completely incompetent) which claim the capacity and the right to exercise power over us, to control us, to licence us, to regulate us, to tell us what to think, to tell us what to do.
My suggestion is simply that someone might like to consolidate some useful information into one place - that’s all!
Whilst i think your idea for a 'dummies guide' is a valid one, the internet does hold many resources that offer basic instruction. A quick search on Google for "novice guide to building a web page" brings up 430,000 pages!
Maybe (and it's just my 2p) what would be of use is a thread where people can offer their 'handiwork' up for review? I fully understand that this could in some way be interpreted as 'self marketing' however, but thats for Paolo to decide
I'm sure there are plenty of people on the forum that would be happy to offer advice, tips and opinions.
'Ultradev' was a name attached to dreamweaver to point out that this version was capable of handling 'server side scripting', that is, producing database sites as well as 'static' pages.
I believe it was also the first product to include the 'Extension Manager', where you can easily download some excellent 'extensions' from Macromedia that allow you to simplify many 'site building' tasks.
Then came 'MX' basically the point of this was to completely redesign the 'user' interface and layout of dreamweaver itself. It was now consistant across all the Macromedia product 'family' (dreamweaver, flash, fireworks).
MX 2004 was an 'upgrade' that brought in a few minor improvements and features, but only one that i could really notice personally. That is support for Cascading Style Sheets (CSS).
Depending on the type of sites your are building, which version of Dreamweaver is 'best' is open to discussion. For static pages, anything as far back as v3 is 'capable', anything else could mean paying for features you probably won't be using.
As for HotMetalPro, it's rumoured that dreamweaver picked up a lot of it's development by purchasing an early copy of HotMetalPro! That said, i've always found using dreamweaver a lot more 'straightforward'.
HotMetalPro is still capable and available (as far as i know), but by huge investment and clever marketing, Macromedia has grown into the 'winner' of the wysiwyg editors ..... much like VHS did with Betamax in the early days of 'video cassette players'.
Ultradev 4 was released after Dream Weaver 3 and added database features. It has now been superceded by DreamWeaver MX7 for (about) the past 12 months. As for Hot Metal, didn't that go out with square wheels?
Hope this helps. As an old school programmer, anything other than Windows notepad does my head in...
If you are in the market for a WYSIWYG html editor, and you don't want to fork out for Dreamweaver or FrontPage, there is one called CoffeeCup which is favourably reviewed here:
Coffeecup is easy to get to grips with and whilst I would prefer to learn HTML from scratch, the WYSIWYG type software like Dreamweaver and Frontpage are good places to start learning it.
When you do something like insert a photograph on your page you can see what the code is that has done that by simply clicking on the photograph and looking at the code.
This is how I have learnt HTML and to be honest I find myself lately editing what Dreamweaver has done to make less code, which means the page memory size is smaller.
There is a 'HTML for Dummies book' which I have found very useful, but it still gets caught up in terminology that I dont understand.
