Archive for November, 2004
· November 23, 2004 at 1:15 am · Web Hosting
I have to say the year has had some ups and downs for your favorite freak, but all and all… things have turned out alright. As I come closer to my one year anniversary of being tossed out on the cyber street by old Web hosting job, I have come to realize if it had not have happened, I would not be where I am today.
Today I have my articles and other works posted on over a dozen different help Web sites. I am a contributor on Lockergnome. I am 22, alive, single and still kicking! Guess it can not get much better than that. So what is in the cards for your old buddy Mitch? Who knows.
I am really starting to get the itch to start a new project. One idea I have been kicking around for a while is writing a technical help book on the wacky world of Web hosting. It would pretty much be the same as my articles you have seen posted here, perhaps longer and more in depth. Then toss in a few scary stories I’ve heard, and it should be a good read. Well, as long as my mother thinks so at least.
· November 22, 2004 at 12:35 am · Odds & Ends
After my recent post about “How Do You Create a Web Site?” I received several E-mails asking the same questions. There are many questions in the world of Web site creation or Web hosting, so I am not surprised. Here’s a good sample of the average E-mail.
Read more of “More On Web Site Creation“
· November 20, 2004 at 1:22 am · Web Hosting
Thank you ICANN for making such a stupid new rule to scare a lot of folks, and to scam the rest. For those of you who don’t know, ICANN (Internet Corporation For Assigned Names and Numbers) pretty much controls the buisness of domain names. Now they have decided to enforce a rule that in effect could cause folks to loose the domain name they love. For more information, please check these articles I did for Lockergnome:
Domain Hijackings to Become Easier
Domain Name Warnings
· November 17, 2004 at 12:30 am · Web Hosting
Before you can own your own stake to Internet glory, you must know what runs the backend of it. For the most part, Web hosting plays the biggest part in how the Internet has been shapped in the past and shall be shapped in the future. Before you can own your own Web hosting account, you must first know what Web hosting is. What is Web hosting and how does it impact you yourself someday starting up your own Web site?
Sure somebody has explained it to you before, maybe several times. However, not every definition can be understood by the untrained eye, what is needed is a translation from Web hosting geek into regular speak.
Web hosting can be broken down into two parts, the Web hosting server and the Web hosting domain name.
Web Hosting Sever
Your Web hosting sever is the place in which your Web page is stored. When you sign up with a Web hosting company, you in effect rent space off of a shared Web hosting server hooked up to the Internet. No mater what Web hosting company you sign with or what promises they give you, at the fundemental core of all of that is that idea. Think of it as one file in a large filing cabinet. You can put as much stuff inside of that folder as you have room for. Folks can pull it out and look at it anytime they want to.
Web Hosting Domain Name
Your domain name acts as a tool to direct your visitors, or yourself to your own Web site. Simply, your domain name points to your Web hosting account so that when you type in, “http://www.mitchkeeler.com” you in return go to MitchKeeler.com. Think of the domain name as a way to label the folder mentioned earlier. If none of the folders in the filing cabinet had lables it would be aweful hard to tell what content was in which folder. The same could be said about domain names in relation to Web sites they are directed to.
Need More Help?
Try searching Google for the definition of Web hosting, you are given a plethora of definitions and options other than these above.
· November 17, 2004 at 12:25 am · Web Hosting
Creation has been a fundamental stepping stone to the world we live in today. Our ancestors created works of art out of wood, paint and stone. These days such works can be created in a much more digital sense. For those of you who would say Web site creation is far from being a way to express your artistic abilities, I would have to disagree. It takes many hours, days, months and years sometimes to create a successful Web site. Basic fundamentals should be followed, and once it is done there should always be room for more. Don’t get me wrong, just about any idiot can create a Web site, but creating a good Web site is another matter all together.
The Web Hosting Easy Way
Here are a couple of ways I would describe as being the easy way out of creating a Web site.
Hire Somebody Else to do it for You
There are a number of Web design firms out there Online today that would be more than happy to design your Web site for you. They are often professionals who do design for a living, so you do not have to worry about quality of work. The best thing to do would be to shop around at several different companies before you make your final decision.
On the up side, this leaves you more time to focus on the content of the Web site rather than the design. On the down side though, you are often as the mercy of the person doing the work. It might take some people longer to see the vision you have for your Web site and that alone can be a demanding process.
Use a WYSIWYG Editor
To answer your first question, WYSIWYG stands for “What you see is what you get”. By using a WYSIWYG editor such as FrontPage or Dreamweaver you often do not have to worry about the back end coding of the Web site. Instead, you are given a blank page, and you can change boxes, tables, fonts and colors just as you would inside a word processor.
On the up side, this leaves you with an easier way to create what it is you want to put out Online. After reading through a few instructions and tutorials you should be well on your way. on the down side though, you might be limiting your audience. Not many WYSIWYG editors do a good job at making your Web site look good across all of the browsers out there today. What looks perfect in Internet Explorer might look like a jumbled up mess in Firefox.
The Web Hosting Hard Way
I do not want to disenfranchise anybody by describing these as the “hard” way out. Maybe a better term for them would be the more “advanced” way in.
Designing it Yourself
This is the approach I like to call, getting your hands dirty. Just like you would when building a car, or constructing a house you are in charge of every single bit of code that gets plastered up onto your Web site. On the up side, this means you are given total control over everything you see. On the down side, you need to read up on your HTML (hyper text markup language) and be ready to learn more as you progress.
Using a Content Management System
There are many CMS (or content management systems) out there today to choose from. Many are meant to control and manage blogs, but that should not limit your imagination. Some of the best Web sites Online today are controlled by such blogging tools of the trade, like Movable Type.
The upside is that your Web site has many more powerful tools for your users right at your fingertips. Some of these include forums, comment management and syndication of your Web site content. The down side is that many of these Web sites (especially with PHP-Nuke) look the same. There are all pretty much the same Web page layout with a different banner on the top. Not much room for individuality.
Which Way is the Best Way?
None of these options listed above I could put over the other. Depending on the Web site and the person running it, it could truthfully change by those factors alone. The best thing to do would be to figure out which would work best for you, then stick with it. Creating your own Web site can be as satisfying as finishing any job that is worth doing. The hard part is keeping things updated and evolving so that you can keep your visitors coming in.
· November 15, 2004 at 6:25 pm · Odds & Ends
I was tricked into buying the first PS2 Grand Theft Auto game, (Grand Theft Auto 3) by seeing the commercial over and over again every time I turned on the television. With all the hype surrounding the graphic nature of the game, what male would not be excited? Got to say after popping the disc into my PS2, I was surprised by how much I liked it. Then came Grand Theft Auto: Vice City. Well this was just right for me, being a child of the late 80s to early 90s.
Now here comes Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas. I have to say at first I was turned off by the thought of all the hip-hop gangster type game play. Thinking of myself as more of a rocker than a rapper, I did not think the game had that much to offer me. I was wrong. This game is as addicting as the other two before it. Sure it has more cursing than a Quinten Tarrintio flick, but it is fun to play, period. Too many games today are hyped up as being the best thing out there just because they are pretty. It is nice to see that putting a little more interest in game play and a little less interest in polygon count has finally paid off.
So forget your Doom 3 and Halo 2 typical graphical masterpieces. Get back to your roots with a little fun game play and a little Grand Theft Auto.
