- Welcome!
- Abstraction Programming and Education
- Four Questions about Math Education
- The Future of Education
- A New Curriculum
- Writing with Less Writing
- The Goals of Learneroo - How I Hope to Improve Online Education
- The Java Job Market
- Kickstarter Success, Thank you Backers!
- Comments and Chat
- Path to Learning Java
- Aristotle on Learning
- Programming Bootcamps as an Alternative to Lectures
- The Education Dialog
- The Mean, the Median and Startup Equity
- Membership on Learneroo
- Discounts - Satisfaction Guaranteed!
- Lecture Videos and Learning
- Learn Programming by Example and with Challenges
- Java Coding Contest Results
- Coding the Java Explorer
- New - Java Budget Bootcamp
- Java Jobs II
- The Web for All - Kickstarter
- Finding a Web Host and Creating a Site
- Web Development for Entrepreneurs, Marketers and Biz-devs
- Web Development for Non-Developers
- Lessons from my Unsuccessful Kickstarter Project
- Changes on Learneroo
- Learneroo on Reddit and the Powers of 10
- Free Membership for Teachers
- New Algorithms Tutorials
- Free Membership on Learneroo
- Algorithms for Interviews and Jobs
- Interactive Cartoon Guide to Ruby on Rails
- Kickstarter Launched
- Learn Web Development Kickstarter - Q & A
- Ruby on Rails for Web Designers
- Web App Framework vs. CMS vs. Website Builder
- Real Web Development for Entrepreneurs
- What Programming Language Should You Learn?
- Lessons from my Successful Kickstarter Project
- Ruby Coding Contest Live!
- Understanding Recursion
- Ruby Coding Contest Recap
A blog about education. On Learneroo Itself. Blog Home
Finding a Web Host and Creating a Site
Here's an early sample from the Web for All Tutorials in which Jim consults the Guru and finds out his best options for creating a website.
Jim: I’d like to create a website for my lemonade stand. How do I get started?
Guru: The easiest way is to use an online site builder. For a quick solution, try the free Google Sites or Wix.com for a more modern look. However, if you want more control to edit everything, you should use a tool that lets you deal with the actual HTML.
Jim: Yes, I’d like to have full control. Can you explain what exactly HTML is?
Guru: Every web page is made up of HTML. The HTML marks the different elements of a page, such as headings and paragraphs. To create a web page, you can just upload your HTML file to a web server.
Jim: What’s a web server and how do I get one?
Guru: A web server can simply be a computer connected to the internet that serves web pages and files to other computers that request it. In practice, you’ll want to get a web host to host your web pages on their web servers.
Jim: OK, How do I get a web host?
Guru: Well that depends, do you want a static web host or dynamic one?
Jim: Damnit, I don’t know, what's the difference?
Guru: A static web host just serves web files to those that request it, but doesn’t do any computing on its own side (on the back-end). A dynamic web host can do stuff first, such as running code or accessing a database.
Jim: So which one do I need?
Guru: If you just wanted a simple site with only HTML files, you could use a static web host. Do you want to create any other sites besides for your lemonade stand?
Jim: Well, I’d also like to experiment with a startup idea I have that will demolish Facebook.
Guru: Then you’ll want a dynamic web host so you can run applications on the backend. You can also use web-based tools for editing your lemonade stand site, so you don’t need to edit all the HTML on your computer. So just pick a good dynamic host and get started.
Jim: OK, how do I pick a web host?
Guru: You have 2 general choices to go with: shared hosting or PAAS (Platform-As-A-Service) hosting. Which do you want?
Jim: PAAS my AAS! I just want a website already. I don’t know what these terms mean.
Guru: Patience grasshopper. Remember web servers? Well your little site doesn’t need a whole web server. So shared hosting puts a whole bunch of sites on 1 web server. PAAS or Cloud hosting does the same thing, but in a smarter way so you can easily scale up. Also, some PAAS hosts are free initially.
Jim: So why the hell wouldn’t I go with a PAAS host?
Guru: Shared hosting offers some tools, such as one-click app installations, that can be useful for beginner web creators.
Jim: Since I’m going to be the next Facebook, I need to scale up. So I’ll take a PAAS. Where can I get a free one that’s still easy to use?
Guru: OpenShift is a good PAAS that provides a generous free tier. In fact, it may be better than many paid shared hosting options (but without the support).
Jim: Finally an answer! So now that I have a web host, what do I do with it?
Guru: Well, you can start by installing Wordpress on it (in a couple clicks) so you have a quick site. Later we can look at other alternatives, including completely static options.
Jim: If I’m going to use Wordpress, wouldn’t it be easier to just Wordpress.com?
Guru: Yes, but then you couldn’t customize it how you want. By installing your own Wordpress site, you can easily install thousands of plugins and themes for free.
This is a sample of some early content from the Web for All tutorials. Check out the Kickstarter page for more on the full tutorials, which will include challenges and cartoons.