Hi all!

I need to create a website for this business I am starting.

I have never done anything with websites before, but I know I need to get a domain name and someone to host it for me. Or.... could I host it myself?

I will be selling just a few things from this site (I have not quite finalised what yet) ideally using visa/debit cards and paypal - I believe I will need E-Commerce?

There won't be many pages on my site, and I have a fairly good idea on the layout.

I have seen some free website builders on the internet, but I want to create my own look, and not something from a template.

Other places such as 123-reg.co.uk look expensive for E-Commerce and the costs soon mount up.

So could anybody point me in the right direction?

I would like to get a page up on the internet with something along the lines of 'website is under construction' as soon as possible.

Thanks,

James

Hopefully, as a LocostBuilders member, you would support our hosting provider (who give all bandwidth for the site free).

Ok, so it helps that I own the company!

www.netrino.co.uk, or give me a call in the office on 0207 670 1670.

Cheers, Chris

We use Dataflame at work to host our sites and they are pretty good and a reasonable price.

Have a look at www.joomla.org as this is a CMS (content management system, i think!) that allows you to create a really good looking site. It also has online shop modules which integrate really well.

I have made all the websites for our business using it



[Edited on 30/7/08 by trogdor]

First port of call should naturally be ChrisW on here


Otherwise I use 123reg for the actual domain name registration (have about 7 with them now) then just change the dns to point at the free host I use.

Free hosting is available from jamroll.net which includes 5 MySQL Databases -

So you can use fantastico to install CubeCart or OS Commerce along with joomla or drupal for the actual website creation. You can add a forum as well i.e phpbb3

for hosting have a look at one.com, very cheap to start with. no bandwidth limitations and plenty of storage.

For building the webshop oscommerce, mkportal or joomla are most common. oscommerce being just a shop while joomla and mkportal are primarily for content and a addition is webshop functionality.

Linky's

oscommerce
joomla
mkportal

Oh and to test drive any of the packages that you are thinking of using go to

OpenSourceCMS

You can log in as the admin on all the software listed down the left hand side and play around to your hearts content - the whole lot gets re-installed every 2 hours

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Originally posted by ChrisW
Hopefully, as a LocostBuilders member, you would support our hosting provider (who give all bandwidth for the site free).

Ok, so it helps that I own the company!

www.netrino.co.uk, or give me a call in the office on 0207 670 1670.

Cheers, Chris

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you can also first develop all your stuff on your computer using XAMPP, it turns your computer into a webserver with database capabilities and php support.

xampp

Thank you all for your response!

There seems to be a lot of options! I am having a look at all of them at the moment, but I have also tried a tutorial on the internet to get a basic grounding in HTML.

I've cracked fonts, size, colour, paragraphs, underlining etc. so hopefully by this time tomorrow I will be running the next google! Well, maybe not...

Ok I am starting to look at web hosts, but there are so many! jamroll.net as recommended by Mr G seems ok but apparently I would need to have some small ads at the bottom of my page? Is there a way around this?

One.com seems cheap but I have heard that not hosting from UK servers can be a problem?

After a night of learning HTML I have got links, tables and images down I am getting there... slowly!

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Originally posted by james h
Thank you all for your response!

There seems to be a lot of options! I am having a look at all of them at the moment, but I have also tried a tutorial on the internet to get a basic grounding in HTML.

I've cracked fonts, size, colour, paragraphs, underlining etc. so hopefully by this time tomorrow I will be running the next google! Well, maybe not...

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Originally posted by Delinquent

whilst it is an excellent idea to get a good grounding in HTML, I would highly recommend that you have a look around for someone to help you with the design and implementation if it is for a business. My first career was in design, and the damage good intentions but poor skills can do to a new business is quite extraordinary! The fact you are doing it and in a field you don't know that well usually means you'll be really pleased with your efforts when they might not quite come up to scratch.

Obviously I mean absolutely no offence by that, it's just rare to find people who's skills lay elsewhere complete this area successfully.

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Originally posted by james h

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Originally posted by Delinquent

whilst it is an excellent idea to get a good grounding in HTML, I would highly recommend that you have a look around for someone to help you with the design and implementation if it is for a business. My first career was in design, and the damage good intentions but poor skills can do to a new business is quite extraordinary! The fact you are doing it and in a field you don't know that well usually means you'll be really pleased with your efforts when they might not quite come up to scratch.

Obviously I mean absolutely no offence by that, it's just rare to find people who's skills lay elsewhere complete this area successfully.

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I can see exactly where you are coming from - the main part that I am worried about is adding the e-commerce section. I definitely will need professional help with that!
For the other side of things, I have a friend who has made websites before but as he is in Belgium its not a lot of help at the moment, as I really need a physical demonstration.

For the time being, I would just like to get a decent template going until my skills progress to a suitable level.

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Originally posted by Delinquent

Fair enough

Once you are done, if you'd like some honest thoughts on it let me know, Although I'm not in the industry myself anymore I still dabble, and the missus still does most of the creative for loreal and other similar high end brands. (though be warned, we're fairly blunt, if only for the prospective business owners own good!)

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