Website FAQs

Welcome to the build or make website frequently asked questions. These are a collection of Faqs (with answers) that I've either received or that I have had myself.

 If you have a question related to any aspect of website making, promotion etc then please use the Ask Webmaster form and I will do my best to answer as promptly as possible.

• Active Server Pages -Active Server Pages allow Web developers to make their sites dynamic and access databases easily. The code is mainly written in VB Script and is embedded within the HTML by means of special SCRIPT tags.
  The server reads the ASP code and then translates it to HTML before sending it to the browser making it browser independent.
• What is an autoresponder- An Autoresponder is an system that automatically replies to emails. Normally you send an email to an autoresponder address an you receive an automatic response. They can be used for acknowledgement purposes, sending out information on request, newsletters etc. They are discussed more in the autoresponder section.
• What are CGI Programs -A CGI is a program that translates data from a Web server and then displays that data on a Web page. CGI involves the transfer of data between a server and a CGI program (script) allowing HTML pages to interact with other programming applications.
   The scripts themselves are normally written in Perl but they can be written in other programming languages such ac C and Python.  Some hosts provide pre-installed/pre-defined CGI scripts, meaning that the scripts are already installed on the server for you to use on your site.
   Page counters, forms, guest books, are examples of commonly provided CGI scripts. Some hosts permit the use of user-defined or custom CGI scripts, which means the site owner creates his/her own CGI script and runs them on the Web site.
  Not all servers allow user-defined (custom) scripts for security reasons. Almost all hosting companies offer CGI today. If you think you will need forms, guest book or page counter on your Web site, CGI could be a key requirement.
  They are not really used any more having been replaced by scripts.
• What are client side scripts.- Client scripts are scripts that are run by your browser. Client side scripts are written in either JavaScript Or VBscript.
  Because they are run by the browser they require browser support. Most modern browsers support JavaScript not all support VBscript. Therefore it is recommended that you use Javascript.
  They are responsible for many of the "cool" effects that you see like test highlighting etc.
• Domain Parking- Many hosting companies give you the option to 'park' your domain name without actually having your Web site up and running. Because you either don't have a Web site yet or you haven't told your domain name registrar what to do with you domain name he will give you a temporary Web site with a default Under Construction notice Web page .
  Most Domain Name registrars provide this facility as part of the registration fee. If they didn't then when you attempted to connect to the Web site you would get a browser error message saying domain not found which tends to imply that it doesn't exist when you know that it does.
• Domain Name Aliasing- This is another name for Web forwarding. (see above).
• What is email forwarding-  Email forwarding allows you to continue to use an existing email account – e.g. an email account provided by your ISP - yourname@ispdomain.com.
  Any email messages that are sent to your 'new' address e.g. yourname@yourdomain.com, is automatically redirected to your existing address-yourname@ispdomain.com, just like traditional postal forwarding.With forwarding normally all email sent to anyone@yourdomain.com will be forwarded to the existing email account for example:
  info@yourdomain.com-----> your@ ispdomain.com
  
sales@yourdomain.com -----> your@ ispdomain.com
admin@yourdomain.com-----> your@ ispdomain.com
 

• What are FrontPage Extensions- FrontPage extensions can be thought of as "mini programs" that allow features of a Web site created with MS FrontPage to operate smoothly. It is possible to use MS Front Page to create a Web site and host that site on a server that doesn't offer FP extensions, however some of the powerful features of the program cannot be used in these Web sites. After you design your Web site, you will know whether FrontPage extensions will be a requirement. It is possible to implement the features provided by FrontPage that require FP extensions by other methods.
• What is FTP (File Transfer Protocol)- This is the primary method of transferring files (uploading and downloading) across the Internet. Most Web sites are uploaded to the Internet by means of an FTP program. This is how the Web site you create on your computer at home is transferred (uploaded) to the Internet.
   Some software, such as Microsoft Front Page, does not require use of an FTP program but the use of most any other HTML editor requites the use of and FTP Program. Sometimes the FTP protocol is built into the HTML editor so as to make publishing easier. There is a free windows based FTP program called WS_FTP which can download at download.com. See also Uploading web pages for more detail on use.
• What is JavaScript- JavaScript is a scripting language which can be used as either a client side script or a server site script in conjunction with active server pages.
   Although JavaScript is similar in syntax to Java it is not Java.
• What is Java- Java is an object-oriented  programming language like C, C++ developed by Sun Microsystems.
• What is JSP- Java Server Pages is Sun Microsystems answer to Microsoft ASP. The programming language used is Java. Although very popular for large corporates it is not the choice of small/medium website designers.
• What is Perl Scripting-Perl is an interpreted language optimized for scanning arbitrary text files and extracting information from them. Many of the CGI scripts available on the internet are written in Perl. The commands are executed on the Web server, making it browser independent
• What is PHP Scripting -PHP is another scripting language like ASP which allows Web developers to make their sites dynamic and access databases easily. The server reads the PHP code and then translates it to HTML before sending it to the browser making it browser independent. PHP is free and works on Windows and  Linux (Unix releated). PHP has very good database support and is normally used with MYSQL (free download) server. The range of back-end databases supported by PHP meets all but the most unusual needs.
• What are Server Side Scripts. -Server side scripts are scripts that are run on the web server itself. because they run on the web server they are browser independent . Serve scripts can be written in a variety of scripting languages the most popular being Perl, PHP, VBscript and JavaScript (Active server Pages).
• What are Server Side Includes (SSI) -These are commands that can be included in Web pages that are processed by the Web server when a user requests a file. The command takes the form <!--#include virtual="/path/to/file"-->.
  A common use for SSI commands is to insert a universal menu into all of the pages of the Web site so that the menu only has to be changed once and inserted with SSI instead of changing the menu on every page.
• Sub-domains A sub-domain is a subdirectory or folder created under the primary Domain account which is a fully operating Web site. A sub-domain is a perfect way to guide frequent visitors directly to their destination.
  In addition it creates a very professional appearance to your organisation. A sub-domain can appear as follows: service.yourname.co.uk or support.yourname.co.uk.
• URL Definition: A URL is defined as the absolute address of a web page/resource on the Internet. See What is a URL for more details.
• What is VBScript- VBScript is a scripting language which can be used as either a client side script or a server site script in conjunction with active server pages.
  VBscript tends to be mainly used for active server pages as most web developers use JavaScript for client side scripting because of its universal support.
• Web forwarding- You may already have a Web site if so Web forwarding allows you to 'forward' your domain name to a particular site hosted elsewhere on the Internet - e.g. on free space allocated by your Internet Service Provider (ISP).

  Example:

  http://www.yourdomainname.com

  forwards to: http://freespace.onetel.net/your_user_name/http://www.build-your-website.co.uk/index.html

  Normally the redirected domain name is masked so the user does not know they have been forwarded . See Website or Domain Forwarding for more details.

• What is WebMail -  This allows you to access your Emails in your POP3 mailbox by using a browser. You can even send Emails under your own domain name and you don't require a special mail program. Everything is done with the browser.
• What is a Website ?

  It is important that you are clear as to what a website really is before starting.

   Websites are simply folders (directories) containing web pages that are stored on a web server (web host). You can, in fact, construct your entire website on you own PC, and when complete transfer (upload) it to your Internet hosting provider.

   This means that In reality you don't need a website on the Internet until the very last stages and I would not advise that you to register a domain name and purchase web space until you are very happy with the basics. By this I mean that you are able to, at a minimum, make web pages containing images and tables and link the pages together.

  What is a Catchall Email Address -This is an email address for the entire domain. It is designed to cover for the case of misspelled addresses. For example if someone sends an email to a user stevec@mysite.com (invalid) instead of steve@mysite.com (valid) then rather than sending an undeliverable message to the sender you can arrange the email to be sent to another mailbox (catchall box).

  
  

• What is XHTML- XHTML stands for eXtendable HYpertext Markup Language and will eventually replace HTML. It is basically a more stricter form of HTML. By stricter we mean that the rules will be much more strongly enforced than with HTML.
  With HTML many browsers would simply ignore html errors with XHTML they will produce an error. XHTML is required because of the many news ways available of connecting to the Web- mobile devices, household devices etc.
  The main characteristics of XHTML are:
  • Case-sensitive everything is written in lower case
  • All attribute values must be in quotes
  • Tags must be nested properly
  • All tags must have closing tags or written in a special format that combines the opening and closing tag - <br/>

  See XHTML explained for more details.