In February, 1997 I was approached by a writer named Craig Lock. He had published three books, and a Web Page had been created for him.

He was just in the process of buying a computer, and I advised him on one that would suit his needs.

When it arrived and we connected it to an Internet Service Provider, we discovered we could not find his page. It was not listed on any search engine, and the address we had been given was incorrect.

I had only been on the Internet myself since August 1996, so in order to help Craig I had to learn very quickly how to use this new medium.

Without access to his original Home Page, we decided to create a new one with the same host (Tripod.com) that had been used for his original Home Page.

Their service was free and provided enough space for a few pages and a couple of pictures.

Next we had to find a medium to create the Home Page, as we had no experience with HTML.

I chose Microsoft Publisher 97 as it had a Web Page creation facility. It was certainly easy to create a page, and it was not long before we had our own page on the web.

To further improve my skills I created my own Home Page, so I was now working on two Home Pages.

We then discovered that we could have a free Home Page with Geocities, and the next thing I knew I was creating four Home Pages.

By now I had realised that Publisher was not a good medium for creating Web Pages. I had no control over the HTML, and I was ready to get back to basics.

In my experience there is no better way to create a Web Page than by doing it yourself from scratch. No special tools are required, other than a little bit of skill and lots of patience!

I have found that Notepad is quite adequate for writing the HTML code, and the page itself can be viewed in Netscape Navigator or Internet Explorer.

I use Netscape, and have it open but not connected to the ISP, so that I can observe my handiwork as I make changes, and before I upload them to the Internet.

There are many places on the Internet that provide information about HTML and writing pages, the most useful I have found for HTML basics are

Having created a Web Page it is now time to sit back and reflect on the quality of your creation.

Anyone can create a Web Page, but it takes time and effort to produce one that does its job well.

Some people have the idea that a Web Page must be full of graphics, colours and animations to succeed.

Nothing could be further from the truth. The fact is that content is what will ultimately draw people back to your page again and again.

So before you create your Web Page masterpiece, take a piece of paper and write down what the content of your page will be.

Having done that and honed it to your satisfaction, you can now take time to present it in the best manner on your Home Page.

A good balance of text and pictures that load quickly and are pleasing to look at will ensure surfers will enjoy dropping in to your Home Page.

Nothing is worse than a slow loading Page that has nothing on it except a graphic which you have to click to go to another page.

Upsetting your surfers in this way ensures that they will avoid you like the plague!

So you've created the perfect Home Page, but with 80 million pages on the Internet, how do you get surfers to visit yours?

It's a bit like having a new telephone. How do you let people know your number?

You have it put in a Telephone Directory, tell all your friends and make sure the word gets around.

The Internet is no different. If you want visitors to your Page you are going to have to advertise it.

Tell your friends how to find your Page. Always show its address on your e-mail signature. If you are a business, incorporate it in your letter-heads.

But this still only tells the people you know. So it is important to get listed in the Search Engines.

There are a number of major ones like Alta Vista, Yahoo, Infoseek, HotBot, Excite, to name a few.

The most successful way to get on these is to visit them and submit your URL yourself.

You can have them submitted for you at no cost by these two:

Just because you have an account with an Internet Service Provider does not mean that you can only have a Page on the Internet with them.

Some ISPs do provide free space for your Home Page, but many do not. If you have to pay for space with your ISP, you may want to consider having your Page Hosted by a third party.

This Page is Hosted by Tripod, a free service with 2mb of space. More space (10mb) can be provided for a small fee.

One advantage of having your Page Hosted in this way is that if you decide to change your ISP, you will not need to re-locate your Home Pages.

Sites like Tripod provide assistance with creating and maintaining your Pages, and getting your Pages uploaded is a fairly painless procedure.

You've created your page, got listed on a search engine, and still the visitors don't seem to be coming.

One way to encourage more visitors is to exchange links with other sites that have similar ideals to you.

But, be careful, don't link to someone or have them link to you unless you feel happy with the content of their page and its relevance to yours.

There are a number of Link Exchange sites that operate a Banner Exchange program.

You agree to have a random banner appear on your page in return for having your banner appear on someone else's page at random.

It is doubtful whether many visitors will come to your site this way, and those that do may have no interest in your site and will disappear as quickly as they came.

Also, it encourages visitors to leave your site and visit another, after you've spent a lot of effort getting them to your site.

Rings are made up of sites with similar ideals who link to each other.

A visitor to one site can surf to the others using the link.

You may have more surfers coming to your site at random, and they will be more likely to be interested in the content of your Page.

But will a Ring radically increase traffic to your site?

It is doubtful, but having a Ring on your Page will probably not do any harm.

Be aware though, that every Banner or Ring with a graphic will slow down the loading of your Page.

You can get free Guestbooks from a number of sites.

Some Host Sites provide one as part of their service.

The idea is that visitors to your site can leave a comment, and it is handy to know what people think about your Pages.

Of course the reverse is true, if you visit a site with a Guestbook, then leave a message and include the URL for your Home Page.

With a bit of luck someone else will see it and come and pay you a visit!

However, a word of warning. Some people scan Guestbooks to obtain e-mail addresses and send you junk e-mail, so be warned!

These are a very useful tool. As well as showing how many visitors you have had, some of the more sophisticated ones can tell you when they visited and where they came from. They can even break it down to time of day, day of week etc.

One that I am using and which is free is Hitbox, which not only shows you numbers, but also allows you to choose a category.

It is then interesting to see just how high you come in your category, whether you can make the top 1000 or even 100!

Counters that give you the origin of visitors, e.g. country or ISP, are very handy, as you can build up a profile of the type of visitors you receive.

Recently Web Page Designers have gone overboard on the idea of splitting up your screen into segments called Frames.

The principle is sound enough, and I do use them if I think it is appropriate as in my Statistics Page.

However, the idea of splitting up the screen and cramming what should be on a whole screen into a third of a screen, does not make good sense.

It is hard to read, often doesn't load properly, and is used by some sites to stop you leaving their site when viewing Pages created and maintained by someone else!

Also, not all surfers can view frames on their computers, so be careful how you use them!

The object is to have surfers arrive at your Page and stay, not have them leave in disgust and frustration when they see your slow loading Frames Page!

Remember that old adage KISS?

Keep It Simple Stupid!

Bear that in mind when you start to think about frames.

Standards have been set on the construction of Web Pages by a group called The World Wide Web Consortium or W3C for short.

Currently HTML has three versions, 1, 2 and 3. A fourth version is being considered.

These versions are approved by W3C and are designed to work with all Web Browsers.

In other words if you write your HTML according to their standards you can be sure that anyone can view it.

Netscape Navigator and Internet Explorer have developed their own standards outside these approved ones, and if you use them you have to realise that they will be incompatible with other browsers.

Some users have taken the Web Interoperability Pledge, which says that we will work to ensure that standards are maintained so that all users will continue to have full access to Web Sites.

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