The World Wide Web has become the fastest way to communicate and send information globally. This guide will show you how to create your own Home Page that can be published on the Web. The guide takes you step-by-step through the process of planning, designing, building, and publishing your own Web site. Publishing your page puts your ideas and interests in front of a global audience. Your Web page can also be a bridge to new interests and new friends.

Six steps to building a Home Page

Step 1: The Details. Begin with a good Idea. What do you want to say with your words and pictures? What is your purpose? What do you want to share? And with whom?

Step 2: Design Your Page. Sketch out what your page will look like. Decide where to put the graphics, text and the titles. Look at other Home Pages for ideas.

Step 3: Prepare The Pieces. Write the text, draw or scan the graphics, or capture the images.

Step 4: Build Your Page. Put everything together: import the pieces, set their sizes, move them around your Home Page until you see what you like and the page is built to do what you want it to do.

Step 5: Test your Page. Using Explorer or other Web browser, open the pages you just made to see how they look.

Step 6: Publish The Site. Publish your page.

By following the detailed instructions below, you will learn all you need to develop a Home Page.

Step 1: The Details

Develop Your Ideas--What do YOU want to say? This is the first and most important step in the whole process.

Purpose--Home Pages can have different purposes. Some tell about a group or an organization (American Cancer Association). Some Home Pages try to sell you things (Precious Moments). And still others are there just for fun (The Hedgehog Home Page). What will be the purpose of your home page?

Audience--Think about the audience: who do you expect to be looking at your page? Why would they be looking at it? What would they expect to learn from your page? No single design can please or entertain everybody. Focus your page at a particular audience, a set of people who would be interested in what you have to share with them.

Ideas--Now that you know the purpose of your page, and who it's aimed at, you can set forth the ideas you want to present. Make a list of the ideas that you want to get across with your Home Page.

Content--For each idea on your list, write down exactly what you will put on the Home Page to get that idea across. If your Content List seems too long, go back and remove a few. By now, you have thought quite a bit about your Home Page. You should have a good feeling for what's going to be in it, and who will be looking at it.

Step 2: Design Your Page

What will it look like? How something looks can be as important as what it says. Before designing your own page, it's always helpful to look at Web sites others have created. This gives you some ideas as to what your page could look like. Look at these Web pages as examples:

• Boston
• Castles on the Web
• Lakota
  

Professionals have designed these pages, but you can learn from their designs. You might compare their use of color, titles, images, and text. Which are attractive to look at? Which ones are easy to read? Which ones are confusing and cluttered? Which ones make the information easy to find?

As you judge, you might find yourself mixing and matching; liking something here and something else there. Notice how the text, the graphics, and the titles are arranged. This arrangement is called the Web page design. Your next step is to come up with a design for your page.

The best way to do this is to take out several blank sheets of paper and draw out your your design. Put your lists of ideas, audience, purpose and content to one side, read them over again, and then begin your design into the box.

In your sketch, show where the titles will be, where the words will be, and where you will locate the pictures. Try to keep your page simple, so it will fit on the computer screen. If you have more information than will fit on one screen, make another page for it.

Step back for a minute. Give your Home Page a critical look. Think of the person who is looking at your Home Page. Will they understand what is what? Will they understand how your text and Images work? Will it be clear to them what the page is about, and will they know how to get to the information they need?

Some tips for designing Home Pages

Make reading easy. Experiment with colors to find what's most readable. A picture or a pattern underneath words (backgrounds) may make them hard to read.

Keep images small but clear. If the pictures are too large, they will take a long time to download over the Internet. If they are too small, they will be hard to see.

Use large but brief titles. Titles should be in large type. If your text is long, use titles to break it up into sections.

Design one page at a time. When you have sketched out that first page so it's what you want, sketch the other pages. (Number the Home Page 1, and keep track of the other pages)

Get advice. At this point, it's useful to show your ideas and your design to others. Show them the sketches, explain to them your purpose, and ask for their suggestions. They can give you some good ideas on how to improve your Home Page.

Step 3: Prepare the Pieces

What are its parts? Your Home Page will contain several pieces: some text, some images, some titles. It's time to get each of these ready. Here's how to prepare each type:

Text--Use simple text to type the words that will appear in your Home Page. When writing for a Home Page, keep the sentences short and the verbs active. Separate your ideas into paragraphs. Be sure to check the spelling!! Save the document on your disk, then print a copy of your text on paper. Read it, and show it to others for their comments.

Images--Pictures can come from many sources. You might want to draw them. You can use clip art images. You can snap images if you have a QuickTake digital camera. Your pictures will need to be saved in a gif or jpeg format. (You may need to use a "Gif. Converter). Save your pictures into the same folder on your disk. Give each picture a name that clearly says what it is, for example: "corvette.gif"

Titles--Make a list of all your titles at this time, exactly as they will appear on your Home Page. Keep titles short, so that they will fit on one line when displayed.

Now you have all the elements ready to assemble into your Home Page. You are ready for the next step.

Step 4: Build Your Page

Take out the sketches you made in Step 2, above. Building the page will be easy, because you have already assembled everything. Here is a good web site to use as a reference when you build your page: HTML Crash Course.

When your Home Page looks just like what you had sketched out in Step 2, it's time to save your work. Save your document into the same folder on your disk. Save your page as an ".htm" or ".html" document.

Building the second page--Repeat the process you just went through to create the second page of your Web site. Give this page a different title and filename from your first page. Use a name and title that identify what is on the page.

Creating links between pages--Go back to your first page. There should be a reference on the first page that refers to the second page, such as text or a graphic. Create a "link" to the second page.

Build and link more pages--For a large Web site, it's a good idea to make many pages, each covering a different topic. You can then use hypertext links to make connections between the pages. Make sure you save all these pages into the same folder on your hard disk.

Step 5: Test Your Page

Now you are ready to see if your Home Page works. The way to test your page is to look at it just as your audience will look at it: with a web browser.

Open the web browser. From the File menu, choose Open File. Locate your Home Page folder, then choose your first Home Page. Your Home Page will open in the web browser. Now you are seeing it just as your audience will see it. Does it look the way you want? Make notes about things that need to be changed. Test the links to the other pages. Don't forget to check the Image links (drawings, pictures, photographs) as well as the Text links.

While your page is running in the browser, it's a good idea to have some other people look at it. Ask them to view your Home Page. Ask them for suggestions. Make a note of these ideas also. Now, double check the content of your Web pages. Is there any word or picture that will offend someone else? If so, it doesn't belong on your Home Page. When you publish a Home Page, where many other people will see it, you have a special responsibility to make sure that it's fair and accurate.

When your page has been tested thoroughly by you and others, and you have taken notes on the changes to be made, open your Home Page and make the necessary changes. Make sure you save your pages when you have finished making these last changes. When you are finished making changes, launch you web browser and preview your page again.

Step 6: Publish the Site

Going Public--You have created a World Wide Web site, consisting of several pages. And you have tested the site to make sure that it works with the web browser, and it's OK with your parents and teachers. Now you are ready to publish the site so that others can experience it.

If your school has a Web Server set upon its network, then you may publish your site on this Server. Follow these steps:

1. Ask the Webmaster for permission to publish your Web site on the Server.
2. Follow the Webmaster's instructions on how to copy your files to the folder on the Server.

Publishing on the Internet--To publish your Home Pages globally, you must copy your files to a World Wide Web Server that's connected to the Internet. If your family subscribes to an Internet provider, they will have a Server that you can use. (Some websites allow you to publish on their server). Your first step is to find out who the Webmaster is for the WWW Server you want to use. Then you should contact the Webmaster. Ask them if you may post your pages to the Server, and ask for detailed instructions on how to send your files to the Server.

When you receive permission, you can follow the Webmaster's instructions to get your site published. In most cases, you will simply copy your home pages and image files to a special folder that the Webmaster sets up on the WWW Server just for you. Once your files are posted on the WWW Server, the Webmaster will tell you the URL for your Web site. To see your site, you will use your browser to connect to that URL and view your site. Here are a couple of web sites that allow you to publish on their sites, GeoCities and HomeStead.

What next?--After you publish your page, you will need to maintain it. Regularly check your links (especially ones to outside sites) to make sure they are still "active". Once you build a page, whether you publish it or not, you will want to build another one... a better one, a richer one, one with more "bells and whistles." You can get more ideas for your own pages by browsing the Web for new models. And, you can read a book: there are books that can give you more skills and provide you with solid, imaginative information about making Home Pages.