Extreme Noobie questions!

[drmarie]

I have been learning html for a while now and feel like I am ready to start my own website. I am having a hard time understanding how to use the host server though.

I'm not even sure how to word my question! I am having trouble understanding the logic of how the server decides which pages to show.

I understand that my main site has to be index.html and that that is stored in my public www folder. If I have say a page2.html, do I link to that file from my index.html file?

Can anyone point me in the direction of a good tutorial about where to put files in the file manager?

Thanks!
Marie

[GvilleRick]

Yes, you would need to link the other pages from your site. You can use whatever names you want but it is worth noting that filenames and folder names are case sensitive in linux. Most any HTML tutorial site would have the syntax needed to link to the pages. All files you want to view on the internet should be in your public_html folder or a folder within it. The www folder is a symbolic link (sort of like a shortcut in Windows) to the public_html folder.

[GatorNathon]

By default an index.html or index.php will show from within any directory you goto in the browser. No one will even know that there are other pages or files in that directory unless you make them available through links.

Most website design tools handle the majority of this for you and it is by far the best way to learn. Once you have built a site in a program like dreamweaver and upload it you will see how the file hierarchy works.

[virtvir5]

Originally Posted by drmarie

I understand that my main site has to be index.html and that that is stored in my public www folder. If I have say a page2.html, do I link to that file from my index.html file? Can anyone point me in the direction of a good tutorial about where to put files in the file manager?

The physical location of your web site's files (in various subfolders under your host server account's main public_html folder) is primarily a matter of "housekeeping" and organisational convenience. Each major web application (e.g., a blog or forum or CMS application) should reside within its own public_html/subfolder (and subsubfolders below that) if only to avoid possible conflicts and "collisions" that could arise if they were all dumped together. Apart from that, however, physical location is less important than the way you link it all togather.

Perhaps the most important issue is the issue of using absolute vs relative URL links. Generally speaking, the latter are preferred for several reasons which are discussed (amongst other things) in almost all on line site building tutorials. You'll find some very basic disussion of this and other related issues here.

[kcurran]

Originally Posted by virtvir5

...physical location is less important than the way you link it all togather.

Ordinarily that's perfectly correct. For anyone interested in getting high search engine rankings, however, the placement of the files is one way to increase basic SEO.

For example, if you have a knitting site with a potholder page linked from index.html, these two anchor tags are not equivalent from a SEO perspective:

<a href="potholders.html">blah</a>

and

<a href="/we-sell-custom-made-potholders/potholders.html">blah</a>

Do anything you can do to help the crawlers index your pages. In this case, name a subdirectory to reinforce your message to the crawlers and place your html file there.

[hostmydomain]

If you feel confident with html, Why don't you get a free css template, Open the template up in your web browser (index.html file), Then with say notepad++, Edit the index.html file, Save the changes, Re-fresh in your browser to see the changes.

There are also some great free ftp programs to use for uploading files to your public_html/ if you have ftp support (coreftplite).

All the best

[EarlyOut]

You did notice, didn't you, that this thread is almost two years old?

[hostmydomain]

Sorry - Got carried away.