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I would suggest that you start with a free site from Yahoo Geocities. They have the Page Builder which enables you to build a website very easily without any HTML. You can sign in by clicking on their name above.
Tutorial: They have a tutorial that explains how it works. It is located at the right on the page with the yellow box to launch Page Builder. If you write down the most important points of it on paper, you can build a small website right away.
New page: the best thing to do when starting a new page is to click on Add-on and then on Background. Choose a background color or a template.
Then from the menu, select Format and then Page Properties. There you can choose colors for the text, links and visited links. If you want light blue, choose lilac then move the red cursor to the left side. To have purple, choose indigo then move the red cursor to the right side.
You can also change the page's width and height. I think it's best to make the width about 800 and the height at least 5000. You can check the layered HTML box if you want to be able to make elements overlap.
It is important to write a title and keywords describing what your page is about, since they will be used by search engines to bring people to your site. Write as many related keywords as you can, separating them by a coma and leaving a space before and a space after the coma.
Text: click on Text to get a text box. You can place it where you want to. It would be a good thing to enlarge it right away with the arrows around the borders.
You can also choose the font face and size right away or do it later by highlighting the text. You can make an highlighted text bold, italic or underlined.
You can write text directly in Page Builder or write text in Word and paste it in Page Builder. First, highlight your text in Word, then select Edit from the menu and then Copy (or press the CTRL key, keep it down and press the C key at the same time).
Then in Page Builder, you need to make a text box first by clicking on Text and to place the cursor inside the box. Then click on the clipboard button below the Link and Add-ons buttons. Then press the CTRL key, keep it down and press the V key at the same time. Your text should appear. Then click on Paste and you'll have it on your page.
Links: to make a part of text a link, highlight the text, then click on Link, write the address of a website (you can skip the http://) or select E-mail instead of Web URL and write an e-mail address.
Colors: you can have different colors for the text in the same page. You have to change the color in Page Properties first, then you can click on Text to open a new text box. You may have to go back to the original color afterwards, so you get back the color of your links. To have links of different colors, you will have to use HTML (see below).
Pictures: if you want to put a picture on your page, click on Pictures. You have access to pictures already in the Page Builder. You can take pictures from the Yahoo Picture Gallery.
You can upload pictures from your own computer that you scanned or that you saved on other websites. You can resize the image with the arrows, but this will change the focus. It's best to resize it with GIF Works.
With Page Builder, you also have access to many fun page effects like the sun tail on this page and like many others demonstrated in my Effects page. Click on Insert and then on Page Effects.
You can also add banners, images and animations from other sources or make your own as demonstrated in my Images page. Be careful not to put too many images on a page since that will make it long to download.
Save: Remember to save your work often so you don't lose everything if there is any kind of problem with your computer. You don't need to view your page every time.
HTML codes: as you begin to learn some HTML language, you can add HTML codes in your Page Builder pages. Click on Insert, then on Forms and Scripts, then on HTML code. This can be done to add some special features with HTML code from providers like Bravenet. They have message boards, mailing lists, engines to search your site, etc. You can also add things you can't do with Page Builder like rounded tables.
Transfer a page in HTML: You can also make a page in Page Builder, view it in a browser, then select View from the menu and then Page Source. You see there the HTML code for your page. You can copy it and paste it in Geocities' HTML Editor.
You can add things to the page and save it in HTML language. It is best to also keep your Page Builder page under a different name so that you can make changes in it later if necessary. It usually is easier to do it in Page Builder and transfer the page again or only your changes to the HTML editor.
If you make changes in Page Builder and transfer it back in HTML, you will need to write again the additions you had made before in your HTML page. So it would be a good thing to add a commentary in between <! and > signs in the Head section of your HTML page and write the additions you have made. |
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