How to Establish a Presence
on the World Wide Web

2. Create a Personal World Wide Web Page

Objectives

• Learn about Netscape Navigator Gold's page creation and editing features
• Learn the elements of HTML and Web page design.
• Learn how to create a Web page.

Background

Web pages can be created with several different software programs, including PowerPoint, MS Word, and Adobe Acrobat. Full-featured Web page authoring packages are also available, such as Adobe PageMill, MS Front Page, and Netscape's Web page editor. Feature summaries and examples of pages created with each of these packages can be found here.

You have already used Netscape Navigator as a browser, e.g., to navigate and search the Web. The "Gold" version also includes a powerful editor that permits you to create and edit your own Web pages without knowledge of hyptertext markup language (HTML), the formatting codes that browsers like Netscape Navigator and Microsoft Explorer use to interpret how Web documents should be displayed, and what they should do. However, some knowledge of HTML is useful, as sometimes even the best Web page editors will not do what you want them to do.

Netscape's editor provides three basic ways of creating Web pages: a wizard, templates, and from scratch. For this exercise you will use Netscape's wizard to create and save your own home page.

Create your Web page with Netscape's "Wizard"

Step 1: Launch Netscape Navigator Gold.

 

Wait for the program and default home page to load completely.

 

Step 2: Launch Netscape's Wizard by selecting it from the File --> New Document menu.

 

Step 3: Read the introductory information; then click on "START" to start creating your page.

 

Step 4: Click on the links to add content (title, introduction, hot links, conclusions, e-mail link) and change the looks of your Web page.

 

As you add content you'll see your page develop in the "Preview" frame. Once you're satisfied with the looks of your page click on the Build button at the bottom of the "Instructions" frame and your personal Web page will be created.

 

After you click Build, your new page will be displayed in a new Navigator window. At this point your Web page is sitting on one of Netscape Corporation's servers out in "Cyberspace". Before you can do any further editing, or publish your page, you have to save it locally.

 

Save the page on your diskette or hard drive by clicking on the Edit buttonor by choosing Edit Document from Netscape's File menu. You will be presented with a window indicating that links will be adjusted and any images associated with your page will be downloaded along with your page.

 

 

 

Click Save, give your page a name (I suggest home.html), and indicate where you would like your page and associated images saved. I suggest you create a new folder or directory on the Windows Desktop called MyFolder into which your files will be downloaded.

 

 

 

 

The new folder will contain your home page and associated image files.

 

You can now continue editing your page using Netscape's collection of editing tools.