Websites for Beginners
As an introduction, there are three main things you need to get your website up and running on the internet.
- Domain Name
- Web Design / Development
- Web Hosting
Domain Name
The domain name is your identity online - as long as you pay for it and renew it (usually annually), no one else can claim to have it. For more information, we have a more detailed domain information page to help you understand what a domain is and how it works.
Web Design / Development
You will need a website designed and developed so that people can navigate your website and view your content. This requires the knowledge of HTML or in some cases, a programming language like PHP, ASP, or JAVA. At atechnologysolutions, we do most of our development with the fabulous Ruby on Rails framework.
Web Hosting
There is no one 'type' of web hosting - the most popular are virtual hosting, dedicated, and colocated. Unless you have extremely demanding needs or have your own server, virtual hosting will suffice. Virtual hosting itself is synonymous with 'web hosting' - it just means that your site is hosted on a server with other sites. The steps usually needed when getting a web host are:
- Select a Web Host Plan - At A-Technology Solutions, we offer 2 distinct web hosting plans to choose from. Please see our main Work and Services Page to view more information about these plans.
- Sign up - Once you select a plan, you will sign a hosting contract with us for a specified amount of time (usually 1 year).
- Change Nameservers - If you already have a registered domain name we will need to change the nameservers of your domain to that of our nameservers. This is done so that when someone enters yourdomain.com (yourdomain.com being whatever domain you have) they will end up at your site. This may take up to 72 hours to be fully functional.
- Upload Your Site - We usually maintain all of our hosted sites so you don't have to worry about uploading content. However, if your tech savvy and like to maintain your own site, we will setup an FTP account at no charge!
- Sit Back, and Enjoy! - Your site is now up and running on the world wide web!