X-posted. Help needed. Thanks to DU, I was inspired to obtain an internet domain name and

[Mike 03]

I know can help a lot of people if I can transform this domain name into what I want it to be--a source of comfort for people who have lost love ones but actually have no place to express these feelings due to family, personal, societal or other factors. But unfortunately I have no idea how to make a web site.

Does anyone know how I could transform a domain name and an idea into a serious, helpful website?

[thunder rising]

1. Many years ago I used this tutorial for teachers. It's very good.

http://www.mcli.dist.maricopa.edu/tut/lessons.html

[wyldwolf]

2. first, get server space that has fantastico...

... then auto install wordpress...

[sandnsea]

5. Look at ning.com

I don't think you'll ever use wordpress again. I use wordpress, but man I hate it.

[wyldwolf]

7. I've seen ning. my only issue is it's remotely hosted

They could shut down or start charging at a moment's notice. (They just dumped thousands of adult networks.) You also need to pay them if you want to run your own ads. But it's still slick and would do exactly what the OP needs.

I like wordpress with premium themes like revolution.

[Mike 03]

8. This sounds good. I wish I knew more about how to even begin this.

I just have no clue. I don't want to make money off of this. At all!

I just want help making it a reality, and I will pay for it.

[wyldwolf]

11. it's all self explanatory. Go to ning.com, sign up, and check it out... it's your own Facebook!

[sandnsea]

10. Using your own domain name

I haven't actually looked at how that part works. I thought you would transfer files at that time. No? I think it's fair to pay to run your own ads. It's only $25 a month to do that so that gives someone time to get a network going and then transfer it if they get enough traffic to make some money.

[sandnsea]

3. I've just found ning.com

and I think it would be the perfect place for you to start. You don't need a domain name, but you can use their interface with your domain if you want to. I do hosting and web design, but I have way too many balls in the air to take on another project, not to mention hand to mouth bills to pay. If you have any glitches though, please do PM me at any time and I will try to help. I think most people are going with bluehosting.com, bluehost.com, something like that.

[wyldwolf]

6. ning is awesome...

[Mike 03]

4. I hope I'm not violating any DU rules when I say that I would obviously pay for these

services. I hope that goes without saying.

[Mike 03]

9. I'm worried that I've taken on more than I can do.

This is the first idea I've had passion for in four years. I hope I can find someone to help me make this a reality. I'm realistic enough to know I need help.

[greyl]

16. Please check your PM.

It sounds like a very worthwhile project.

[MineralMan]

12. There are many things to think about...

First off, forget about free hosting for your site. Free hosts are death to serious websites, since so many people recognize them and avoid them like the plague for their noxious advertisements.

Second, you'll have to choose a way to create your site. Your computing platform, the type of site you want to run, and many other factors play roles in this decision. If you want a discussion area, there are several systems available. If you want a straight information site, you can use any web site development platform.

Third, you'll need lots of time and energy to make a site people will want to visit and visit frequently. Content is king, and it has to be fresh and frequently updated.

If you can detail what it is that you want your site to do, you'll probably get lots of suggestions. It doesn't sound like you're trying to do this on the cheap, so there are so many possibilities. I think you'll get lots of help here, once you define your goals and concept for the site.

A lot of people who will talk to you about this here have sites of their own. Most of them have the site urls in their profiles. Before taking advice, see what their sites look like. The same thing applies if you pay someone to help you. See what and how they do things and make sure it matches your vision.

[Mike 03]

17. Good advice. Thank you.

No, I don't want to do this on the cheap. I want it to be a serious site.

[RiverStone]

13. Congrats on pondering the leap!

Any kind of entrepreneurial adventure requires lots of faith and a degree of daring. I am also pondering creating a web site, but about something entirely different. Just figuring out where to begin has to be one of the toughest aspects. Yet putting the question out there (or here) is a great place to start.

Best wishes :hi:

p.s. Leap and the net will appear!

[lumberjack_jeff]

14. I jumped in about three weeks ago.

http://www.evstreet.com (still under construction)

The domain was purchased through http://www.namecheap.com/
The domain is hosted by http://izfree.com/ Their site is (currently) free of any advertisements, they offer subdomains, php and three pop email addresses. They also have a helpful community for advice.
I use Ubuntu, so I downloaded filezilla (to do ftp) and Screem (to do the html editing, but I'm going to get something better soon).
I downloaded the template from http://www.oswd.org/

Total cost per year: $8.81.

I defray that minimal cost with google adsense.

There are great html tutorials available online.

[Mike 03]

18. Maybe I should have shopped around a bit more, but I don't have much

energy these days.

This idea really took me by surprise, in the worst possible way.

[lumberjack_jeff]

20. I remember your post from last week. I hope things are getting back to normal.

Been thinking about you and hoping you're okay.

You're welcome to any meager tech advice I can give. My html experience is 15 years out of date.

[Muttocracy]

15. when it comes to content you could brainstorm here:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topics&forum=323


for development, these might help

http://www.w3schools.com/hosting/default.asp

http://www.htmlhelp.com/

I don't know whether you're looking to do web development itself, or download a template, or use a blog type software?

If you're wanting to get into HMTL, you can gradually learn new tricks as you go. One of the best things about the web is you can easily follow templates of sites you like by looking at their code. It's not nice to copy directly, but you can learn tricks of how a page is formatted. On a PC in Firefox, for instance, you can right-click on a page and view its source and see the code that led to the formatting. Well, sometimes it's more complicated than that if there's a database or something, but for making things bold, italic, colors, images, fonts, sizes, etc., you can get up to speed fast.

[shraby]

19. Web Pages for Dummies

Really easy to understand. I use it when I run into trouble. My site is hosted by hostmonster.com it's inexpensive and the domain name is included in the hosting. Unlimited space and unlimited bandwidth.

[BlooInBloo]

21. There are hosts that provide dotnetnuke portal hosting...

Where about the only thing the user has to do is supply content and configure stuff.

http://www.google.com/search?source=ig&hl=en&rlz=&=&q=dotnetnuke+hosting&btnG=Google+Search&aq=f