Webmasters: the next step?

[sharpfive 0]

OK, I dumped FrontPage and rebuilt my site with Dreamweaver, Flash, and Fireworks. Now I want to create dynamic pages, but I'm confused by the Macromedia forums. Can I get by learning CGI, or should I go for ColdFusion? Adding to the situation, Microsoft says XP Home will not support IIS or PWS. If this is true, they are real ****heads. How easy is it for a self taught web designer to download and use something like Apache HTTP?

[fudd 0]

I think most people who use apache is self taught. It's not that difficult, I would recommend running it on a linux box along with php and mysql. There are loads of tutorials on the web.

I write my pages in Vim. (a unix text editor), but that's just my style.

There are only 10 types of people in the world. Those who understand binary, and those who don't.

[BadDog 0]

Is your site up yet? I'd like to watch the progress.

[BadDog 0]

Fudd, I get a 404 when I try to view your site.

[jfields 0]

If you aren't a *nix person, I'd skip the Apache myself and stay on the Windows platform you are familiar with. There are plenty of freeware and shareware programs that let you run web pages off of an XP Home machine.

Or if you are more motivated, switch your web server box over to Win2k Server. That way, you can use IIS5 instead of PWS.

The *nix geeks may disagree, but I say it is better to be a competant Windows admin than push the envelope and be an incompetant *nix one. Stick with what you know.

[sharpfive 0]

Thanks everyone,

Damn, this is getting complicated and scary. Can someone point me to one of those freeware programs for XP Home? I think I'll head to Borders and pick up CGI for Dummies as an intro.

[jfields 0]

Something in here ought to work for you...

http://www.webattack.com/freeware/server/fwwebserver.shtml

[sharpfive 0]

Thanks

[pilotdave 0]

I used to run Omnicron httpd until I wanted to run a database-backed website. Then I switched to Apache and MySQL, using PHP. Apache isn't easy to use, but it's not horrible either. I was surprised how quickly I had a database driven website up and running, with no previous knowledge of PHP. I spent a lot of time reading the important parts of the apache, mysql, and php manuals, but it was not hard to understand, just time consuming.

I was never able to get cgi to work on a windows based server. I didn't want to learn CGI myself so I just downloaded some example scripts that I could modify. The problem I ran into is that everything seems to be set up for running on a unix (or apache) server. Once I was running apache, getting downloaded php scripts to run was no problem, and I found php simple to learn.

Dave

[sharpfive 0]

Thanks Dave,
Looks like it's time for some serious book time.

[mattwhoo 0]

Are you going to be hosting this site on your home computer? If so coldFusion is not really an option unless you plan on spending about $1500 to buy coldFusion server. I think they have a development version you can download to develop with and then have your site hosted with a hosting company. I use a company that has coldFusion hosting for $10 a month. I have been doing coldFusion programming for about 4 years now it’s fairly easy to learn. When I started my boss said hey I need this here is a book and a computer go learn. There is a ton of coldFusion stuff out there. The hardest thing I found when learning was what to build. It’s kind of hard to learn a programming language with nothing to build. I started by building an address book it gives you the basics of inserting updating and retrieving information form a database and displaying it on a web page. Or you could start by building your self a web-based logbook :) If you have any coldFusion questions let me know I will be glad to get you pointed in the right direction.

Matt

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