website.qxd  4/9/2003  11:52 AM  Page 13

Website Development & Hosting

a

If you must have large graphics, you must provide estimated times of download. 

a

Any required viewers, plug-ins, applications, and other utility tools should be noted, and,

if possible, links should be provided to allow users to download needed programmes. 

Maintenance

Maintenance  is  where  the  real  cost  of  a  website  surfaces.  The  cost  is  hidden  in  the

amount of time it takes to answer questions, check links, rebuild old pages and build

new ones.

Every page should have a mailto: and/or some other form of email contact for the creator and/or

maintainer of the page/site.

a

Mail should be read and answered at least every two to three days (more often if your page

is an institutional or organisational homepage). 

Links to other sites should be checked frequently to determine if the URLS are still active and the

sites are still useful.

a

Especially pages that are heavily used. 

Pages should be updated/revised/altered on a regular basis.

URL-naming  structure  should  be  based  on  standards  and  on  a  thorough  knowledge  of  how

automated robots, wanderers and spiders index websites.

Anatomy of a Web Page

Before you start thinking about coding a web page, try to place yourself in the proper mindset.

.irst, you are creating something that will be, potentially, available to anyone in the world with

access to the Internet and a browser. Second, you are writing for a non-traditional media; your

page should not look and act like a book or a pamphlet. You may want similar information on your

page, but you will have to re-create that information for a global web environment. Third, you will

have  to  maintain  your  page.  Unlike  a  book,  a  web  page  is  never  finished  and  is  always

under construction. As new documents appear and disappear on the web, your page should

change. As new standards develop, your page should change. As new technologies appear, your

page should change.

In its most basic form, a web page is created in plain ASCII text using any standard text editor, and

saved as an html file, which can be opened and interpreted by a web browser. How the page looks,

operates, is indexed and interacts with the client will depend in part on how you code the page  

so coding is important. All pages should be coded to accepted standards and the policies of your

institution, organisation or Internet service provider. Checking with your webmaster before you

start may save you time and energy later.

Copyright  NESIS 2002

13