Writing and publishing your own Web Page on the Internet can certainly be an effective way to promote your business. Or it could be a method of offering help or seeking advice from others or just to make a statement about yourself and tell the World that you exist. Whatever you choose for your Web Page, it is sure to be of interest to someone among the tens of millions of people who have access to the Internet and the World Wide Web.

You don't need to have any programming experience, just a little patience. These pages will lead you through the basic principles of How and What, and maybe a little Why, to get you started. We suggest you print this page so that you have a hard copy to follow.

First you will need to become acquainted with HTML. That's Hyper Text Markup Language and while that may sound frightful it's actually quite simple. Most of the web pages that you see on the Internet, including this one, are text based. That means that with the exception of any graphics (pictures and backgrounds) they can all be written using a simple text editor or word processor. Notepad will do the job quite nicely. Why not save this page onto your hard disk and later load it into Notepad to view the HTML commands inside the < > marks.

There are many different HTML commands and most local book stores will have HTML reference books which list the commands, explain how they are used to the best advantage and will help you make your page look just the way you want. To see what your page will look like when published simply load it into your browser, either Internet Explorer or Netscape, by entering its full name and path into the Address or Location box.

An alternative method to generate your Web Page is to acquire a specialised HTML editor from your local computer store or from one of the many software sites that exist on the Internet.
Microsoft's FrontPage is one of the best and is simple to use. It will give you WYSIWYG creation and editing control over HTML pages.

If you want to add pictures to your web page you will need some graphics software which can handle .GIF and .JPG formats, both of which the Internet supports. Again this can be acquired from your local computer store or from one of the many software sites on the Internet.

Click here to visit one of the software sites  where you can search for and download software.

Once you are happy with the look of your page you will have to transfer it to the Micromat server site and to do this you will need some File Transfer Protocol software which you can download from this site Click here to download FTP software now. This will take about 5 minutes to download using a 56K connection.  If you need some software to unzip it then click here. This one will take 3 to 4 minutes. A broadband connection will be very much faster.

Although it is not imperative it makes life much simpler if you only use lower case characters for every file name and that all your HTML files end with the extension ".htm"
Make sure that the first page to be shown on your site is named  "index.htm"
Anything else just will not work!

To be reasonably well organised you should have all your HTML files, together with any associated graphics files, in the same folder/sub-folder structure on your computer. This will make the transfer much easier and you should re-create the same folder/sub-folder structure on the Micromat Internet server.

These notes are for use with the WS-FTP program. Other ftp programs may use different commands.

Where username is shown you should type your own username!  Sounds obvious - but . .

1. Connect to the Internet as normal and then start your FTP software.
2. The display is in two sections. The Local System on the left hand side is your computer
   and the Remote Site on the right hand side is the Micromat Internet computer.
3. Click on Connect [ bottom left ]
4. Click on New
5. In "Profile Name" type your name and Home Page.  [ e.g. Fred's Home Page ]
6. In "Host Name/Address" type www.username.micromat.net
                or www.domain-name.co.uk    (or .com)   if you have your own domain name.
7. In "Host Type" use the arrow to select UNIX (Standard) or Automatic detect
8. In "User ID" type your username or your domain-name.
9. In "Password" Yes - you've guessed - type your password. [ you will only see stars *** ]
10. Leave "Account" and "Comment" clear.
11. Click on Save Password
12. Click Apply or Save
13. Click OK and you will connect your web space on the Micromat Internet computer.

After a few moments the box under Remote Site should show /

This is where your web pages must be placed so that they can be viewed by everyone.

1. On the Local System side click on the ChgDir button and enter the full path to where your home page files are kept on your computer. This maybe something like c:\webpages\home
2. Click on OK and your home page files on your own system should be shown in the left hand window.
3. Now click on Options (along the bottom).
4. Then click on Save Current Directories as Connection Directories and click OK.

You have now configured the FTP software so that each time you use it, it will take you to the correct directories on both the Local System (your computer) and Remote Site (our server) for to transfer your files.

Now for the easy bit. Double click on each file in the left window (Local System) that you wish to transfer - and it's done - the files will be copied into the right hand window (Remote Site).

You must use ASCII mode for html files and binary mode for images e.g. jpg or gif files.

Don't forget that the page you wish to be displayed first must be named index.html

( If you create a subdirectory structure on your site you should ensure that the first file to be shown in each subdirectory is named index.html  )

When you've finished, click on Close (bottom left) and the Exit (bottom right).

Your own Home Page is now on the Micromat Internet server and is ready to be seen by the world.

Set your browser to http://www.username.micromat.net to view your handiwork!
(or to  http://www.domain-name.co.uk )

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