Introduction to designing your website.

Experienced coders can do this with a simple text editing tool such as NotePad. However, if you are not a coder there are alternatives and DoveSoft recommend free tools such as Mobirise, WordPress and Joomla. For the hobbyist, other recommended non coding software includes Xara Web Designer and  Incomedia WebSite X5 Evolution.

You may simply require to host your site on your own computer and its web pages will contain links to web addresses of your choice. This is achieved by simply publishing/exporting your site from the web design software to a folder on your computer. Most users however will require their site to be accessible to all on the Internet, in which case you will need a domain name, web host and optionally a database.

A domain name such as dovesoft.uk, can most easily be purchased from your web host. Domain names vary in price depending on the suffix used. Typically co.uk names are for hobbyists and cost about £2.50 per annum while com names are for business users and cost about £10 p.a. You may have a web host already but if not try 1&1 and select domain names from their menu and check if your required domain is available.