www.churchsoftware.co.uk
Advice on free PC software, multimedia and web design for individuals and churches
Below are personal recommendations on programs and techniques for your consideration. (The adverts on the left will offer alternative commercial products and services)
Broadband Web Design Programs
Domain names and hosting
Many churches now have a website and more and more people expect to find the times of your services, details of your organisations and church news on the web. Many of us will have started off by using the web space provided by our personal isp AOL gives you about 50 mb. The problem is that if you change isp then you have to change the web address. It is better for the church to purchase a domain name like www.burntislandkirk.org.uk. You can order a domain name from a company like 1&1. They are the cheapest that I know of at £1.99 + VAT per annum. I should say that I get a small commision if you sign up with 1&1 through my ad. The domain name then belongs to the church. Using the control panel you can redirect from the site to the where your site currently is. So for example when folks look up www.alansharp.co.uk then they are automatically and invisibly redirected to an AOL members page. This is very easy to set up in 1&1's control panel.
I already have a personal site in my isp space and I felt that the church's web page should have its own space. 1&1 give you 250mb of webspace for £1.99+VAT a month which is very reasonable. They also provide websitebuilder which allows you to put a small (8 pages max) website which may be adequate for many churches initially. The problem comes when you want the ninth page. It is certainly possible to tack on daughter pages or simply to make the pages very long and use bookmarks - like the index above to navigate around. But eventually you may have to bite the bullet and get a web editor. There is an unrestricted version of website builder for 4.99+VAT a month, this also gives you 800mb of web space, and a few other goodies. But you will only need this much web space if you plan to have video or audio material on line. The option is there though if you do need it.
It is also possible to get web space for free if you can put up with the ads see for example: http://geocities.yahoo.com/ .
Broadband
If broadband is available for your area then get it - it's a no brainer. Its not much more expensive than a dial up service (you can get it for under a tenner a month). It is very much faster - even the slowest broad band 512kHz is 10 to 20 times faster than a dial up modem. It is always instantly available. AOL do a good job of filtering spam and the silver (0.5mb/s) is reasonably priced (you pay more for higher band rates) it has a nice easy interface - good for beginners it includes the hardware and there are no restrictions on how much you can download. But look out for cheap deals from companies with combine, broadband, phone and TV services
Again watch the cover CDs the magazines, recently I've seen Namo Web editor 4 and Web Fusion 8 being given away. Consider using the software that you have Word will create web pages. I used Namo Web Editor 4 and then upgraded for £25 to Namo Web Editor 6 which I down loaded from their web site. The only drawback that I have found is that it really struggles to interpret web pages made by other programs and sometimes crashes as a result. This site and was put together using Namo Web editor 6
These programs come in two types. HTML editors - on windows explorer if you select view and then source when you are looking at a page you will see the raw code that creates it unless you are captivated by a desire to get your head around it -avoid. WYSIWYG editors (what you see is most times what you get) are easier not much different from using a word processor.
The free program is Nvu 1.0 which is a WYSIWYG editor fairly easy to use and fairly powerful. It includes a publish option so you shouldn't have to mess about with a separate file transfer program (ftp). If you need an ftp try Wise ftp version 3 its free.
When you come to put up a web site then I would recommend the following:
1) Have good content. Think about your reader, what do you want to get across. Don't spend hours on web design and minutes chucking in some text - work on the text and put in good graphics. Use your digital camera. Ask permission to include photos of people - always get parents permission for photos of children.
2) Simplicity - don't make it overcomplicated. Dont use lots of fonts (1 is fine, 2 is ok, 3 or more is just naff). Dont use lots of different text sizes. Don't use lots of effects. Don't use frames or javascript, unless you really know what you are doing. Try to keep it simple on the eye. These pages have been built by first creating a table and then adding text and graphics and shaping it. I started with a blank document, made up one page with the layout and colours that I wanted. I added the graphics and the headings that I wanted on every page then I saved it as a template. Closed that page. I made a new empty sub directory and used site manager to create all the pages that I wanted. Added text, graphics, and navigation bars and finally ads from google adsense and trade doubler (ads are not worthwhile unless your page gets a lot of hits). So far trade doubler has been a washout but with google I'll going to be an internet millionaire 10 millenium after I'm dead.
3) Pleasing to the eye - look at sites as you browse the web which ones work? You can simply copy and paste web designs but there will be copyright issues and your editor program may not understand the code on the page. Instead use the ideas when you make your own design.
4) Navagation - good sites are easy to get about. Here I have chosen to put everything on one page and added lots of side bars for getting about.
Burntisland Parish Church my church site
alansharp.co.uk - devoted to my hobby - electrical madness and highvoltage insanity