How to Quickly Publish a Web Page

 
What's a Web?

 The "web" is the term for a collection of information electronically stored in computers (called servers) scattered throughout the world.

 The ability to quickly store and retrieve information electronically with relative ease in a timely manner is acknowledged as part and parcel of twenty first century life. The web augments and, in many cases, replaces the dominance of printed matter. Dissemination of information by the web is rapidly becoming the norm.

 A "web page" is analogous to a printed page and a "web site" to a book or catalog. "Web publishing" is the act of making the pages accessible on the web.

 A major part of the power of the web is the "link" function. Whereas in printed matter, the use of footnotes provide the "link" to additional relevant material, on a web page, a word, phrase or image is sensitized such that clicking on it automatically accesses the relevant data. This ability to immediately reference supporting data at any time is a breakthrough in rapid information retrieval.

 
How can I use the web to help me?

 If you need to disseminate information quickly and to a large audience with the ability to revise the information at any time, then publishing on the web is a viable option.

 Some examples are schedules, notices, reference material, resource lists, work assignments, etc.

How do I publish on the web?

 To publish, you require several things: 

• A program to create and format the content
• A place to store the content (called a "web host" or "server")
• An internet connection to move the content between the computer to the host

 
So, let's get started

 Prerequisites:

• You are familiar with using a computer
• You know how to use a word processor to create documents
• You have access to a computer connected to the web
• You are familiar with basic web browsing techniques including URL addresses and bookmarking

 
You need a web host to store your web pages. Some options are:

• Your Internet Services Provider (ISP) such as Hawaiian Telcomm DSL or Oceanic Cable Road Runner Service provides you with "free" space, typically 5-15 megabytes, as part of your contracted monthly service.
• Your organization, DOE, etc. provides you with "free" space.
• You rent space on a commercial web hosting service.
• You sign up for free web space with one of many providers, such as Google, Yaoo, etc. and are willing to accept the mandatory advertising pop-ups and/or inclusions.

 
You need to format your content into web-acceptable format. Some options are:

• Acquire a program for your computer to format your content and then move it to the host.
• Use a web-based program provided by your chosen web host to format your content.

 
Finally, you need to disseminate the URL address to your audience

• The URL address is the location indicator of where you stored your pages.
• For the trivia oriented individual, URL is the acronym for Universal Resource Locator, an industry standardized indicator that identifies the Internet location of the host computer.

 A quick and simple web site using Google Site Creator

 Google Site Creator is a free web host combined with a web-page authoring tool. It is a basic tool with some limitations, but perfectly usable for beginning web sites.

 In order to use Google Sites (as it is commonly called), you MUST have a Google Gmail account. You can request a free account as follows: 

• Go to http:// google.com/sites
• Click on " Don't have a Google Account? Create an account now"
• Follow the steps to create an account
• Write down your new Gmail account user name and password

 
 The Exercise 

• Create a web site with two web pages
• The first page, commonly known as the Home page, contains a short introduction and description of the site. It also contains a series of links to other pages of the site, the equivalent of the "Table of Contents" in a book.
• The second page contains a body of text. One or more links to additional material outside of the page may be embedded in or follow the text. A link back to the Home page sits at the bottom of the page.

• Log into http://sites.google.com/ with your Gmail account user name and password
• Click on Create New Page
• Select Put page at the top level since this is your home (top-level) page.
• Type in a title for the page in Name space, and then click Create. This will be the heading for your page. For example: Uncle Grumpy’s
• Under Site Settings you can choose to Change Appearance to select different themes and/or colors for your pages.
• You can now type in your page introduction and description in the area below your title.
• Click save to save your work
• Click the title of your page under navigation to view your page

 
The second page 

• Click on Create New Page
• Select Put page under (your home page title) since this page is to be accessed from your home page.
• Type in a title for the page in Name space, and then click Create. This will be the heading for your page. For example: Little Red Schoolhouse
• Enter your content into the area below your title.
• Click save to save your work

 
Modify the second page

• Click on The Little Red Schoolhouse
• Click on Edit page
• Add the following sentence:"For information on Hawaii Biodiversity click here".
• Select and highlight the words "here".
• Click on the Link on the toolbar above.
• Click on OK
• At Go to null-change-remove, click on change
• Enter the following in the box to the right of  existing page “ http://hbmp/hawaii.edu/hbmp”
• Click on the OK.
• You have just modified the page to include a link to an outside page

 Pau – (done)

 You have successfully created a website with a home page and a link to a second page. The second page has a link to return you to the home page.

 You have also created a link to an outside source of information on Hawaii Biodiversity.

 To test this, type "http://sites.google.com/site/your-gmail-name " into the Address line and press Enter. You should see your home page. Click on the link at the bottom for your second page. This should now display your second page. Click on the link at the top of the page and it will return you to your Home page.

 
Links to the outside world

 You can return to Google Sites at any time to add, delete and change pages and content. For example, you could edit the second page to add additional links. Just type in a word/title, highlight it and click on the Link button. Select Web Address and type or paste in the URL and click the Ok button.

 
Adding images onto the page

 To insert an image or graphic onto a page, click on the insert , then images on the top to get the "Add an image" page.  Click on the "Browse" button and select an image file from your computer.  Once the image appears, highlight it, then click the "Add Image" button. You can then click and drag the image wherever you want. You can also select the size of the image (Small, Medium, Large, Original Size).

 Good luck, have fun

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Jim Yuen 4/26/2006
revised 4/17/2011