Frequently Asked Questions Q. How do I create my own World Wide Web pages? A. Creating Web pages is quite easy, as the pages are only plain text files, such as those saved by the AmigaDOS Ed program or a text editor such as Cygnus Ed or GoldEd. Images are stored in GIF or JPEG format. The appearance of the pages is determined by the use of special codes in the text files, called HTML tags. Q. What is HTML? A. HTML is the HyperText Markup Language. It's the set of special tags which control how a Web pages looks and defines any links to other pages. HTML is very easy to use: for example, to make a line appear in bold you include it within the tags for bold, like this. There are doens of other tags, and these define the size of the text, the inclusion of images and any links to other pages or other parts of the document. Q. How can I edit my Web pages? A. Any text editor will do. You can simply open a new document and start typing away, including the HTML tags as you go. There is nothing magic about it. You can then preview your pages by loading them into a Web browser such as AMosaic or IBrowse. Each of these programs has a load local file option and this is the one you need to use. Q. Are there any authoring tools available? A. Yes. Look out for Hedley and HTML Heaven on Aminet. Both these programs make it easier to add the HTML tags, although neither are true WYSIWYG (What You See Is What You Get) editors. The forthcoming Web browser AWeb includes authoring tools. Q. Can I use Netscape HTML tags, even though I have an Amiga? A. Certainly, as the tags are only particular pieces of text. Of course, you won't be able to view the improvements made possible unless your browser supports the new tags. At the moment few (any?) Amiga browsers are available to display items such as textures backdrops or frames. That doesn't mean you can't use them -- if you have access to a PC or Mac you can view the pages on a copy of Netscape Navigator. Q. How do I create graphics for my Web pages? A. Graphics need to be saved in GIF or JPEG format. The art program Personal Paint will save in both these formats. All you need to do is draw or load images and then save them out in GIF (for simple images) or JPEG (for more details image, such as digitised pictures). You can then add a HTML link to the image. Q. How do I handle links to graphics and other pages? A. The HTML tag for images is , and the tag for links is link text . A potential problem is what to put in for the filepath and filename. The easiest thing to do is put the HTML document and all the images and other pages in one directory. You can then reference them all by leaving out the filepath totally, like this: Or if you create a new directory in the same directory as the HTML document, you can reference them like this: The point is that you shouldn't include a full filename like this: If you include a full path then it means that if you move the document about (for example, copy it to another disk or upload it somewhere) the filepath will no longer be valid and the image will not be displayed. The same holds true for links to other pages: keep the references local to the current document. Q. Where can I put my pages? A. If you have a dial-up account with an Internet Service Provider (ISP) they may give you some space (1Mb for example) on their own Web server. Some companies don't give space for free and you'll have to pay for it on a monthly or yearly basis. One way around this problem is to run your own Web server. Q. How can I run a local server? A. When you dial into an ISP using AmiTCP, your Amiga becomes part of the Internet. This means that you can contact remote computers, but also that remote computers can contact you. If you run a Web server program (called a http daemon) then you can store all your pages locally on your machine: when someone uses a Web browser with your IP address they will access your machine. The only drawback is that your server will be online only when you are dialed into your ISP -- which of course costs you money. The program you need is called "httpd" and it was written by the authors of AMosaic. Q. Where can I find out more on HTML? A. There are many books around on the subject of HTML authoring, but the best place to find information is the World Wide Web itself. For example, you could pay a visit to http://webzone1.co.uk/www/johnk/helphtml.htm where you'll find some essential information which I put up a month or so ago. I'll try and update it when I get more time, so feel free to email me with suggestions. Box out: Essential HTML HTML pages are plain text files with additional special codes to alter the text attributes, create links or trigger the display of pictures and other external files. The easiest way to see what a HTML file looks like is to use the save option from within a Web Broswer such as Mosaic, and then load the file into a normal text editor or word processor. The HTML codes are all contained within greater-than and less-than signs, and if you remove them you can see that the HTML file is more or less plain English. Table of HTML codes Start a HTML page End a HTML page
Draw a horizontal line

Take a new paragraph
Force a carriage return

Text size 1 (huge>

Text size 2

Text size 3 (medium)

Text size 4

Text size 5
Text size 6 (small)
Bold text Italic text Underline text Typewriter font Add emphasis to text Even more emphasis! 
       Don't format the text
    Ordered list
  • An item in a list Display an image Create a link to another site Note: The use of the slash "/" is always used in HTML to "switch off" a particular option.