Using FrontPage 2000 on GeoCities

A domain name is any alphanumeric name that ends with a specific extension name, such as .com and .net (dot com, dot net). Typically you will see a domain name in the URL of a web site you browse to on the Internet, and "www" will often precede the domain name. For example, "www.cnn.com" is a domain the the "World Wide Web", and hence the "www". "www" is not an absolute requirement, when typing in a URL to a web browser. However, some hosting companies are configured such that you indeed need to place the "www" part in front of the domain name for the address to be resolved properly.

.com is used to indicate a commercial site, but this is not a definite rule. .com is just the most popular type of domain name.

.net is used to indicate mainly internet service providers or virtual web hosting companies (such as http://www.internic.net)

.org is used mainly to indicate non-profit organizations, however there are no real rules that define or constrict you to being "non-commercial" on a .org site.

.edu is always used to indicate an educational institution, and rule do apply to obtaining such a domain.

There are many new domain extension names, but are not as popular as the ones above. See www.godaddy.com for a sample of the many new domain name choices.

In the past, registering a domain name used to be no simple task, and you would do it directly through www.internic.net (the company hired by the U.S. Government to manage the web) and pay $70.00 for the first two years. If you go through a service (and there are plenty of them now) then you can pay a smaller fee, such as 10 dollars a year! www.godaddy.com is one such registrar on the Internet. The process of domain name registration went through a major change in the USA and the world, a few years ago

www.godaddy.com is a good place to register your domain name, and it will cost you $10.00/Year.

Once you have a domain, you need a server to host it on. This can be done at the company you buy the domain from, or any other hosting company out there, and there are plenty of them.

Make sure you pick a host that supports and offers FrontPage Extensions, if you plan to use FrontPage to create your web site.

You can opt to host for free at places such as freehostia.com, AngelFire.com, GeoCities.com or others. These last two sites will enforce ads on your pages but freehostia.com will not. I recommend freehostia.com. To get rid of the ads on other sites you must purchase domain space on a per month or per year basis. All three sites offer paid domain space for more features and more space and bandwidth (how much data can be served out per month). These are just two examples of companies that host sites. There are many more. A simple search at www.google.com will reveal many. Hosting service company www.crystaltech.com is one that I use.

Warning: freehostia.com and AngelFire.com offers FREE FrontPage hosting, while GeoCities (which is now yahoo) does not. You have to pay for it, or host your domain there to get FrontPage support.

Using FrontPage with AngelFire: http://www.angelfire.lycos.com/build/fpfaq.tmpl

Logging into AngelFire with Expression Web: http://frontpage.angelfire.com/members/{your user name}

Microsoft FrontPage server extensions are files and directories that are needed by Microsoft Expression Web for it to function properly. These extensions need to be enabled by the member in order to enjoy all of FrontPage's features, such as easy updating of a Web site. Normally FrontPage must be configured to be used with your account at freehostia.com and AngelFire.