Lesson 2. Your first design studio.

You do not need to rent an office downtown or employ a janitor to set up your first design studio. You don't even have to be connected to the Internet! More happy news, you do not have to download or buy a lot of software. In most cases the software is already there!

Well, all right, you have to have a computer. And I don't think that Amiga or Atari will do (please do not flame me for this).

So what do you need?

There are two basic tools you will use. One is for creating web pages. Another is for viewing them. First is called an editor. Second is called a web browser.

So the question is now... do you have this stuff? If you know that you do and you know how to run both programs, just skip this lesson. If you're not sure, read on.

The text editors come in all shapes and colors, I will just name two. One is for Windows/Windows95 and I guess for forthcoming Windows98 (although Microsoft is known for changing things) and it's called NotePad. Another is for MS DOS platforms (are there still people who don't have Windows95?) and is called "edit.exe". There are also text editors for Macs and Unix machines, but frankly I have no idea what they are.

Actually, you can use almost any word processor (the program that you use to write letters and stuff, if you don't know what it is) to write HTML. But because word processors usually save a lot of formatting information together with the text you enter, you have to prevent word processor from doing this. One way fo doing this will be to choose "Save As.." and then choose "Text Only". If you are not sure, read a manual or help file for your word processor (search for Text Only)

The other tool in your studio should be a web browser. Here I will be less vague. Because you must have one of the two: either Netscape Navigator (or an integrated suite of space-wasting stuff, Netscape Communicator) or Microsoft Internet Explorer. What's more, you should have the latest versions of these browsers. The latest for Netscape is Netscape Communicator and the latest for Microsoft is Internet Explorer 4. You can download these for free (!) either at Netscape site or Microsoft site.

However, do not rush off to download your copy just yet. You might have the program on the computer. Please read your OS manual for more details on how to install a browser.

If you're sure you don't have a browser, again, do not start downloading yet. The full version of Microsoft Internet Explorer (you might see me using MS IE or IE abbreviation, it's a wide-known practice) is about 150MB and download should be your last resort.

So where do you find browsers? Well, the best deal is to buy a computer-related magazine with a cover CD. Browse through a couple of magazines to see what's on a CD and you should find either Netscape Communicator (Netscape is also often abbreviated as NS) or MS IE4. This will save two days of downloading and if your disk crashes (no, no, it should not happen!) or you run out of space, you will always have a distribution copy on a CD. Always remember this little "trick". Magazines sometimes even give away free software... and you also get a magazine to read, or put on your bookshelf to impress your mates.

All right, now that you have both your tools, your design studio is complete. It is not the best studio you can have, I admit, but it's a building block, and you will be surprised to know how many people (me included) use only a NotePad to create their web pages!

Conclusion. Now you have your own design studio. In the next lesson you will already be designing your own pages. This lesson did not say anyhting about installation, but because there are so many alternative programs and you might get into all sorts of problems during installation, I am unable to give any specific comments. If you have trouble installing your software, consult the software developer, it is his job to help.

Just click here to go to the next lesson, Creating your first web page.