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Web design

Just a list of useful web design links...

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1.  Domain Names and Web Hosting

Registration means obtaining use of a certain domain name.  Delegation means assigning that domain name to a host computer.  A host is a computer that is permanently connected to the internet.  A website is maintained by uploading web pages (the files that comprise your website) to your web host, so that people can view them.

Kalessin usually recommends the following businesses as well-established, 'can't go wrong' registration and hosting options for new web users.  (Neither he nor this website derive any financial benefit from these recommendations.)  Jesus.com.au is hosted by Ultraserve.

Add a link3 links in this section
Australian Church Website Hosting
Providing site hosting to a large number of Australian Churches and Christian agencies - standard plan is $12.50 per month for 200mb of space, includes full-featured control panel, site statistics, create up to 100 email mailboxes, unlimited email aliases, etc. Click the link to see more. Read our client comments here: http://www.auschurch.com.au/comments.php
Melbourne IT · Business
a leading Australian domain-name registration service
Web Central · Business
a leading Australian web hosting service
2.  Learning HTML
Add a link6 links in this section
A beginners guide to HTML · Recommended
by NCSA
About.Com : Web Design
one of the larger portals to good sources of information
Full list of HTML tags
From the W3C.
HTML Goodies
Tutorials and HTML reference
HTML Help
Full HTML and CSS compatibility guides
W3C Web Schools
interactive HTML examples; edit HTML and click a button to see the results
3.  Usability, including accessibility
Add a link7 links in this section
Accessible web design articles
A series of articles on accessible web site design trying to accommodate web designers with the concept of accessibility and the design compromise for the sake of users.
Dive into Accessibility
designing for disabilities (blindness, inability to use a mouse, etc)
Nielsen Norman Group
large site, authoritative resources
Relative Font Sizes
CSS, inheritance, accessibility
Top Ten Mistakes in Website Design
Written in 1996 (Revised for 1999), still very current.
Usability News
by the Software Usability Research Laboratory, Wichita State University
Web Accessibility Initiative
W3C resource page: guidelines, checklists and techniques
4.  Information design
Add a link3 links in this section
Web Style Guide
2nd edition, definitive
Writing for the Web
by the Nielsen Norman Group, v. useful
Yale Web Style Guide
Excellent resource, ironically let down by an unfocused page design
5.  Design and inspiration
Add a link4 links in this section
Color Selection
a great (short) introduction to lots of color models and resources.
DeskMod
desktop designs, plus themes and skins; some brilliantly applied artwork, and not a bad gateway to some of the webs best graphics sites.
Dmitry's Design Lab
Introduction to design
Legal Color Names for Browsers
Names and rgb/hex codes for ~150 'web-safe' colors. Web-safe is important again for PDA's; but otherwise obsolete. The naming is quite user-friendly, though.
6.  HTML Editors and FTP programs

Wordpad on Windows or SimpleText on Mac are good enough for getting started. My personal choice is Vim in an SSH shell (or via PuTTY on a Windows machine) but that only saves time once you've learned how to use it.

Add a link7 links in this section
Arachnophilia
free (careware) HTML editor (Windows)
Download.com
THE place to find software for Windows. The search options can limit to freeware if you like.
EditPlus
Reasonably priced shareware HTML/code editor, with an evaluation period. Syntax highlighting, Ctrl-B to switch to browser view and back, includes FTP program. (Windows)
FileZilla
Fully featured open source FTP client.
The 46 Best-ever Freeware Utilities
Excellent list.
WinSCP
SFTP and SCP client. Secure file transfer.
WS-FTP LE
free for non-business use;  uploads files (Windows)
7.  Graphics and font resources
Add a link8 links in this section
Absolute Backgrounds
excellent collection of tiling patterns
FontShop
Australian source for professional typefaces.
Free Medieval Fonts
gorgeous stuff!
IrfanView
View, convert, optimize almost any kind of image files.
IStockPhoto.Com
Inexpensive photo sharing resource, credits for posting quality photograpy of your own
Textures collection
from Mayang; large and impressive, non-tiling
The GIMP
A freeware image editing program. Not quite Photoshop but almost as good and a whole lot cheaper. Right-click to see the menu. :)
Typophile
The leading typographic community online.
8.  Cascading Style Sheets
Add a link10 links in this section
An Interactive CSS Tutorial
Gets into some detail, but does a good job. Allow a few hours.
Cascading Style Sheets, Level 3
the improvements in CSS1, CSS2 and CSS3
CSS bugs list
browser compatibility guide from RichInStyle
CSS Layout Techniques
links to everything useful
CSS Zen Garden · Recommended
The ultimate demonstration of the power of CSS for separating good-looking design from the information content of pages.
Full CSS Property Compatibility Chart
At-a-glance listing of CSS support in all major browsers.
Full list of CSS properties
From the W3C.
Live Design Tutorial · Recommended
an excellent tutorial in which the CSS design of the page progressively takes shape from one page to the next, with all of the changes explained.
Meyer, Eric
Eric Meyer, Cascading Style Sheets guru
Zeldman, Jeffery
One of the better known CSS gurus. Lots of good articles.
9.  Javascript & DHTML
Add a link2 links in this section
IRT.org
extensive Javascript FAQ
JavaScript Kit
useful collection of scripts and applets
10.  High-end design (including Flash)
Add a link3 links in this section
Computer Arts
online mag, leading edge tech., tutorials
FlashKit · Recommended
for Flash developers; examples, tutorials, materials
Webmonkey
A very useful site full of up to date tutorials, reviews and discussions.
11.  XML design

XML will eventually replace HTML.  It's already readable by 6.0 browsers and can be used to generate files in other formats, eg. .html, .txt and .pdf.

Add a link7 links in this section
DocBook Demystification HOWTO
by Eric S. Raymond: "Its devotees speak an argot that is dense and forbidding even by computer-science standards..."
Editing XML: The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly
at WebReference; introduction to XML-editing tools and mentalities
Gentle Guide to DocBook
document format designed for generating other formats
Get XSL To Do Your Dirty Work
answers 'Why use XML / XSL?'
Writing Documentation Using DocBook - A Crash Course
...is what it says it is
XML 101
at Internet.Com
XML Software
portal to XML tools, docs, etc
12.  Website promotion
Add a link4 links in this section
ClickZ.Com
hyper-trendy web-marketing zine
RobotsTXT.org
the robot exclusion protocol (directs search engines)
Search Engine Watch
optimizing pages for search engine listings
Web Marketing Info Center
by Wilson Internet Services; esp. see The Web Marketing Checklist
13.  Church websites

This question is likely to be of interest to many of our readers. What actually makes a good church website?

Add a link3 links in this section
Purpose of a Church Website
A short blog entry that asks the big-picture questions.
The Web Evangelism Guide
by Tony Whittaker; the authoritative reference: see section 5 for church websites.
What to design into Church websites?
from Christian-Web-Masters.com, a good set of ideas.
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