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jaybee -> Your first web site (3/10/2007 12:17:59)

I'm not sure if this will have the desired effect or not but I'll give it a go. I was talking yesterday to some potential Outfronters who are too scared to join up as they feel we are all so much better than they are.

Other than assuring them we all have to start somewhere and that we were all as dodgy as they feel I couldn't really think what else we could do to make them feel at home. Then I hit upon what I hope is a stroke of genius.............. get all the "pros" to post a link to their first site to prove you can learn how to do it properly.

Comments along the lines of "it's no longer on the web" and "I deleted it ages ago" won't wash. I thought the same but the good old Wayback had it safely stored.

So, to all the experienced devs on here, I dare you...............

Here's mine.

Please note the regular use of fuzzy pics (resized with FrontPage of course), the hotspots, the tasteful marquees and the rather cute lines constantly drawing themselves. I seem to have restrained myself from using counters and mouse trails but that's probably because I hadn't worked out how to do them.

Over to the rest of you.



Mike54 -> RE: Your first web site (3/10/2007 13:17:28)

OK jaybee I'll play along. I don't know if it counts or not since I'm not a pro (I don't get paid to do it, in fact I've only ever been paid for one).
Here's the first site I ever put on line, it's still on line and while corporate keeps talking about updating it they haven't. It's got so much content it would be a nightmare...
Anyway --> nelsonheaters

Hmmm seems I need to republish to fix a couple of broken images too.[&:]



d a v e -> RE: Your first web site (3/10/2007 13:23:36)

mine isn't on the web and i deleted it (used the floppy for something else) and i did check using wayback

i did this though in about 1999/2000 or somewhere abouts http://www.davenportbrosltd.com/bodyshop1_beginning.htm (the homepage and some other page have been faffed about with some so used this page as an example)



jaybee -> RE: Your first web site (3/10/2007 13:26:20)

Nice one Mike. Perhaps I should reword that, I don't mean Pros as in "Doing it for a living" but those on here who have a fair bit of experience now and seem to be pros to newcomers.

Thanks Dave, brilliant.



Tailslide -> RE: Your first web site (3/10/2007 13:29:42)

Without wishing to make excuses... my earliest efforts (1997-ish) were either for my own fun and not published or on the Intranet for the company I worked for.

I can describe them though -

My first webpage was done in Notepad in my lunch hour - it was pink and had a photo of a Land Rover in the middle and "Hello World" at the top. Woo original eh?

Next efforts were my departments page on the company Intranet. It was all table based nastiness (so actually I'd moved down in skillset!) using Net Objects Fusion. I remember being really impressed with the nasty templates that came with it!

I went away and had children then in about 2002 I started another page on the "real" internet which had photos of the kids etc - it had frames AND tables - niiiice! I've checked wayback machine but as the site still exists (updated since!) and as it's got a password on it, it won't take a screenshot.

The earliest example of my work still available for laughing at - sorry I mean looking at is here:

http://home.freeuk.net/mwgaviation/index.htm

It's from early 2003.

It was originally done in Netscape Composer (yuck!) for a Web Design course I was doing at the time - and although it did validate at the time (had to for the course - which I passed) it doesn't any more (sniff).

It appears that someone else has taken it on as it now has Generator="FrontPage" whatever in the header.

I must be mental posting it as it's got my email on it openly... and apparently I didn't understand copyrights then (don't worry, I bought the stock images at the time!)



jaybee -> RE: Your first web site (3/10/2007 13:36:02)

Pink with a LandRover. [&:] I see your taste has improved then. [:D]

quote:

Hmmm seems I need to republish to fix a couple of broken images too.:)
[sm=rofl6.gif]



Mango Himself -> RE: Your first web site (3/10/2007 13:40:49)

I think it's a great idea. Sort of opening our old high school yearbooks and seeing how young and dorky we used to look in comparison to how old and dorky we now look [:D]

I would start by defining the word 'pro'. So that many of our friends here are willing to join this thread, let's just say you qualify as a pro if you are trying to be better and show an interest in learning. It makes no difference if you do this for a living or not. How about my suggestion? Is it acceptable?

Here is one of may very first jobs ever, I originally created it with an old html software that went belly up since, Then I retouched it with Yahoo sitebuilder in its first version and updated it with the following versions. It was painstakingly long to create since I had only 64 megas in RAM. I later added a dhtml menu and music (how could I leave music out?) The Gifs were quite in fashion then.

Vet site



jaybee -> RE: Your first web site (3/10/2007 13:42:27)

Good definition there Mango. You do realise this thread could go down in the annals of Web Design. [:D]



BobbyDouglas -> RE: Your first web site (3/10/2007 13:43:55)

Whoever can find my first website, will earn $200, or best offer (proof required before the money is paid!).

It has a maroon background image that repeated as tile. Homer Simpson on the left frame (bobbing up and down), as well as the main navigation below that. The right frame is where all the horrible content was.

It was hosted for free at geocities around 7 years ago when they had the areas and numbers as part of the URL.



jaybee -> RE: Your first web site (3/10/2007 13:52:17)

Errrr whilst on a roll, I looked up my second site. It seems I had a complete brain fart and went downhill from the first site. What was I thinking!!!!!

The missing graphic on each page was a large purple and green monster trundling across the page and leaving footprints in its wake. Seems even the wayback has drawn the line on that one. [&:]



Mike54 -> RE: Your first web site (3/10/2007 14:36:11)

OK, every once in a while I like to pull this one out. Something simple I threw together after I'd actually been here awhile.[:D][8D]
Many names will be unknown to the new members but they were quite a group. Outfront Fairy Tale
Obviously I had learned a lot.[8|]

BTW Mango, your Vet Site is sure to be a real classic someday (if it isn't already).[;)]



womble -> RE: Your first web site (3/10/2007 15:01:57)

Hmmmm. Some interesting ones there. [sm=lol.gif]

I particularly liked the music and the nice puppy paws on Mango's! [:D]

Well fortunately, or unfortunately, depending on how you look at it, my very earliest efforts haven't survived the passage of time, and even the Wayback Machine can't help as I've no idea what the URLs were - they were on my ISP's free space, using the web builder thingy they provided, complete with frames - yum! They would have been around 1996/7 I guess. One was for a local health support group and had the obligatory hit counter on it. It had a purple background and pink boxes in the middle for the text to site on so it was at least legible. The web builder thing was very restrictive in the themes you could choose and it was almost impossible to pick a colour scheme that didn't look completely naff - that's my excuse anyway! I vividly recall when we made it into three figures on the hit counter - a very exciting day indeed! The second was one I did for the local Gingerbread group, which had very much the same sort of luck, and I think was very possibly one of the reasons for the group folding. There were later versions of both which were done in Word saved as HTML - they unfortunately lacked the hit counters though. [&o]

After that I went back to university and got tied up doing other things for a while. My first FP site was started in 2004. First record of it the Wayback Machine has is in 2005, though nothing much changed in that time apart from I was frantically working on v2 for months on end - I think version 1 had been on the server about 3 weeks when I decided a redesign was in order. It unfortunately seems to have lost my pictures, including the odd animated one, but you get the general idea. http://web.archive.org/web/*/http://www.ddeaf.org.uk
The second version of the site that's on there is the one that's up there now, though that's coming down shortly for a redesign and rebranding.

My first CSS layout one is I think the one that's in my profile and is far from perfect. Doesn't help that various bits of it dropped off during an unplanned server move last year and either got lost in the move or I never found time to put them back on. That's in the middle of a redesign at the moment between working on other stuff. At the current rate of progress v2 should be ready sometime around 2010. [:D]



Mango Himself -> RE: Your first web site (3/10/2007 15:22:58)


quote:

ORIGINAL: jaybee

Errrr whilst on a roll, I looked up my second site. It seems I had a complete brain fart and went downhill from the first site. What was I thinking!!!!!



My dear, you really did use Frontpage at one time in your life![;)]



Mango Himself -> RE: Your first web site (3/10/2007 15:25:01)


quote:

ORIGINAL: Mike54


BTW Mango, your Vet Site is sure to be a real classic someday (if it isn't already).[;)]



Mike

your sites look fine. Mine looks like a tiny toon's trip on acid!!! Classic? Sure. Maybe to show all those things one is never supposed to include in a site. Thanks for looking at it and for your nice comment!



Mango Himself -> RE: Your first web site (3/10/2007 15:26:44)

quote:


I particularly liked the music and the nice puppy paws on Mango's! :)


Dear womble

the paws were big then! And who could forget the text spiral chasing the pointer?



womble -> RE: Your first web site (3/10/2007 15:52:46)

quote:

ORIGINAL: Mango Himself
Maybe to show all those things one is never supposed to include in a site.

...ah yes, and then there was this one I did (with a little help in the good taste department from Jaybee [;)]): Caz & Donkey's Wedding Website!

[sm=rofl6.gif]

That one was soooooo much fun to do! [:D]



Mango Himself -> RE: Your first web site (3/10/2007 16:12:23)


quote:

ORIGINAL: womble

quote:

ORIGINAL: Mango Himself
Maybe to show all those things one is never supposed to include in a site.

...ah yes, and then there was this one I did (with a little help in the good taste department from Jaybee [;)]): Caz & Donkey's Wedding Website!

[sm=rofl6.gif]

That one was soooooo much fun to do! [:D]


I am still laughing! It is a masterpiece!



Nicole -> RE: Your first web site (3/10/2007 16:21:18)

Well most of mine, and I had a few, were all Geocities ones with ridiculously long URL's with numbers and category names that meant little, and right now I can't seem to remember the right combination of names and numbers. I'll keep thinking, but I do remember my first ever was a site for the Squash Club I played for circa 1998 that had, for no reason at all, a fluttering Australian flag.

The only easy domain name I've owned and can obviously remember is my web design site which should show what can be achieved in 2 - 3 years. I started out with very basic images and text, frames of course too!

http://web.archive.org/web/20041022025626/http://www.nixdesign.com.au/



caz -> RE: Your first web site (3/10/2007 16:25:00)

OK I'll bite the bullet [:)]

From 1998/99 I was responsible for the content and database, but not the coding - hadn't a clue back then because I was more a user of online services like Datastar/Dialog for information retrieval. The backend database here was something we had created inhouse on an IBM mainframe and then used it for income generation, charging suppliers rather than users. Blimey, it looks like the wonderful IT people used Word 97 to create it. [:'(]

Buildline

My first personal site created a couple of years later in FP98 with frames, blinking and hosted on free space impressed everyone - including me [;)]and I really must find time to overhaul it...

School reunion site

I really do feel unwell now.
[:D][:D]

PS Mike, it's always good to see the Fairy Tale again!



mar0364 -> RE: Your first web site (3/10/2007 16:34:22)

I take your dare JB.

This is my first.
http://www.garywcooper.com/



caz -> RE: Your first web site (3/10/2007 16:49:52)

Hey, no fair Rich - you have a DocType. [sm=laughing4.gif]



jaybee -> RE: Your first web site (3/10/2007 17:15:19)

These are classic! We'll never work again! [sm=rofl6.gif]



womble -> RE: Your first web site (3/10/2007 19:34:05)

True. It's working already. I'm having to resort to doing sites for my 7 yr old nephew....[&o]

...talk about picky and indecisive! He makes most of Jaybee's clients look normal! [:D]



caz -> RE: Your first web site (3/10/2007 20:33:38)

And I am back to database work next week. [:(]

Think I'll learn to knit instead, now there's challenging. [sm=lying_bstard.gif]



jurgen -> RE: Your first web site (3/10/2007 23:37:08)

Here is my very first "official" website...... many moons ago, Nov 2002 ..... :-)

Flower site

I didn't know they are still there..... Jeeeeeezzzzz what a mess.... [sm=BangHead.gif]



jaybee -> RE: Your first web site (3/11/2007 4:12:54)

Perfect Jurgen. That is a classic of its time. It falls into the same category as my second site. The "when did we get the idea that badly rendered rainbow text was ever a good idea" section. [:D]



womble -> RE: Your first web site (3/11/2007 5:10:45)


quote:

ORIGINAL: jaybee
The "when did we get the idea that badly rendered rainbow text was ever a good idea" section. [:D]

You mean it's not? [8D]



golfer -> RE: Your first web site (3/11/2007 13:58:47)

I would lik to assure all the peolple that jaybee referred to in her initial post that being an absolute dummy in this area allows you to qualify into the wonderful world of Golfer.

This is an honourable existance on Outfront as I have been a member here for a couple of years and my accumulation of the 'knowledge' has been painfully slow and in some respects taking great strides backwards.

I have some understanding of FP. Dreamweaver is well ......non-existant. CSS is another world and to me very, very geeky. Oh yes I have the books and will pick it up where I left it some 18 months ago - at the start of chapter 1.

Flash is only with a dirty raincoat. Photoshop just lies dormant on my PC - far too scared to even open it.

Firework, I have used - well kind of.

Do I class myself as even a semi pro? Most certainly not.

Am I making progress? Yes I am but only with the help of people on this forum. Stupidly they all give me hope that I will, one day, be reasonably good at it.

All beginners posting on OF will have my support even if they feel they are asking a stupid question. They can openly say that they are a member of Golfer's group. So don't be anxious as the knowledgeable members here already have to put up with me.

My first site is no longer in existance as it was for a group of golfing friends.

However .....OMG I hear. I put a site my second site up for critique on Outfront (link here)

Anyway. I am not a pro so I shouldn't be posting on this thread but do I care?

Of course not coz I'm Golfer.[:)]

[edit]You can tell how good he is, he managed to get the link going to the wrong place. [:D] Fixed it for you sweetie.



womble -> RE: Your first web site (3/11/2007 18:23:45)

Aw Golfer! Where you been hiding?! (Being out playing golf is not a good enough excuse...you should be HERE!) [:D]

Ah yes, that classic thread....snow blindness? Warm colours? Hmmmmm....I think the highlight of the thread was very probably you getting a tad tetchy with Mr Fonty himself, and I think that's a damned good site!

Not being good at code and stuff isn't a problem, cos I know there are other things he's very good at. [;)]

quote:

All beginners posting on OF will have my support even if they feel they are asking a stupid question. They can openly say that they are a member of Golfer's group. So don't be anxious as the knowledgeable members here already have to put up with me.

And we love you dearly, darling. [sm=kiss.gif]

As someone's sig says, the only stupid question is the one you don't ask (or something like that). As for not knowing stuff, it really doesn't matter. A friend of mine who I did a site for a while back always describes me as an "expert". I'm not! The main thing I've learned over the past three years or so is that there's always more to learn.

I can code a valid site, I can make it fairly accessible. I can find my way around Paint Shop Pro (but I've never touched, and have no desire to, Photoshop). I know bits of various web languages now. I can more or less get databases to behave. When the web design fairly sprinkles creative dust on my pillow, sometimes I can combine all that to come up with a fairly tasteful and technically sound site, but there's loads of stuff I don't know.

Flash - terrifies me.

Dreamweaver - it's not Microsoft, so it sounds okay, but I've never even tried out a trial.

Fireworks - light the fuse and stand well back.

No-one knows everything there is to know about designing websites. There's just too much to know. You're constantly learning, and you learn from your mistakes.

As the tagline of this site says, we're a "learning community". We learn from each other and help each other out. I wouldn't be where I am today web-design wise if it wasn't for all the help and encouragement I've had from members here. Around two years ago I came here looking for answers as to why when I tried to view my site on my computer, in Internet Explorer I got a warning pop-up from pages with javascript on them (a question I discovered that gets asked on a regular basis), but no-one laughed at why I didn't know the answer, and helpfully told me what I needed to know.

The natives were friendly, and I decided to stick around. After a while I found I was able to answer more questions than I was asking, and I fell in love with making websites. I've made some good friends here too.

I'm rambling - again! I'll go now. [;)]



mtfm -> RE: Your first web site (3/12/2007 11:38:06)

Unfortunately, my original site is behind a corporate firewall and not visible. Plus it has been re-done multiple times over. The original original site used frames, no doctype, and a three-tiered javascript dropdown as its exclusive navigation.

And that was only a year ago, more or less! I like to think I've come a long way since then, and indeed I have, but things always change and there's always more to learn which is why this forum is so useful.

To any newbies who are intimidated by the "experts" here-- I can only say one thing and it's the same thing my mother used to always say, when trying to prod me into action, "the journey of a thousand miles begins with the first step."

Of course I'd then call her a Fortune Cookie and continue my inaction, but that's just me! [:D]

Seriously, starting out is hard but the people here are always willing to help-- and unless you have the time to read 100's of technical books hoping in vain to find the information you're looking for, this is the best way to learn.



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