Starting out on a new site project

The most critical thing to remember when beginning a new site project, even if it is just an exercise for learning purposes, is to correctly set up the site's Root Folder. This is where all of your website files will be saved to. When saved into this folder, your pages and other files can refer to each other directly in your code structure. So when we link from 'index.htm' to 'page1.htm', for example, we need only write the most direct path to the file name.

This makes it possible to upload your website to a hosting service and maintain the relations between files in your site. In other words, even though your local root folder (on your computer's hard drive) is named something like 'project folder', when copying to the remote folder on your hosting service the relationship between your files remains intact.

Therefore, when we set up a new site project, the very first thing we do is define the Root Folder. Here's how we do it in Dreamweaver....

1. Launch the Dreamweaver application program.
2. From the 'Sites' menu, choose 'New Site'
3. At the top of the 'Site Definition' dialog box, click the 'Advanced' tab.
4. For Site Name, enter a name for your project.
5. For Local Root Folder, click the folder icon at the end of the entry field.
6. In the 'New Folder' dialog box that opens, navigate to a location on your local hard drive where you wish to create the new folder (use the Student volume on your classroom computer)
7. Click the 'new folder' button. Name the folder.
8. Select your folder and click 'Choose'.
9. IMPORTANT! Make sure that Links are set Relative to Document*
10. Make sure 'Enable Cache' is checked.
11. Click OK.

*This prevents linking and embedding from failing on sites that have been copied to a host. If the 'Relative to Site' option is checked, the site will only function locally.

Next: Creating the Homepage