Basic Web Design Questions

[mintyguitarman]

Howdy Y'all.
I'm currently making my first website, and having had no lessons before, im kinda doing things by trial and error. I was wondering if you could help me with a couple of things - first off, id like to put a link in which opens a board window. I want the board to be essentially a list of the comments already made (and who made them), with a couple of boxes at the bottom to put your name and message in, then a post button. So, can anyone help me with this? I want it to be pretty small, just a little scroll down box with no navigation bar or anything.

Secondly, im also looking to make an image gallery. Ideal layout would be a set of thumbnails and a larger frame to the side of them. When the desired thumnail is pressed, the enlarged image appears in the frame. If possible, id also like to make it possible to click the larger frame version to open a full resolution image in a new window with a next and previous link at the bottom.
Phew. Quite a bit there perhaps, but if anyone could direct me to the software i need, or a basic walkthrough of what i need to do, id be eternally grateful.

Thanks in advance

Face - www.silvacode.com

[sypher]

looks to me like your looking for dynamic scripts.

Seeing as your new it would be a while before you learned how to make these scripts yourself, for now your best using ones already made. They can be found at www.hotscripts.com

Each come with a read me on how to install them etc

[saltedm8]

What programmes have you got ? let me know

[mintyguitarman]

Right now, im just using word to make the basic structure as you can see on the site. Cutenews is used on there (although its very basic at the moment), and aside from that im not using any programmes. Can you point me towards any decent ones?
Thanks

[Rob]

Word makes the most trashy web pages out there.... they make look passable, but their code is spagetti like... laods of un-needed code and more often than not they will ONLY work in Internet Explorer.

MS Word is actually worse than Microsoft Forntpage (search these forums for front page)

All that being said, it's quite normal for people to start out using these applications and if they are serious about web design, they'll eventually come to realise how limiting they are and get frustrated at how ineffecient they are.... my guess is that you'll soon be looking to learn HTML from the ground up so you'll have ultimate control over every aspect of your design.

If so, you'll need some good reference sites and some good books.

We'll happily provide you with examples if/when you need them.

[mintyguitarman]

Yeah, well as you can see, its a band website so we're not looking to make the best page out there that's going to be something that people visit every day. Essentially what we're looking to do is scan pictures in, and use them as backdrops for text. We're thinking of having a links page, which will basically be an intricate drawing which incorperates all the areas of the sites. We'll then make the words into links, badda bing. Is word suitable for something like this? As i say, we're not going for amazingly flashy and full of complex code, we just want simple and artistic.
As an aside question, currently on the page, if you press refresh, the objects appear at different times. Im not going to try and explain precisely what i mean, but if you take a look, im sure you'll get what i mean. Is there any way of fixing this? Ie. can a part of the image be made into a link without doing what im currently doing (which is to select and copy the area, then paste it on top, making sure its correctly aligned with the image beneath, then to just turn it into a hyperlink). Thanks once again for your time.
Face www.silvacode.com

[SoundSystem]

When I started out like you, I used a free web host and used the 'easy build version'.
Then I tried the 'Html' version, downloaded a customisable layout for free, and had a play about, see what I could and couldn't do.
From that, I learnt more and more Html and scripts.

[mintyguitarman]

Hokay,
So im getting to grips with basic design and stuff. Ive switched to frontpage although this clearly isnt significantly better. I used a crappy template wizard to try and set up a message board, and while i think i ended up with something like it, every time i try to post a message i get an error page telling me i need to publish the page on a server that supports frontpage extensions (which mine does). As i said, im not looing for anything complex with regards the board. Very simply, i want a small window with a list of comments, with the option to add a message (and if its not too difficult, have the name linked to a url). So could somebody please give me an idiots guide to doing this? Im sure frontpage has the capacity, but it throws in loads of uncessary crap like a "welcome to the discussion board" page. Im looking for a dead simple, all on one small window type deal.
Thanks for all the help
Si