I’ve composed a list of the most common questions/misconceptions about the Web design process. Please read this frequently asked questions BEFORE viewing your demo site. Or view it after if you have any questions. I’m pretty open on it!
What is the difference between registering a domain name, buying a hosting package, and designing a website?
Domain Names
Computers communicate by using a string of numbers, called IP addresses, to contact each other, similar to how one uses a phone number to dial a specific person’s phone. Domain names are a lot like listings in a phone book. The phone book tells people looking for a business what the entries are just as a domain tells computers that a domain is hosted on the server. Without a domain, you would have to tell people that your site is located at a temporary url such as 123.456.789.123/~yoursite instead of using a domain name such as yoursite.com.
Web-Hosting Servers
The web-hosting is much like the actual space that you rent out to have your business in. It is just the space itself, so it does not include furnishings or equipment, just as the web-hosting account doesn’t include a website. Your website is designed and those files are then uploaded to your website account.
Without the hosting services, you won’t have a place for your files to reside, so your domain would then become like a disconnected phone number in the phone directory, and your site files wouldn’t have a place to stay.
Website Files
The website files are what your visitors and potential customers actually see when going to site. The site files are the same as any other file you normally use, like a .jpg photograph, or .mp3 music file. Website files also include .php files or .html files, which are PHP scripts or html pages respectively.
Why is my text in Latin/Spanish?
Lorem Ipsum is simply dummy text of the printing and typesetting industry. Lorem Ipsum has been the industry’s standard dummy text ever since the 1500s, when an unknown printer took a galley of type and scrambled it to make a type specimen book. It has survived not only five centuries, but also the leap into electronic typesetting, remaining essentially unchanged.
It is a long established fact that a reader will be distracted by the readable content of a page when looking at its layout. The point of using Lorem Ipsum is that it has a more-or-less normal distribution of letters, as opposed to using ‘Content here, content here’, making it look like readable English.
It simply used as place holder content for content not yet generated. Once we walk you through WordPress you’ll be able to replace the Latin with your content!
Why don’t the links work?
Since many times our customers prefer to purchase several designs we create only the home page with no child pages built yet. Once the home page is signed off on, we then create the additional pages based loosely on the home page.
Why is the address in the address bar a subdomain of point2pointMarketing.com and not MyName.com?
While in in the design and development phase all work is done in a development server, usually companyname.point2pointmarketing.com. This is a private address which is not viewable to the public or indexed by search engine results. Once the Web site launches this link will disappear.
Why did you pick that specific image?
Stock photography, much like latin text, is often used as a place holder while we wait for more specific feedback.
I wanted green, but not that green, is this a big deal?
While we try to select the best color palette for each site there is no way we can read minds. However it is extremely easy to change font color, box color or pretty much anything on the Web site.
I’ve given you the go ahead to launch my site but it’s not live yet?
Once we change the name servers there can be up to a 48 hour window where the old Web site is still going to load for visitors. It’s because of DNS propagation, you can read more about it here.