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  Introduction
  Web Based Uploading
  Using FTP

Introduction
One of the main problems that people face when making a website is how they’ll upload their pages to the Internet. To most first time webmasters it’s a rather daunting task, but it’s actually really easy. There are 2 basic ways to upload a file to a web server, which will make it available on the Internet. The first is by using web-based pages and the second is FTP.

Web Based Uploading
Most free and paid web hosts will give you the ability to upload your pages on the Internet through your control panel. It’s a very simple process to upload the page. First you login to your control panel, then get to the page which will allow you to upload files. In many control panels, you have to go to the “Manage Files” or “File Manager” page to get to the page that will let you upload files. Once you find it, click the “Browse (for files)….” button. The prompt will show you a file manager window that will allow you to upload files. Find the file and click the ‘Open’ button. Most web based file uploading systems allow you to upload a bunch of files at the same time. So once you’ve chosen all the files you’d like to upload, click the ‘Upload’ button. Also if you’re uploading updated versions of an existing page, remember to check off the ‘Overwrite existing files’ option.

FTP
FTP might seem somewhat scary to the first time user but it’s actually very simple to use. Most of FTP clients (programs) allow you to simply drag and drop files from your hard drive on to the web server. I personally recommend SmartFTP. To get SmartFTP go to their download page: http://www.smartftp.com/download/. It’s completely free for non-commercial uses and it’s really easy to use. One of the things that you need to get is your FTP login ID. Keep in mind that most free hosts don’t support FTP. If you’ve paid for your web hosting, your host should support FTP. If they don’t, you should probably leave them. Anyways, your host will usually send you your FTP login information in an email. So once you’ve installed SmartFTP or whatever FTP program you’ve chosen to use, you have to login.

To learn how to use a FTP client continue on to: Using a FTP Client.