Zetnet Services - Zetnet User's Free Web Space FAQ
Web Site Address (URL)
Web Page Authoring
Getting Web Pages onto The Server
Common Problems
How do I get my allocation of free space?
Free web space is not set up automatically and has to be requested. to set up your space we require the following details:
Organisation:
Non-profit making organisations such as charities, clubs, religous groups, support groups etc.
Personal:
Sites which do not fit into either of the two above categories.
This free space is only available to holders of a valid Zetnet Internet Account.
Zetnet reserves the right not to host material it considers questionable in nature.
You are totally responsible for any material which appears on your site. In the event of your site containing material which may be unsuitable for any reason then access to the site will be discontinued and you will be contacted.
The site may be used to promote your own business.
The re-selling of your free web space or publishing of advertising for gain etc. is strictly forbidden.
User written server-side scripts (cgi, perl etc,) are not allowed.
How much free space do I have?
At the moment there are three types of account available to Zetnet clients.
How much server space will my web pages use?
The amount of space occupied on the server will be approximately the same as the files take on your own hard disk. You must however remember that files will occupy more disk space than their stated size, just as on your own machine. Disk space on the server is allocated in 1KB blocks, therefore:
A 4.1KB file will use 5KB of disk space.
100 files each 4.1KB in size (410KB in total) will use 500KB of disk space.
Text is very economical on space. Pictures use quite a bit of space but careful consideration of which format to use and what compression to apply can result in very economical file sizes without loss of quality. Sound and video files even of only a few seconds in duration can be of an astonishingly large size.
Some FTP programs will allow you to send commands to the server. If you can do this the command "site exec du -hc" will return a reasonably accurate figure for the space used.
What happens if I exceede my space quota?
The table below shows how the disk space for your site is managed.
| ACCOUNT | WEB SPACE |
ACTUAL SPACE |
LIMIT | DAYS GRACE |
| Business Hours Account | 25MB | 25,600KB | 26,000KB | 5 Days |
| Budget Account | 50MB | 50,120KB | 51,000KB | 5 Days |
| Standard Account | 100MB | 102,400KB | 103,000KB | 5 Days |
| Web Space: | This is figure commonly used to talk about the space available on the different account types. |
| Actual Space: | This is the amount of disk space actually available to you. Remember this space is used by your root directoery strucure. |
| Limit: | In order to allow users some 'working space' to manipulate or test replacement files when their space is near full then their quota can be exceeded up to this maximum limit. The amount of time files can reside in this area is strictly limited, see below. |
| Grace: | This is the number of days for which the 'working space' (see above) may be in continuous use. Once the time limit is reached you will not be able to upload any new files and if you attempt to overwrite existing files then they may be reduced to zero size. The only alternatives you have are to delete some existing files to bring you back under your quota or to aquire extra space. |
Your quota of web space can be increased by either by upgrading your account or renting extra space.
Increasing your quota by upgrading your account:
To upgrade your account either:
Once you have 25MB. of free space the only way to increase your quota is to rent extra space at the rates in the current price list. To rent extra space contact the Zetnet Webweaver either by phone (01595 696667) or e-mail webweaver@zetnet.co.uk
What will be the address of my website?
The URL (address) for your free web space will take the form of:
The directory name must not contain any spaces.
The directory name must only contain the characters:
Use only lower case characters in the directory name.
As spaces cannot be used a "-" (dash) or "_" (underscore) can be used to separate characters.
The directory name does not influence search engines.
Can I use my Zetnet sub-domain on my web site?
If you have a Zetnet sub-domain (Standard Account holders only) then this can be applied to your web space.
If your sub-domain is "myname.zetnet.co.uk"
Then the URL would become "www.myname.zetnet.co.uk/"
If your sub-domain is applied to your webspace then your site would still be accessible from the standard URL of "www.users.zetnet.co.uk/myname/". Your site logon details would remain unchanged.
To be allocated a sub-domain you must have a Zetnet Standard Account. The request may be made either by e-mail to admin@zetnet.co.uk or by phoning them on 01595 696667. When making a request please quote your user number (100*****).
Can I use a personal domain name?
If you have your own domain name then your allocation of free space can be used under that domain name. If you already have web space on the free server (www.users.zetnet.co.uk) you have the choice of:
How can I get a personal domain name?
Zetnet will register domain names for holders of Zetnet Standard Accounts, the current cost for a domain name can be found on the price list.
There is an on-line application form for domain names available at http://www.zetnet.co.uk/zetpages/forms/dnsform.html
The answer to this one is well out with the scope of this FAQ, all that can be done is to suggest some of the links below which may help the newcomer get started:
HTML is an abbreviation of Hyper Text Markup Language. The HyperText Markup Language is composed of a set of elements that define a document and guide its display. In easy terms it is the instructions used to format the text and layout of a web page.
What HTML authoring tools are available?
There is a huge range of editors to help you write HTML. The most basic for a PC is the old faithful notepad program which comes with Windows, even the most complex web page can be written with notepad provided the user has a knowledge of HTML.
The vast majority of editors fall into two categories, HTML editors and WYSIWYG (What You See Is What You Get) Editors.
HTML Editors
Basically an HTML Editor can be compared to word processor, it allows you to type in your pages with tools to help with the generation of the HTML code. The better editors will also allow to view the way the page will appear on a browser. This type of editor is best suited to those who wish to to 'serious' authoring. It allows the user to retain complete control over their web site with the ability to use all available and new web functions.
WYSIWYG Editors
A WYSIWYG editor can be compared to a Desktop Publishing Program in that you lay out the page as you wish it to appear on the web without having to deal directly with any HTML code. This type of editor is ideal for those who do not wish to get to grips with HTML (It is not that difficult - honest) in order just to produce their own one-off site.
Which type do you use? Very much a case of horses for courses. You will find plenty of editors to download and try at TUCOWS web site.
Does the server support Microsoft Front Page Extensions?
No, at this time Zetnet does not support the extensions. Zetnet servers run on an Apache (the most popular web server world-wide) system under Linux. The Microsoft Extension Software to run on these servers is still considered to offer security problems by many ISPs and until a suitable version is released they will not be supported. The Microsoft Front Page software can still be used to author and submit web pages and our own server side scripts for form mailing etc, are available.
What server side scripts are available?
There are some server side scripts (perl/cgi etc) available for use by Zetnet users.
Form Mailer
This will return the data from a form in your web space to you by e-mail.
Site Search
This will search the nominated pages on a web site and return a list of all pages containing the search string.
Image Map
For those who wish to use a server side rather than a client side image map.
Any new scripts added will be listed here.
How do I get my web pages onto the server?
By FTP
FTP (File Transfer Protocol) is the most efficient method of maintaining your site. By FTP you can have direct access to your site and update it at will.
By HTML Editor
Web authoring packages such as Microsoft Front Page and Netscape Composer allow you to upload your pages directly. While this method is perfectly acceptable those wishing to have better control over their files on the web server and their transfer will find conventional FTP programs superior.
By e-mail attach
Sending your pages in by e-mail attachment can be used if you are unable to use FTP. If you use this method please note that there may be some delay in the pages being put in place and that frequent changes by this method will not be undertaken.
There is a large range of FTP software available, the two most popular programs for the PC are WS_FTP Lite (freeware) and CuteFTP (shareware) and for the Mac Fetch is reccommended. All these programs will provide the facilities you will require to upload your web pages.
These programs can be obtained from:
| The Zetnet CD | WS_FTP only |
| ZIMACS Files Page | WS_FTP and CuteFTP |
| TUCOWS Software Archive | For Windows 3.x For Windows 95/98 For Windows NT For Macintosh |
How do I use FTP to upload my website?
Information on the basic operation of your FTP software should be contained in the program's help file. To transfer files between your computer and the web server certain information has to be entered into the FTP program. The required information is:
Some other useful web resources are:
I have uploaded my pages but cannot see them when I go to my URL.
If you go to your website and all you see is the Zetnet 'Under Construction' page then check the following.
Should there be neither a "index.htm" or "index.html" file in a directory then a listing of the contents of that directory will be displayed.
I can see the text of my pages on the web but not the pictures.
There can be many reasons for this:
I can see my home page on the web but the links to other pages do not work.
Possible reasons for this:
I have uploaded an amendment to my site but the changes do not seem to have taken effect.
Assuming that the file has been uploaded correctly then the probable cause lies with the browser. What could be happening is that when you go to view the changes you in fact are still looking at the old page being held in your browsers cache. To rectify this all that needs to be done is to click on your browsers refresh/reload button.