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#003/13-Mar-98

POOR RICHARD'S WEB SITE NEWS
Geek-Free, Commonsense Advice on Building a
Low-Cost Web Site

Editor: Peter Kent
Top Floor Publishing

http://www.poorrichard.com/

IN THIS ISSUE

Beginner's Column: CGIs -- What Are They, and Should You Touch Them?
Picking a Web-Hosting Company
Shopping-Cart Software -- Part II
More on The Missing Web Page Problem
Mac FTP Programs
650,000 Clip Art Images -- for $17.95
Poor Richard's Web Site in the Press
Working Efficiently
Corrections
Share Your Success
Reading Back Issues

Beginner's Column: CGIs -- What Are They, and Should You Touch Them?

If you are just beginning to set up a Web site you may have heard -- but perhaps not understood -- the term "CGI". CGI means Common Gateway Interface. A CGI script is a little program that runs on a Web server and interfaces with Web pages.

HTML (HyperText Markup Language), the basic building block of Web-page creation, can create forms quite easily ... but it can't make them do anything beyond transmitting the information to the Web server. So to make a form work, what usually happens is that information is sent from the form to a CGI script at the server. The script processes the information, and sends some kind of response back to the Web browser. (Forms can be made to work using other methods, but the most common method, and often the simplest, is to use a CGI script.)

With CGI scripts all sorts of things are possible. Forms can be used to transmit data from the form to an e-mail address, or to save the information in a text file at the Web server. Forms can even be used to create sophisticated "shopping-cart" software (which we'll be looking at in more detail later in this edition of the newsletter), so visitors can place orders at a Web site -- CGI scripts can be used to calculate totals, figure out shipping costs and sales tax, and so on.

CGI scripts are _very_ useful things. But, as with everything in life, there's a cost involved. While many excellent CGI scripts are available at no cost, or for a very low cost, the problem is that scripts are often quite difficult to install. I believe that many people should not touch CGI scripts ... at least until they've learned certain skills

In order to work with CGI scripts you must understand a variety of basic concepts and skills. You must ...

Understand how to use Telnet and FTP.
Understand how to move around in the directory tree at your Web server.
Know some basic UNIX commands so you can create directories and change file and directory permissions.

You must also be comfortable fooling around in scripts. You need to be able to understand a little bit of programming gobbledygook; that's not to say you need to be a programmer (though it helps), but you must be able to read and understand, to some degree, what the script is doing.

If you've never seen a CGI script, and want to figure out if you can handle this sort of thing, take a look at this page:

http://www.poorrichard.com/examples/cgimail.htm

This explains how to work with FormMail, a free script from Matt's Script Archive. If this script looks completely incomprehensible to you, you should probably not work with CGI scripts!

If you think learning to work with a word processor or Web- authoring tool was a major achievement ... you shouldn't be fooling around with CGI scripts. On the other hand, if you believe you can pick up most computer skills with a little effort, and perhaps have created program macros before, you may be able to install CGI scripts.

However, there's one more problem. Beyond the fact that CGI scripts require a certain technical skills, they're also very hard to work with because the documentation is generally absolutely awful. The documents explaining how to install scripts are usually written by programmers and for programmers; they're close to indecipherable for normal people.

If you decide that you can't work with CGI scripts, don't give up yet. There are some great scripts available, things that you may want to use at your site. If you find something that you'd like to use, you may be able to pay someone as little as $25 to install it. A simple response-form script is very easy to install, and may only cost a few bucks to install; more complicated things, such as shopping carts, may cost around $200.

There are a few places to find people who will install CGI scripts for you:

Ask your Web-hosting company; they may be able to install scripts. If not, ask if they can recommend someone.
See the CGI Resource Index site's Programmer's page at http://www.cgi-resources.com/Programmers/ for a list of consultants.
See the Selena Sol's Help for Hire Page: http://selena.mcp.com/Scripts/help_found.html

By the way, the CGI Resource Index site has a huge list of scripts, so you may want to visit the site sometime and see what's available:

http://www.cgi-resources.com/Programs_and_Scripts/Perl/

That page shows you more than 600 Perl scripts; that's the most common form of CGI script, but you should understand that you can only run CGI scripts that are compatible with the particular Web server you are using.

One final thing ... another option for using scripts if you don't really know how to set them up. There are a number of Web services available that run scripts for you; you create an HTML form and link to the script running on another server somewhere. You can find a list of over 200 of these services at the CGI Resource Index site:

http://www.cgi-resources.com/Programs_and_Scripts/Remotely_Hosted/

Picking a Web-Hosting Company

I recently received a phone call from a jewelry store in Texas. The owner was trying to get a Web site set up, and having trouble figuring out how to create a secure-server connection so they could take orders. They wanted to buy "Poor Richard's Web Site," and have it shipped out right away so they'd have it in the morning.

We chatted for a while, and I discovered that the problem was their hosting company didn't have a secure server. It seems bizarre to me that any company could be in the business of hosting Web sites, and not have a secure server. Still, some don't. But many people new to creating Web sites don't think to ask. "I thought one hosting company was the same as another," the jewelry store owner said. No, I'm afraid that's not the case!

First, for the complete beginners among you, what do I mean by a Web-hosting company? I mean a company that will ... well, host your Web site. You pay them a monthly fee, and they put your Web site on their server.

Now, I've said in an earlier issue of this newsletter that a good place to start looking for a hosting company is Budgetweb:

http://www.budgetweb.com/

Here's the problem, though. If you know nothing about Web sites and the services they should provide, how do you know how to choose between the huge selection?

What sort of services do hosting companies provide? Email accounts, autoresponders, shopping-cart software, secure servers, mailing-list programs, cgi directories, and plenty more (I figure there are at least 40 things you should investigate before signing up with a hosting company.)

If you're new to this game -- and most people are -- how do you find out about the services a hosting company should provide, and how do you compare? Well, I could say you should read Chapter 4 in "Poor Richard's Web Site." It's called "Finding a Web Host," and has 24 pages of advice. I could also say that you should refer to Appendix A in that book, which contains a 7-page checklist you can use when comparing hosting companies. But I won't. Instead, you can read the free article, "20 Questions to Ask a Web Hosting Company":

http://www.poorrichard.com/freeinfo/special_reports.htm

This isn't quite as detailed at the chapter in "Poor Richard's Web Site," of course, but it will give you an idea of what you need to look out for when hunting for a host. I'd also recommend that, if you plan to add a shopping-cart system to your Web site, you read " Shopping-Cart Software -- Part II," next, because it may effect the choice you make.

Shopping-Cart Software -- Part II

I talked about shopping-cart software in the previous edition of this newsletter, and I've been continuing my research. (By "shopping-cart software" I mean programs that are used at Web sites to take orders.) If you didn't see that article, you can read it here:

http://www.poorrichard.com/newsltr/002.htm

Several readers e-mailed me with information about programs and services I didn't include in that edition, and I ran into a few myself. (I've listed them at the bottom of this article.)

Picking a Shopping-Cart

Picking a shopping-cart system for your Web site is difficult. First, you must be careful not to be led astray by false claims. There are a number of products on the market that are being sold with claims that make them sound an easy solution to your problems. As discussed in the previous edition of this newsletter, these products claim that all you need to do is install the product on your PC, and click on a button to transfer a shopping cart to your Web site. But in fact nothing's that simple in the world of Web programming, and you'll probably find that although you can transfer the shopping cart to your Web site ... your Web site has to be running on a particular hosting company.

I mentioned Foreman Interactive's Internet Creator in the previous issue, and I found a similar product recently, QuickSite, from Site Technologies. Although their advertising implies that QuickSite, a Web-authoring program, has a shopping-cart system built into it, what it actually provides is a link to a none-too cheap shopping-cart hosting service. So if you already have a Web site at a hosting company, you'll have to pay extra and sign up for the shopping-cart service at the other company.

How, then, do you pick a shopping-cart system? That depends where you are in your Web-creation process, how much money's in your budget, and your technical skills. Now, I'm going to ignore the expensive systems, the ones that require your own server and thousands of dollars, and look at what can be done on a budget for a Web site located at a Web-hosting company's server.

If You Haven't Yet Got a Web Site

This is a good position to be in as far as shopping carts go! If you're in the market for a hosting company, you can look for one that can provide a shopping-cart system for you. But remember to see my "20 Questions to Ask a Web Hosting Company" article, mentioned above. Don't go with a hosting company just because they have a good shopping-cart system; remember that there are other important services, too. In fact if you can't find a hosting company that has a shopping-cart system _and_ the services you need, you may have to go with a hosting company that doesn't provide a shopping-cart system and find a shopping cart somewhere else.

If You Have the Skills to Work with CGIs

Perhaps you've already got a hosting company, and don't want to move. Well, if you have the technical skills to work with CGIs -- as we discussed earlier -- then perhaps you can install a CGI shopping-cart program. There are lots of them around, ranging in price from absolutely nothing to around $1,500. But remember that even if you have the skills, it may take quite some time to install a system, perhaps an entire day or more.

You Don't Have the CGI Skills

If you don't have the required CGI skills, or you don't want to spend the time, you have three main options.

You can pay someone to install a CGI system for you. Some CGI programs actually include installation (four of the systems listed in the previous issue included installation, and these programs ranged from $120 to $695). But if you find a CGI program you like that doesn't include installation, you can probably find someone to install it for between $100 and $200.
You can use one of the PC programs; buy a product such as Internet Business Breakthrough or Foreman Interactive's Internet Creator (listed in the previous issue). It will be relatively easy to work with and create your own store, but you'll have to sign up with a hosting service that is set up to work with the program ... so you'll end up with two hosting services, and link from your original to the second one for order taking.
Sign up with one of the shopping-cart services listed in the previous issue (more are listed later in this issue), and link from your Web site to that service.

My Own Experiences

I hope the information I've provided in these two issues of the newsletter will save you some time ... because I've wasted plenty of it! I've looked at many systems, but three in particular:

Internet Business Breakthrough
PerlShop
Hazel

Internet Business Breakthrough

I spent a lot of time using Internet Business Breakthrough. I tried to install this program on my hosting company's server. In fact the staff at Breakthrough Software spent quite a bit of time trying to install this program, too. We never did get it to work properly, and I finally just gave up.

This could be a great product, but if you want to use it I'd advise that you find a hosting company already set up to work with it -- there are currently 20 such companies. To set it up on your hosting company's server may be next to impossible, or at the very least extremely time consuming. Another problem -- the documentation is atrocious; still, Breakthrough Software knows this and says they're trying to fix the problem.

The nice thing about the program is that it's fairly easy to create a store on your PC and then, assuming you're working with a pre-configured hosting service, transfer the data to the Web server. It'll probably take an hour or two for you to get used to the program, though -- it's by no means as easy to use as, say, Microsoft FrontPage, but it's far easier to use for setting up an online store than a CGI system.

You can find more information here:

http://www.btsw.com/

PerlShop

After losing a lot of time on Breakthrough, I thought I'd try a CGI system. So I looked at PerlShop, partly because the Web site said that it was easy to install: "Simply copy the script to your cgi-bin directory and mark it as executable, create a few directories and change their permissions, then just modify the script to customize it for your server address and business procedures." Unfortunately it wasn't that simple; there were mistakes in the documentation, and missing steps, and after a couple of wasted hours I gave up.

Hazel

I'm currently looking at Hazel, and may have a demo system up by the next edition of the newsletter. This is another CGI system, and it has two great advantages. The documentation is excellent; there were a few places where I think it could have been a little more helpful, but in general it was very, very good ... and way above anything I've ever seen for CGI scripts. Secondly, it's highly configurable. It may take you a day to learn how to work the system, but it appears that it can do just about anything you might want -- including setting up complicated shipping and tax scenarios. You can find Hazel here:

http://hazel.netsville.com/

I'll let you know when or if I get this up and running.

A Few Guidelines

Before we leave this subject, here are a few things to consider when looking for a shopping-cart system:

Will the program be able to handle as many categories and products as you need?
Does the program allow the buyer to add products to a basket, then continue shopping and add more products?
Does the program work with a database -- if you have a lot of products you really need to be able to enter the products through a database. If you only have a small number of products you can enter by typing the information in, so no database is required.
Can a buyer leave, come back later, and continue shopping where he left off?
Can buyers search for products? (Not important if you have a small number of products.)
Will the program allow you to add fields? For instance, you may want to add a check box that allows buyers to sign up for a free newsletter, or a "where did you hear about this product" drop-down list box. (Of course this information must then be included in the order information provided to you by the program.)
How does the program calculate state sales tax? You should be able to specify sales tax for particular states -- ideally for particular zip codes. But some programs don't calculate sales tax well (for instance, if the user types Colorado instead of CO, the sales tax is not calculated.)
Does it allow you to specify all the shipping method and rates you want to use? Some programs provide little flexibility, and don't allow the customer to choose a shipping method.
Will the program verify that credit-card numbers and e-mail addresses were entered in the correct format?
How does the program provide confirmation to the user?; it should display a confirmation page, but it should also send an e-mail message.
Will the program email a message to you letting you know that an order's been taken?
Does the system require that buyers register before making a purchase? (It shouldn't, but some do).
How is the order information delivered to you? It should be easy to import into a database, so you need a text-file format (comma- or tab-delimited text) or a database format. Some systems deliver in an email message, which is usually inconvenient (how do you get it into a mailing-label or credit-card processing program?).
Try entering information in many different ways -- foreign phone numbers and provinces, different country names, and so on. Does the program handle different situations well, or does it give error messages.
Do you like the overall "look and feel" of the product? Is it confusing, or simple to use? Does it make your customers "jump through hoops," or is it quick and easy?

More Programs and Services

The following programs and services are ones I've tracked down since the last issue of the newsletter (thanks very much to all the readers who sent information).

If you want to see a complete list of all I've found, see the following Special Reports page at Poor Richard's Web Site (the list hasn't been added yet, but will be in the next few days):

http://www.poorrichard.com/freeinfo/special_reports.htm

As in the previous issue of the newsletter, I've grouped the programs and services into four categories.

Categories 1 & 2 - Your Server or Your Hosting Company

$195 for up to 100 products, $495 for unlimited size
Hazel, Netsville
http://hazel.netsville.com/
CGIs - use on most servers; very good documentation

$200
Hassan Consulting's Shopping Cart
http://irata.com/
CGIs - use on most servers

Free
PerlShop
http://www.arpanet.com/PerlShop/
CGIs - use on most servers

Free
JSHOP
http://www.jshop.co.uk/
JavaScript; will work on any server, and is very easy to install (because it requires no program files installed at the server), but a significant number of users have browsers that won't work with JavaScript; perhaps 20+% or more of all users are working with browsers that won't work with JavaScripts very well, or at all.

$295
WebGenie Shopping*CartPro, WebGenie
http://www.webgenie.com/
CGIs -- use on most servers

Category 3 - Sign Up With a Hosting Company

$??.
Snapsite Web Architect, Media in Motion
http://www.mediainmotion.com/
Not yet available -- probably available May/June 98
This product can only be used through a hosting company that has installed the Snapsite software.

Category 4 - Use a Service

$49 for the software, then $99/mth, 2.5% per transaction
QuickSite, Site Technologies
http://www.sitetech.com/
Although from the advertising one might assume that this product should be in category 1 or 2 (Site Technologies advertises that this product includes "a full suite of internet commerce tools ... Catalog Builder including OrderEasy"), I've listed the program in category 4, because in fact the program itself has no shopping-cart capabilities. Rather, it provides an easy way to link to the OrderEasy service (listed below), and QuickSite owners get a discount at that service. You can link to other services if you prefer.

$99/mth, 2.5% per transaction, $49 setup
OrderEasy
http://www.ordereasy.com/
Credit-card transaction processing included

$90/mth, $120 setup
DXShop
http://www.dxshop.com/

$50/mth, $250 setup
The Engine, Icorp
http://www.icorp.net/engine/

$119/3 months
Smart ShoppingCart, WebGenie
http://www.webgenie.com/

$35/mth, $20 setup
WizzCart, Marketwizz
http://www.marketwizz.com/wizzcart.html

AUD$40/mth (Australian dollars)
Sofcom
http://www.sofcom.com.au/

$249/year
Americart
http://www.cartserver.com/americart/

$20/mth, $75 setup
CyberCart
http://www.lobo.net/~rtweb/

$120/6 months
Internet Shopping Cart Server
http://www.webisland.com/cart/index.htm

Mac FTP Programs

In the previous issue I asked if anyone knew of a Macintosh FTP program that will move files between directories; a reader e-mailed me with the information that the Cyberdog program had drag-and-drop file moving capabilities. You can find Cyberdog here:

http://www.cyberdog.apple.com/

650,000 Clip Art Images -- for $17.95

I've discovered a fantastic clip-art resource. ArtToday has a library of 650,000 images, including 5,000 that are designed for Web-site use: buttons, bars, backgrounds, animations, and so on. (They say they are planning to greatly increase the number of Web graphics ... and of course there's nothing to stop you using the other hundreds of thousands of images in your Web pages.)

This art is royalty free, and it's "all you can eat" for just $17.95 a year! It has a very easy to use catalog, too. Here's how to find the ArtToday site:

http://www.arttoday.com/

Poor Richard's Web Site in the Press

The book, "Poor Richard's Web Site: Geek-Free, Commonsense Advice on Building a Low-Cost Web Site" is getting wide coverage in the press, and reviewers are saying a lot of nice things about it.

Jerry Pournelle named it Book of the Month in his Byte column.
Peter Cook and Scott Manning, writing in the Philadelphia Inquirer, said " We highly recommend this book."
David Thomas, writing in the Denver Post, said "If you want to put together a Web site that actually does something, and preferably not spend a lot of money, you need Peter Kent's new book, 'Poor Richard's Web Site.'"

For more reviews, and many readers' testimonials, visit ...

http://www.poorrichard.com/

Poor Richard's Web Site is in many bookstores, and can be ordered by others; it can also be ordered online, through the mail, by fax, or by phone.
See ...

http://www.poorrichard.com/order/

Order direct from the publisher, and you'll get a 100%, 1-Year Guarantee. If the book doesn't help you set up a low-cost yet effective Web site, send it back for a refund!

Working Efficiently

In the last edition I promised a "Working Efficiently" article in this one. I've run out of room, though -- I think this edition is long enough already. Sorry! I'll include it in the next issue.

Corrections

In the last edition of the newsletter I referred to the first part of a domain name (.com, .net, and so on) as the "first level domain." As one friend and colleague reminded me, it's actually known as the Top Level Domain.

Oh, and I hope you got the immediate correction I sent out concerning InterNIC's domain name; it is, of course, http://rs.internic.net/ (not .com!).

Share Your Success

Have you found a good way to bring people to your Web site? Want to share it with others? Let us know the tricks and techniques you've used ... other readers will learn something new, and you'll get a little publicity for your Web site.

E-mail us at feedback@poorrichard.com

Reading Back Issues

If you need to refer to back issues of this newsletter, you can find then at the following location:

http://www.poorrichard.com/newsltr/

In Future Issues ...

Here are just a few of the subjects we'll look at in future issues of Poor Richard's Web Site News:

Speeding up your online communications using keyboard utilities
Keeping Your Domain Name Safe
Taking checks and electronic funds transfers on your Web site (and the difference between them)
Web-page Templates for the Design Challenged!
"Push" Technology That Really Works
Putting Your Web Site Near the Top of the Search Engines
Managing Your List Directory using Bookmark Programs and Offline Browsers
E-mail Merge Programs
Electronic Press Releases -- Do They Really Work? (Yes! ...We'll Explain How)
Getting People to Visit Your Web Site by Using the Announcement Lists
Distributing Electronic Newsletters
Animated-GIF Archives

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