So if you haven’t gathered from my previous post I’m a software engineer….. in transition.

Nobody saw that coming this time last year, least of all me. But after a lockdown few years I needed a change there are so many sayings about the possibilities of what could happen at the edge of said comfort zone, I’m about finding out  for myself. The change of direction actually comes by way of my current job. I work in a very successful global logistics operation, labelled a great place to work in several countries and the services that we offer are innovative and competitive. However, we have a problem. A small enough problem but having to deal with it on a daily basis myself, it’s a very irritating issue and not just for myself but for other colleagues in my line of work and customers alike. So I set about developing a solution to rectify that issue. I had the idea, I just didn’t have the knowledge or experience of where or even how to start, and so began my re-education as a software engineer. 

“The real trick to life is to turn hindsight into foresight that reveals insight” Robin Sharma 

With that allow me to use the hindsight of my past missteps to be your foresight that reveals insight.

 

Dear me of 3 months ago, let’s make this less traumatic then it needs to be.

 

here’s some advice you’ll need to deploy your first website.

 

First things first, this is not going to be as easy as you thought it would be. Learning to become a developer is time intensive and a real labour of love. When things just don’t click… and you will have days when they just don’t click you have to have the tenacity to keep pushing until it does.

Before I started learning how to write code and develop programmes, had you asked me how to deploy a website I’d have said,:

1.       Buy the ‘name site’,

2.       Push a button to launch it and

3.       Then move on with your life.

I regret to inform you that I was  wrong, see what I didn’t know about back then was:

·         Domain names

·         Hosting a site,

·         Linking the two

·         The product testing that goes into it,

·         The checking for optimal performance,

 Put short, none of those things were in my head at all. My first website deploy was a lesson on those issues in just about every way. Sure the initial deploy went well, the site was live on netlify and looked great to me. The tweaks that I had made to the site while it was live looked amazing and I was so excited! There was only one problem, the website wasn’t under the domain name that I had purchased and there wasn’t a ‘type your purchased domain name here and we’ll link it for you!’ button. I had to learn how to do that myself and ended up going to a developers best friend ‘Google’ to find out how to make that happen.

Truth is I was blissfully ignorant, and had a very quick lesson to learn. If you done it all a bit backwards like I did, let me help you dig yourself out of my first coding hole.

It’s all in the name!

Firstly purchasing a domain name probably means that you’ve purchased the literal address of where your client software is due to be, nothing else really comes with that. Domain names can help to link your website to your website identity. Good places to purchases those include  www.namecheap.com and google domains, be sure to check what support they offer in case you need a helping hand for any unexpected mishaps in the future.. But remember, there are more steps to take if you intend to build a website that other members of the public can visit rather than just on your personal computer.

Congratulations! You’ve bought the name, your worries are not over. What do you know about website hosting options?

When you purchased your website name did you think about how you would be hosting your site? A website host is the place where your website is housed think of it as buying or renting a house to put all of your carefully crafted code.  Depending on what you plan to use your website for, your hosting options may differ. If you do not expect your site to have a lot of traffic and are okay with the occasional advert appearing on it a free hosting platform may be just what you need.  Netlify, Heroku and GitHub all offer free hosting to their users and are great for smaller quieter sites.

They may not be such a great option if your site will be high traffic as you may have a cap on your bandwidth or face your site being disabled if you abuse the terms of your contract. If your website requires a back end, some free hosting options may not be suitable for you, as always, research is key.

So you remember that fancy domain name that you bought, now it’s time to attach it to the website that you’ve deployed. This is where you put the domain name that you have purchased and link it to the platform hosting your site. Depending on the hosting platform and the place that you have leased your domain name from you’ll probably be looking through your documentation to find your CNAME. A CNAME is a type of DNS domain name server, where you’ll need to enter this and the IP addresses associated with your site. There are dozens of literature and videos out there that all explain how best to go about adding your custom domain name to your site, Tony Teaches Tech, does a great job of explaining how to add your custom domain name to your Github page.

WHATEVER YOU DO, DO NOT FORGET TO ADD SECURITY!

This was pretty simple but easy to forget, hosting a site on GitHub allows you to quickly check a tick box that allows your site to be secure, please note this option is not auto selected and therefore you will have to manually add it yourself. In google a padlock icon to the left of the address bar indicates that your website is safe and can therefore be trusted. In some cases if site security is not offered by your hosting site, you may need to purchase a certificate if not available for free online.

Now its up, don’t forget to test it and make sure that it runs well across all browsers and its performance is optimised. Some search engines will penalise your search rankings if your website is not fully accessible and under performs, so this is actually important if you intend your website to show up in search engines and establish your web presence.

That’s your first deploy of many complete.

That wasn’t so bad, but I'm glad I prepared you not to walk into this blindly.