Updating your website

These instructions will explain how to work out what sort of website you have, and what software and settings you’ll need to make changes to your site.
The two most common ways of updating your website are by:

• creating and editing webpages on your computer and then transferring them to the GreenNet webserver using FTP or
• submitting new content for your website through an online web form that you access using a content management system

The option that you use will depend on whether your website is:

• static: a series of html files organised under your main URL on the webserver
• dynamic: served up from a database using a content management system (CMS) when users call for it.

Check with GN support if you are not sure which approach your site uses.

This article will focus on the process for updating static websites. Check the web projects section of this website for more information on using a Content Management System (CMS) to update your website

Updating with FTP

You can directly transfer your web pages (html files) to your web site on the GreenNet server using any FTP software. We recommend FileZilla, a free FTP client for Windows PCs, Apple Macs and Linux. The same configuration applies regardless of which software you use, but procedures may be slightly different if you use a different program. Contact us if you need help in setting up a different FTP client.

After you receive your FTP account details from GreenNet, you can enter these into FileZilla as follows:

Host: www.yourname.org.uk (use your web site name)
User ID: yourname (use your FTP user name)
Password: *********(use your FTP password)
Port: (leave empty)
Click on the quick connect button, to connect to the webserver.

Once you have successfully connected to the webserver, the folders on your local computer will appear in the left hand panel, and the folders on the remote web server computer in the right hand column.
You can browse into and out of different folders by clicking on the different levels of the folder tree.
Ideally you should create a file structure on your local computer which matches the file structure of your website on the remote computer.

As you enter different folders, the files and folders which lie within will be listed in the panel below their parent folders.

Transferring Files

You can drag and drop files and folders to transfer them between the local and remote computers (use SHIFT-click or CTRL-click to select multiple files). Alternatively you can simply double click on the file that you would like to transfer to the other side. As each file transfers you will be shown its progress. After all the files have transferred there will be a slight pause while the right-hand panel refreshes itself.

Deleting Files

There may now be files on the web site that you no longer need. Select the unwanted files in the right-hand panel, right-click and select delete. You can also rename files by right-clicking in a similar way.

Checking Your Site

Once you have finished updating your site/uploading your files, you should check your work in a web browser. You may need to hit the reload or refresh button to see the latest version of the pages. If you find missing/broken graphics, you can simply return to FileZilla to upload them. If you find broken links or other problems, check your local copy of the files, test them out and then upload the corrected versions to the appropriate level in your file structure. We recommend that you keep a backup of your site on your local computer and occasionally copy it to a CD in a safe place.

WS_FTP

WS_FTP is an older, non-free FTP client; we would now suggest using Filezilla. Screenshots of the limited edition are available at http://old.gn.apc.org/support/ftp/