Access & Upload Instructions
For Web Sites Using Their Own URL
Hosted On The TrainWeb Servers
http://www.trainweb.com/tech/url.html

To upload your web pages, FTP to your own domain name and use the User ID and Password (lowercase only!) that were sent to you via e-mail from us. (Leave off the leading "www." when you are using FTP).

You can use any FTP (Internet File Transfer Protocol) program to upload and download files from your new web account hosted on TrainWeb. I use the free Ipswitch product "WS_FTP LE (32-bit)" from home and the $37.50 professional product "WS_FTP Pro (32-bit)" from my office. I am going to explain how to use "WS_FTP LE (32-bit)" to log into your web account and upload files. If you are using some other FTP program, you will need the information that I am about to give you, but your FTP program might ask for the information in a different order and have different names for requesting each piece of information.

If you don't yet have an FTP program, I would recommend the above products from Ipswitch. You can download the home version for free or even the professional version for a free 30 day trial. Click on any of the links below to download WS_FTP now for free:

If you have problems using the above links to download and install WS_FTP, then use your web browser to go to www.download.com, search for "WS_FTP", and then download it from there. You can click here to go to www.download.com now.

Once you download, install, and run WS_FTP, follow these instructions to access your web account:

Note: These very detailed instructions may be a bit out of date. They were created to exactly match the version of WS_FTP LE (32-bit) that was being distributed in 1999. Newer versions might ask the questions in a little differently or in a different order, but the information that you need to provide will still be the same and is provided below.

  • Click on New
  • For Profile Name:, type the name of your web site
  • For Host Name/Address:, type your domain name without the leading "www."
  • Leave Host Type: as Automatic detect
  • For User ID:, type the User ID you were sent via e-mail from us (All lowercase!)
  • Use your mouse to click on the Save Pwd box
  • For Password:, type the Password you were sent via e-mail from us (All lowercase! The last 4 characters of your password are usually a 4 digit number. If there is a "0" in the last four positions, it is probably a zero.)
  • Leave the Account: and Comment: fields empty
  • Click on Apply
  • Click on Startup and you will see a new screen
  • For Initial Remote Host Directory, type public_html
  • Unless you know where your HTML web files are located on your local computer, leave the rest of the fields empty. If you do know where your HTML web files are located on your local computer, you can type that into the Initial Local Directory: field.
  • Click on Apply
  • Click on OK
  • You will now see the contents of your web account on the TrainWeb server in the right window and the contents of your local computer drive in the left window.
  • You should see a temporary file called "index.html" in the right window. If you don't see it and don't know how to fix this problem, then click here to send e-mail to tech@trainweb.com.
  • You will need to use the left window to navigate around your local computer to find the web pages that you have created. Once you find those pages, you can highlight them and click on the right arrow to upload those pages into your web account.
  • If you need further help, then I would strongly recommend that you click here to order the HTML For The World Wide Web Book. That book explains about creating web pages and about using WS_FTP to upload them into your web account.

If you are already very familiar with using FTP, then the important items you will need are your User-ID, your password, and to specify your Initial Remote Host Directory to be public_html .

You can use any web design utility to create your web pages. However, I would strongly recommend that you DO NOT use Microsoft Front Page to create your web pages. We get more problem reports from WebMasters using that software than any other. Microsoft Front Page is also more likely to generate web pages that violate the current HTML industry standard than any other web design utility and could result in pages that will not operate properly on our server or sometimes only display properly for people using Microsoft Internet Explorer. Microsoft Internet Exporer also generates a large array of files in various folders with encoded names that make it very difficult for us to help you if you run into problems with your web site. We have not seen similar problems with any other web design tool and would suggest that you use any tool other than Microsoft Front Page.

Your home page at TrainWeb must be named "index.html" or "index.htm". If you use 3 letter filename extensions (".htm") instead of 4 letter filename extensions (".html"), then you MUST delete the temporary "index.html" file that we have placed into your web account. You can use FTP to delete this file.

To view your web site, just set your web browser to your domain name with or without the leading "www.", whichever you prefer. They both work.

If you have problems following the above instruction to access and upload files to your web account, the following procedure will also work and might be easier to understand:

FTP to your domain name, but leave off the leading "www.". Log in using the above User ID and Password. Once you have logged in, change to the "public_html" subdirectory.

Upload your index.html file into that directory. That file becomes your top web page. You can upload additional web pages and graphics into that directory or you can create additional subdirectories under that directory. (If you are using a MacIntosh or Windows-95, "subdirectories" are also called "folders").

To view your web site with your web browser, just set your browser to your domain name with or without the leading "www.", whichever you prefer. They both work. That is the address that you should publicize to let everyone know how to get to your web site.