Hi guys,

Im looking to build a website with the ability to host a forum. Also for anyone to be able to post music, images and videos and to have options to add many more tools besides this.. possibly the opportunity to buy and sell products in the future.

Can anyone recomend any reputable website builders or have any previous experience of the best way to go..

Thanks in advance.

take a look at http://www.phpbb.com/ its a forum software

if you like that i can help you set it up and i can provide hosting plus domain name registration (or you can register your own domain name and i can provide hosting)

Hi there,

Thanks for the help. This may prove useful, but i'm looking for more than just a forum or message board.

I have seen a few different 'website building' sites ranging in price from 5 or 10 a month right up to 50. At this stage though, i'm just not sure exactly how much vaue for money these would be, so if anyone has used something similar i'd appreciate any experiences you may have.

Paul

my advice would be to avoid any website building sites like the plague. you will be restricted by then, not by yourself.

pick up a copy of NVU to create yourself a site and add forum, ecommerce, etc as you wish.

In fairness though - I don't have a clue as to how to do this myself.. so once I get started would it be relatively straight forward - or do I have alot of learning to do, I probably know the answer I guess.

If I was to go down the route of a website builder - just how restricted would I actually be?

it would be as restrictive as the website builder wanted it to be.

if you have an evening free download and install http://www.net2.com/nvu/ then sit and play with it.

in all honesty it will be time well spent, and you might discover that its not as difficult as you imagine.

Thanks - I appreciate your help.

Am I ble to use this with a Mac?

http://www.net2.com/nvu/download.html yes. theres a mac download link on that page.

Thanks very much. I will take a look. Do you use this yourself?

i have done. i bounce between it. dreamweaver and namo.

plus occasionally just use notepad.

Try elance or on digital point

the last few sites i have done though i have been lazy and just created with wordpress.

www.hamsterley.net is one.

try this, its uses a DTP approach that new comers may find usefull does all that you ask.

http://www.serif.com/webplus/

C