Warning - This blog post is only available as a preview and it does not contain links to the services mentioned here.
You may fit these criteria:
- Normal person
- Uses the Internet
- Wants a website
In this case, you may look to host a website for free.
You look at your options.
You think of website builders. They are the easiest way to create a website. Two examples that give you an agreeable website are Google Sites and Weebly.
But you know how to code, HTML, CSS, JavaScript - everything you need to make a website, and you are very tech literate. You need a free domain and hosting, which is hard to get in one service.
There are services like Trinket and Code.org that allow you to host a small project on the Internet - but these give you a long shareable URL and are oriented towards ‘younger ages' - by that they mean children.
There are more ‘formal' services like w3schools' spaces service, but you have a bandwidth limit that resets every month! I tried the service but half of my monthly requests had been taken up by testing the site!
You venture further into the deep, dark cave of Free Website Creation. As you trip over a twig, you stumble across Firebase hosting. Firebase is a service owned by Google that has everything you need to deploy your own apps, like deep links, databases and most importantly, hosting. You do have to install Node.js on your computer and use commands to set everything up, but once you've logged in and got everything ready, you can update your website with one command.
So, after around 3 years of experimentation, I have finally decided what I'll use to host my site. Firebase gives you a .web.app domain for free, so you also get a short URL!
- Gabriel