by Curtis Carmichael

It’s important to update your site every once in a while. No one likes to view out-dated information. Of course they can always leave and get it somewhere else, but the point of your Web site is to attract as much visitors as possible.

If updating your site on a frequent basis is too much of a hassle, you can insert a JavaScript into your pages to produce the current date. You can also install another script that greets the user with "Good morning!" or "Good afternoon!" appropriately to the time of day. And best of all, its all automated so you don’t have to maintain the scripts. This is a great marketing strategy to make your visitors believe your pages are updated with current information. If you’re interested, you can test these scripts and copy/paste them to your Web pages from an excellent online resource intended as a companion Web site for the book "JavaScript for the World Wide Web." The Web site is located at http://www.chalcedony.com/javascript. If you’re ever interested in expanding your knowledge for more powerful Web page functionality, this book is definitely worth looking into.

If you would be interested in adding news headlines that automatically update, check out http://www.isyndicate.com. Their "express" version of this service should be fine for most cases and it doesn't cost you a dime. Basically the way this works is you sign up for their service, choose the content you want and copy/paste JavaScript code to your HTML. Whenever your page is viewed online, the user will see fresh, updated content that didn't require you to update yourself. You might also want to look into Reuters news photographs that automatically update. This is a free service through your membership with isyndicate.com and you will have the opportunity to add additional services to your site with your membership. Just be careful you don't make the mistake adding too much content. All of these special features can only be accessed through other servers, which means you'll have to attach a link to these locations. With the high popularity of many of these free and useful services, you can expect a somewhat moderate delay for the additional content to load.

Updating files is easy. Simply select the file(s) you want to update and transfer it to the appropriate directory on your online account. The update occurs almost instantly.

To view Web page document updates, you may have to click your browser’s "Reload" button. The reason for this is because the programmers of Web browsers created a method where Web pages, graphics, and other content become cached. With cached Web pages, the Web sites you visit most often load faster than having to download the entire site all over again. By clicking the "Reload" button, the cache file will regenerate.

Side Note: Speaking of the caches, it’s a good idea to erase these collective files on a frequent basis (we recommend once every week) because they are known to take up large amounts of disk space and virtual memory.

The default cache folder for Netscape Communicator is: C:/Program Files/Netscape/username/Cache (where "username" is your specific username.

The default cache folder for Microsoft Internet Explorer is: C:/Windows/Temporary Internet Files