University of Delaware

Publishing Web pages on UD's central Web server: www.udel.edu

Once you are notified that your Web directory has been created, you can access it by logging in to the the central UNIX system called "Copland."

Publish your Web pages

When you are satisfied with the appearance of your page, you are ready to publish it by copying the new files (including any image files) to your web directory. To transfer the files from a Windows computer, use the SSH Secure Shell file transfer window; from a Macintosh computer use Fetch. Both programs are available from the University's software download page. Be sure to name your main page "index.html."

Address for your web directory

When you use either the SSH Secure Shell file transfer window or the Fetch program, the address you type in the remote directory box is
/www/htdocs/your_directory_name

Browse your page

Once you have published your page, you will want to look at it in a browser:
  1. Open Firefox or another browser.
  2. In the “Location:” box, type the URL of your new home page. 

    http://www.udel.edu/your_directory_name/

To make changes to your Web page, you can edit the copy on your local computer and then repeat the publishing steps. 

Set the protections for your web page

Once your pages are in place, you must make sure they are readable to the world. The SSH Secure Shell file transfer window offers the easiest way to do this by allowing you to change file protections right in the remote window. You can also change them by logging directly into your web directory through your UDelNet account:

  1. Log in to your UDelNet account and change to your directory by typing the following command at the % prompt: Note: You must have created a link to your directory to do this.
  2. Make all your files readable to the world by typing the following command at the % prompt:

Read more about protection settings if your want to modify the settings for your pages.

After you complete the above steps, the URL (address) for your Web page is http://www.udel.edu/your_directory_name/.

Set up a shortcut (link) to your Web pages

You can create a shortcut (symbolic link) to your "www" directory to make it easy to access. (After typing each command, press ENTER or RETURN.) 
  1. Log in to Copland.

  2. At the % prompt, type the command below, substituting your "www" directory name for directory_name and a word of your choice for mydocs. (Note: the command is ln -- as in the word "link" -- that is, the letter "el" before the "n." After the "ln," there is a space before the "-s".)
  3. ln  -s  /www/htdocs/directory_name  mydocs

    This will create a link (shortcut) to your "www" directory.

  4. If you have more than one "www" directory, repeat the ln command for each one, replacing mydocs with a word you haven't yet used in a link command.

  5. You will only need to issue the ln command once for each "www" directory you have. Subsequently, you can access your "www" directory by typing
  6. cd mydocs

    where you replace mydocs with the word you used in place of "mydocs" in the ln command.

  7. To verify that you have successfully created the link, type
  8. pwd

    You should see

    /www/htdocs/directory_name

General information

Special information for directories with group write access

When more than one person edits your Web pages and a directory has been created with group ownership, there are a few additional steps to be taken to allow others in the group to edit the pages. If your Web directory isn't set up so that files are automatically placed into the correct group, you should change the group number for the uploaded files. Also be sure to change the file permissions. You must repeat these steps any time you add new files to the directory.

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Last updated: September 1, 2005
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