How to work on a website without a domain? [closed]

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I have an idea and I would like to start building a website. How could I create a phpbb type based forum and view it/develop it before actually purchasing a domain and hosting it? I'm talking about viewing it in my browser on my local network, just like it would be seen as if it were a real website. Sorry if this question is confusing, but I have little experience with web hosting.

Answer 1

Yes. The only thing a domain name does is "points" to the server where your site is hosted. You can establish a functional web server locally by simply creating the same hosting environment (e.g. Apache server running PHP with a MySQL database, or similar).

There are several packages you can download in which the necessary software for a local server has already been included. In the case of PHP-based web hosting, packages such as Xampp or the sadly discontinued Mowes will let you very quickly set up a server which you can view from localhost.

You can also make use of your computer's hosts file to emulate browsing with a "real" domain name. E.g. if you were developing a site called acmetools.com, you'd edit your hosts file like so:

127.0.0.1 acmetools.com

Then you could browse to "acmetools.com" and it would run from your local server.

Answer 2

One of the simplest ways is to download and run some free web server software locally on whichever machine you are developing on. There are a few different types, but probably the most well-known and frequently-used is Apache.

Apache provides you a folder into which you can place all your html, css, js, php, etc. files that you would use for your website. After that, if you want to view the website on your local machine, just enter into the browser:

http://127.0.0.1

(this just redirects your request to port 80 of your local machine).

Whatever is in the folder that Apache provided will be displayed.

This link should give you a pretty good start for how to install Apache on common Linux distros.

Answer 3

Basically, what you would want to do is to host the site on your own computer. Depending on your operating system, there are a few packages that combine an Apache server, PHP and a MySQL database server for free (something like http://www.apachefriends.org/en/xampp.html).

Answer 4

If you create the html file, you can just open it using your internet browser. Right click it and you should see a open with option.

Answer 5

I really like Google AppEngine (https://developers.google.com/appengine/) for free no-hassle web development. You can purchase a domain name at your leisure. ApppEngine supports development in Java or Python and has lots of powerful features. However, AppEngine may not be a good option if you plan to one day host it yourself, as the AppEngine environment has cannot really be duplicated elsewhere.