iWeb Website Hosting: A Comprehensive Guide

iWeb website hosting is a popular choice among small business owners and individuals who want to create a professional online presence. iWeb was founded in 1998 and was acquired by Vodafone in 2012.

The company offers a range of hosting plans to suit different needs and budgets. For example, their "Starter" plan starts at just $4.95 per month and includes 1 GB of storage and 10 GB of bandwidth.

One of the key benefits of iWeb hosting is its ease of use. Their control panel is user-friendly and allows you to manage your website and hosting settings with ease.

iWeb allowed users to publish their websites to MobileMe, a suite of online applications developed by Apple, with just a few clicks.

Publishing to MobileMe was a seamless experience, requiring only the entry of account information before clicking a button to publish the entire website.

iWeb also supported publishing to other third-party web hosts using FTP, giving users flexibility in hosting their websites.

Publishing your iWeb website is a straightforward process. You can publish directly to your hosting account using iWeb '09.

To publish with iWeb '09, select the Website you want to publish in the Website Organizer, and then enter your hosting account information in the Site Publishing Settings window. This includes your site name, contact email, server address, user name, password, and directory/path.

Here are the specific settings you'll need to enter:

Once you've entered your hosting account information, you can click Publish Website to upload your website to your hosting account.

If you're using iWeb '08, you'll need to use the Publish to a Folder option and then manually upload the files to your hosting account via FTP. This will create a folder on your computer containing your website's files, which you can then upload to your hosting account.

iWeb made it easy to create and design websites and blogs without needing to know how to code. Users could choose from a number of Apple-designed themes, each with several page templates that had coordinated fonts and colors.

These themes included templates for blog, podcast, and photo and movie gallery pages, as well as standard "Welcome" and "About Me" pages. Users could customize these pages by replacing placeholder text and adding their own photos and movies.

The iLife Media Browser was a powerful tool that allowed users to access all the music, movies, and photos stored in iTunes, iMovie, and iPhoto. This made it easy to drag and drop content into their pages.

Nine interactive "widgets" were included with iWeb, which let users embed YouTube videos and Google Maps, include a countdown timer, and add RSS feeds.

iWeb had its limitations, especially considering it was only in its third version when it was discontinued. It had a limited feature set and some unresolved bugs.

One of the main issues was the way CSS files were handled. Separate CSS files were created for each page, rather than a single stylesheet for the entire site. This can make maintenance and updates more complicated.

iWeb also had some limitations when it came to editing HTML code. There was no option to directly edit the HTML code of templates, and HTML support was limited to small snippets that could be embedded into the page. This can be frustrating for users who need more control over their website's code.

Here are some of the specific limitations of iWeb:

Unfortunately, iWeb was eventually discontinued by Apple. In June 2012, Apple announced that it would no longer be supporting the service, and all iWeb websites hosted on MobileMe disappeared if not hosted elsewhere.

iWeb's limitations were quite notable, especially considering its time of release. It was in its third version when it was discontinued.

Separate CSS files were created for each page, which made managing styles across the site a bit of a challenge. This was in contrast to a single stylesheet for the entire site.

No option to directly edit the HTML code of templates was a significant limitation. HTML support was limited to small snippets that could be embedded into the page.

Password protection was not supported on non-MobileMe-hosted websites. This made it difficult to secure certain sections of the site.

Creating templates required third-party software and was overly complex. This added an extra layer of difficulty for users.

Comments on blog pages were not supported on non-MobileMe-hosted websites. This meant that users couldn't engage with their audience in the same way.

Here are some key limitations of iWeb:

iWeb was discontinued as part of the iCloud transition, which began in 2011.

Rumors emerged in June 2011 that iWeb would not be developed further, setting the stage for its eventual discontinuation.

The final nail in the coffin came on June 30, 2012, when Apple discontinued MobileMe, which hosted iWeb websites.

All iWeb websites hosted on MobileMe disappeared if not hosted elsewhere, leaving users to find alternative solutions.

Apple provided instructions on how to move iWeb sites to another host, giving users a chance to save their content.