building a site with no programs?

Question

Is there a way to build a interactive web site with a database without buying all these expensive programs.

Answer 1

Absolutely.

For database, you can use MySQL. It is an open-source database, which means that it is free to use and free to download.

For writing the actual programs, basically, all that you need is a regular text editor (yes, even just NotePad is good enough). If you want to do web programming, most of the development servers are free to download; you can download and install them to your computer and then you can run your web applications. If you want to do regular software, you just need to compile your programs using command line compilers and then you can run your programs.

Of course, all those expensive programs provide a lot of different gadgets (like Tag Completion, Code Help, ...etc.). If you just use a NotePad type of text editor, you will need to really know your stuff or just a bunch of reference books available just in case you need to look up something.

Answer 2

For a database there are free ones available. MySQL is probably the most popular of the free ones.
http://www.mysql.com/

For building code, most source code is a plain text file, so you can create the files with Notepad if you have Windows.

You may need some extra languages like javascript, php, etc. and these once again are text files, edited in Notepad.
There are many resources for javascript
http://www.javascript.com/
http://www.w3schools.com/js/default.asp
http://www.javascriptkit.com/

Also for php
http://www.php.net/
http://www.php.net/downloads.php

Tutorials for php
http://www.w3schools.com/php/default.asp
http://www.phpbuilder.com/

Be aware though, most free software have catches, or problems. Also, if you do not understand the program, what can you do if something goes wrong.

Answer 3

Definitely.

There are many programs that you can use on a trial license (Dreamweaver: http://www.adobe.com/products/dreamweaver/ ), or are free (Visual Studio Express: http://msdn.microsoft.com/vstudio/express/ ). Or if you are hardcore, you can program the site using a text editor (Notepad, vi) using languages like PHP or Perl.