A Buy a domain name (optional)

You do not have to buy anything to build and host a professional personal website as a student. BUT, if you’ve always wanted to own www.firstnamelastname.com, here are some instructions. Note, if you’re not sure what a domain name is there are heaps of explainer articles online, just search “what is a domain name”. You don’t really need to know too much.

A.0.1 Some caveats

• I’d recommend doing some of your own further research to make sure this is actually the best approach for you and what you actually want or need.
• This isn’t legal or financial advice. Duh.

A.0.2 Don’t pay full price!

There is almost always a deal going on. May not still be live when you’re looking, but ‘nameboy’ was a code for 25% of domains.com when I was setting up mine.

A.1 But what if you don’t buy a domain name?

If you don’t want to buy a domain name, your personal website’s address will appear as: your-github-username.github.io. Even more reason to choose a good username! See more in the prerequisite secion.

For example, I made a simple landing page for the ISSC at https://uoft-doss-issc.github.io/.