This is my first post and was not sure where to put this thread. sorry if its the wrong place.

I am trying to get my head around dynamic sites. I'm no web master (well not yet). I have a static site set up (Click here to view) and want to try and create a dynamic site. I think, I may just be overcomplicating the subject but could someone please answer me a few question.
So far as I under stand the subject. - I need to down load something called a application server, one that is compatible with the web server that I am using. So I guess I need to ask my adminatrators at toucan what web server they use. Is it normal for the space you get with Broad band to support dynamic sites?
This application server. Does it get uploaded to the web server by me or is something provided by webservers themselfs? If it is uploaded how is it contained. (eg webpage) and what space does it take up?
I use a mac which is the best application server to use?
I even bought a dreamweaver advanced book that just deals with dynamic pages and i'm still none the wiser as the book does'nt explain things very well.

There are several options for dynamic web construction: ASP (usually available on Windows web servers), PHP (available on all flavors of web servers - Windows (under IIS or Apache), Unix (w/ Apache), or Mac (w/ Apache)), .NET (Windows servers only, high learning curve and expensive dev tools required - Visual Basic) just to name the current most popular ones. PHP is my personal favorite to use because its easy to learn and the syntax is similar to other programming languages (such as C++), and its open source, meaining it costs you nothing to learn and develop with.

>> Is it normal for the space you get with Broad band to support dynamic sites?
Chances are - No. These free spaces are usually tailored for home users who want to post up photos and such and most do not support dynamic scripting.

>> This application server. Does it get uploaded to the web server by me or is something provided by webservers themselfs?
It is intergrated with the web server application (such as Apache) and can only be installed and modified by the web server administrators.

>> If it is uploaded how is it contained. (eg webpage) and what space does it take up?
PHP, for example, is contained within the html pages themselves and contain the file extention .php to trigger the web server to parse the scripts before sending out raw html to the client (your visitors). The pages are really just text files, so the take-up space is relatively small.

>> I use a mac which is the best application server to use?
The best way to learn a scripting language is to use a text-editor. There are other WYSIWYG applications that support PHP and ASP, but to get in the real nuts and bolts is to learn by scripting by hand. Even the WYSIWYG editors require user development of scripting languages.

>> I even bought a dreamweaver advanced book that just deals with dynamic pages and i'm still none the wiser as the book does'nt explain things very well.
Go to www.w3schools.com and www.htmlgoodies.com to get good tutorials on different scripting languages.

Jason you already got some good advice from mgraphic. I'll add a few things of my own experience. When I wanted to learn how to create dynamic pages I first chose the language I wanted to use. I decided on php because of it's open source nature. There are certainly other languages you can use like asp.

Once you decide on a language the best thing to do is simply jump in and start learnig that language. Find a web host that has things set up for the language you want to use. Another reason i chose php is that more servers were set up for it.

If you want to practice on your own computer you'll need to install both a server and the language which could be easy or difficult depending on your skill level. Most intro books to a server side language will probably have an appendix with instrutctions on how to set everything up.

There are also some all in one tools that are easy to install which will essentially give you everything you need and basically install themselves. xampp is one you can use if you want to fo the php route.

You'll most likely also want to use a database and your choice will depend somewhat on the language you decide to use. With php I use a mysql database though postgresql is another popular option.

You'll should be able to find intro books that cover both the programming language and the database.

NET (Windows servers only, high learning curve and expensive dev tools required - Visual Basic)

That's not quite true - the learning curve for .NET isn't really any harder than any other platforms, specially if you've done OOP in the past.
Expensive dev tools are not at all required. They make development incredibly quick compared to doing it by hand, but it is surely possible and not that difficult to code an entire .NET site in nothing more than a text editor. I did www.inoxia.co.uk in Notepad. Also, Visual Basic (or VB.NET) is only one of the many languages available to the .NET platform. C# is also very common, you can also use C++, J# and even Cobol, plus others.