How Do I Create a Downloadable CD on a Webpage?
If you have a CD with content that you'd like to make available to your website's visitors, you have two options: Let them order the CD and ship it through snail mail, or post the content online in a downloadable format. The latter is the most convenient option, as it saves on shipping costs and trips to the post office and lets your visitors start listening to your content right away. It's easy to do and doesn't take a lot of time if you have a fast Internet connection. Just rip it, zip it, upload it and link it, and you're done,
- Difficulty:
- Moderate
Instructions
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Rip Your CD
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1
Skip this section if your CD content already exists in an uploadable file format on your hard drive. Otherwise, on a Windows PC, place your CD in your computer's CD drive and open Windows Media Player.
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2
Click "Rip" on the menu at the top of the screen.
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3
Make sure all of the tracks have a check mark in the check box next to them. If the rip doesn't start automatically, click "Start Rip" on the bottom right corner of your screen.
Zip Your CD
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1
Locate your files on the hard drive. If you ripped them using Windows Media Player, they will most likely be in your Music folder, in a sub-folder with the same title as the CD. Open the folder by double-clicking on it.
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2
Click on the first file in the folder. In Windows, hit Ctrl+a on the keyboard to select all of the files.
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3
Right-click on the selection and hover the mouse over the "Send to..." option. A sub-menu with destination options will appear. Click on "Compressed (zipped) folder."
Upload Your CD
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1
Upload your files to your file server. If you have your own Web hosting account, log in with your FTP program, or log in to your web host's cPanel and go to the File Manager.
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2
Under the public_html folder, locate or create the folder or sub-folder where you want to store your downloadable CD.
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3
Locate the zip file you just created on your hard drive. In your FTP program, with the correct destination folder selected on your website, double-click the zip folder to upload it to the website. In your cPanel file manager, click "Browse" to select the zip file, and then click "Upload."
Link To Your CD
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1
Locate the URL of your uploaded zip file. On your own host, this should be something like "http://www.yourdomain.com/destinationfoldername/zipfile.zip."
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2
Create a link to download the file. If you are linking to it from a blog post, simply use your blog platform's linking tool to link to the URL of your zip file. To create a sidebar link in your Wordpress blog, go to your Wordpress dashboard. Under the "Appearance" menu, select "Widgets." Drag the "Text" widget to your sidebar. In the text field, enter a blurb about your CD along with the HTML link code: <a href="http://yourzipfileURL.com/zipfile.zip">Download My CD.</a>
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3
If you are linking from an HTML Web page, open your page's HTML file and insert the link code from Step 2 somewhere between the <body> and </body> tags. Save the file and upload the changes to your website via FTP, or save the changes in your cPanel File Manager.
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1
Tips & Warnings
If you have a free hosted blog or website that doesn't allow space for file hosting, you can instead upload your CD zip file to a file sharing website such as 4 Shared. Once your CD is uploaded, the sharing site will provide you with a URL you can use as a link for your visitors to download the CD.
File sharing is intended for legal downloads. Be sure that your downloadable CD content is original to you, or that you have permission to share it.
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- Photo Credit cd-r image by Claudio Calcagno from Fotolia.com
