(1) I'll reiterate what rf has said: use relative-pathed links (which is
probably the best suggestion anyone can make about web design), and show off
my neurosis while I'm at it. Relative links will always make your life
much, much, much easier. Especially in your case, where file paths are very
likly to change over time. While "/index.html" might work well now, what
happens if you move the site root? Will all your links still go to the
right pages? Nope. I can't stress this enough. Use relative-pathed links.
Even on the things that will never, ever, in a million years, move. Even if
you only have one page, without any links. Use relative-pathed links.
(2) Use page templates. Using templates will make it 100% easier to make a
globally navigable site. Just think, without templates, if you add a new
department, you'd have to go into every single one of the HTML files you
already have, and add that department to whatever form of navigation you end
up using. This may not seem bad when working with one department, with
10-15 pages. But what happens when you have 200 pages? Better use this one
from the start.
If you arn't (and don't have access to) a programmer, there are still many
solutions to this (personally, I've never used VI6, so it might have this
functionality) -- ranging from the free (In the land of search.cpan.org,
look up HTML::Mason [which I use]), to the expensive (Dreamweaver UltraDev 4
[which I also use]). If you are/have a programmer, nothing will beat out a
custom-built solution to the problem -- all the things you can buy (or
opensource) will be more general than you really need, and the things you
will need will be implimented not to your liking.
(3) Make everything nice and small. Even though i's just for the Intranet
now, who can say that 6 months down the line, in the biggest show of
management stupidity your company has ever seen, somebody, somewhere far up
the latter from you, will deem it appropriate to allow the general public
access to your Intranet site? While 10Mb pages may cut it on your nice,
high-speed network, not many in the internet community will be as lucky.
(4) Assume the people using the site are much, much stupider than they
appear to be. If every single one of them has a phD in Communication,
chances are, that atleast 1 of them will not be able to find the "News"
page. Even if you have a flashing red button that says "NEWS!", that is
both: half the size of the screen; and makes a loud, blaring sound of you
yelling "CLICK HERE FOR THE NEWS!" whenever your mouse comes within 10
pixels of it.
(5) Don't use IIS. Nomatter what the IT/IS department tells you, it is in
no way supperior to Apache for Windows. If one of the IT/IS people says "I
can configure IIS for you," don't let them. If you need to, create your own
webserver. But, never, ever, use IIS. IIS will not only make you a target
for almost every Server-Worm in existance, but it will also make your life a
living hell. 5 months into the project, you'll realize that you need a
feature, and you'll delve into every resource on IIS you have, and realize
that IIS3 had it, but IIS5 does not.
(6) Don't use Front Page Extensions. If you're not following #5, then
atleast follow the advice of #3. Some day, management will decide that your
entire company will move from Windows to Macintosh OS X, and you will have
to redesign the entire site without FPEs. This is much like the problems
described in #2.