Help positioning text and shockwave beside <!--Include File....-->

[RWC]

Hey Folks!

I'm having trouble with an asp page. First off, I'm new to the html / asp
world, but not to software development. I'd like to minimize or "normalize"
the site, so I'm trying to use one menu page and include it into any page
that needs the menu. The problem is, I include the header.asp page, include
the menu.asp page, but when I write the body of the page, it sticks the text
underneath the side menu. I'd like the text to begin under the header
(logo) but beside the menu on the left side of the page.

The page that I'm working on is at http://www.hemmingway.com/default.asp

Any indication of what I should look at or what I might want to try
searching on would be a great help, because right now, I'm not finding
anything.

Thanks in advance!

Rick

 

[Adrienne]

Hey Folks!

I'm having trouble with an asp page. First off, I'm new to the html /
asp world, but not to software development. I'd like to minimize or
"normalize" the site, so I'm trying to use one menu page and include it
into any page that needs the menu. The problem is, I include the
header.asp page, include the menu.asp page, but when I write the body
of the page, it sticks the text underneath the side menu. I'd like the
text to begin under the header (logo) but beside the menu on the left
side of the page.

The page that I'm working on is at
http://www.hemmingway.com/default.asp

Any indication of what I should look at or what I might want to try
searching on would be a great help, because right now, I'm not finding
anything.

Thanks in advance!

Rick

This is a client side issue, but just for kicks, I'll give you some
pointers.

1. Validate and you will see quite a lot of errors.
<http://validator.w3.org/check?uri=http://www.hemmingway.com%
2Fdefault.asp&charset=%28detect+automatically%29&doctype=HTML+4.01
+Transitional&ss=1>.

2. Use a DOC type. STRICT 4.01 should be used for new documents. Strict
doctype will put the browser in standards mode. With no Doctype, the
browser goes into quirks mode, so may act very differently across various
browsers.

3. You are using includes in the wrong way. There is no need to include
the HTML or BODY elements, they are throwing errors as only one HTML and
BODY element are needed for each page. Include only the markup that is
necessary. (OK, this part is relavent)

4. Stop abusing tables. Tables are for tabular data, not positioning of
elements. You would do better using CSS, a two column layout, Google for
many examplesm or do something like:
<style type="text/css">
#head {width:100%; height:102px}
#menu {width:100%; float:left}
#menu ul {list-style-type:none}
#content {margin-left:110px; }
</style>
<div id="head>Your logo</div>
<div id="menu">
<ul>
<li><a href="">Home</li>
....
</ul>
</div>
<div id="content">
Your content
</div>

If you are bound and determined to use tables, then you need to do:
<table>
<tr>
<td colspan="2">Your logo</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>Your menu</td>
<td>Your content</td>
</tr>
</table>

5. Stop using deprecated markup, eg. FONT.

6. Make sure to include the alt attribute for all images. If the image is
for decoration only, then the alt attribute should be empty, eg. alt="".

7. Image maps are bad for accessibility. Make sure you include alternative
content for users without images.

8. The font size you are using may be too small for some users. Best to
not use font size at all, just 80% for copyright statements.

9. The buttons on the side can easily be reproduced with CSS, even the
hover effect without javascript. Alistapart has some great examples of
hover buttons, see <http://www.alistapart.com/articles/taminglists/>, the
blue list toward the bottom is similar to what you want.

HTH