html/css compliant

[derek giroulle]

Hi all,

after reading up during the last weekend on the last 700 messages in
this newsgroup and documents referred to in the FAQ and in
signatures/responses from the more illuster memebers of this group I
have a question .

Before I would like to ask don't flame about my English I'm a native of
another tongue , don't flame if I happend touch your particular
deadbeaten horse, and don't repeat unuseful contributions like
"I don't like tables" or "I don't like frames" : I don't either and
that's why i'm here !

The current state of the project can be seen at www.skimaroc.tk.
I'm currently using tables as a formatting tool, I'm sorry about that
and I don't want to revert to using frames.

I use DreamweaverMX as my development tool, and I want a site that is as
close to HTML / CSS (w3c-standards) as possible. My ISP doesn't provide
me with PHP, ASP, or serverside-scripting facilities, (i don't know if i
can do SSI)

Scope : I need to support a website that caters for people much UNLIKE
myself, else I would have made it entirely in English , my readers
however don't speak English or as a matter of fact can speak one or two
of the other languages.

I have some elements I would call common : and that should envelope the
information on the site.(say a graphic topbanner, a righthand bar and a
footer.
The problem is with the rest

objective and contraints of the development

1- navigation
1.1 -I would like to make a single content file for each language such
that I only have to maintain 1 TOC.
1.2 however I would like the TOC to be "context sensitive" such that I
can show the subjects of interest to the user
(assume he is interested in press related information) the user would
select the press item in the menu and would be shown the menu with press
related links on the top. those links would direct him to information of
direct interest like press-releases, press articles and information
about skiing,
however that latter subject is also of interest to our members and would
come up as an item on the menu used by our members where member-related
subjects would be on top
1-3 I would like to use the content-link file also as a site map for the
site
How do I go about this without having to repeat whole chunks of links in
different menu items

2- think of how frames work - BUT i don't want to use frames - because I
would have problems with spiders and search engines,
I setup the envelope and I display central content pages and a menu
within that envelope.
I would like to make central content pages that have maximum content and
minimal quantity of the common graphical envelope items and without the
menu
each page would come with some links to a <title>(previous) and a
<title>(next) page and a link to the languagemain (home) page
Inside the text some external refernces are used. However I don't want
the user to go away from my site ( so I open that page in a new browser
page for IE and new tab in opera, mozzila and netcaptor) I do the same
if the user gets a single language page (1 menu language, multi language
content)
Nevertheless the central content pages (if not displayed in another tab)
when clicked from the menu or from within a curent page should display
in the central content area.
Currently some of the datafiles are much too long or devided at such
ackward places that the logic of the content is not maintained

3- I would like to maintain a breadcrumbs trail of how people got to the
informationpage they are looking at where could i find a script that
would maintain/display this

Any advice from the experts how this can be realised?
links to clientside scripts -Dhtml- etc that can be helpful are appreciated

derek

 

[Mitja]

Hi all,

after reading up during the last weekend on the last 700 messages in
this newsgroup and documents referred to in the FAQ and in
signatures/responses from the more illuster memebers of this group I
have a question .

Before I would like to ask don't flame about my English I'm a native
of another tongue , don't flame if I happend touch your particular
deadbeaten horse, and don't repeat unuseful contributions like
"I don't like tables" or "I don't like frames" : I don't either and
that's why i'm here !

The current state of the project can be seen at www.skimaroc.tk.
I'm currently using tables as a formatting tool, I'm sorry about that
and I don't want to revert to using frames.

I use DreamweaverMX as my development tool, and I want a site that is
as close to HTML / CSS (w3c-standards) as possible. My ISP doesn't
provide
me with PHP, ASP, or serverside-scripting facilities, (i don't know
if i can do SSI)

Scope : I need to support a website that caters for people much UNLIKE
myself, else I would have made it entirely in English , my readers
however don't speak English or as a matter of fact can speak one or
two of the other languages.

I have some elements I would call common : and that should envelope
the information on the site.(say a graphic topbanner, a righthand bar
and a footer.
The problem is with the rest

objective and contraints of the development

1- navigation
1.1 -I would like to make a single content file for each language such
that I only have to maintain 1 TOC.
1.2 however I would like the TOC to be "context sensitive" such that I
can show the subjects of interest to the user
(assume he is interested in press related information) the user would
select the press item in the menu and would be shown the menu with
press related links on the top.
....

This alone calls for server-side scripting. I'm afraid there are no
alternatives. Even SSI includes you mention are hardly powerful enough for
this.
Since it seems that the page you're talking about is for a company (I only
read the post diagonally, it awfully long), a host (host != ISP, BTW) with
server-side scripting facilities should be a negligible expense.

links to clientside scripts -Dhtml- etc that can be helpful are

appreciated

With much fuss, you could make it work half-reliably. And even if it did
work, it would be worse for spiders than frames, so it's definitely a very
bad idea to involve JS.

 

[SpaceGirl]

This alone calls for server-side scripting. I'm afraid there are no

alternatives. Even SSI includes you mention are hardly powerful enough for
this.
Since it seems that the page you're talking about is for a company (I only
read the post diagonally, it awfully long), a host (host != ISP, BTW) with
server-side scripting facilities should be a negligible expense.

Can I nit pick here?

ISP = Internet Server Provider. Hosting is a service provided on the
Internet, isn't it?

 

[Neal]

Since it seems that the page you're talking about is for a company (I
only
read the post diagonally, it awfully long), a host (host != ISP, BTW)
with
server-side scripting facilities should be a negligible expense.

Easily under $100 a year if you shop around. And yes, server side (like
PHP) not client-side with Javascript, as that cannot be relied upon.

 

[Andy Dingley]

ISP = Internet Server Provider. Hosting is a service provided on the
Internet, isn't it?

No. By widely-established convention, the ISP is the "provider of
internet services" who connects your office location to the 'net. This
is distinct from those who offer hosting for web or email.

I own the codesmiths domain, buy my DNS and email hosting from one
vendor, webbage from several, and send outgoing SMTP via my ISP (who
also supplies the broadband connection). With SPF for email I'm now
stuffed.... 8-(

 

[Nik Coughin]

Can I nit pick here?

ISP = Internet Server Provider. Hosting is a service provided on the
Internet, isn't it?

Yeah, except you've either misread Derek's post or you didn't know until now
that ! means NOT in a lot of programming languages, hence "!=" means "not
equal to", therefore Derek was saying "host is not the same thing as ISP".

 

[Neal]

Yeah, except you've either misread Derek's post or you didn't know until
now
that ! means NOT in a lot of programming languages, hence "!=" means "not
equal to", therefore Derek was saying "host is not the same thing as
ISP".

Yeah, except you've either misread SpaceGirl's post or you didn't know
until now that to "nit pick" is to argue that some detail is incorrect,
therefore SpaceGirl was humorously saying "I disagree".

 

[Nik Coughin]

Yeah, except you've either misread SpaceGirl's post or you didn't know
until now that to "nit pick" is to argue that some detail is
incorrect, therefore SpaceGirl was humorously saying "I disagree".

Touche.

 

[Toby A Inkster]

My ISP doesn't provide me with PHP, ASP, or serverside-scripting
facilities, (i don't know if i can do SSI)

Solution is to install a web server (complete with PHP and whatever you
need) on your own machine, then use wget to grab a static version of the
website and then upload that with your favourite FTP client to your ISP's
space.

 

[SpaceGirl]

Yeah, except you've either misread Derek's post or you didn't know until now
that ! means NOT in a lot of programming languages, hence "!=" means "not
equal to", therefore Derek was saying "host is not the same thing as ISP".

No honey, you misread my post. I said exactly what I meant I'm also a
programmer...

 

[Mitja]

No honey, you misread my post. I said exactly what I meant I'm
also a programmer...

You're wrong, then
ISP = Internet Service (not Server) Provider, i.e. provider of the
connection, not (necessarily) the storage area on the server.

 

[SpaceGirl]

You're wrong, then
ISP = Internet Service (not Server) Provider, i.e. provider of the
connection, not (necessarily) the storage area on the server.

Computer speech is so not straight forwards. I *know* that ISP refers to the
line provider rather than hosts, but in my plain speaking mindset and ISP is
providing a service on the net - I don't care what that service is

So in the real world, a host Provides a hosting Services for Internet sites.
Do we call them PSI? Most ISPs in the UK also provide the physical
connections too (DSL or cable)... so are they ISPPSI's?

 

[Psyonicdreams]

Computer speech is so not straight forwards. I *know* that ISP refers to the
line provider rather than hosts, but in my plain speaking mindset and ISP is
providing a service on the net - I don't care what that service is

So if I order a pizza online thats contacting my ISP? 8o)

 

[Neal]

Computer speech is so not straight forwards. I *know* that ISP refers to
the
line provider rather than hosts, but in my plain speaking mindset and
ISP is
providing a service on the net - I don't care what that service is

If you provide a service on the net, it's a fault. Love-15.

 

[derek giroulle]

This alone calls for server-side scripting. I'm afraid there are no
alternatives. Even SSI includes you mention are hardly powerful enough > for this.
Since it seems that the page you're talking about is for a company
(I only read the post diagonally, it awfully long), a host
(host != ISP, BTW) with
server-side scripting facilities should be a negligible expense.

Sorry Skimaroc.tk is not a commercial venture we are a strictly
non-profit organisation in charge of a pre-olympic team, and ist
supporting activities. We're on a very tight & limited budget, which is
entirely devoted to our primary activiies ( 90% olympic preparation and
10 % broad public activities) moreover we haven't got sponsors apart
some material sponsors. As a matter of fact the site is entirely my own
(development) and its hosting is on my private budget.
As a matter of fact I would like to keep that information "loaded" and
unchanged and only update the TOC and the cental information page.

With much fuss, you could make it work half-reliably. And even if it did
work, it would be worse for spiders than frames, so it's definitely a very
bad idea to involve JS.

more development issues in another posting

derek

 

[SpaceGirl]

If you provide a service on the net, it's a fault. Love-15.

LOL!

Smartarse.

 

[SpaceGirl]

So if I order a pizza online thats contacting my ISP? 8o)

 

[derek giroulle]

With much fuss, you could make it work half-reliably. And even if it did
work, it would be worse for spiders than frames, so it's definitely a very
bad idea to involve JS.

Further to my posting I was looking at it this way:

I was planning to load the "common page elements" like the top banner
(with language menu) the leftside partnercolumn and the fixed footer and
keep them unchanged unless the user selects another language
like a kind of "background page", like a stage on which to show my
"presentation", I'm not realy sure how to make this happen

then I wanted to load ( depending on the language) the menu with the
common elements , and the welcome page in a scrollable I-frame in the
middle
I've found scripts/examples for the scrollable items iframe and for a
self-adjusting iframe at dynamic-drive.

Some of the menu items ( related to a subjects main page ) would be hard
coded links <a href...> with an Onclick script that executes some menu
altering script which reloads the TOC_lan.html (where "_lan" stands for
a language code)

on the other hand i think that to open an iframe i need other tags than
the <a href...>

The links <a href...> linking to subject main pages would ensure
that a spider would find all the subsequent informationpages and the
information pages would link to each other like a ring so that all pages
would be spidered by the search engines

I inherited a framed-website but i needed to maintain 2 copies of the
site one for the frame users and another for <noframes> that latter part
kept me spidered correctly but its a real pain and as a maintainer you
get into trouble with the links as complexity progresses.
I had the impression that the user would also run into trouble with
pages displaying in the wrong window after the frameset was loaded and
unrefreshed for too long.

 

[Mitja]

Further to my posting I was looking at it this way:

I was planning to load the "common page elements" like the top banner
(with language menu) the leftside partnercolumn and the fixed footer
and keep them unchanged unless the user selects another language
like a kind of "background page", like a stage on which to show my
"presentation", I'm not realy sure how to make this happen

If the user selects another language, change the whole frameset:

then I wanted to load ( depending on the language) the menu with the
common elements , and the welcome page in a scrollable I-frame in the
middle

Didn't you say you wanted to avoid frames? iframes are even a wee bit worse.
But it seems you should stick with them anyway, if you really can't get a
host with server scripting enabled. (BTW, why did you split your post in
two?)

I've found scripts/examples for the scrollable items iframe and for a
self-adjusting iframe at dynamic-drive.

Try to do it without scripting. They are, IMO, a worse problem than frames.

Some of the menu items ( related to a subjects main page ) would be
hard coded links <a href...> with an Onclick script that executes
some menu altering script which reloads the TOC_lan.html (where
"_lan" stands for a language code)

on the other hand i think that to open an iframe i need other tags
than the <a href...>

Why? See examples above.
Or did you mean actual client-side _creation_ of iframes? If so, rethink
your design. It's a bad idea.

The links <a href...> linking to subject main pages would ensure
that a spider would find all the subsequent informationpages and the
information pages would link to each other like a ring so that all
pages would be spidered by the search engines

I inherited a framed-website but i needed to maintain 2 copies of the
site one for the frame users and another for <noframes> that latter
part kept me spidered correctly but its a real pain and as a
maintainer you get into trouble with the links as complexity
progresses.

If you manage to maintain a complete version with no frames, why bother
without them at all? With frames, you won't make the access to your page
_impossible_ for nearly anyone, merely inconvenient. With JS, it may well be
the other way round.

I had the impression that the user would also run into trouble with
pages displaying in the wrong window after the frameset was loaded and
unrefreshed for too long.

Not sure I understand this one.

 

[Stephen]

In derek giroulle <[email protected]> expounded:
:: Sorry Skimaroc.tk is not a commercial venture we are a strictly
:: non-profit organisation in charge of a pre-olympic team, and ist
:: supporting activities. We're on a very tight & limited budget, which
:: is entirely devoted to our primary activiies ( 90% olympic
:: preparation and 10 % broad public activities) moreover we haven't
:: got sponsors apart some material sponsors. As a matter of fact the
:: site is entirely my own (development) and its hosting is on my
:: private budget.

Someone here guided me to http://www/hostingforabuck.com .It seems to have
all the bells & whistles and it really is $1/mo. Only upgrades are for more
space or more e-mails. You might want to check it out.