It's time to give your Web page that final once-over before you get it out to the Web. You should check your spelling, check your links, check your directories, check everything. Fortunately, FrontPage keeps everything you have to do from start to finish in mind and offers a few tools that can help you, as well!
When you develop your pages with other types of editors, sometimes you can't tell, at a glance, if your links are working correctly. With FrontPage, you can tell quite easily from within the FrontPage Explorer. Look in Outline View or Link View, both shown in Figure 25.1, and you'll be able to tell whether the links between pages in your Web site need fixing. When you view your pages in Link View, you can expand the tree by clicking on any page icon that has a plus symbol (+) on it. That symbol tells you there are links to other pages contained in that page.
Links inside pages are links from a page to itself, such as links to bookmarks that appear on the same page. In the example shown in Figure 25.2, the Hyperdocument page contains links to itself, as you can see more clearly in the Link View.
There are also a couple of broken links, represented by the torn pages, on this page that jump out at you, too. Notice also that some of the outgoing links are represented by arrows and others by circles. The arrows designate links to other pages (either in your web or to other webs). The circles represent links to items included in the current page-usually images or content that appears inside Include bots.
You can view links inside a page by using one of the following methods:
To turn off the display of links inside pages, repeat one of those procedures.
You can use the FrontPage Explorer's Outline View or Link View to view links to images within your current Web site. Links to images are displayed with an icon of a picture in a frame, as shown in Figure 25.3.
To view links to images, use one of the following methods:
To turn off the display of links to images, repeat one of these procedures.
You can use the FrontPage Explorer's Outline View or Link View to view repeated links to pages within your current Web site. Sometimes more than one link to the same page appears within your page. For example, you might have ten copies of the same bullet graphic on a page, or, as the example in Figure 25.4 shows, you can have links to your e-mail address in a couple of places on your Web page.
In most cases, you want to view links only once-but if you need to remove links to a particular page, you might miss the additional links on the page unless you choose this command.
To view repeated links, use one of the following methods:
To turn off the display of links to images, repeat one of those procedures.
What if you've got hundreds of pages on your site? You don't have to look at them all manually, do you?
Have no fear: There's an easy way to check the links on all those pages. Use the Tools | Verify Links command to both verify and repair internal and external links.
Figure 25.6 : Broken external links are represented by a yellow circle next to a question mark.
Once you establish an online connection, use the following procedure to verify external links:
You might have some broken links inside your web, such as links
you forgot to complete, links to pages you might have deleted
from your web, or perhaps even links from pages imported into
your web that you forgot to edit. You can easily fix them by using
the Tools | Verify Links command in the FrontPage Explorer.
| TIP |
If you've got lots of broken links to look at, you can sort the list of broken links by one of three categories-Status, URL, or Linked from page. Click the headings above the list of broken links in the Verify Links dialog box |
To repair broken internal or external links, follow these steps:
TIP |
Page URLs can change frequently on the Web or become outdated rapidly. If you run the Tools | Verify Links command on a fairly regular basis, you can delete or revise links when necessary and keep all the links in your Web site current |
You can also choose to edit the page on which the broken link appears. This doesn't automatically fix the other links on which the same broken link appears, but it does allow you to verify where you wanted that link to go. To edit the page on which the link appears, follow these steps:
If a bot is configured incorrectly, or if a page that a bot refers
to is moved or deleted from your Web, you'll notice a small red
triangle next to the page in the FrontPage Explorer's Outline
View. You can determine why the error appears on the page by using
the following procedure:
TIP |
If you notice these red triangles after you import several pages that you know are linked correctly, choose the View | Refresh command. The error triangle might be there because of the order in which pages were imported to the web. Refreshing the web resolves some of these error messages |
OK, your pages are linked, your spelling is checked, and your images are all nice, neat, and trim. You're ready to go on to the Web now.
There are three ways you can get your files onto the Web. If your service provider has the FrontPage Server Extensions installed, you can use the Copy Web command in the FrontPage Explorer to transfer your web files to their server. If your service provider doesn't have the extensions, you have a couple of alternatives. I'll take them one by one.
Use the Copy Web command to transfer your web to a service provider
that has the FrontPage Server Extensions installed. When you use
the Copy Web command, you can copy the root web alone, the root
web and all child webs, or any child web to the remote server.
| NOTE |
When you use the Copy Web command to copy your web pages from your local computer to a remote server, you will be prompted to enter a name and password. Enter the name and password you use to transfer content to your remote Web directory in the Name and Password Required dialog box |
To copy your web to the remote server, follow these steps:
What happens after this? First, FrontPage checks to see whether the remote Web site has a web with the same name as the one you specified in the Destination Web Name field. If it does, it then checks whether you chose the Add to an Existing Web option. If you did, things proceed along just fine. If you didn't check that option, you'll get an error message.
Next, FrontPage gets the URL of the source web and creates the URL for the destination web. After that, FrontPage looks at each directory beneath the source web and creates each destination web. Directories that hold programs (such as the cgi-bin and _vti_bin directories) are marked as executable.
After the directories are created, FrontPage copies the contents into each directory. You'll see messages in the status bar as this occurs, indicating the percentage of completion.
FrontPage repeats this procedure for each child web beneath the root web, if you elected to copy all Webs on your server.
Once this process is finished, you should open the destination web in the FrontPage Explorer. Check to see whether there are any red triangles near any page names. If there are, follow the procedures outlined earlier in this chapter in "Fixing Page Errors."
If your service provider doesn't have the FrontPage Server Extensions installed, you can use Microsoft's FrontPage Publishing Wizard to copy your pages to your remote site. This wizard has some advantages over using an FTP software package to transfer your files:
You can download the FrontPage Publishing Wizard from Microsoft's site at the following URL:
http://www.microsoft.com/frontpage/freestuff/fs_fp_pbwiz.htm
When you use the FrontPage Publishing Wizard's setup program, the wizard is added to your Windows 95 Start Menu or to a program group. To use the Microsoft FrontPage Publishing Wizard, establish a connection with your Internet Service Provider and then choose the Microsoft FrontPage Publishing Wizard from your Start menu. The wizard guides you through your choices.
To use the FrontPage Publishing Wizard, follow these steps:
| CAUTION |
If you're transferring a web other than your root web, append the web name to the end of this entry. If you don't do this, the pages are copied to your home directory and overwrite any pages with the same names. For example, if you're transferring your /FarOutThere web, your entry should look something like this: /home/shell/dtyler/FarOutThere |
| NOTE |
If you select the root web in this wizard, it doesn't automatically copy the child webs to the server. |
| NOTE |
You'll receive warnings when your pages use any of the following features:
|
| NOTE |
The FrontPage Publishing Wizard logs on to your FTP site during the publishing process |
If you use an FTP program to transfer your pages to your remote site, this will give you an idea which files you should (or shouldn't) transfer for your Web site to work properly.
You should transfer the following files:
You shouldn't transfer these files:
After you transfer your files to your remote site, browse through the site to make sure all links work the way they should. If your server has the FrontPage Server Extensions installed, you can use the Tools | Verify Links command while logged into your remote site to verify the links quickly. Check your pages once again, using various browsers, to see if things look the way they should.
There are several ways you can publicize your Web site. One way is to post messages in newsgroups that relate to your topic of interest. If your site has information that will be of interest to those who frequent the newsgroups, post your URL so they can find your site.
I know you're excited about your new Web site and want to tell the world-but post your Web announcements sparingly, posting to only a handful of newsgroups at a time. Most who frequent newsgroups don't take too kindly to spamming-posting messages in dozens of newsgroups at the same time.
Another good way to publicize your Web site is to register your home page URLs with some of the many Web searches and robots, such as Yahoo!, AltaVista, Excite, Open Text, and others. Some of these search engines also provide links to sites from which you can send your URL to many other search engines at once.
Your web is complete and resides on your remote server. Now you can get to the task of getting the word out. You've come a long way since the day you first opened the FrontPage box. Congratulate yourself for a great accomplishment! You're on the Internet!
In this chapter, you have learned how to give your Web site the final once-over and how to publish it to a remote site. You have also learned three ways you can get your pages out to the world and which files you shouldn't transfer when your service provider doesn't use the FrontPage Server Extensions.
I hope I've succeeded in anticipating everything you need to know when you design your Webs. Sometimes it's difficult to consider all the questions that arise. I'll be maintaining a support site for this book at the following URL and will post answers to frequently asked questions, include more tips and tricks, and also include some graphics you can include in your pages:
http://frontpage.flex.net/dtyler/FPSite/index.htm
As far as where to go next, the sky's the limit. Keep tabs of the new features being developed for the Web. Learn how to use custom scripting languages to enhance your site even further. Continue to develop your Web design skills to keep up with the latest and greatest.
| Q: | Are there any newsgroups I can join that concentrate on using FrontPage or the Server Extensions? |
| A: | Yes, Microsoft has some newsgroups that might help. Subscribe to one of the following newsgroups to communicate with others who use FrontPage:
For the FrontPage Client (FrontPage Explorer and FrontPage Editor): news.microsoft.public.frontpage.client For Internet Service Providers using UNIX Server Extensions: news.microsoft.public.frontpage.extensions.unix For Internet Service Providers using Windows NT Server Extensions: news.microsoft.public.frontpage.extensions.windowsnt |
| Q: | Are there any other areas where I can get technical information? |
| A: | The Microsoft Knowledge Base, located on their Web site, has articles that address technical questions. There is a link to the Knowledge Base on MSN (go MSSUPPORT if you're a member of the Microsoft Network). You can also find the Microsoft Knowledge Base at the following URL: |