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MS Office Forum / Publisher / Web Design / April 2008Creating individual .pub files
David, We spoke the last time concerning the "break up" of my 310 page website. I went to all of the previous comments and the links that you provided, however, I can not find your post about the break up. Would you please advise me again on how this should be done. Should I just copy and paste or is there an other way to create .pub files and keep my current color schemes. I am going to make each page an individual .pub file. One way that it could be done is make three copies of the file, i.e., file1.pub, file2.pub and file3.pub. In file1.pub delete pages 101 through 310. In file2.pub delete pages 1 through 100 and pages 201 through 310. In file3.pub delete pages 1 through 200.  SignatureDon Vancouver, USA > David, > [quoted text clipped - 6 lines] > an other way to create .pub files and keep my current color schemes. I am > going to make each page an individual .pub file. Chistiaan, The thread where we discussed this before is: http://groups.google.com/group/microsoft.public.publisher.webdesign/browse_threa d/thread/19d6061d6eb05e4b/ddb4508198d85f09?lnk=gst&q=Christiaan#ddb4508198d85f09 We didn't really discuss the mechanics as much as we did the structure. Are you asking about an actual work flow for converting your one Pub file to multiple files? If so, post back and I will share some ideas about how I would approach the project. DavidF > David, > [quoted text clipped - 6 lines] > an other way to create .pub files and keep my current color schemes. I am > going to make each page an individual .pub file. Hi David, I need to break the site up into individual files. Don suggested that I copy my site and delete the other pages: keeping the ones that I want in that specific .pub file. I thought of doing all the big work now and create a .pub file for every page in my site but I see now that Mike predicts a disaster. Should I rather stick to the 12 sections as discussed earlier? > Chistiaan, > [quoted text clipped - 18 lines] > > an other way to create .pub files and keep my current color schemes. I am > > going to make each page an individual .pub file. Christiaan, I would like to hear more about what Mike was thinking when he said breaking your site up into a Pub page for each page would be a disaster. He has a good mind for organizing things (and raising peppers ;-), and I am sure he had a good reason for saying such. I discussed at length what I thought was the most logical way to break up your site in that thread I referenced. It seemed to me that you did not need to break it up with each page a separate Pub file. It seems to me now that would be overkill and might over-complicate things...especially a navigation system. I would go back and read my reply after you provided a link to your site, and I discussed making the "City" pages individual Pub files, and how to incorporate those into your site. Think about how you are going to build the navigation system, and that should dictate how you build the site...and think about how you are going to add to the site. The whole idea is to break the site up so it is more easily managed. You don't want to have to go back and change all the static parts of the site just to add a City. I will think more about this, and offer other ideas after reading about what Mike has to say. I would change one suggestion I made in that thread. I have read that for SEO (search engine optimization) that using something like "northwestlichtenburg.htm" instead of "index.htm" is a better choice for your subwebs. I had suggested it was easier for me to always use the default "index.htm", and now I am not sure I would. I would use subfolders to organize the site, but perhaps not index.htm each time. Yes, the main home page should be index.htm but not necessarily the others.... Let's hear from Mike...and then I may have some other thoughts and opinions. DavidF > Hi David, > I need to break the site up into individual files. Don suggested that I [quoted text clipped - 31 lines] >> > am >> > going to make each page an individual .pub file. Christiaan, I have some more ideas about how to go about converting your site, and a work flow, but don't have the time to explain myself right now. I will try to post the thoughts within a day or so... DavidF > Hi David, > I need to break the site up into individual files. Don suggested that I [quoted text clipped - 31 lines] >> > am >> > going to make each page an individual .pub file. >I am > going to make each page an individual .pub file. You are looking at a disaster waiting to happen if you do this. Mike Mike, Thanks for jumping in here. Would you please elaborate on why you say it would be a disaster? Also, can you suggest a "best" way for Christiaan to break his site up and organize it. Single pages/single pub files seems overkill to me too, but I am curious about why you said it. Thanks. DavidF >>I am going to make each page an individual .pub file. > > You are looking at a disaster waiting to happen if you do this. > > Mike David, Unless Christian is anal retentive like me, he has used relative links, so copying and pasting text or object with links will mean they are broke. He will also have to be very careful renaming pages so he doesn't end up with a couple dozen index.htm pages. I faced this problem at the end of 2006. For week after week, I kept adding pages of news, links to other groups, etc. Suddenly my file was out of control with over 300 pages. So I copied just the main pages to a new file and used absolute links instead of relative ones. I then deleted all of those pages and uploaded the file to /2006. Then I created a /2007 folder and file and kept the copied pages as my main file. It gets updated to my root directory, which has links to the 2006 and now 2007 archives. Even now, once a file gets to about 60 pages, I start a new one with only the skeleton pages and rename it something like 2008April.wpp. I can do incremental updates without deleting files so that isn't a problem. I do something similar with a site I do for my church. Since I add at least 12 pages a month, it was becoming way too large also. Now stuff goes into a 2008 folder or a special events folder. Yeah, I have more native files, but they stay relatively small in size. Also, and I don't know if Pub allows this or not, I can insert an "offsite" page and have it automatically included in the Nav Bar Mike > Mike, > [quoted text clipped - 10 lines] >> >>Mike Now I understand. I actually addressed the issue of relative vs. absolute links in the looooong thread and discussion we had before (which I doubt you read...way too long and wordy). I hope he realizes that the primary challenge he faces is the navigation system. It needs to be such that adding a page does not require going back and changing 200 plus pages. Also he does use custom file names instead of index.htm already, so that shouldn't be a big change. I am sure you are busy, but if you or anyone else have any ideas of how best to organize his site, it is at http://www.siyayasa.com/. About the only argument I can think of for breaking it up to one page per Pub file is that if he eventually decided to switch to a server side database, having the individual pages could make the conversion easier. A bit off topic, but do you know anyway to import a textual navbar, and specifically one that looks like the typical bottom navbar, into a page? I currently import a javascript menu to each page that only requires changing the javascript in one folder on my host, and the change is reflected in each page. I can tell Christian how to do that, but I haven't figured out how to import a textual navbar at the bottom of each page. And if anybody else has an idea, I would appreciate it. DavidF > David, > [quoted text clipped - 38 lines] >>> >>>Mike Hell it's nice to have so much help, thanks guys!!! I think what I am going to do now: I am going to make my homepage a single .pub file. Each of the 9 provinces consists of a provincial "homepage" and about 30 pages of content that relates to each province. For instance: the Limpopo "homepage" wil be linked from my site homepage and the content of Limpopo will be linked from the Limpopo "homepage" but the Limpopo "homepage" will still be called Limpopo.htm. I think that I should give the about us and the advetise with us pages their own .pub files becuase they are going to be static. So in effect the site should look something like this: index.htm(Site homepage) Limpopo.htm Mpumalanga.htm Gauteng.htm Northwest.htm Freestate.htm Kwazulunatal.htm Northerncape.htm Easterncape.htm Westerncape.htm aboutus.htm advertisewithus.htm I will build the nav bar myself with some text or small images. I am just not sure how the link will look that links index.htm(site homepage) to the provincial "homepages". Am I in the right direction? > Now I understand. I actually addressed the issue of relative vs. absolute > links in the looooong thread and discussion we had before (which I doubt you [quoted text clipped - 63 lines] > >>> > >>>Mike Christiaan, I would probably keep the about us and advertise with us pages in the original file. It won't clutter up your file but will be easy to maintain. The links would be simple. Your homepage would be: http://www.siyayasa.com/ with other pages such as About and Advertise looking like http://www.siyayasa.com/about.htm Your other files would go in their own folder so the homepage for Limpopo would be http://www.siyayasa.com/limpopo/index.htm or you can name it http://www.siyayasa.com/limpopo/limpopo.htm The advantage of naming it index.htm is that is what browsers will look for. If someone would type in http://www.siyayasa.com/limpopo/ without the file name, they will get a directory listing of all the files in that directory. Mike > Hell it's nice to have so much help, thanks guys!!! > [quoted text clipped - 94 lines] >>>>> >>>>>Mike Your current home page: http://www.siyayasa.com/index.htm Current link to Limpopo page: http://www.siyayasa.com/index_files/Limpopopage.htm Link after creating new Pub file, Limpopo.pub, saving home page as limpopo.htm instead of index.htm or limpopopage.htm when you Publish to the web, and uploading to a new folder on your host called "limpopo": http://www.siyayasa.com/limpopo/limpopo.htm I would suggest that you consider getting away from using uppercase, unless you can be very consistent. I also don't know why you couldn't use limpopo.htm instead of limpopopage.htm??? I just don't see the need to use the "page" part. Unless you have a good reason for that, I think the shorter version is better. Plus one of the reasons to use "limpopo.htm" vs "index.htm" is that in theory it will help with search engine optimzation SEO. It seems to me that the search engines might like to see the name of the province, and not provincepage. The main thing is it would be shorter... And keep in mind what Mike said, it can be a good thing to use "index" for the default home page for many reasons. Then if I understand you correctly, the individual cities and all the links from those cities will be part of the limpopo Pub file. So if you follow the link to Ellisras that link right now is: http://www.siyayasa.com/index_files/ellisras.htm Now as a subpage of the limpopo Pub file the link will be: http://www.siyayasa.com/limpopo/limpopo_files/ellisras.htm Don't forget that when you Publish to the Web, and if you choose something other than index as the default file name then the index_files subfolder (that contain your other pages and all the graphics) is changed to reflect the file name. So when you save the home page as limpopo.htm you will get a limpopo_files folder containing the other pages and the graphics. So now I also assume that the accomodation page for Ellisras is part of the limpopo.pub file, so that link is now: http://www.siyayasa.com/index_files/ellisrasaccommodation.htm and would become: http://www.siyayasa.com/limpopo/limpopo_files/ellisrasaccommodation.htm Etc, etc... So you would be working with 12 Publisher files and 11 subfolders on your host. Your home page will be uploaded to exactly where it is now. It will be a single page, but will have both an index.htm file and an index_files folder. One subfolder will be called "aboutus", another "advertisewithus". The other 9 subfolders on your host will be named "limpopo"...after the province name. All these subfolders will located at the same level in the directory as the index_files folder is for the home page. Now is that what you are proposing and does the way the links are written make sense to you? Your organization seems logical and will make it easier to manage. If you think the providence Pub files will end up being more than 30 or so pages, I would suggest that you consider an alternative. Keep all the main sections with the home page in one pub file of 12 pages, and produce eacy cities content with a seperate pub file and their own subfolder on your host. Yeah a lot more initial work, but as you add content to the cities and even more cities, it will be easier to manage...just thinking out loud. Isn't the city content the most dynamic part of your site? DavidF > Hell it's nice to have so much help, thanks guys!!! > [quoted text clipped - 118 lines] >> >>> >> >>>Mike Sorry for taking so long to respond but your suggestions does make a lot of sense and the links will be easier to manage your way. I see what you are saying about the amount of pages per section so I am now faced with a decision. My site is having a slow start but yes, if that changes, the sections will grow very rapidly and I will have to restructure the site. I think that while my site is currently published, rather do the big work now. Thanks for your and Mike's help, I will shout if I need anything else. > Your current home page: > http://www.siyayasa.com/index.htm [quoted text clipped - 180 lines] > >> >>> > >> >>>Mike You are welcome, and hope we haven't led you down a bad path. One suggestion if I haven't made it before now has to do with updating or replacing an existing website. I have done total makeovers of my site on occasion, and I have always worried about deleting the old site before confirming the new site is up and functioning. My workaround for this has been to log on to my host and rename the original index.htm file to index.htmOld and the index_files folder to index_filesOld before uploading the new files. If the new files don't work as I expected, I delete them from the host, and go back and rename the original files and folder, remove "Old" from both, and I have my old site back up. Only after I have the new site up and running do I finally delete the old files on the server. And of course keep a copy of your original Publisher file that has the original site, so that if you must, you can recreate the original html files and upload again. And one more tip. You mentioned building your own menu/navbar. If you build a textual navbar you can add some CSS code to each page to get a more dynamic menu. Using the insert html code fragment tool, try inserting the following code snippets one at a time on a page on your site that has regular underlined hyperlinks, do a web page preview and then mouseover the links. -------- <style> a{text-decoration:none} </style> -------- <style> a{text-decoration:none} a:hover {color: #930015; font-weight: bold;} </style> -------- <style> a:hover {color: #930015; font-weight: Bold; text-decoration: none;} </style> --------- You can vary the font color, whether to use the bold text mouseover effect, and/or remove or add the underline by varying this basic code snippet. Remember that the code snippet has to be inserted on each page...just stick in the corner some where. Oh...and to determine the color code, download and use the free color picker tool Pixie: http://www.nattyware.com/pixie.html A great tool that Mary told me about. nuff...DavidF > Sorry for taking so long to respond but your suggestions does make a lot > of [quoted text clipped - 243 lines] >> >> >>> >> >> >>>Mike Christiaan, I think that you should rethink moving to a new program to build your site. As much as I enjoy the challenge of helping you figure out how best to use Publisher to produce your site, it really is probably in your best interests to switch to a program like Web Expression. I think the timing is right as you are ready to rebuild your site, page by page. If you are already prepared to invest the time to do that, then you may as well rebuild your site one page at a time in a web building program that isn't going to limit you like Publisher will. No matter how hard you try with Publisher, you are never going to be able to accomplish what you will be able to do with Web Expression. Nor will it ever be easy to manage a 200+ page that will grow to many more, with Publisher. There are many things that you will want to do with your site in the future that you haven't even thought about yet, that will be so much easier in Web Expression. If you are going to invest the time to rebuild your site, then invest that time in a program that won't limit growing your site...chances are you will eventually make the switch, so you may as well do it now. Web Expression has some bugs and some problems, but MSFT seems to have it on a high priority list, and committed to making it a good program. They have invested a lot in replacing FrontPage...or discontinuing FP, and introducing Web Expression as a "more better" web program. So it does seem that it is on the fast track for version 2 to come out with fixes to most of the bugs with the first version plus some added functionality. I read recently that MSFT has decided that if you buy the current version then you will get version 2 for free when it comes out. That also implies version 2 may be coming fairly soon. Check for details. I would look at a number of alternatives to Web Expression, but also I would suggest you strongly look at it. Go to the newsgroup and read some of the posts and ask some questions about rebuilding your site in Web Expression. Rob and a lot of other really smart people hang out there, and they treat newbies nicely. I am sure if you posted your URL, told them that you wanted to rebuild your site in Web Expression, that they will be happy to help and make suggestions about how to proceed. You should also look at Serif Web Plus. It is inexpensive, is much like a DTP in the way you layout the pages, relatively easy to use, and offers a lot more built-in functionality than Publisher. Much easier to learn and use as compared to Web Expression. Mike Koewler uses it to build his sites and loves it. I am impressed with what I have seen and know of it. So, though I am happy to continue helping you use Publisher to build and maintain your site if that is your choice, I just think you may have outgrown Publisher...your site deserves better. And given the timing, now is the time for you to consider making the change, so I had to say something. Just my two cents worth... DavidF > You are welcome, and hope we haven't led you down a bad path. > [quoted text clipped - 309 lines] >>> >> >>> >>> >> >>>Mike David, I don't know the coding for Nav Bars but if all Christiaan wants is a link to each main page without submenus, a simple table or row of text with links to each page would work. He could liven it up by using mouseovers or such. Mike > Now I understand. I actually addressed the issue of relative vs. absolute > links in the looooong thread and discussion we had before (which I doubt you [quoted text clipped - 63 lines] >>>> >>>>Mike |
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