More Songs About FrontPage Explorer And Food

Just so you don't start off confused, the title of this article is a take-off from an album title by the Talking Heads, "More Songs About Buildings And Food." So, don't expect me to talk about food, okay? And in case you're wondering why I've spent so much time talking about FrontPage Explorer, it's just because FrontPage Explorer is (1) what makes Microsoft FrontPage superior to most website development software, and (2) probably the most difficult aspect of FrontPage to master. So, without any further ado -

Today I want to talk about some of the most useful and often-used functions of FrontPage Explorer. I've already talked about Explorer's ability to create, move, rename, and delete files and folders, just like Windows Explorer. So, I'm going to talk about some of the commands, and what they do. I'll skip the most obvious ones.

Edit Menu - I will talk about 2 of the Edit commands:

 

Open With... - This is an important command. You may not always want to use the default editor to open your files. Sometimes, for example, you will want to do some hand-editing of one of your HTML pages, or an IDC file. By using this command, you can choose the tool you want to use for editing your files. When you open the file, it is exported to the FrontPage Temp file and opened from there. You won't need to save the file. When you close the program you've been editing, it will ask you if you want to save it. After you say "yes," it will re-import it back into your web. This is important for updating the _vti files, which keep track of your changes. As I've said so often before, Don't use any other program for accessing these files! You can also choose the "Open With..." command by right-clicking the file in folder view and selecting it from the popup menu.

 

Properties - This command will give you information about a file or folder at a glance. When used with folders, it allows you to set the Read/Execute property of the folder on the server. This is especially important if you want to use IDC, CGI, or ASP. These kinds of files need to be kept in an executable folder. In FrontPage 97, you only have the option of setting the folder's properties to "Execute" or "Read." In FrontPage 98, you can set a folder to both if you need to. this is sometimes necessary with certain ASP files.

 

View Menu - I will talk about several of these commands:

 

Hyperlink View - Use this view to trace your hyperlinks from one page to another. It gives a web-like look at the hyperlinks coming from and to the currently selected page, with lines extending from the icon for the page in the right-hand pane, and a "tree-like" representation of the hyperlink structure in the left-hand pane. It can give you an idea of the "flow" of your pages, and is often useful for large websites.

 

Folder View - I use this view more often in managing my websites. It looks and functions much like Windows Explorer, giving a structured, "tree-like" view of the files and folders. In the right-hand pane you will see all the files and folders in the currently selected folder in the left-hand pane. It is useful for file/folder management, and for quickly finding files and folders you want to work with.

 

Hyperlinks to Images - This is one of 3 optional settings for Hyperlink View. It adds (you'll never guess) hyperlinks to images in the right-hand pane. Sometimes you may find the images add clutter to the right-hand view, and may want to turn this off. Other times, you may want to check up on your image files, and turn it on.

 

Repeated Hyperlinks - By default, this is turned off, and for good reason. If you have more than one hyperlink from one page to another, you can select this option to show them all. But I haven't yet figured out why anyone would ever want to do this.

 

Hyperlinks Inside Page - This is also turned off by default. If you use bookmarks (or "anchors") within your pages, you can select this option to view hyperlinks to these bookmarks. Again, this is one option I've never used, and can't figure out a good use for. Not that I don't believe there is one. I just can't for the life of me think of it!

Tools Menu - There are a number of useful tools. I'll try to hit on the big ones:

 

Spelling... - FrontPage comes with its' own spell checker. The coolest thing about this spell checker is that it will check the spelling in every page in the web! Other than that, it works a lot like any word-processing program's spell checker.

 

Verify Hyperlinks - This utility is enormously helpful, and the larger your web becomes, the more useful this tool becomes. It will go through the entire web and tell you where every broken hyperlink is. If you're connected to the Internet, it will even check hyperlinks to other webs on the Internet. One note, however: Certain kinds of hyperlinks can appear broken to FrontPage, even though they are not. One of the best examples is in an HTX page, when you have used a database column value tag to create a dynamic hyperlink, it will show up as broken. Also, certain hyperlinks to CGI programs may appear broken, depending on what syntax is used. But if you're careful about what you look at, it can speed up your web management by Warp Factor 9.

 

Recalculate Hyperlinks - This command comes in handy in certain special situations. Since these are all special and independent of one another, I don't intend to go into the "gory details" here. For the most part, and in most situations, you don't need to worry about this command.

 

Web Settings...- You can use this to add or change different "settings" in your web. The "Parameters" tab can be used to add "global" parameters which can be used with a substitution WebBot to insert various kinds of text in your pages. The nice thing about using these parameters is that, for instance, should you enter a phone number for contacting yourself, and that phone number changes, you don't need to go through all of your pages to find it and change it. Just change the parameter's value, and all pages with that parameter inserted automatically change with it. The "Configuration" tab can be used to change the name of your child web, or its' title. The "Advanced" tab can be used for various settings, most of which you shouldn't have to mess with. The "Language" tab, like the "Advanced" tab, is almost never used, unless you move to a foreign country, I suppose. Leave it.

 

Permissions... - This tool communicates with the web server to set up any special kinds of permissions settings (Administer, Author, or Browse) for a given web. Most of the time you won't need to change the default settings. In certain situations, like when you have multiple authors for a given remote web, you can add Users for Author permission. Or, if you want to restrict a certain web to a given group of users, you can set the permissions for that web to only allow people using the proper user name(s) and password(s).

 

Options... - I'm only going to cover one aspect of this utility, as the other 2 are seldom used, and that is the "Configure Editors" tab. Even this tab is used sparingly, but you can use it to set up default editors for various file types (identified by their extensions). For example, I changed the default text editor from NotePad to WordPad. Don't ask me why; I just like WordPad better!

Well, I think I've about "worn out my welcome" for this week. The information I've covered today should take awhile for you to digest in any case, and I don't want to "overfeed" anyone! But if you can master these utilities, you might be surprised at how fast you can crank out your websites and pages. And that should give you more time for the important things in life. Like reading up on the latest technology coming down the pike. ;-)

Author: Kevin Spencer
Date: 10/10/97

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