WebMastersLoom

by Jeff Cogswell

Sometimes, when developing Web applications with ASP.NET, you encounter a problem like this. You have a small amount of data that rarely changes; you need that data again and again throughout the life of the application; and further, such data is shared among users accessing your application.

For example, you might have an online sales application that serves a limited region. Your application is aware of 50 different zip codes. For each zip code, you might associate the phone number of the sales office serving that zip code. This data might be used in various places in your application, including as a datasource for some Web server controls.

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by Larry J. Seltzer

You don’t have to surf the Web very long before running into pages written in PHP (which officially stands for PHP: Hypertext Preprocessor), an open-source Web scripting language. According to Netcraft’s February 2001 survey of Web servers (www.netcraft.com), PHP is running on over five and a half million domains. Shop for Web-hosting services and you’ll find they almost all offer PHP.

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by Mark Gibbs

GEARHEAD INSIDE THE NETWORK MACHINE

We’ve always loved those smartalecky names that programmers give to their applications. In particular, we rejoice in the recursive names such as Pine and PHP Pine used to be one of the most widely used e-mail packages for Unix and came after another e-mail program called Elm. PINE is a recursive acronym that stands for “Pine Is Not Elm” (yes, you have to be a geek to find this stuff funny).

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This hands on PHP Programming article provides the knowledge necessary to design and develop a search engine for your website using PHP version 4.0 and above. Making a search engine for your website with PHP is really easy and provides substantial functionality required by most of the small to medium websites. This article introduces every steps of the development, including both design and PHP programming. Basic computer skills and knowledge of HTML fundamentals are required. Ok, let’s begin now.

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Ever since I’ve been doing SEO work, I’ve always griped and complained about FrontPage and all the extraneous code it puts in the section of the page, etc.

Then recently, I had the opportunity to visit with a group of advanced search engine optimizers, and I was shocked to find that many of them use FrontPage and love it.

FrontPage

The first thing I learned is that there are ways to keep out the extraneous code! With FrontPage, you can remove the code, but it keeps comes back again and again and again. But, there’s a way to get rid of it forever.

How to Get Rid of Extraneous Code and Headers

Dave Barry, Webmaster of SmartCertify Direct (http://www.smartcertify.com), explains how:

• FrontPage 97 or 98 users:
• Click on Start, then Find, then Files or Folders. Search your hard drive (generally your C drive) for a file named frontpg.ini. Click on the file.
• When it opens, look for a line that says, Version 3.0.?
• Add this line under Version 3.0:
• HTMLREFORMAT=0

The next time you use FrontPage, remove the extraneous code and headers, and they won’t come back.

FrontPage 2000, 2002, or XP users:

• Look at the menu bar at the top of the Open Web. Click on Tools, then Page Options.
• You’ll see an option box. Under HTML Source, at the top of the page under General, you?ll have this choice:
• When saving file(s):
• Preserve existing HTML or Reformat using the rules below
• If you choose Preserve existing HTML, and if you delete any extraneous code and headers, you won?t see the code or headers on your pages again.

(To view an example screen shot showing the above, click here: http://www.academywebspecialists.com/newsletters/fp2.gif)

Dave added:

To disable the HTML changing of FrontPage 2000, a registry entry is also needed. This registry file (http://www.academywebspecialists.com/newsletters/noreformat.zip) will do it automatically. Just open the file with Notepad to verify its authenticity before using it.

The attachment and registry entry must occur on the server.

Or, if you want to edit the registry manually, here is the code:

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESOFTWAREMicrosoftShared

ToolsWeb Server ExtensionsAll Ports]

“ReformatHtml”=”0″

Add-In that Generates META Tags

FrontPage also has an Add-in that will delete META tags without going into the source view. It?s called META Tag Maker 2002, and it will create and manage META tags through one dialogue box, without having to go into source view.

http://www.microsoft.com/frontpage/downloads/addin/searchdetail.asp?aid=80

In fact, the FrontPage site has an amazing number of Add-ins for FrontPage that are free for the taking. http://www.microsoft.com/frontpage/downloads/addin/def ault.asp

Some of the more popular Add-ins include:

Multimedia/Special FX, Windows Media Add-in, that will easily embed audio and visual into your Web pages;

Clear Teal Template, that is a 16-page easy-to-use Web template that lets you easily create a Web site;

Scripting/Database Tools, J-Bots Plus 2002 Trial. According to the FrontPage site, J-Bots components make FrontPage Web sites more customized by adding JavaScript-enabled features, but you don?t have to know how to write code or cut and paste. Simply fill in dialog boxes, click Generate, and the JavaScript is created for you.

Other Advantages for Using FrontPage

* Server side includes are easy with FrontPage. Before we go on, let me explain what ?server side includes? are.

Server side includes (SSI?s) generate parts of Web pages dynamically on the ?server side.? They allow you to add customization features to your Web pages, such as an e-mail form. Unlike other forms of dynamic content, or content that?s created on the fly, server side includes have a normal URL that?s easy for users to remember and doesn?t create problems for the engines.

In other words, SSI?s embed special commands into an HTML document that tells the server to perform specific actions when a user requests the page. The server then creates the Web page on the fly by merging files or inserting requested information.

How might you use SSI?s on your Web page? Let?s say you want to add a form to your Web site for your users to complete to sign up for your newsletter. You could create the form using SSI?s.

For more information on creating SSI?s with FrontPage, visit: http://www.microsoft.com/frontpage/using/default.htm and click on FrontPage Server Extensions.

* Dave Barry, who recently created two major sections of the Dell Web site using FrontPage, manages 40 to 50 Web sites at SmartCertify, and he easily moves back and forth between those sites using FP. With that many sites, there is a lot of duplicity, and he can effortlessly share objects with FP or edit multiple Web sites. With FrontPage, you can cut and paste between the sites, use shared borders, and easily drag and drop files, thus saving a lot of time versus handling each site separately.

If you?ve ever wanted to experiment with Cascading Style Sheets (CSS), FrontPage also makes using them a breeze. You can even create DHTML using FrontPage.

Dave created a video on how to copy and paste, how to use Cascading Style Sheets, and how to use shared borders with Front Page:

http://www.smartcertify.com/seo/frontpage.asp

(Author Note: When viewing these videos, make sure you have the latest version of Microsoft Windows Media Player. To download the latest version (7.1), click here (http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;Q299321). Also, I found that I was unable to view the videos if my firewall (Zone Alarm) was running.)

* Another benefit to using FrontPage is being able to create virtual directories with ease. As you know, when you specify a home directory, all of the subdirectories beneath than home directory automatically become subdirectories of the Web site as well. However, you can also designate a folder located elsewhere on the system as a subdirectory of the site by creating a virtual directory out of it. A virtual directory is a directory or folder on a server that is not in the actual server directory structure.

Again, Dave created a video on how to create virtual directories using Front Page:

http://www.smartcertify.com/seo/iis.asp

* If you want to create a database, it?s no problem with FrontPage. It will virtually create a database for you and import data without any database knowledge at all. The program works with Access, SQL, Oracle, and ODBC, and you can set up an SEC-compliant database within 30 seconds and begin working with asp pages with no prior knowledge whatsoever.

Click here for Dave?s video on how to create a database using FrontPage:

http://www.smartcertify.com/seo/dwizard.asp

* To Lee Davies of #1 Internet Marketing (http://www.1-internet-marketing.co.nz), the main advantage to FrontPage is that you can so easily manage all your html pages from the folders section.

For example, ?If you were to rename an image, which is something that needs to be done when optimizing, it will rename the links to the images from every page,? he explains.

* What I kept hearing again and again as I interviewed users of FrontPage is that FrontPage saves you time in creating Web pages, because it?s so easy to use. Don Hammond with DonOMite (http://www.donomite.com) explains,

?Straight HTML pages are a breeze with FP. I know a lot of programmers scoff at using it, but it means I can crank out a basic HTML page in seconds rather than minutes. And when I get paid by the job, it means more $/hr to me.?

* Dawn Rowlett with Web Submission Services (http://www.internetmarketingwebsites.com) explains further:

?From the first day that I was introduced to FrontPage, I was instantly able to catch on to some of the many features because it was so easy to use. I think the most beneficial factor to the program for me was that I was able to go in and design a page, knowing nothing at all about HTML. I could include hyperlinks, tables, images, change colors, backgrounds, insert text, create paragraphs, etc. with absolutely no background in coding. I was able to do all of this on my first day with the program!

?I remember one time in the beginning when I was involved in a discussion with a designer who was using another HTML editor and was completely stuck on the coding of how to create a simple table. My first thought at the time was, using Front Page, that is such a simple task.?

* Many professional SEO?s also like to use FrontPage because it?s a program that?s simple enough for their clients to use. So, when the SEO turns the site back over to the client, the client can easily make changes with FrontPage without having to know HTML. As Tom Altman with RSM McGladrey, Inc. (http://www.rsmmcgladrey.com) explains,

?Most of the folks already have the office suite, so they are used to using Word and the like. FrontPage is not that much different, and it lets them maintain their own site.?

Make FrontPage Work the way YOU Want it to!

At the Microsoft FrontPage Server Extensions Resource Kit, you?ll find links to all of the possible ways to make FrontPage work for you, instead of the default values after installation.

http://officeupdate.microsoft.com/frontpage/wpp/serk/apndx03.htm

Take a Free Course in using FrontPage!

Dave Barry at SmartCertify Direct (http://www.smartcertify.com) created a free course in using FrontPage. Simply register at the following URL, and take the free course:

http://www.smartcertify.com/seo/register-seo.asp

In Conclusion

As you?ve seen, some very experienced Web designers and search engine optimizers use FrontPage as their ?editor of choice.? Its ease of use and variety of ready-made templates make it a program that?s easy for beginners yet has the functionality that advanced designers need.

It also allows the designer or SEO to get a page designed quickly and easily, and time adds up to money for a busy SEO.

As Nancy Nelson with Search by Design! (http://www.search-by-design.com) said,

?Is it a perfect tool? Certainly not, but FrontPage combined with minor HTML knowledge can take you a long way…?

So FrontPage users, don?t be ashamed to admit that you use FrontPage! Some of the best Web designers in the industry use it, with good reason.

Special Thanks to Dave Barry

Dave Barry with SmartCertify created the videos, screen shots, and free tutorial available in this article. Plus, he gave me the work arounds for getting rid of extraneous code, and he verified the accuracy of the content. Thank you Dave ? there?s no way I could have created this article without your help.

Copyright 2002 Robin Nobles and Dave Barry. All rights reserved.

The very name CGI used to send chills up my spine. For years I put it in the ‘too-hard-basket’. But like most things in life, CGI is not as scary as it seems. If you have a cgi directory on your website and you know how to FTP files, chances are you can have a CGI script up and running in less than 20 minutes.

CGI (Common Gateway Interface) is not a programming language but a standard that allows visitors to interact with your website. CGI scripts can be written in a number of different languages but most are written in Perl (Practical Extraction and Reporting Language).

This article gives you details of five free CGI scripts that will do the following:

1. Mail out your Newsletter from your server
2. Track the number of times your free E-Book is downloaded
3. Rotate banners on your website
4. Create your own auto responders
5. Allow visitors to recommend your website to friends

At the end of this article are details of where to download these 5 free scripts. But first, here are some basic guidelines on how to configure and install CGI scripts:

1. CGI programs usually come in a zip file. Unzip the file and open the README file. This document will give you instructions for configuring the program file.
2. Open the program file using a text editor such as NOTEPAD (the program file will usually have the file extension .cgi but may have other extensions such as pl).

In most CGI programs you will have to configure the following 4 items:

3. Uploading

Upload the program files to your cgi-bin (or a directory off your cgi-bin) using ASCII mode. Never use BINARY mode, as this will play havoc with the line-breaks in the script.

4. Set the File Permissions using CHMOD

CHMOD (changing mode) is the term for setting security permissions on files. The README file will usually tell you the permissions that you need to set for each file. The script file will need to be set to 755. This allows the file’s owner to read, write, and execute the file; anyone else can only read and execute it.

You can set the permissions using telnet, but the easiest way is to use the built-in option in your FTP program.

5. Calling the Script

Now that you’ve configured the script, uploaded it and set the permissions, it’s time to try it out! You do this by ‘calling the script’ using a URL in an HTML document. This is what the URL for calling your script will normally look like:

http://www.yourdomain.com/cgi-bin/script.cgi

Again, the README file should have specific instructions on how to call the script. In addition, most CGI programs are accompanied by a web page that contains the form your visitors would use to call the script.

And now here are the details of the 5 free CGI scripts I mentioned earlier:

Subscribe Me Lite

Subscribe Me Lite is a program that allows prospects/customers to automatically subscribe and/or unsubscribe themselves from your mailing list. It has a built-in mass mailing form for sending out your newsletter or updates.

More Information: http://www.cgiscriptcenter.com/subscribe/index2.html

Rob’s File Tracker

Rob’s File Tracker is a perl script that counts file downloads or click-thrus to any file. Very useful if you want to know how many people are downloading your free E-Book.

More Information: http://www.robplanet.com/cgi/tracker/

AdRotate Pro

AdRotate Pro is an ad rotation program that’s easy to setup and easy to use. Features include unlimited rotations, expiry by date, views or clicks, default ads for when all ads are expired, and customer reports.

More Information: http://www.vanbrunt.com/adrotate/

MasterRecommend

This script allows visitors to recommend your website to a friend by sending an email, without leaving your website. The program will also send you a copy of your visitor’s message (nice to know what your visitors think about your website).

More Information: http://www.willmaster.com/master/recommend/MasterRecommendmanual.html

Master Auto-Responder

This is a standard auto-responder program. The script allows you to set the “From:” and “Subject:” lines for your auto-response.You can also choose to receive a copy of each email that the auto-responder receives.

More Information: http://mastercgi.com/howtoinfo/howautoresponderswork.shtml

If you need more help installing your CGI scripts, here are two excellent free tutorials:

• http://spider-food.net/install-a-cgi-script.html
• http://www.stefan-pettersson.nu/scripts/tutorials/installcgi.html

(c) 2001 by Michael Southon

As a webmaster you already know how important it is that your web pages download fast. In a nutshell, if your pages are slow, then you’re losing visitors. And if you’re losing visitors, you’re losing money.

To speed up your download times, most web design experts will suggest that you optimize your GIFs and JPGs so that they download faster. They’ll suggest that you make your images smaller or remove them altogether. Or they’ll simply suggest that you put less stuff on your pages.

All of these methods work. The problem, however, is that they all involve doing things that you don’t want to do. You don’t want to squeeze any more quality and color out of your images. The same goes for your content - you put it there because you want it there. Basically, there’s only so far you can go with these approaches before you really start to ruin your page.

Fortunately, there’s one way to get your pages opening faster without having to compromise your images or your content. This is a simple and effective method, but one that is rarely discussed by the web design experts.

To understand this approach, it’s important to recognize the difference between “perceived” download time and “actual” download time. The perceived download time is the time it takes to have enough stuff displayed on your page for the visitor to be able to start studying your content. The actual download time is the time it takes for the entire page and all its contents to be fully downloaded.

The perceived download time is the one that really counts. Why? Because once your visitor has something before his/her eyes to read or look at, then there is much less risk that he/she will click away because your page is taking too long to load.

So how do you improve your perceived download time?

Simple, you break the content of your page down into two or more tables.

You see, web browsers will not start displaying the contents of a table until it has compiled the entire table to the end. Once a table is compiled it will display, and the browser will start compiling the next table.

That means that if you place the entire contents of your page inside one big table, the browser will have to compile the entire contents of your page before anything will be displayed. The result: your visitor spends all that time staring at a blank screen.

However, by putting some of the content towards the top of the page into a table of its own, the rest of the page can be downloading farther down, while your visitor is busy studying the stuff that’s already displayed.

I’ve used this method to great effect on my own website. I went from an actual download time of up to 20 seconds (staring at a white screen) down to a perceived download time of rarely more than 3 seconds (often as low as 1 second)!

The ironic thing is, my page is now bigger (in terms of Kilobytes) than it was before I made the change. That’s because 2 tables take more HTML than one.

But boy has that extra bit of HTML paid off!

Make a test page now and try it out. Your hit counter will thank you for it!

CSS or Cascading Style Sheets allow you to implement a few neat effects on your webpages easily. You can implement these CSS effects on your site by simply copying and pasting the code.

ROLLOVER COLOR TEXT LINKS

Have your text links change color when the mouse passes over them by inserting this code into the HEAD of your document:

<style type=”text/css”>
<!–
A:hover {color:red}
–>
</style>

LINKS WITH NO UNDERLINE

Remove the underline from any or all of the links on your page by putting this in the HEAD of your document:

<style type=”text/css”>
<!–
A:link {text-decoration:none}
A:visited {text-decoration:none}
–>
</style>

Or, remove the underline form individual links by forming them like this:

<a href=”page.html” style=”text-decoration: none”>link</a>

LINKS WITH A LINE ABOVE AND BELOW THEM

This is an interesting look that works especially well as a hover attribute for your links, but can also be applied to all of your links. It will show the normal underline and a line above the link:

<style type=”text/css”>
<!–
A:hover {text-decoration:overline underline}
–>
</style>

HIGHLIGHTED TEXT

Highlight important text on your page or words you want to stand out, easily:

<span style=”background-color:yellow”>highlighted text</span>

Try adding it to your link hover for a neat effect:

<style type=”text/css”>
<!–
A:hover {background-color: orange}
–>
</style>

BACKGROUND IMAGE THAT ISNT TILED

This will create a background image that doesn’t repeat:

<style type=”text/css”>
<!–
BODY {background: #ffffff url(bg.gif) no-repeat}
–>
</style>

You can also center it, however it will be centered as the background of the entire document, not centered on the screenful:

<style type=”text/css”>
<!–
BODY {background: #ffffff url(bg.gif) no-repeat center}
–>
</style>

When designing elements for your webpage, you will often be called upon to specify a color. For example, the code for a span shown below specifies that the color of the text within the span will be yellow.

<span style=”color:yellow;”>Text</span>

Colors can be specified according to their names, for example “yellow”, “green”, or “blue”. In many cases, these simple color names will work. But what if you want to specify a more sophisticated color like “cornflowerblue”? A particular browser may not recognize a particular color name. It’s more reliable to specify colors with an “RGB triplet”.

An RGB triplet specifies a color based upon the amounts of red, green, and blue, on a scale from 0 to 255, required to create the color. For example, to create the color cornflowerblue you need red=100, green=149, and blue=237. We could then specify the color of the text within a span using the rgb function as shown below.

<span style=”color:rgb(100,149,237);”>Text</span>

This will work fine with style notation, but what if you want to use straight html. Html doesn’t recognize the rgb function. In that case, you can specify color using “hexadecimal” notation. Whereas the decimal numbering system uses the characters 0 through 9 to get 10 values, the hexadecimal numbering system uses the characters 0 through f to get 16 values. (After 9 the characters a, b, c, d, e and f are used, as shown below.)

Decimal Hexidecimal Equivilants

dec hex
0 = 0
1 = 1
2 = 2
3 = 3
4 = 4
5 = 5
6 = 6
7 = 7
8 = 8
9 = 9
10 = A
11 = B
12 = C
13 = D
14 = E
15 = F

On first appearance, this looks pretty simple but you need two hexadecimal characters to represent all decimal values from 0 to 255. When you increment decimal 9 by 1, you change the 9 to 0 and put 1 in the ten’s place. When you increment hexidecimal F by one, you change the F to 0 and put 1 in the “sixteens” place. Sometimes it’s not easy to convert between decimal and hexadecimal in your head.

RGB Triplet for Cornflowerblue

color   dec   hex
red     100    64
green   149    95
blue    237    ED

We could then specify the color of text within a span using the hexadecimal notation as shown below.

<span style=”color:#6495ed;”>Text</span>

Note that when we indicate the use of hexadecimal notation by placing a pound (#) sign in front of the number, and we don’t use commas to separate the color components.

If it’s not easy to convert between decimal and hexadecimal in your head, then how do you do it? You can use a calculator that has a decimal to hexadecimal coversion function, or you can learn to think in hexadecimal. For example, what’s the next number after CE? That would be CF. what’s the next number after CF? That would be D0. Which hexadecimal number is higher 99 or B2? B2 would be higher than 99. It gets easier with experience.

Here’s Java Script code for a simple decimal to hexidecimal color converter

function convert(decvalue)
{
var num = parseInt(decvalue);
if(num >= 0 && num < 256)
{
var hexnum = num.toString(16);
alert("#" + hexnum);
}
else {alert("Error!");}
}

It’s important to use hexadecimal notation to specify colors when you use DHTML with visual effects, because to create a dynamic color change you have to increment or add a value to a color. The vast amount of color specification on webpages is in hexadecimal notation, so it would be wise to become familiar with it.

Copyright(C) Bucaro TecHelp.

Permission is granted for the below article to forward, reprint, distribute, use for ezine, newsletter, website, offer as free bonus or part of a product for sale as long as no changes are made and the byline, copyright, and the resource box below is included.

We’ve all seen them, you’ve been browsing a website and you click a link and nothing loads apart from the words ‘404 Error’ along with the usual stuff.

So what is a 404 Error page? The 404 Error page, basically informs the user that the server cannot find the file they are looking for. However, instead of using the default 404 Error page you can create your own, this is how you do it.

First, you need your .htaccess file which should be within your web site directory. If you cannot find it you will need to create one. You will have to contact your host asking them how you would go about creating or editing this file. They may want you to use a text editor and then upload it, or they may want you to use a PICO editor and create or edit the file on the server.

How you have access to the .htaccess file lets edit it. Add this line to the .htaccess file:

ErrorDocument 404 http://www.yourdomain.com/404page.html

Make sure this line is kept on online. This is where your 404 Error page is kept.

Now you’ve change the .htaccess file you need to create the page. This is simply a normal HTML document. Once you’ve created the HTML document, save it and call it 404page.html. Now the next step is to upload the .htaccess file and the page to the server.

Now that is done your next step is to turn it on. This is done by setting the CHMOD attribute to 644. You can do this via telnet or some FTP programs. If your going to telnet into your server, use the following command:

chmod 644 .htaccess

Now test to see if it’s worked. Just go to a page that doesn’t exist on your server and you should see your new 404 Error page. If not, then make sure the CHMOD is set correctly, and if that doesn’t help, you may want to ask your hosting company for support.