Website navigation (Two menu's)
I have a mostly simple designed website. It has a DHTML foldout menu and also a regular HTML menu, because some people were having problems viewing the DHTML menu. I saw a topic similar to this where the person is having to edit every page because the code for the menu is on every page. What I want to do is create a page that would hold both the menu's data and then have it loaded into the other pages inside a frame, or if there is a better method to doing something like this let me know. The reason I am posting here is I need help with the code setup to do this.
Thanks, IDW.
Internet Database Website: My current website.
IDW posted this at 05:59 — 22nd February 2006.
He has: 18 posts
Joined: Feb 2006
I did some searching on google going through websites that explained how to use frames. I copied my main page to the computer, and started editing it trying to figure it out. It took some time, but is very easy once you have figured it out. I now have the website banner, and both menu's onto their own menu.html page. Here is a basic explaination of how frames work.
The main page which will be holding the frames does not have the body command. It is replaced by the frameset command. Example of main page:
<HTML><HEAD>
<TITLE>title</TITLE>
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8">
<meta name="Description" content=" ">
<meta name="Keywords" content=" ">
</HEAD>
<FRAMESET rows="35%, 65%">
<frame src="menu.html" frameborder="0" noresize>
<frame src="news.html">
</frameset>
</HTML>
The menu.html takes up the top 35% of the screen, and is left scrollable for 800x600 res. browsers, but cannot be resized. The news is all of the content other than the menu that will be placed on the rest of the page. Taking up 65% of the botten half of the screen. Menu.html, and News.html both contain their own body and CSS commands. Im sure there is an easier way to do that though. I do have a question though. A lot of the websites said frames are not supported by all browsers, or the browser might not be configured to display frames? Is it common for people to have frames disabled, and what is the reason? What browsers do not support the frame usage?
Internet Database Website: My current website.
Busy posted this at 09:39 — 22nd February 2006.
He has: 6,151 posts
Joined: May 2001
Frames are bad because ....
People can not bookmark your pages
Search engines do not like frames
frames are limiting
Frames cut down viewable content by heaps on smaller screen, the lower half is always the cut down section so banner could be 3/4 page and content 2 lines (have seen sites like this)
Frames pages can be more work to modifiy/change/update
etc etc etc
Take a look at some advanced CSS, overflow on textarea etc
IDW posted this at 12:24 — 22nd February 2006.
He has: 18 posts
Joined: Feb 2006
Thank you for that information on why frames should not be used. I am currently reading an advanced CSS tutorial and things are coming along great. You can customize so many differnt things. Im only about a quarter way through the tutorial but have learned a lot so far. I notcied you also wrote "overflow on textarea". Should I find this in a normal advanced CSS tutorial, and if not could you provide me with some links? Also if there is anything else a beginner website designer like me should look at please provide links. I know all of HTML so far, and some of javascript, and now some CSS. I dont need to go all extreme. I just want a very compatible website on any browser or monitor resolution that looks nice, and is easily customizable by me.
Internet Database Website: My current website.
Busy posted this at 20:17 — 22nd February 2006.
He has: 6,151 posts
Joined: May 2001
As HTML/CSS (anything really) is so universal you'd need an exact tutorial for what you are doing otherwise you would only be able to use bits of things which can sometimes lead to a big mess.
A quick example (bit far fetched), you learn how to center in HTML you learn how to align with tables you learn how to align with CSS then it's all used together (and this is very common) ... when only one of them is needed.
I recommend looking at source code, find out why it's working, hows it's working
Do a search for CSS overflow and/or CSS tutorials
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