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Question

How to repeat the header, menu and footer on each page with DW (following)?

Forum|Forum|4 years ago
July 25, 2021
5 replies
2193 views

Hello,

Thanks again for your BenPleysier info !! : -0

As I have not been able to answer you for several days in my discussion thread about
of the "How to repeat the header, menu and footer on each page with DW?", (I don't know where the problem comes from?
, it looks like the thread is closed / blocked .. ??) Anyway, I had to post a new thread: - ((

At first, I didn't understand, as soon as I made a modification in the model,
 it was not updating the child pages for me .. ???: I was recording and I did not have the window that offered me to
update linked pages. (after several attempts ... !!!, I decided to rebuild everything
 and apparently now it works fine !! :-)) (this avoids using PHP's "include")
(Rem: I hope it's not a DW bug ... ?? !!! because my site should be between 50 and 100 pages and I don't want to
each modification of the model to be updated one by one the child pages.:-0)

Question:
Indeed I tried with this process while keeping the same header, menu and footer during navigation
and therefore make modifiable that the "content" part
 but I realize that the entire pages are reloaded each time: - (((it's not very pretty, nor fluid!)
in fact, what I would like is to really fix the header, menu and footer.
(I noticed on other sites (having the same configuration), it seems more fluid and with each choice of the menu, the pages
don't seem to reload every time (maybe they use CMS (Wordpress, Joomla, Wix, ..) ??
Otherwise, is there a solution to avoid this inconvenience without using PHP, javascript, ...: - ((?

PS: To answer Nancy Oshea,
- my site should be around 80 pages
- static site (mostly text) and update frequency approximately every quarter.
(On the other hand, you tell me that for the more important sites, the .dwt models can be corrupted ... ???
What do you mean by that? )
Thank you all for your advice :-))

This topic has been closed for replies.

BenPleysier

Community Expert

As @B i r n o u has correctly stated

and to drive the nail in, if as said, and confirmed @Phil5E57 .... the OP doesn't want to use PHP nor JavAcript.... in that case... the use of the Dw Templates as recommended since the beginning by @BenPleysier , remains a very viable and coherent solution

By @B i r n o u

to me, DWT is your only real option.

It satisfies your criteria as in, you use Dreamweaver and you do not want to use JavaScript or PHP.

Tales about it not being reliable for a large number of pages only come into effect when you need to adjust the template file and even then it remains to be seen that a corruption will take place. This is especially true if you take care to follow the rules and not try to change the template code by hand..

When you create a child file from the template, there is no uploading of the other 80 odd pages required.

Wappler is the DMXzone-made Dreamweaver replacement and includes the best of their powerful extensions, as well as much more!

O

osgood_

Legend

When you create a child file from the template, there is no uploading of the other 80 odd pages required.

By @BenPleysier

True, but when you need to update the date in a generic footer or content in a sidebar or navigation that's when it gets tedious, especially when you upload all 150+ pages then someone spots a spelling error or an incorrect link......phew!!!!

B i r n o u

Legend

Question: Indeed I tried with this process while keeping the same header, menu and footer during navigation and therefore make modifiable that the "content" part but I realize that the entire pages are reloaded each time:
By @Phil5E57

It is important to understand that the child pages are all independent pages and therefore they load independently each time one of them is invoked.

As @osgood_ says, you should not confuse them with SPAs, and of course if you are interested, I recommend the following two books by Manning.

however there is a lot of free material on the web if you prefer

Anyway, DWT will not be of any use to you, and you will have to become familiar with JavaScript (and in particular promise - https://techtalkbook.com/javascript-promises-and-how-it-works/)

my site should be around 80 pages - static site (mostly text) and update frequency approximately every quarter. (On the other hand, you tell me that for the more important sites, the .dwt models can be corrupted ...
By @Phil5E57

It is true that during the development period, it can be annoying to frequently update all child pages, as soon as the model changes (you can also refuse to update from time to time, especially if it does not affect the model in depth... conditional or repetitive variable or block changes...).

However, it should be taken into account that once in place, this type of modification remains sporadic.
So only the modified child pages will be downloaded. 80 pages is a correct number for not being a massive management... and modification once in a while (90 days...) is not at all a painfull task...

I can't answer for @Nancy OShea , and it's not my approach, but I've been using DWT consistently for years (mind you, when it's adapted, justified and validated) and I don't encounter any particular problem.

if sometimes a child page gets corrupted... it's not a big deal... just open the assets palette, snag the Template and drag and drop it onto the visual rendering of the child page concerned. and hey presto, the affections are re-formed.

At the time, Joseph had published a wonderful book on the subject... https://www.amazon.com/Joseph-Lowerys-Beyond-Dreamweaver-Lowery/dp/0735712778 the problem is that the shipping costs can be more expensive than the book itself

O

osgood_

Legend

80 pages is a correct number for not being a massive management... and modification once in a while (90 days...) is not at all a painfull task...

By @B i r n o u

I'm afraid I totally disagree with this statement, 80 pages IS a considerable amount of pages to manage, in my opinion. I'm in full agreement 100% with Nancy on this issue, there are better water-tight methods than using Dreamweaver templates. I personally would not want to risk that such an extensive amount of pages actually have been updated by using a draconian method, which really if anytthing, lends itself to simple websites with few pages. The only sure way to to check is to open each and every single page, which of course no-one is going to do so potential for errors to creep in un-noticed are constantly present. When using a more robust approach this can't happen, you can be totally confident that the update process has been executed accurately. You'll always be in good shape to scale the project as well if needs be.

I inherited a holiday/touring website some years back to manage, which had been built with DW templates. I suspect it started off small with a few pages and grew to about 150+ static pages - absolute nightmare to manage as handfuls of files attached to DW templates became corrupt on each update, which then had to be detached from the template and manually updated and I could never get the template re-attached again so had to write down the names of the files which became corrupt so I could keep track of which were un-attached to the template. Of course it all became a hive of a mess over a coupl/e of years of updates until eventually I was able to rebuild it using a more robust workflow...........bliss.

'Beyond Dreamweaver' - Joseph Lowery 1st edition publish in 2002 - thats like 19 years ago!! I think things have move on - back with the dinosuars comes to mind.

I mean if you want a book specifically on DW Templates try Murray Summers (contributor in this forum for many years before he retired) and Brad Halstead, also written in 2002 BUT I wouldnt recomend it NOW.

B i r n o u

Legend

'Beyond Dreamweaver' - Joseph Lowery 1st edition publish in 2002 - thats like 19 years ago!! I think things have move on - back with the dinosuars comes to mind.

By @osgood_

Nope, things never moved concerning DWT, since that time... and I know that 20 years in computer science represents a whole era.

but, looking closely at this point... on the DWT side, it has had no reason to really move... if to make many improvements in their own usability within their own implementation inwithin DW.

But not on the functioning of the HTML pages themselves that once passed through the DW mecanism will work without any third party technology that would be obsolete.

An that is in itself an extremely important point to take into account

DWT produces simple HTML
DWT is an internal DW mill that produces HTML only
DWT is not a technology that requires special support, no server, no plugin, nothing but just HTML

so the question is whether this DW-specific mechanism for producing simple HTML is still acceptable, practical and efficient in this or that situation... that's all.

Anyway, I'm not trying to convince anyone... I'm supporting Ben's point of view in this thread, I'm giving my testimony as a DWT user, but I'm not forcing anyone to do it.

concerning Murray, I never found a book about Template, I just hear (at te time it was written) about Jospeh... Joseph was a real developper... at the time of xHTML (before AJAX) he was a genius on Javascript routine... but I will be really glad to learn from the Murray's one, if you have any link ?

O

osgood_

Legend

Question: Indeed I tried with this process while keeping the same header, menu and footer during navigation and therefore make modifiable that the "content" part but I realize that the entire pages are reloaded each time: - (((it's not very pretty, nor fluid!) in fact, what I would like is to really fix the header, menu and footer. (I noticed on other sites (having the same configuration), it seems more fluid and with each choice of the menu, the pages don't seem to reload every time (maybe they use CMS (Wordpress, Joomla, Wix, ..) ??

No, that approach is called SPA (Single Page Application) the page doesn't reload when you click on a navigation link, the content is loaded into the 'template' page, so it looks seamless.

To build a true SPA you'll need to use javascript, php or some other language.

Nancy OShea

Community Expert

A single page app is impractical for an 80+ page website. That said, multi-page sites are perfectly OK. But fast loading web pages start at the hosting level. Cheap or cut-rate hosting is not a bargain at any price. You'll pay for it with poor performance. I'll stop now because I really don't want to take this off topic.

Nancy O'Shea— Product User & Community Expert

O

osgood_

Legend

'because my site should be between 50 and 100 pages and I don't want to
each modification of the model to be updated one by one the child pages.:-0)

There's absolutely NO WAY you should be using DW templates for a website of that magnitude. Good luck though, I'm butting out of this one. You'll regret it at some stage.

Nancy OShea

Community Expert

My only problem with DW's proprietary templates is that they rely entirely on DW to to do all the heavy lifting. This puts added strain on the app and your computer which can lead to file corruptions. Also you must republish your entire site each time you edit the Template.dwt (header, footer, navigation). This gets tedious, even on small sites. But if you're only updating 3-4 times/yr, it's not much of an issue for you. Feel free to use Templates.

Nancy O'Shea— Product User & Community Expert

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