Publisher erased all my page names again - disaster!!

[Wintensive]

This has happenned a few times. I open up my publisher page to make
some changes to day to find out that all the pages have blanks in the
page options section under FILE NAME.

As a result, all the pages are named random things like Page067.htm if
I publish them.

Therefore all external links to my site now do not work because the
page name they refer to has been changed by the program.

This happenned once before when I only had a few pages and links and I
was able to fix them with 30 minutes of work. Now that I have over 10
pages and several external links, it will be a pain. And I have no
idea how to prevent it again in the future. I think this may have
been the last straw for Publisher. Anyone know how good Expressions
works?

 

[DavidF]

I suspect that you simply forgot to save the Pub file with the changes in
the custom file names. And though I empathize with your frustration, I can't
imagine that it would take more than 30 seconds to type in a custom name for
each page. Me thinks you doth protest too loudly ;-)

If you want to move to Web Expression, go for it, but don't expect it to be
less frustrating. Go read the Web Expression group to get a taste of what
you are facing. It is a huge jump in price and learning curve, plus it seems
generally acknowledged that the current version of Web Expression has some
substantial bugs. If I were considering the move, I think I would probably
wait for the next version which won't be free to purchasers of the first
version. Perhaps Rob could speak to that, as he is the expert. My knowledge
about Web Expression is very limited.

DavidF

 

[Rob Giordano \(Crash\)]

Wait for Expression 2 to be released...I don't know when but it should be
soon.
It's great, but there will be a learning curve coming from Publisher, but
you'll be able to do a lot more than you can with Pub.
Also...just buy the Upgrade...should be under 100 bucks.

For now...download the Trial version and see for yourself.



--
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Rob Giordano
Microsoft MVP Expression

 

[jason]

Expressions is more difficult, you are right.

I went through this once before with publisher. I setup all the pages
with the correct names. I saved them twice to be sure. I had opened
up the file several times without having trouble like this. Then all
of a sudden last week, I opened up the file, adn all the page titles
were gone. Now all pages are named things like page006.htm

Sure I could rename them all again, there's only nine of them. But if
I don't fully understand why the names were changed I will always
wonder when it will happen again. I'll have to check every time to
make sure this hasn't happened because if I publish to the web without
checking, I could break all the links.

I know other people have mentioned this happenning to them in this
forum, I searched it before. This is the second time it's happenned
to me. In any case, we don't know why it happens...

I woudl change from Publisher for only 2 reasons:

This bug that seems to make my life more difficult
I need a way to add some javascript to enforce forms and can't figure
it our with Publisher. I know lot's of people have done this, but I
guess I don't understand js well enough

Moving to Expressions isn't goign to solve this, you're right. I just
don't know what I'm doing and don't know js. It would be great fi I
can find a way to make Pub work for me.

 

[DavidF]

I am sure your memory is better than mine, but I do not remember anyone else
posting with the problem of custom file name changes being changed after
saving. I can't even see how it is possible, but I accept your experience as
fact. My best suggestion is to create backups of your file, so if it happens
again, you won't have to redo the custom names. I think it is a good
practice anyway, cuz you never know when those computer gremlins will
strike. David Bartosik wrote a good article about backing up Publisher files
that I think is good reading even if one already does back ups: Common Sense
Computing 101 aka "Why in the world would you lose your publisher file?" :
http://msmvps.com/blogs/dbartosik/archive/2006/01/19/81461.aspx

Download the trial version of Expression and try it...

Go to your webhost and see what kind of form program it offers. Perhaps you
won't have to use javascript or the Publisher form.

As to validation of the Publisher form, perhaps you could put two email form
control fields in the form....asking that they fill in the second one for
confirmation. No, it won't prevent the user from skipping that field, or
making a mistake, or stop the form from being submitted, but at least the
user will have to type their email address twice. Hopefully they will get it
correct at least once, which leaves you a way of contacting them if there is
other information that you need. In my mind if a user can't at least get
their email address correct after typing it twice, then I probably don't
want to deal with them anyway. I got a voice mail message the other day
where the person I did not know begged me to call him back ASAP, and left a
fairly lengthy message...but left only his first name and didn't leave his
phone number. I felt bad for about a second...

Good luck.

DavidF

 

[jason]

I don't understand how this happenned either. It happened once awhile
ago, and I thought...well maybe I just didn't save the changes. So
when it happenned this last time, I know I was very diligent about
saving changes. And the names of the pages stayed put for many opens
and closes of the file. I can't see why it happenned this time and I
have thought about it a lot. I just don't know why this happenned.
But I don't care anymore because I have a much worse problem now. I
can't seem to even find my website project at all. The original pub
file is completely missing from my computer?! I was going to do just
what you said and use a backup...

This is all very bizarre. Let me preface by saying, I'm actualy a
tech person...not a programmer, but I work with computers a lot. I'm
an idiot for not having a backup right now. That said...I employ 2
backup systems, one is an online service, and somehow I have no backup
of my actual pub file. I do have a published version of the site in a
separate file for some reason. So I have a folder that basically has
what you would have when you "publish" to the web if you instead
published to an actual folder on your hard drive. It has all the html
files and the images that go with it. That folder is backed up on
both my backups, but there is no pub file anywhere. Complete
wierdness. I can only just imagine that it was something dumb I did,
but again, I'm usually pretty good about this kind of thing. I guess
usually doesn't cut it in web design ;-) If it were just one thing I
could blame my computer, but this seems to be a pattern for me lately.

I do think that the problem with the page names does have something to
do with saving (publishing) to a local file and also saving as a pub
file. Maybe I messed up doing that. I only have the published
version because I accidentally published to a local file instead of
the web. Also once when I was starting using the program I thought
that was how you saved it....didn't initially realize that you just
save the pub file and publish to the web only. In any case, I never
went back and made sense of everything and I must have confused the
two again. Whatever...now what I have is the published files.

Is there a way to import these all back into a PUB file so I can get
back to work? I tried Expressions. It's not exactly what I
expected. If anyone feels quite sure that the idiocy I have
contracted is not contagious and feels compelled to offer me more
advice on how I can import the published versions of the project and
get an actual pub file that I can begin managing properly, I very much
appreciate the help and ongoing tolerance. I seem to have turned into
a bonehead in the last few days! Thansk!

And here was one of the posts I read about page names changing back to
number:

http://groups.google.com/group/micr...en&lnk=gst&q=page+names+gone#cf48e1017839997e

 

[jason]

OK...I figured it out. Well, I don't know exactly what happenned, but
I see some pieces of the puzzle, and it makes a little sense (and I
have a working copy of my website after all)

Somehow I have 2 different published version of my website. One
folder has an index.html file and a folder called index_files. This
folder is a flat copy of my entire website in html files, as if I
published the pub file to my hard drive. The html files in the
index_files folder are all correctly named with the proper page names
as I saved them. I can only open these html files up one at a time
and therefore cannot work on the file as one web site, but rather as
individual webpages. At least I can view them...I haven't tried to
make changes or work on them.

The second folder has another similar copy of my website with the
following differences. There is one file called wintensive.htm (not
index...), and a folder called wintensive_files. This must be the
name I gave the file as it is also the name of my domain. Inside
wintensive_files are all the individual other web pages but they are
named things like page006.htm. When I open the main page,
wintensive.htm, in Publisher, it opens my entire web site as if it
were the PUB file I thought I was missing. All the pages are there
(with the names stripped out from the file details area) and I can
work on them altogether as a web site. I can then save as a pub file
and now I have a single PUB file that is my entire website. YAY!

My only guess is that at some point I saved the web site as an htm
file instead of PUB. Im still not sure why the page names were lost,
but at least now that I have one PUB file to manage and publish to the
web, I can make sure I save all changes, only publish to the web, and
only have one PUB file to manage and backup. If I do this and monitor
it diligently, I suspect I will never have the problem with the page
names....if I do have the problem again, at least I'll know I have not
lost my mind.

Yikes! Sorry about all my confusion, and as usual I appreciate any
help and feedback everyone offers.

 

[DavidF]

Whew! I am glad you found a copy of the Pub file. If you read the article I
referenced, David does provide a method to rebuild your site from the html
files, but it is a pain in the rear gear.

DavidF

 

[DavidF]

See, I told you have a better memory than I.

However, that case was a bit different. Decoder took his Pub 2003 file to a
"local service bureau" to publish his file, and they used Pub 2002. Pub 2002
does not have the option of custom naming the individual pages, and that is
why it reverted to the page "number". Custom file naming was available in
Pub 2000, and then MSFT really messed up the program with 2002...in many
ways, but brought back the option of custom files names in Pub 2003.

DavidF

 

[Wintensive]

That article was a bit different...I swear there was another
individual that had my experience. No matter...I think I figured out
what I did at this point. It is wierd that I had saved my entire
website as htm instead of pub...but I have fixed that.

Thanks again!