Web host specs, what is basic?

[Rachel]

I have just purchased Frontpage 2003, and I have started to prepare my
companys website. We dont know yet where the files would be hosted. How can I
make sure whatever I develop would be portable? Its a basic website requiring
no login information,ecommerce or any kind of specialized scripting.

Please help.
Rachel

 

[Chuck Davis]

Rachel,

I have several web sites hosted by MinnesotaShopper.com
http://www.minnesotashopper.com
The server allows FrontPage Server Extensions to be installed from the
Control Panel to which you would have access. A lot of function available.

 

[Rachel]

I did not ask for website host recommendations,

I am asking for some basic guidelines to work in Frontpage so that it is
portable to
website host.

Thanks
Rachel

 

[Chuck Davis]

Rachel,

I'm sorry! Create your web site, Home page and other pages. Set up the
navigation scheme and PUBLISH it to your host. Don't try to create a 100
page site and then publish for the first time. Start with three or four
pages. If you don't advertise it, no one will see it while you work on
problems that you will create. Make a few changes and Publish again.
Install several browsers and visit your site with each. Any differences
should be corrected. There are many browsers in use, but in addition to IE,
I reguarly use Firefox, Netscape, Opera and Avant. If you have a friend with
a Mac, have them take a look.

Use Help regularly, The F1 key has never broken anything!

Come back with detailed questions.

 

[Rachel]

Thanks Chuck,
What I want to know what components if any the webpages made in Frontpage
require that they be already installed on the server. In other words if I use
Interactive Buttons, linkbars, tables in my html webpages, do these require
some special software/libraries to be on the webhost server?

Thanks
Rachel

 

[Tom Willett]

see http://support.microsoft.com/kb/281532 which lists everything
that requires extensions on the server.

 

[Tom Miller]

What I want to know what components if any the webpages made in Frontpage

require that they be already installed on the server. In other words if I
use
Interactive Buttons, linkbars, tables in my html webpages, do these
require
some special software/libraries to be on the webhost server?

In FP2002 under menu item: TOOL -> Page Options -> Compatibility (Tab) you
can set FP to allow or disallow a variety of facilities including front page
extensions.

This only works on new pages or a new website from scratch. It will not
work (probably) on a website created with a wizard. By unclicking the FP
extensions, enabling only Javascript, not enabling VRM etc you can cause FP
to create a webpage that should run on nearly any webserver and provide
pages that can be read by nearly any browser.

The catch is if you need the functionality that is provided by the FP
extensions you will have to find Php/Javascript replacements (which are
usually available).

If you can, it is a LOT easier to limit your webhosting to company that
supports frontpage extensions. You can more easily design things within the
context of FP. But I regularly setup my websites with FP extensions
disabled, etc.

Hope this helps,

Tom Miller

 

[Rachel]

Thanks Tom,
This is exactly what I was looking for.

Rachel