[Pro] In-Line Confusion

Freeway
1

I’m beating my head against a wall on several what-used-to-be-simple-when-I-built-sites-via-drag-n-drop issues. Please advise!

  • I’m having difficulty moving the elements around in the page view, even if they are inside the same “wrapper.” The elements don’t seem to allow any movement at all. Am I doing something wrong?

  • My CSS Menu looks fine in the browser, but in the FW document, it is nearly 3000 px high. I’ve tried setting the height to “minimum” and various other combinations, but I can’t seem to fix this. My pasteboard has a ton of “unused” space. I know in-line is less WYSIWYG, but this seems a little crazy.

  • Didn’t there used to be a way to select multiple items at once on the pasteboard? I can’t remember if it was a command-click or a shift-click, but now it doesn’t do anything but deselect item one and select item two. Dragging the mouse over the elements doesn’t seem to be working either.

  • Non-in-line question: when I have erroneously created the dreaded “style 1” is there a way to ask FW to show me where in the document I created this?

Thanks everyone!

Doty

http://invertministries.com/contact/index.html

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2
  • I’m having difficulty moving the elements around in the page view, even
    if they are inside the same “wrapper.” The elements don’t seem to allow any
    movement at all. Am I doing something wrong?

Inline items are like letters in a box - they appear on an invisible line
of type/objects. You can drag their position in the sort order, but that’s
about it. They don’t “move” in the traditional sense anymore - they are in
relation to the objects in the line around them - just like letters in a
line of type. You control their position logically - with spacing of margin
and padding, with positions of float or align.

  • My CSS Menu looks fine in the browser, but in the FW document, it is
    nearly 3000 px high. I’ve tried setting the height to “minimum” and various
    other combinations, but I can’t seem to fix this. My pasteboard has a ton
    of “unused” space. I know in-line is less WYSIWYG, but this seems a little
    crazy.

I know, the same kind of thing happens to me all the time. I’ve no idea why
FWP gives so much vertical spacing sometimes to the weirdest things. The
only comfort I can give is that as long as you can envision the logic of
what you are doing, the appearance of it becomes less and less concerning.
I’m working on a grid design now that in FWP looks nothing at all
grid-like.

  • Non-in-line question: when I have erroneously created the dreaded “style
    1” is there a way to ask FW to show me where in the document I created this?

Sure, open the Style Editor window from the menu Edit > Styles and select
the style name from the list at left. Set an obvious characteristic like a
Background-Color of Red, then go back to your document and see what pops
up.

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Doty,

I’m honestly a bit

####confused about question 1,

cause as far as I know, you once subscribed to my screencasts (or you’re even still active???), correct?

Didn’t I mentioned that - several times? Extra episodes for padding, margin, float and clear?
Ufff - If not, shame on me - I have to note this down, but Ernie already explained the gist.

####The thing with the menu:

Your menu list is long - very long - if not to say extremely long. Despite the fact, that this won’t make fun if it comes to touch and small devices, the space is required by this list you created (click into the navigation item to see the vertical list). The CSS menu action is just mirroring or displaying it user-friendly horizontal).

####Extra tipp:

I can’t influence your workflow - it’s yours. But you’ll run into some critical breakpoints the longer your project goes - for sure and promised.

There is no outline written - no structure to detect - at least not for me. You assume, a visitor is clicking all those sub-menu entries? If I am the visitor - definitely not. Cause it overcharges me - and I’m off within seconds.

Cheers

Thomas

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4

Ernie,

Let me see if I’m understanding…

I should be able to sort items like this

  • item 1
  • item 2
  • item 3

But not like this

  • item 1
    • item 2
    • item 3

Is that correct? It seemed to me last night I couldn’t move items even when they were at the same “level” in the outline, but maybe I was too tired.

So, the vertical spacing issue w/ the CSS menu isn’t just me, huh? That is a relief, but it’s still annoying. I wish it weren’t happening, but I can live with it.

Your tip about changing the characteristic of a erroneous style 1 is a good idea – so long as I’m still on the same page in the document. I was hoping FW7 revised this behavior. In the meantime, I will continue to be vigilant watching my styles.

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Thomas,

Yes, I looked at your screencasts before I posted this to see if there was an answer to my vertical spacing question regarding the CSS menu. I’m absorbing as much as I can from your screencasts. Thank you. Are you planning to do any for FW7? The question in the back of my mind is always, “I wonder if this is different in FW7.” In the past, if I couldn’t get the inline layout to work I would just “cheat” and revert to “what I knew” using drag and drop methods. FW7 has increased my determination to dig into the problem a bit deeper and stay committed to the inline way of things.

Yes, my menu list is quite long. It’s longer than I wish it was. But that doesn’t change the question of why FW is taking up so much vertical space. Even when I did this website with only four pages, FW7 insisted on allowing 104px vertically for a menu that, in reality, was only taking up 28px vertically. The longer CSS menu simply exacerbates the already existing issue with how Freeway is handling things.

Regarding my workflow… I do indeed have an outline. I’ve spent months revising it in OmniOutliner before I ever touched the FW document. It is a massive site attempting to catalog every piece of plastic village ever created for train sites going back to the 1947. Contrary to most websites I build, I don’t expect someone to look at every page. My goal is to create a reference site where the visitor can find the information he/she is looking for as quickly as possible with the least about of confusion/friction. It is a paid member site (indicated by the MO in the menu fields), so members know what they’re looking for and expect it to be in the sub-categories listed.

This project was originally done by long-time list member Gordon Low. Gordon designed the site in FW years ago (I believe starting with FW4) and built the entire thing in tables. It served it’s purpose, but I’m trying to bring as many responsive features as possible to the site. My goal is to make it usable for tablets, as I think a site of this scale is not feasible for phone browsing.

Thanks for your thoughts and great video tutorials!

Doty

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6

Something didn’t work right with my markdown… (I left off the http:// on my urls) Here are the websites I tried to link to above:

But that doesn’t change the question of why FW is taking up so much vertical space. Even when I did this website with only four pages, FW7 insisted on allowing 104px vertically for a menu that, in reality, was only taking up 28px vertically.

and,

Gordon’s original site

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7

On 14 Oct 2014, 1:51 pm, Doty wrote:

Thomas,

Yes, I looked at your screencasts before I posted this to see if there was an answer to my vertical spacing question regarding the CSS menu. I’m absorbing as much as I can from your screencasts. Thank you. Are you planning to do any for FW7?

I do. But I have to write the outline first and gain some experiences with FW7.

The question in the back of my mind is always, “I wonder if this is different in FW7.”

The basics in Freeway didn’t change since version 4. I am not aware if they will one day - inline is inline (relative), drop and drag is drop and drag (absolute) - so in 7.

In the past, if I couldn’t get the inline layout to work I would just “cheat” and revert to “what I knew” using drag and drop methods. FW7 has increased my determination to dig into the problem a bit deeper and stay committed to the inline way of things.

I see no alternative to do - especially if it comes to use Freeway for professional purposes where no constraints are basically to accept. I remember me saying, that I watched Dan’s screencast 50-100 times before I got it. It requires patience, experience and fun.

Yes, my menu list is quite long. It’s longer than I wish it was. But that doesn’t change the question of why FW is taking up so much vertical space. Even when I did this website with only four pages, FW7 insisted on allowing 104px vertically for a menu that, in reality, was only taking up 28px vertically. The longer CSS menu simply exacerbates the already existing issue with how Freeway is handling things.

I just tried and you can (theoretically) give the item where the css-menu is applied to a fixed height, if you want - let’s say 100px.

The trick is (or should be), that the nav wrapper (the one the action applied to) has a height of auto and its height is steered by the padding you set in the action (Browser spoken!!!)

Regarding my workflow… I do indeed have an outline. I’ve spent months revising it in OmniOutliner before I ever touched the FW document.

Excellent.

It is a massive site attempting to catalog every piece of plastic village ever created for train sites going back to the 1947. Contrary to most websites I build, I don’t expect someone to look at every page. My goal is to create a reference site where the visitor can find the information he/she is looking for as quickly as possible with the least about of confusion/friction. It is a paid member site (indicated by the MO in the menu fields), so members know what they’re looking for and expect it to be in the sub-categories listed.

There is an interesting read about on Intermediary Pages in a Site Hierarchy | CSS-Tricks - CSS-Tricks

I’m today on the trip to avoid any drop-down and wrapping them into a strong hierarchy of main pages that are jump pages for sub-categories. I call this “story writing” and leads a visitor slowly deeper and deeper the page. And this without losing connection to the main story above.

I could write prose, literally (and I already started to do http://www.kimmich-digitalmedia.com/articles/workflow-wireframe-construction ) just to see from where I’m coming from (these days).

This project was originally done by long-time list member Gordon Low. Gordon designed the site in FW years ago (I believe starting with FW4) and built the entire thing in tables. It served it’s purpose, but I’m trying to bring as many responsive features as possible to the site. My goal is to make it usable for tablets, as I think a site of this scale is not feasible for phone browsing.

There are indeed situations where a “small-device strategy” can be different towards all the rest of the page. I think it’s even still allowed to redirect in certain situations, isn’t it?

Thanks for your thoughts and great video tutorials!

Doty

You’re welcome.

Cheers

Thomas

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8

Doty, I am confused as to whether or not you’ve grasped the concept of
inline layout.

the full workup is here - Absolute or Relative?

Absolute items can mostly be dragged and positioned all over the workspace.
Inline positioned items cannot - they can only be dragged within the line
of items they reside with, often unintentionally. Often they cannot even be
intentionally selected in the workspace, and can only be selected via the
site pane. Even then, the best way to reorder their placement in the flow
order is to either plan the placement order ahead of time… or you can cut
and paste, which is still notoriously difficult. Dragging, for me, is
usually a last resort.

To place an HTML item inline (and know that you have) you must first have
an item you can do this with. For me, this is the workspace itself - in a
new document you can simply double-click (or select-enter) the blank
workspace so that your flashing text cursor appears, just as if you are
about to type a word… THEN use the menu Insert > HTML item method to insert
your HTML items. You can repeat this command over and over to insert more
html items - just like letters in a word.

These items all push at each other - when you change their size or fill
them with content, they all will move (in that line) to accommodate each
other. Using floats and margins and padding are all how inline layouts are
positioned. Of course, they all can in theory be dragged INLINE which will
change their hierarchy in the site pane.

Inline layout is not really favorable to users who need to visualize AS
they build… it should be the result of a pre-planned design. And then
patiently implemented as any design flaws or enhancements required during
construction will need some backtracking and rework.

–
Ernie Simpson
843-475-3523

On Tue, Oct 14, 2014 at 9:50 AM, Doty email@hidden wrote:

Ernie,

Let me see if I’m understanding…

I should be able to sort items like this

  • item 1
  • item 2
  • item 3

But not like this

  • item 1
    • item 2
    • item 3

Is that correct? It seemed to me last night I couldn’t move items even
when they were at the same “level” in the outline, but maybe I was too
tired.

So, the vertical spacing issue w/ the CSS menu isn’t just me, huh? That is
a relief, but it’s still annoying. I wish it weren’t happening, but I can
live with it.

Your tip about changing the characteristic of a erroneous style 1 is a
good idea – so long as I’m still on the same page in the document. I was
hoping FW7 revised this behavior. In the meantime, I will continue to be
vigilant watching my styles.

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email@hidden
Update your subscriptions at:
http://freewaytalk.net/person/options

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