I’ve added SSS to an old site today and it works as advertised apart from one page where the results page remains blank. Can anyone please tell me what I’ve done wrong.
The page is here http://www.wekanhire.org/ (skip the intro to see the problem page.
You will also notice another problem directly related to the URL above that needs solving. Irrespective of which page of the site you are on, the URL remains the same. If you refresh on any page, it takes you back to the ‘splash’ page. Again, what have I done wrong?
David, you’re not wrong about the timed redirect but that’s what the client wanted. This was also the first site I produced in FW several years ago, and until the client says he’s not happy and wants to pay to have it overhauled and updated, it has to stay as it is. It’s also not frame-based but it’s not box model either, it’s individually placed elements. And both the splash page and main site are all on the same server.
That said, I don’t know if I’m missing something in your reply, but I can’t see anything which helps with either of the problems(?)
Hi Neil,
As Dave mentions your site is enclosed in a frameset which is bad (as we already know) for SEO, bookmarking, usability etc. Did you add the frameset yourself in Freeway or has this been added in by your host? Check your Freeway document and see if any of the pages are framesets and if they are try and restructure your site so you don’t need them any more. Some hosts and domain registrars (123-reg for example) offer to place your site in their own frameset so you can keep your site on a free hosting account but display your site under the domain name. If this is the case I’d suggest repointing the domain name to your actual web server where the site should show up outside of the frameset.
As for the Simple Site Search Action it does most of the magic by passing variables between the search page and the results page using a query string (this is just the jumble of text in the page URL). In a frameset the results page can’t ‘see’ this which is why I suspect the results stay empty.
I hope this helps.
Regards,
Tim.
On 15 Nov 2011, at 09:18, neil.west1 wrote:
That said, I don’t know if I’m missing something in your reply, but I can’t see anything which helps with either of the problems(?)
Thanks for that Tim, can you please explain to me what a frameset is, and how I would know if I’ve got one. It might sound a little daft to ask, but most of the sites I produce now use the box model or are individually positioned items, but I’ve never knowingly used a frame (if that’s the same thing!)
Hi Neil,
Apologies for that. A frameset is a special type of HTML page that is basically a container object for other html pages. Each frameset is composed of a number of frames that can hold either standard html pages or other framesets. I can freely admit that I used to love framesets (I’ve since had counselling) as it would allow me to create single pages as page parts and incorporate these into a larger design. For example if you had a common navigational bar or footer a frameset site would allow you to include these pages into a larger design without having to copy and paste all of that content into each page.
Before I used Freeway (which handles a lot of that repetition for you with things like master pages) updating a common element on every page of a 200 page site wasn’t a minor undertaking.
In Freeway if you look at the site panel on the left hand side of your document you should see all of the pages in your site. If you only see the items for the current page click on the site panel header (labelled Page) until it says Site. Looking down the listed icons in the site panel frameset icons are indicated as landscape (wider than tall) documents (standard pages have portrait icons) and show a page split into three sections. Also when you select a frameset page in Freeway the inspector palette interface changes to show options just for the frameset selected.
It sounds like the frameset you are seeing is being provided by your host. Check with them how you can turn this off.
Regards,
Tim.
On 15 Nov 2011, at 10:07, neil.west1 wrote:
Thanks for that Tim, can you please explain to me what a frameset is, and how I would know if I’ve got one. It might sound a little daft to ask, but most of the sites I produce now use the box model or are individually positioned items, but I’ve never knowingly used a frame (if that’s the same thing!)
Thanks Tim, nope, no frames, so it must the ISP which I’ll check with. I’ve figured the SSS problem though - I had 2 search fields in exactly the same place!
In terms of the URL, how do I go about giving each page it’s own URL? The client-owned domain is pointing to the website which is hosted by my domain, is it this causing the problem?
In terms of the URL, how do I go about giving each page it’s own URL? The client-owned domain is pointing to the website which is hosted by my domain, is it this causing the problem?
If you get rid of the Frame issue and make sure that the site is wholly hosted at their domain then that issue will go away.
I’ve had a look on my control panel but can’t see anything that mentions frames or framesets. I have other sites hosted on our server, what do I look for to know whether they are frames or not, just to check that it is the server and not the site?
The client is very much a technophobe and knows very little about their own domain/who they’ve got it with etc so hosting the site on their domain is pretty much a non-starter.
The client is very much a technophobe and knows very little about their own domain/who they’ve got it with etc so hosting the site on their domain is pretty much a non-starter.
Well you are doing them a disservice if you are not ensuring that they have a reasonable host - at the very least if you cannot host on their server then set up a new domain on a decent server and host it there. But there shouldn’t be any reason why you cannot find out who hosts it. And in fact it is 1and1.co.uk - who do offer reasonable hosting.
You may well not see any mention of frames and framesets in your hosting cpanel - it is probably outwith your control.
Email the support team and ask them for future reference.
But now you know where it is hosted you should have no problem getting access and hosting there.