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Save time with the FrontPage Include Bot!

Does your web site have repetitive headers or footers on multiple pages, such as navigation images or text? Do you dread making changes because of all the work you’ll have to do updating all those pages? The FrontPage Include Bot is your answer!

The Include Bot allows you to include the contents of one page within another. For instance, if you have navigational links or a logo at the top of each page, you can instead tell those pages to "include" the contents of a separate page (let's call it the "Source"), which actually contains the links or logo. Any time you update the Source page, all the pages that "include" it will reflect the changes; seamlessly! I use this on clients’ pages and it is an incredible timesaver, as well as a great way of ensuring consistency among your site’s pages.

How It's Done

Create the Source
In the Front Page Editor, create a page which will be used as the Source. On this page, you might place text or image hyperlinks typical in many web sites such as About | Links | Contact . The content can really be anything. Don’t worry or bother about background colors or graphics, since the Source will inherit those properties from whatever page it’s included in.

Tell Your Pages to "Include" the Source
Save the Source and open your "Target" page in the Front Page Editor. This is one of the pages you want the Source to appear within. Position the cursor where you want the included Source to appear and select Insert | WebBot Component…, and then select "Include" from the dropdown list of available components. You are presented with a dialog box where you can enter the URL of the Source or browse for it (I'd recommend browsing to avoid typos). Find your Source file, click OK to return it to the dialog box and click OK again. Voila! The contents of the Source file now appear in your Target page.

You can use the Include anywhere; at the top, bottom or within a Target page, making it very flexible. Any time you update the Source, all pages referring to it are updated as well.

Potential"Gotcha's"

The Include Source page must be within the web.
You cannot include, say, another web site’s page within your own using the Include Bot. If this is what you need, then you may want to try using Frames.

The Include Bot uses Relative URL’s
If your Target pages are stored in different directories within the web AND your Source Page has image links, some pages will display broken links to the images. To get around this, edit the HTML of your Source so that the links point to the full URL’s of the images, such as:

<img src="http://www.mydomain.com/images/MyImage.jpg" width="100" height="75">

The "Target" page's settings prevail.
Again, page settings within the Source, such as background colors, background images and hyperlink colors will be overridden by the setting of the Target page. This is great for consistency.

Remember to "Refresh"!
When you change a Source’s content (say, add another hyperlink) and then go to see it in a Target, you’ll most likely have to Refresh the page. If you have problems seeing the changes, go to the Front Page Explorer and select
Tools | Recalculate Hyperlinks.

Have fun!

Author: Frank J. Mazzella
Date: 09/23/97

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