I detail the steps involved in creating, designing, hosting and maintaining my web pages.
Content is the most important item. See C.J. Silverio's web page rant, "Why the Web Sucks". I started out using the excellent design principles in the book, Web design in a Nutshell. Documentation is important (or is it?). UNIX ohne Worter.
The main web page is the XHTML file index.html in the top level directory. The other items are sorted into subdirectories. Image files are of type .png or .jpg and usually put into their own separate directories.
My web pages are written in XHTML 1.0, and XHTML 1.1 which I edit with the Vim text editor using html or css syntax mode. I also use predefined macros. Upon completion, I validate each XHTML file using W3C's service.
I have one CSS 2 style sheet for all my documents and an additional style sheet to make MS IE explorer work as well as possible. For more about style sheets, see Dave Raggett's introduction to CSS, the beautiful examples in the CSS Zen Garden. the textbook and don't miss the highly readable and definitive CSS 2 reference. Finally, of course, I validate the my .css file.
For typesetting equations to be presented on the web, I use TeX to typeset my equations, export to .pdf file format, view it at large resolution on the screen on my Mac, then cut out a screen shot, crop it and save the equation as a .png image file.
Other methods I've tried --- Starting with a Microsoft Word with Equations File. insert the formulas with MS Equation Editor 3.0. Make the formulas larger so you get better resolution. You may need to install the equation editor from CD if it is not there by default. After entering in the equation, right click on it, select Format Object/Colors and Lines and set color=white and transparency=0%
Next export the document in filtered HTML format to produce an *.htm file and a subdirectory containing *.gif images, one per equation.
I run the *.htm file through my
custom Perl script
to clean up the HTML syntax, then hand-edit it as required.
I use Paintshop Pro to batch convert *.gif equation images to *.png images and rename the HTML file links to match. (The Perl script I use to maintain this site will automatically rename the links). You can use Paintshop Pro to resize the equations if they are too large without pixellating them. The result comes out like HTML with Equations File.
Occasionally, I use Mathematica to output HTML text containing .gif image equations. My Perl script cleans up this HTML also.
Source code is distributed under the terms of the GNU General Public License.
The math forum lists different methods for typesetting mathematical notation for the web and has links to software.
In the top level directory, I have a
script
which maintains this site, and its associated
makefile.
written in
Python
It deletes temporary files and directories,
rewrites hypertext and program source code as necessary,
and uploads my changed web pages to my web sites automatically.
Source code is distributed under the terms of the
GNU General Public License.
It does a multitude of checking and automatic rewriting of my web page files.
I still need to submit each page to a final link check as web links undergo software rot. As a check, I have all of my style sheet elements gathered together in my CSS 2 test page.
Note that Freeservers doesn't yet parse XML, so I need to modify the lines in each .html file to
<!-- freeservers.com cannot parse XML yet:
< ? xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
-->
from
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
AtSpace.com will give a 500 internal error if you have certain types of hyperlinks in your .html file. Apparently they have funny characters, have forbidden keywords such as " a m a z o n . c o m" or are too long. For example, the book links to Amazon.com books usually give me this error. You can replace them with Google search links for the book title and author instead. Also, AtSpace.com wil not accept .zip files, so you need to rename them with the extension .zip.bin and tell your users to rename the file after download.
Freeservers and AtSpace.com won't display code in .c or .cpp files, so hyperlink to copies of the source files with .c.txt and .cpp.txt file extensions instead to view them.
Artificer laptop.
I do my development on my 17" MacBookPro laptop on which I have loaded a variety of software designer's tools
Immediate backups go onto on a Lexar USB JumpDrive. Long term backups are onto RW-CD's. I'm using DSL and the laptop has a built-in wireless link. Everything fits into a Targus carrying case along with the power supply.
I still have a Dell Inspiron laptop on which I sometimes test my software under Windows XP.
I use Freeservers, which I have used for a number of years with excellent results. I used to use the file manager in the member area, but now I use my automatic updater program.
I'm also hosted at AtSpace.com in Europe. I used to use the file upload manager in the member area or the command line ftp, but now I use my automatic updater program.
I use AT&T DSL with a wireless transceiver so I can communicate to my laptop. I used to connect through the phone on a separate line with Netzero as my ISP.
I use the Firefox internet browser which displays my web pages correctly. I check the web page appearance on different systems, if possible.
Some tips on submitting the site to search engines are given in search engine watch. I submit to Google. I test search for my site using Google and check its German translation with language translation.
I also occasionally post some specific areas of my site on the newsgroups.
Copyright © 1986-2009 by Sean Erik O'Connor. All Rights Reserved. last updated 23 May 09.
Home
Up