File names in Publisher 2007

[Nirmalanow]

I just got a new computer and upgraded to Publisher 2007 (as part of Office
2007). When I open one of my Publisher 2003 files which are all .htm files,
Publisher opens them as a generic file called Publication 1 or Publication 2.
When I go to save any changes, it wants to save it as Publication 1 instead
of my original name for the publication, and it also wants to save it as a
..pub file. Even if I have previously opened the file in Publisher 2007 and
saved it as a web page with the original file name, the next time it opens
again as a generic "Publication 1"

Is there any way to get my files to open with their original file names and
also as .htm files so I can just click save when I am done making my changes?
It adds a lot of time to have to find the correct name and change the file
type for the file before I save it.

 

[Rob Giordano [MS MVP]]

Publisher can't open an html or htm file, so not sure what you're doing.

 

[John G.]

That does not appear to be true.
Pub 2003 will open index.htm and it will look just like it did if it had
been generated from a .pub file. And it will retain the name and save again
as a .htm file.

Pub2007 will open the same htm file but call it Publication1.pub and then
come to save it you will have to change the name and the extension.

John G.
Another advance backwards by Microsoft??

 

[DavidF]

Nirmalanow,

John G is correct that Publisher can open .htm files, but this is not the
way you are supposed to make changes in your Publisher webs. By MSFT design,
you should be opening your original .pub file, making your changes and
producing new html files and uploading those and replacing your old web
files.

The difference you are seeing in how Pub 2007 behaves from Pub 2003 has to
do with a change in the html coding engine. In Pub 2003 if you produced your
web files by doing a Save As > Web Page the coding engine produced heavy,
'rich' html code that was full of Office tags which made the code 'round
tripable'. The Office tags maintained the layout when you opened the .htm
file in Publisher. In other words you could open and edit the .htm files as
you have been. If you instead produced your web files as recommended by MSFT
by doing a 'Publish to the Web' the coding engine produces 'filtered' html
code which did not include the Office tags. This code is far cleaner with
less code bloat. As Publisher is not a 'code editor' this 'legacy' ability
to produce 'rich, round tripable' html code was dropped from Pub 2007. Now
it will only produce filtered code whether you produce your code by doing a
Save As a web page or by Publish to the web.

If you don't have your original .pub file, but do still have access to Pub
2003 and your 'rich' html files, you would be advised to rebuild your .pub
file. You are eventually going to have problems editing the individual .htm
files with Pub 2007. You will need to open each .htm file and save it is as
a Pub file, and copy and paste into one Pub file for your whole site. This
will be easier with Pub 2003 and the rich html files.

Here is an article by David Bartosik that explains all of this. Scroll to
the bottom: Common Sense Computing 101 aka "Why in the world would you lose
your publisher file?":
http://msmvps.com/blogs/dbartosik/archive/2006/01/19/81461.aspx

If you have a follow up question or other questions about Publisher webs,
then in the future please post in the web group and we will try to help you
there: public.publisher.webdesign

DavidF

 

[Nirmalanow]

I realize it might not be the intended way of doing things, but I create
individual publications for each page on my website, mainly for search engine
optimization purposes. I do not want all of my webpages to be part of one
large publisher file, because then publisher keeps creating new names for
each webpage which do not have appropriate keywords in the web page name. and
also makes it hard to link to individual pages from outside my website
because publisher keeps changing the name of the webpage with each new save.

But am I correct that I should open each of my webpages and save them now as
..pub files in publisher 2007? Then whenever I open a file and make changes I
can still publish to the web and publisher will create the filtered htm file
for me? Is there any real problem in having dozens of .pub files that make up
my website, rather than one huge file with the whole website?

Thanks for answering my questions. I really appreciate it. I realize that I
am using Publisher in a way it was not really intended to be used, but I have
been doing it for so long that I am now used to doing things this way. My
site is www.endless-satsang.com

 

[DavidF]

One of my favorite sayings is 'if it ain't broke, don't fix it'. If your
workflow works for you, then...

Actually breaking a Publisher web up and building it with multiple Pub files
is very common among users that have large sites. I started doing it many
years ago and find it easier to manage. And as you point out, it does give
you more control of the naming convention of the links. So no, there is no
problem with that.

I do think you should probably start saving the .htm files as .pub files and
working from the .pub files. But I must admit that even that may not be
necessary given that you produce each page with a separate publication. It
would certainly clean up your code to produce filtered code. If you do then
try just one publication and test the web files produced against your
current files and make sure it isn't going to change anything. Back up, back
up, back up....

Interesting site content. I will have to give it more of a read when I get
time. Looks good too, although it is a bit wide for my taste. Though I
understand why you made it that wide and how much work it would be to
change, it does require horizontal scrolling on my 1152 pixel wide screen.
Probably not a big deal as most of the content appears to be to the left.
Thanks for sharing.

DavidF

 

[Nirmalanow]

Thanks for further clarifying. I have a new problem which is that I can not
seem to get the web page preview to work. When I click on Web Page Preview,
Publisher 2007 just opens a new version of the same page in Publisher and
calls it "publication 3". Even if I first save the file as a .pub file, it
still will not open up my browser and show me the file as it will appear. Any
ideas why this might be happening?

I am glad you enjoyed viewing the site. It has evolved a lot over the years
and yes I have put most of the content on the left since I can not get the
site to center on the page. Then the large photos are there on the right,
even if you might need to do some horizontal scrolling.

I may break down and have the site redone in Joomla since I am having these
problems with Publisher 2007. There seems to be only so far you can go in
using Publisher as a website creation tool, and I think I am ready for a
slightly more polished look..

 

[Rob Giordano [MS MVP]]

Mine 2003 or 2007 won't...maybe because I have a real html editor installed
it will open in that even though I try opening html pages through Publisher
(IMO this is weird).



--
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Rob Giordano
Microsoft MVP Expression

 

[DavidF]

A lot of people that start with Publisher webs, eventually outgrow the
program, and need to move on to a program with fewer limitations. I haven't
use Joomla, but have read some good things about it. Now might be the time
for you to make the move if you have the time to learn how to use Joomla.

With that said, learning the differences in how Pub 2007 works won't take
long. I can't reproduce your problem, but perhaps it is your workflow. Here
is what I did.

1. Produce 'rich' html code pages by doing a Save As > Web Page with
Publisher 2003. Direct the output to a folder on my local computer. (This is
the same as your *.htm files.)
2. Open Publisher 2007 > File > Open and browse to where the 'rich' .htm
files are and open the index.htm file, or your custom.htm file. Publisher
will import all the web files and yes, it will call it Publication 2 or
higher.
3. File > Save As and choose a name for the Pub file. This is the file that
you will open and edit and produce new .htm files to upload when you want to
update your site. Close Publisher.
4. Open Pub 2007, and the new Pub file that you just created...or just
double click the file.
5. Do a web page preview....works for me.

Note that when you do the Save As in step 3, the default is to save it as a
Pub file. However, if you scroll down the 'Save as Type' you will see the
option to save as a web page. But note that you can only save as a filtered
..htm file. Even if you want to continue to do a File > Save As a web page
the way you have always produced your .htm files, you can. Pub 2007 will
only produce filtered files whether you do a Save as or a Publish to the
Web.

If you check your file sizes between filtered and rich code your are going
to find your filtered files much smaller. I did a quick check and the test
file I used produced a 75k index.htm 'filtered code' file and the 'rich
code' index.htm file was 340k! It is little wonder that Publisher developed
a reputation for suffering from code bloat.

I would suggest that you make archive copies of your 'rich' html files. You
never know when you might want them, and once you switch to Publisher 2007,
you won't be able to produce any more.

Hope this leads to a solution with your web page preview and perhaps
smoothes the transition to Pub 2007, at least for the interim.

Once again I would invite you to post any follow up or new questions to the
Publisher web groups, and perhaps peruse some of the posts for other
answers:
news://msnews.microsoft.com/microsoft.public.publisher.webdesign
or
http://www.microsoft.com/office/com...soft.public.publisher.webdesign&lang=en&cr=US

DavidF

 

[Nirmalanow]

Thanks again for all your help. I just wanted to share that I figured out why
I was not able to open a web preview. I had switched the file association for
..htm files to Publisher because even when I had publisher open and clicked on
an .htm file, it would open with my browser. Switching the file associations
meant that the file would initially open in Publisher, but it also meant that
when I tried to do a web preview, the file would also open again in Publisher
in a new window. So I switched the file association back to my browser and
now I can do a preivew just fine.

We have a friend who does web design and he recently redid my wife's site in
Joomla (www.radicalhappiness.com) and so we may have him design a new site
for me also. That way I only need to learn how to maintain the new site in
Joomla instead of having to learn the entire program from scratch.

Publisher has served me well, but it does seem I have outgrown it as there
are always a few little things I would like to be able to do, but can't or
have to be creative to accomplish in Publisher.

Thanks again for you help. You helped me over the hump in my switch to Pub
2007.

 

[DavidF]

Glad you sorted things out. Good luck with the transition to Joomla. Your
site and your articles will probably work well in more of a 'blog' or
'template' format.

In the meantime if you want help figuring out some of those "little things
you would like to do", then post in the web group. Sometimes there is an
answer. For example, though it is not a built-in capability you can center
your Publisher webs. Here is one: http://www.devonviewcaravans.co.uk/ If
you want to know how to do that, post in the web group or just peruse some
of the last few weeks of posts, as it is often discussed.

DavidF