FP2003 & DWT - too much white space!

[Malcolm Walker]

Using FP2003 SP3 my site at www.BreatheEasyHalton.co.uk/ was developed
from a free template from Round The Bend Wizards. Although validation
is far from perfect (I'm working on it!) the appearance on-line is much
as expected.

In order to make use of a DWT (as recommended by Ronx) instead of Shared
Borders the reordered site is at http://www.mewalker.co.uk/. Again much
needs to be done including validation before I am satisfied that it is
`finished'. But why white space between the components of the pages?
Is the white space due to the Editable regions or have I gone about
using a DWT in an incorrect manner?

From the original pages I removed the Shared Borders edited them to
their content and attached the DWT. The result far from satisfactory.
What if anything can be done to reduce the white space?

 

[Ronx]

Most of the white space I see is caused by the style definitions in
style.css for the classes plain and textarea. These provide top and
bottom padding of 20px and 15px respectively. Two textareas together
would provide 30px of white space between lines of text.
The stylesheet prof1011-28591.css is not on the server.

Your method of constructing the DWT with includes is similar to mine at
http://www.rxs-enterprises.org/dwt/site.htm - this is a copy of my DWT.

 

[Rob Giordano \(Crash\)]

White space between which components? Not sure what you mean.

Looks like you are not effectively using the DWT...the dwt would normally be
a template of your webpage(s) including the header, footer, graphics, etc.
and then editable spaces for your content. Your dwt is a stark page with
just editable content on it, kinda like an include page (which it also has
on it)




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





| Using FP2003 SP3 my site at www.BreatheEasyHalton.co.uk/ was developed
| from a free template from Round The Bend Wizards. Although validation
| is far from perfect (I'm working on it!) the appearance on-line is much
| as expected.
|
| In order to make use of a DWT (as recommended by Ronx) instead of Shared
| Borders the reordered site is at http://www.mewalker.co.uk/. Again much
| needs to be done including validation before I am satisfied that it is
| `finished'. But why white space between the components of the pages?
| Is the white space due to the Editable regions or have I gone about
| using a DWT in an incorrect manner?
|
| From the original pages I removed the Shared Borders edited them to
| their content and attached the DWT. The result far from satisfactory.
| What if anything can be done to reduce the white space?

 

[Malcolm Walker]

Thank you Ron for your comments. I have reduced the padding to 0 and
the appearance of the home page is so much better I am almost pleased
with it!

I found the style sheet prof1011-28591.css on the server in the folder:
www.mewalker.co.uk/_themes/radial along with two other .css files that
form part of the Radial theme I used for the links in the navigation
bar. As so many of the CSS errors arise from these style sheets I
wonder whether FrontPage has rendered their path correctly?

I have looked at your DWT and I see the similarities between yours and
mine - thank you for making it available.

 

[Ronx]

It is looking better with that padding removed.

The home page has

<link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="beh_styles/style.css">
<link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css"
href="_themes/profile/prof1011-28591.css">

And

<link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css"
href="_themes/radial/radi1011.css">

--
Ron Symonds - Microsoft MVP (FrontPage)
Reply only to group - emails will be deleted unread.

http://www.rxs-enterprises.org/fp

 

[Malcolm Walker]

I was wondering about trying some negative padding where the spacing is
still wider that I would like. But I've made alterations and its
getting there slowly.

Yes I take your point about the paths to the _theme css files. But I
plead `Not guilty M'Lud' as they are written by FrontPage. I have
changed the theme to Arctic and cleared out the unwanted themes using
the tool in Reports. The navigation bar links display correctly in
Design view and pre-viewing in my browser. But on-line they are in
default mode and the CSS Error Console is on overtime! I am wondering
if this behaviour is the result of how I have constructed and am using
my DWT? Perhaps Rob Giordano has a point?

 

[Malcolm Walker]

As I am having problems with the Arctic theme I've used for the
navigation bar links you may be right that I am not using the DWT
effectively. But your `stark page' comment is not what I see either on
my system or on-line. Would you look again please if you have time?

 

[Rob Giordano \(Crash\)]

Looks different today, today it has a header, footer, content area, etc.
before it had no header or footer.


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





| As I am having problems with the Arctic theme I've used for the
| navigation bar links you may be right that I am not using the DWT
| effectively. But your `stark page' comment is not what I see either on
| my system or on-line. Would you look again please if you have time?
|
| Rob Giordano (Crash) wrote:
| > White space between which components? Not sure what you mean.
| >
| > Looks like you are not effectively using the DWT...the dwt would
normally be
| > a template of your webpage(s) including the header, footer, graphics,
etc.
| > and then editable spaces for your content. Your dwt is a stark page with
| > just editable content on it, kinda like an include page (which it also
has
| > on it)
| >
| >
| >
| >
| >

 

[Malcolm Walker]

Sorry about that - it must have been `in development' when you saw it
previously.

 

[Ronx]

Negative margins and padding are more likely to cause problems than to
solve them.
Try reducing the margins between paragraphs:

P {margin-top:.5em;margin-bottom:.5em;}

The default value for paragraph top and bottom margins is 1em.

As it stands, I see little wrong with either of your sites, except the
main column and right column need some separation.

The latest news column could (possibly) be improved by adding a border
around it.
Change:
<td class="usertoolbartextarea" valign="top"><h4 style="text-align:
center"><b><font size="2">Latest To
<td class="usertoolbartextarea" valign="top"><h4 style="text-align:
center"><div style="border:1px solid black;"><b><font size="2">Latest

And add the corresponding </div> at the end of the table cell.
--
Ron Symonds - Microsoft MVP (FrontPage)
Reply only to group - emails will be deleted unread.

http://www.rxs-enterprises.org/fp

 

[Malcolm Walker]

My thanks for your help and advice. They are both very much appreciated.

Malcolm