Text has disappeared

[Bill Anderson]

Back in 2005 I used FrontPage 2003 to create a website for a friend and
I've had it online ever since. It's a simple site with several pages
containing pictures and text. It looked fine in 2005.

The other day my friend contacted me to complain that while all the
pictures and banners and navigation buttons were still where they're
supposed to be on the website, all the text had disappeared!

I checked and sure enough, he was right. I did discover, though, that
all the text really was there -- it was just invisible. If I used my
mouse to highlight text areas, the text would appear -- highlighted.

Weird. So I opened the site in FrontPage (it was still on my hard
drive) and everything looked fine -- all the text appeared where it was
supposed to be. So I re-published, and still no text appeared online.
So I tried something quick and simple -- I just changed the theme on
every page and re-published. OK, now I had text online and all was
well. Problem solved. Really weird.

Then my friend asked whether he could download the entire website,
presumably so he could have a copy for posterity, in case my website
ever acts up again or even goes offline permanently because I fail to
pay my service provider or whatever. That's a reasonable request, but
my friend had forgotten that back in 2005 I gave him a copy of the
website on CD. And now he's lost it.

No problem, I have a copy of that CD myself, so I can just burn him a
copy and send it to him. So just to check, I loaded my copy of the CD
and opened it in Windows Explorer and I double-clicked index.htm and the
home page opened in Firefox and guess what? All the text had gone
invisible on my CD's copy of the website.

Now before you ask, let me assure you that all the text appeared fine
back in 2005, both online and on CD. Lots of people on lots of
computers viewed the website back then and nobody reported invisible
text. So something has changed in the years since. Anybody have an
idea what it could be? Have the recent versions of Firefox and Internet
Explorer changed anything that would cause them to be unable to display
text I created in 2005? That's more than weird -- that's just wrong.

But what else could the problem be? I was running WinXP back then and
I'm running Win7 now. And, and ... what else? The files on the CD
certainly haven't changed. So why can't I see text on the CD using 2011
software? Help?

 

[Ronx]

After serious thinking Bill Anderson wrote :

Back in 2005 I used FrontPage 2003 to create a
website for a friend and I've had it online
ever since. It's a simple site with several
pages containing pictures and text. It looked
fine in 2005.

The other day my friend contacted me to
complain that while all the pictures and
banners and navigation buttons were still where
they're supposed to be on the website, all the
text had disappeared!

I checked and sure enough, he was right. I did
discover, though, that all the text really was
there -- it was just invisible. If I used my
mouse to highlight text areas, the text would
appear -- highlighted.

Weird. So I opened the site in FrontPage (it
was still on my hard drive) and everything
looked fine -- all the text appeared where it
was supposed to be. So I re-published, and
still no text appeared online. So I tried
something quick and simple -- I just changed
the theme on every page and re-published. OK,
now I had text online and all was well.
Problem solved. Really weird.

Then my friend asked whether he could download
the entire website, presumably so he could have
a copy for posterity, in case my website ever
acts up again or even goes offline permanently
because I fail to pay my service provider or
whatever. That's a reasonable request, but my
friend had forgotten that back in 2005 I gave
him a copy of the website on CD. And now he's
lost it.

No problem, I have a copy of that CD myself, so
I can just burn him a copy and send it to him.
So just to check, I loaded my copy of the CD
and opened it in Windows Explorer and I
double-clicked index.htm and the home page
opened in Firefox and guess what? All the text
had gone invisible on my CD's copy of the
website.

Now before you ask, let me assure you that all
the text appeared fine back in 2005, both
online and on CD. Lots of people on lots of
computers viewed the website back then and
nobody reported invisible text. So something
has changed in the years since. Anybody have
an idea what it could be? Have the recent
versions of Firefox and Internet Explorer
changed anything that would cause them to be
unable to display text I created in 2005?
That's more than weird -- that's just wrong.

But what else could the problem be? I was
running WinXP back then and I'm running Win7
now. And, and ... what else? The files on the
CD certainly haven't changed. So why can't I
see text on the CD using 2011 software? Help?

The browsers have changed - they now obey the CSS
rules used by some FP themes.

Some themes use "color:transparent" for text in
the CSS - older browsers ignored "transparent"
(did not understand the word) and used the
default colour (usually black) or whatever colour
has been used before in the CSS for that HTML
element. Modern browsers, however, do understand
transparent, and apply it - thus text with the
style color:transparent applied takes on the
background colour (that is allows the backround
to show through), and disappears.

The solution, as you have found, is to change the
theme - either with a new theme without that
style, or modify an existing theme to change that
style.

--
Ron Symonds - Microsoft MVP (Expression Web)
http://www.rxs-enterprises.org/fp/wf-menu.aspx

http://www.rxs-enterprises.org/fp/newsgroup-closure.aspx
for details of alternative forums

 

[Bill Anderson]

After serious thinking Bill Anderson wrote :








The browsers have changed - they now obey the CSS rules used by some FP
themes.

Some themes use "color:transparent" for text in the CSS - older browsers
ignored "transparent" (did not understand the word) and used the default
colour (usually black) or whatever colour has been used before in the
CSS for that HTML element. Modern browsers, however, do understand
transparent, and apply it - thus text with the style color:transparent
applied takes on the background colour (that is allows the backround to
show through), and disappears.

The solution, as you have found, is to change the theme - either with a
new theme without that style, or modify an existing theme to change that
style.

Thanks for the explanation, Ron. Cascading Style Sheets, huh? I
remember hearing something about the changes involving CSS, but I never
thought to check all my older websites. By luck my key websites were
unaffected, and this seldom-viewed one slipped by me. I'll fix up a new
CD for my friend.