Publishing with Composer, Step by Step

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Publishing with Composer,
Step by Step
From your computer to GeoCities.us with one button, and what to do when the pictures break

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Composer has a button called Publish that sends your page and its pictures straight to your GeoCities.us space. It uses FTP, the same way the FTP programs do, but you never have to learn an FTP program. The settings it needs are the ones on the GeoCities.us File Manager page. Here's how I do it.

Before you click anything

Check these three things:

1. Your page and all of its pictures are in one folder on your computer.
2. Your front page is named index.html. That's the page visitors see when they type your address.
3. Your file names are all in small letters, with no spaces. The computers at the other end think Tater.GIF and tater.gif are two different files, even though Windows doesn't care.

The steps

1	Open your page in Composer and save it (File, Save). Composer won't publish changes you haven't saved.

2	Click Publish on the top row of buttons. A box opens.

3	Check the page title and file name at the top. The title is whatever you typed in Page Colors and Properties. The file name should be index.html for your front page.

4	Fill in where it goes. In the box for the location to publish to, type: `ftp://ftp.geocities.us/` Then put your GeoCities.us member name in the user name box and your member password in the password box. Those are the same ones you use to sign in to the Member Center. Capitals count.

5	Should you save the password? There's a box to check if you want Composer to remember it. On your own computer at home, fine. On a computer at work, the library or the front desk of a vet clinic, no.

6	Send the pictures too. Underneath is a list of other files to send along. Choose the one for the files associated with this page, and make sure every picture on your page is in the list and selected. If a picture isn't in the list, it isn't in your folder, and it's going to break. Stop and go fix that first.

7	Click OK and wait. If you're not on line, your modem will dial. A little window shows each file going up. Pictures take the longest. Get a cup of coffee, or let the dogs out.

8	Look at it on the Web. In Navigator, go to your own address, then hold down Shift and click Reload, so you're seeing the new page and not an old copy Navigator saved. Check every picture and every link.

The next time, Composer remembers where you published, so it's just steps 1, 2, 7 and 8. You can also set the location once and for all under Edit, Preferences, in the Composer section.

When the pictures break

You published, you go look, and where your Corgi should be there's a little box with a red X, or nothing at all. Don't panic. It's nearly always one of these, and they're all fixable. Go through them in order.

Fix 1: Look for the C: drive. In Navigator, with your page showing, go to View, Page Source. Look at every line that starts with <img. If any of them says file:///C|/, that picture is pointing at your own hard drive, and it will never show up for anybody else.

Wrong:
<img SRC="file:///C|/corgis/tater.gif"
 height=225 width=300>

Right:
<img SRC="tater.gif"
 height=225 width=300>

To fix it in Composer: double-click the picture to open its properties. In the box for the image location, erase everything except the file name itself, so it says just tater.gif. Make sure tater.gif really is in the same folder as your page. OK, save, and publish again. Do it for every picture with the C: drive in it.

Fix 2: Check the capitals. If the source says tater.gif and the file is named Tater.gif, it breaks on the Web even though it works at home. Rename the file in small letters, fix the page to match, and publish again.

Fix 3: Make sure the picture went up at all. Go to the File Manager in your Member Center and look at your list of files. If the picture isn't there, upload it right from the File Manager, which takes up to ten files at a time, no extra program needed.

Fix 4: Check the type of picture. Pictures for the Web have to be GIF or JPEG files (.gif or .jpg). If your scanner saved a photo as a .bmp or some other kind of file, open it in your paint program, save it again as a JPEG, and insert that one instead.

Fix 5: Reload properly. If you've fixed it and it's still broken, hold down Shift and click Reload. Navigator may be showing you the broken copy it saved last time.

If none of those work, write me and tell me your page's address. I'll take a look on my lunch hour. I've fixed broken Corgis for three people in Spokane and one in Wales, which I consider an honor.

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Last updated Saturday, September 11, 1999