I see you're "new to the game." Well, hang in there. Web development is not
easy, no matter how good your tools are. Most of the problem lies in the
fact that different browsers tend to interpret HTML differently. Also, as a
browser is a sizable window, the size of the viewport may vary from one
computer to another. Add screen resolution to that. Throw in a mix of
various browser versions, and the fact that HTML has "grown new features"
almost every year or 2 since its inception, and you have a real problem.
Is there a "true" WYIWYG way of creating a page visually without writing
code? Yes. But not without knowing anything about HTML, browsers, and the
WWW. FrontPage has all the tools you need, unless you want to get fancy, in
which case, you may have to learn a little HTML. But that's nothing to be
scared of. It's *not* programming code. It's markup. Just tags that specify
in plain text how different elements in the page should be formatted. Take a
look at the HTML view in FrontPage sometime. It's a great way to learn it.
Now, what do you have to know? Well, you probably have to know which
browsers you're targeting. Your best bet is to go with IE 6 and FireFox,
which is the most Mozilla of all the Mozilla browsers out there. You can
download FireFox for free. You may need to research what sorts of HTML are
supported by different browsers. Google is your friend.
Also, FrontPage
has browser compatibility settings that will disable any features not
supported by the browsers you target.
There are about 50 ways to skin the proverbial HTML cat. You can use tables
for positioning, or CSS (Cascading Style Sheets). It sounds like you're
using Layers, which is a proprietary term for HTML div elements that use
absolute CSS positioning. This can be tricky. But so can tables. Do you want
liquid or static layout? That is, do you want your table to remain the same
size no matter what, or scale to the size of the browser viewport? Each of
these has its positive and negative qualities, and you have to learn what
they are. If you're new to HTML, you might want to stick with tables for
layout for now.
Most of the rest of it, you'll have to research, study, and learn. When you
have a specific question, ask it here, and there are people here who can
help you with it. If you want help with the page you're talking about, post
the URL to it here, and we'll take a look at it, and possibly provide some
good advice. We're all here to help each other out.
And did I mention "hang in there?" ;-)
--
HTH,
Kevin Spencer
Microsoft MVP
..Net Developer
You can lead a fish to a bicycle,
but it takes a very long time,
and the bicycle has to *want* to change.
