Contents:
• Review
• Getting Ready
• Using Background Images
• Changing Text Colors
• Creating the Links Page
• Creating the Vitae Page
• Creating the Sketchpad Page
• Creating Links to all pages
• Working with the Links Page
• Working with the Vitae Page
• Working with the Files Page
• Publishing your work

Yesterday we covered getting started in Netscape Composer, editing text, grabbing images off the web, inserting images in our pages, creating links to other websites, creating bulleted lists, creating an email link, previewing pages and publishing pages (whew!).

Today, we will cover the following: using background images, changing text color for an entire page, creating a site with multiple pages that link together, copying from one page to another, creating a table, and if time, creating a linked menu within a page (like the one above).
 

Getting Ready

• Begin by opening Netscape Composer.
• Go to the page we created and published yesterday (http://php.indiana.edu/~username/welcome.htm     be sure to use the same capitalization as you did when you saved your welcome page)
• Save your welcome page to the C: drive (in either the temp or scratch folder) so you can work on it locally.

You can use any image to be a background, but you do want to be careful that you don't overwhelm your page visually, Remember, the whole purpose of a web page is to communicate information -- you don't want the background or color scheme to get in the way of that purpose. Sometimes less really is more. With that warning . . .for now, you can use one of the following backgrounds for your page.

• To use an image as wallpaper, place your cursor over the image you want, and right click.
• Choose "Save Image as ..." from the pop up menu.
• Save the image in the same place you saved your Welcome page (you may change the name of the image if you want, but it must end in either .gif or .jpg).
• Go to your Welcome page and from the File menu, select Edit Page (this will put you into the Composer)
• From the Format menu, select Page Colors and Properties.
• Click on the Colors and Backgrounds tag.
• Identify the background image by name or by browsing.

 


 

Now you have a background! Now, you may not be able to read anything. That's okay, its easy to switch text colors in Composer (note: if this will be a page that people will want to print out, test the combination for printability before publishing your work).

• Go back to Page Colors and Properties under the Format menu.
• Select Colors and Backgrounds.
• Choose the colors you want for normal text, link text, active link text (what the link color changes to as you click on it), and visited link text.
• If you would like your background to be a solid color as opposed to a tiled image, then select the background color you want as well and delete the filename of the background image.

• From the File menu, choose New -- Blank Page.
• Type Favorite Links at the top of the page.
• From the File menu, choose Save As.
• In the Save dialog box, type the filename links.htm (make sure to save it in the same folder on the C: as the rest of your pages and images).
• In the Title dialog box, type Favorite Links.

• From the File menu, choose New -- Blank Page.
• Type Curriculum Vitae at the top of the page.
• From the File menu, choose Save As.
• In the Save dialog box, type the filename vita.htm (make sure to save it in the same folder on the C: as the rest of your pages and images).
• In the Title dialog box, type Curriculum Vitae.

• From the File menu, choose New Blank -- Blank Page.
• Type My Files at the top of the page.
• From the File menu, choose Save As.
• In the Save dialog box, type the filename sketchpad.htm (make sure to save it in the same folder on the C: as the rest of your pages and images).
• In the Title dialog box, type Sketchpad Files.

The easiest way to create all the links that are needed to enable easy navigation within the site is to make one set of links, where all the pages are included. Then, you can copy the set of links, and paste it onto all the pages. Then you can, on each page, remove self-referring links.

• Go to the Welcome Page.
• Type the titles of all your pages in a single line, something like this:

[Welcome Page] [Favorite Links] [Curriculum Vitae] [Sketchpad Files]
 

• Use the mouse to select the first title, the Welcome Page.
• From the Insert Menu, choose Link or click on the Link button in the toolbar.
• Type the filename you chose for your Welcome Page (welcome.htm) into the text box with the caption "Link to a page location or local file." Since this will be refering to a local file, you do not need the http:// in front of the filename. Now, the first title should appear as a link.

[Welcome Page] [Favorite Links] [Curriculum Vitae] [Sketchpad Files]

• Select the title Favorite Links.
• From the Insert menu, choose Link or click on the Link button in the toolbar.
• Type the filename you chose for your Links Page (links.htm) into the text box.
• Select the title Curriculum Vitae.
• From the Insert Menu, choose Link or click on the Link button in the toolbar.
• Type the filename you chose for your C. V. Page (vitae.htm) into the text box.
• Select the title Sketchpad Files.
• From the Insert menu, choose Links or click on the Link button in the toolbar.
• Type the filename you chose for your Sketchpad Page (sketchpad.htm) into the text box.

[Welcome Page] [Favorite Links] [Curriculum Vitae] [My Files]

• If you have not saved your Welcome Page, do that now.
• Select the whole line with the links.
• From the Edit menu, choose Copy.
• Go to your Links Page.
• Put the cursor at the bottom of the page and choose Paste from the Edit menu.
• Save the Links Page.
• Go to your Vitae Page.
• Put the cursor at the bottom of the page and choose Paste from the Edit menu.
• Save the Vitae Page
• Go to your Sketchpad Page.
• Put the cursor at the bottom of the page and choose Paste from the Edit menu.
• Save the Sketchpad Page.

When you have finished this part, you should go to your Welcome Page and use the Preview button to test it out. Try the links! If you have followed all the steps above, they should work.

 
Working with the Links Page

Go to the links page, and begin by changing the background.  Use the same picture background as you used on the Welcome Page (if you want to keep it simple), or choose a different one.  Then, create a table for your favorite links by doing the following.
From the Insert menu, choose Table or click the Table button on the toolbar.
In the dialog box, you can choose the number of rows, number of columns, choose how big the table will be (as a percentage of the window), and so forth.
Choose to make a table with 3 columns and 4 rows, and make the width of the table 80% of the window.
Type into each cell in the table the name of a web site you visit often (just type a few for now, you can always finish it out later).  If you want, you can copy the links you already have on your Welcome page into your table (the link should copy as well as the text).Your table should look something like this:
 

Indiana University	Area 10 TechPrep Program	The University of Texas
The Center for Excellence in Education	Enrique's Home page	Dallas Cowboys
IU Education Library	NCTM	Austin, Texas
IU School of Education	Instructional Systems Technology Dept.	Disney

Now, you need to turn the text in each cell into a link.

• Select the text.
• From the insert menu, choose Link (or click the Link button from the toolbar).
• Type the URL you link should refer to (or paste the URL into the text box). Remember to begin the URL with http://

Your table should now look something like this:
 

Indiana University	Area 10 Mathematics and Technology Program	The University of Texas
The Center for Excellence in Education	Enrique's Home page	Dallas Cowboys
IU Education Library	NCTM	Austin, Texas
IU School of Education	Instructional Systems Technology Dept.	Yahoo

 
In each cell, add a paragraph of description, and mention anything that people need to know before they follow your links. You might find that you have to highlight some of your description and "unlink" it (select it, click the link button and delete the link reference). Your final table might look something like this . . .
 

Indiana University  My home for the last four years. So what's a "Hoosier" anyway?	Area 10 Mathematics and Technology Program  What a fun group of people!	The University of Texas  My alma mater.  Hook 'em Horns!!!!!
The Center for Excellence in Education  Suite 2100 - Teaching and Learning about technology applications in education	Enrique's Home page  Enrique Galindo -- The man, the legend!	Dallas Cowboys  I know, the team you love to hate. But I grew up in the days of Stauback and Lilly, so their still my boys.
IU Education Library	NCTM  National Council of Teachers of Mathematics	Austin, Texas  Home
IU School of Education	Instructional Systems Technology Dept.	Yahoo

 
 
You should know that images can be links just like text.  Try, for example, to save the following images to the folder where you are keeping your work, inserting them into your link page (at the bottom), and making them into links to your other pages.

Once the picture is inserted, you select it, choose Link from the Insert menu, and the rest is just like when you created text links.

Even an animated GIF, like the little dog could be a a link.

When you are happy with your table, your page is ready.  Make sure you save your work regularly.
 

Working with the Vitae Page

Open the Vita Page, and write a few paragraphs about what you have been up to for the past few years.  Then use the text to experiment with the different formatting options in Netscape Composer.  You must decide how you want the text to look, and you should feel free to try different fonts, different sizes, different alignments, different colors, etc.  Remember to save your work regularly.
 

Working with the Sketchpad Page

You will work use this page later when you learn how to share your Sketchpad work on the web.
 

Publishing Your Work

When you have completed your work, you should publish each page to your ezinfo account so other people can see them. You need to transfer the four pages, and the images that are used. Use the Publish feature to ship them to your ezinfo account. The connection you need to make is to ftp://ezinfo.ucs.indiana.edu/N/fs#/username/Ezinfo/www .  Then the URL of the welcome page should be http://php.indiana.edu/~username/welcome.htm