Subdirectories Strange Behavior

I've figured how to get the subdirectories working, but there is something strange going on. Some of the links on the webpages I've uploaded require that I manually add the subdirectory "famhist," while with other links the subdirectory "famhist" is automatically added to that link.

Is this normal behavior, or is there a bug? This is quite annoying, because now I have to always check all the links on all my webpages on the Internet to find out which ones are not working properly, then open up those webpages that need fixing, and manually add the subdirectory.

The webpages that I'm working on now are all in the same folder, and are linked to each other. You can check out the webpages that I'm having difficulty with by starting here:

http://www.vjandrews.com/famhist/andrewsfamhist.html

You can see the subdirectory that I am talking about, "famhist." When I first began moving the webpages from the original directory to the new one, I added "famhist" to all of the links, and checked them, and they were working just fine.

Then last night, I started running into links that wouldn't load. I realized that the subdirectory "famhist" was duplicated in many of the links, "/famhist/famhist" which was why the webpages would not load from some of the links. There was nothing wrong with the webpages, just the links with the double subdirecty, "/famhist/famhist."

So, I've been manually fixing the problem by deleting the subdirectory "famhist" altogether, which is strange. Why would I need to add the subdirectory "famhist" in the first place, then have to manually delete it later?

Is this a bug, or am I still doing something incorrect? Thanks.

-- vja4Him

I didn't see any double directories. But then I didn't check the second page yet either.
A few things come to mind. Remove most of that white space, that increases the file size for no reason. If you want a gap to make it easier for you to see what is happening, then try 1 or 2 spaces.
Typefaces, most of the ones you listed are not on everyones computer. Especially those from Apple. When possible try to stick with defaults, like serif, sans-serif, times, helvetica.
I see that most images are using relative links while your clickable links are absolute links. Try to use one or the other, just for consistancy.
A few images at the bottom of the page do not display, check for location, right now the the link is pointing to an image in the same directory as your webpage.
Silk

I fixed all the double directories manually, so you won't see them anymore. I'm not sure what you mean by the "white space."

I'm still trying to figure out how to change the spacing on some webpages back to single spacing. I don't know what happened. I must have clicked on something .....

I'm using Nvu to create webpages. Can't afford to buy anything. I'll experiment with changing some of the typefaces, but I like to have a variety to emphasize certain ideas .......

I don't even know what relative and absolute links are! I know that some of the images are not working. I believe those are for things like guestpages, webrings, or animated gifs. For some reason, those images didn't transfer over to some of the pages I simply copied, or did a "Save As," to create a new duplicate webpage.

Any ideas ..... thanks.

-- vja4Him

When you view your page via a web browser, they have an option to view the source code.
When viewing your code, I see maybe one or rwo lines of code then nothing just like you held down the enter key in a word processor, then a couple more line etc.
Even new lines when they are blank create data. Not much but it is wasteful, especially when you need to deal with users on dialup and small server space. It is just good practice thats all, not really anything wrong with it.
As for absolute vs. relative... An absolute address would be http://www.example.com/directory/filename.html whereas relative would be ../directory/filename.html
The difference is say you renamed your domain name. With relative, you are done, no need to edit your webpages, however with absolute, you have to change every occurance that refers to the old domain name. Relative links are for your domain only, linking to other domains, still require the absolute address.
Here's another peice of advice, you can use it or forget it, that up to you. Buy a couple of html books, and dump Nvu. For a long time I used frontpage, I heard others on this forum recommend dumping frontpage and just use a word processor.
At first I thought, they were nuts, I love the idea of clicking on a spot on the screen and then load image.
It wasn't until I started learning the scripting language php, that I realized, how much the editors were holding me back. When ever I was done creating a web page with frontpage, I then had to double check and make sure it did not add or change any html. It had a nasty habit of taking the code I just entered and replacing it with its own code, which was of no use to me as I do not use the extentions on the DH server. And to use that code, it required those extentions.

Well, I guess I am going overboard in details, but just buying those books and practicing using a word processor, like wordpad, and it won't be long and you will be creating page more than likely better than Nvu will. While you are at it, check thread in web design, http://discussion.dreamhost.com/showflat.pl?Cat=&Board=forum_webdesign&Number=45189&page=0&view=collapsed&sb=5&o=14&part= Jessey has a very nice beginner's tutorial on html.
Edit: check out the next thread http://discussion.dreamhost.com/showflat.pl?Cat=&Board=forum_beginners&Number=45376&page=0&view=collapsed&sb=5&o=14&part=1#Post45380 it talk a little about Nvu and the image links.
Silk

Edited by silkrooster on 05/06/06 00:42 AM (server time).

I didn't look at your site's code, but it could be that you're not being consistent with relative link syntax. If you use a link with a leading slash ("/famhist/yourpage.html"), it will be treated as relative to the root of your site, while if you use one without a leading slash ("famhist/yourpage.html"), it will be regarded as relative to the current directory. That could be what's causing your problem.

-- Dan

I've been very careful when I insert links, but I still have problems with links not working, then I'll add the subdirectory, and the link will be working, then later it won't work, and I'll have to delete the subdirectory, then it works again!

Strange .... seems like DreamHost automatically adds the subdirectory sometimes, and sometimes not.

-- vja4Him

Dreamhost shouldn't be adding or deleting anything to your URLs, but depending on what form of absolute or relative reference you're using, and on what base page URL the links are found, they might behave differently in different contexts.

More info on relative/absolute URLs:
http://webtips.dan.info/url.html


-- DanEdited by dtobias on 05/23/06 04:22 PM (server time).