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The Best Way to Learn XSitePro 2
- Watch the Getting Started Video online
- Read the Essentials Manual
- Read the Basic Tutorial
- Read the Advanced Tutorial
- Now you'll be able to use XSitePro 2 to publish a basic Web site.
- When you want to add an advanced feature, like RSS or an opt-in form, use the Tools Manual to
simply look up how to do what you want. It's arranged alphabetically to make it easy.
- The Right-Click Feature in XSitePro
Always remember that a huge percentage of XSitePro's features are accessed using the right
click option. So put your cursor where you want to do or add something, click your right mouse
button... and look at all the things you can do in version 2!
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Reporting Issues to XSitePro
Click here to report issues/bugs directly to XSitePro. It's also worth posting your issue in the forum, in case it's a usage issue, not an actual bug or
software problem.
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Broken Navigation Menus
Be aware that the length of the words in a link can break a fancy DHTML navigation menu by pushing it open
too wide. Example: There's a big difference between "About Us" and "About Humungous Construction Company."
With text links it will simply wrap and it might push your panel open wider, but it likely won't make a big
mess. With a DHTML graphical-type navigation menu, it could ruin the design.
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DHTML Menu is Not Showing Up At All
The DHTML menus in XSitePro V2 will not show up at all if no pages have that menu checked. Go
to Page Settings for each page and check the menus you want it to show up on.
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Sub-pages Not Showing Up in DHTML Menu
Same reason as above. Make sure the sub-pages have "Show in Left Navigation Menu" checked.
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How to Put a Border Around the Info Bar
Here is the CSS for adding a border to the Info Bar. Go to Other > Global Scripts > HEAD
section.
<style>
TD.XSP_INFO_BAR{border: 1px solid #000000;}
</style>
Important: Make sure there is some content in the Info Bar (Designer view) or the border will
not show up. Even if there's an empty paragraph <p></p>, you still need to add at least a
non-breaking space, e.g., <p> </p>. To do this, go to Page Layout > Info
Bar > Designer > Source.
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Info Bar Background
Image Repeating
The new template designs can be tricky to modify. If you add more text to the Info Bar, for example a
longer Company Name than in the sample, the background image might repeat. While there is a way to stop it
repeating using CSS, the simplest way is to reduce the amount of text or the font size of the content you
add to the Info Bar. To stop the background image repeating using CSS, you need to add this to Other >
Global Scripts > HEAD section.
<style>
TD.XSP_INFO_BAR {background-repeat: no-repeat;}
</syle>
Note: The design might still look broken even if the background image no longer repeats.
There might be unwanted white space at the bottom of the Info Bar, for example.
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How Do I Modify the
Default Templates Included with XSitePro?
This is a great tip shared by Rich Butterworth from Intellimon®.
Create a new Web site using a default XSitePro template that you like. Save it, then go to Other >
Resource Manager. Right click on the image you want to replace, e.g., header.jpg, background.gif, etc. Then
choose Copy Locally. Save the image to your hard drive and open it in an image editor like
Photoshop. Add your own Web site title, your USP, etc.
(Alternately, open the default image in Photoshop and note the dimensions, then substitute the default
image with an image of your own with the exact same dimensions.)
In either case above, save the image with the exact same name as the original. Then, in XSitePro, open
Other > Resource Manager and Add the new image to the "images" directory. When it asks if it's okay to
overwrite the existing image, say yes.
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How Do I Make My "Site
Search" Background Transparent?
Simply type the word "Transparent" (without the quotation marks) into Search Box
Design > Text Settings > Search Box > Background.
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How Can I
Test My New Web Site?
Intellimon© has provided users with some free Web space on their own server to test-publish
their Web sites. Details can be found in Lesson 10: Publishing Tab in the
Advanced Tutorial guide. The publishing information is:
Domain Name: www.xsitetest.com
Home Directory: johndoe [Your Name]
FTP Server: ftp.xsitetest.com
FTP Directory: johndoe [Your Name]
FTP User Name: testusername
FTP Password: testpassword
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How Can I Password Protect
My Product Download Pages?
A simple way to protect a download page that links to your ebook or other product is to use
the Password Redirect widget in XSitePro V2. To locate this in XSitePro, right click in
the Design tab and choose Widget Wizard > Miscellaneous > Password Redirect.
Note: This is not a foolproof security system, nor can the password be made unique for
each user as would be required for a membership site. For something like that you will need an application
like the highly-acclaimed DLGuard.
Thanks to Jason at Focus
7 Marketing for this tip:
Do NOT check the "Disallow" box on Other > Robots because, if you do, anyone can access your
robots.txt file and see what directories and files you're trying to protect... and then access
them! Instead leave the "Follow" and "Index" boxes UNCHECKED for your thank you and download pages and any
other pages you don't want indexed in the search engines. Leaving these boxes unchecked puts the following
code in the head section of your page: <meta name="robots" content="noindex,nofollow">.
More information on Password Redirect can be found in the XSitePro V2 manual: Book Two: Tools,
Password Redirect, p. 915.
Want to see YOUR robots.txt file? Type your domain name followed by robots.txt, like this
http://yourdomainname.com/robots.txt and it will open in
a text editor.
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Is there an easy way to copy
an entire page in XSitePro?
Ever want to duplicate a page in XSitePro for split testing purposes or to use as a template
for another page? Here's how: right click on the page name and choose "Copy Page." That will create a new
page exactly like your original page. It's easy!
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My image is broken (not
showing when I publish my site).
Check the Imape Properties and make sure your image was stored in the "images" directory.
Right click on your image in the Design view and check Image Properties > Attributes > Source.
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I am using one of
the XSitePro default templates. How do I change the company name and add my own?
There are three likely places you will find the header text in a default XSitePro template:
Page Layout > Header Panel > Designer
Page Layout > Info Bar > Designer
Page Layout > Left Panel > Designer
Sometimes the title you replace the original text with is longer and may break the design, so you may have
to reduce the font size, re-think your title, put your title on two lines, or even change the design to
accommodate your title (more difficult).
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How do I import a
custom-made template into XSitePro?
If you receive a custom-made template that was created using XSitePro, you should recieve a file from your
designer with an .xse extension. To import this file, simply use the Import function in XSitePro and
browse to the .xse file on your hard drive.
If, on the other hand, you recieve a "template" that is composed of one large .jpeg image, you can't
actually import it into XSitePro. Instead you will need to slice the image into the separate pieces for
each panel and add them in XSitePro manually. If the "template" arrives as a .psd file you can edit it in
Photoshop and shut off layers to extract background images, etc. This is much more complex than simply
popping a header graphic into the Header Panel, so I would suggest that you employ a Web designer
familiar with XSitePro to do this for you.
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My toolbar just disappeared
in XSitePro. How do I fix this?
This happens occasionally for some reason. Just close XSitePro and restart it. The toolbar will
reappear.
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How do I get my XSitePro site indexed quickly in Google?
Here are some legitimate ways to do this:
First, do not submit your Web site to Google directly! This will put you in Google's Sand
Box!
Backlinks: Get links to your site from sites that are already indexed by Google, such as
another of your sites, a friend's or colleague's site, a site that offers complementary information or
products (you may have to give a reciprocal link in return), your Web designer's site (we offer
this free to our clients), etc.
RSS: Add an XML feed using XSitePro's Widget (Insert XML Syndication Link) to your site so
people can get your articles via RSS. Make sure you submit your feed to a site like feedage.com to get it indexed.
Blogs: a) Add a blog to your Web site. Post a relevant blog article that includes a link
to your Web site. Make sure you "ping" your post. Here's how to manually get into Google's blog index:
http://blogsearch.google.com/ping.
b) Go to a blog with a topic related to your business and make a relevant comment. Many blogs are set up so
your URL is included in the comment.
Forums: Visit forums that talk about topics complementary to your Web site. Answer
questions and make relevant posts. Make sure you include a link to your Web site in your signature.
Articles: Submit articles to online article directories.
BUT, if you plan to publish the same article on your Web site, always publish it on
your site first and wait until it is indexed by Google, so Google will bring it up first in the
Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs).
Press Releases: Submit press releases to free online Press Release Distribution
Services.
DMOZ: Submit your Web site to DMOZ. DMOZ is a free open source search directory. A real
person will decide if your site will be included, so please make sure your site is complete and the best it
can be. The more your site looks like an authoritative, information-packed site the better chance it will
have.
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I'm having problems aligning
my Left Panel Navigation Menu
Left navigation issues often happen when you leave the menu width in the Menu Settings at
zero. Try setting it to the same pixel width as the Left Panel (e.g., 150px) and things should look a lot
better immediately.
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My right/left panel is not showing
the 1-pixel border I added using CSS
Borders on the right or left panel won't show up in some browsers (e.g., FireFox) unless
there is actual content in the panel. But when all you want is a 1-pixel border on the outside of that
panel, you don't want any real content in the panel. The trick is to simply add a <br> tag
(Shift-Enter) using the Designer > Design tab. You can also go into the Source tab and simply type
<br>.
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How do I highlight the
navigation link in the menu so the visitor knows which page they are on?
You will need to use a DHTML menu for this. Static menu choices will not show the active
page.
Go to Menu Settings > Step 3: Settings > Main Menu Option (Selected). Choose the font and background
colour you want to use to indicate in the navigation menu the current/active page that the visitor is
on.
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How can I add a Comments
box to my email form?
Right click and open the Forms Wizard. Choose "Standard email
address (using PHP)." The form will also include First Name, Last Name and Email fields (you can remove the
Last Name field only). You will need to use the Settings > Add Extra Form Inputs (e.g., Text Box, 4
Rows) option to add a Comments box for the visitor to type into. You can also remove the Last Name field
here.
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Can I use the Banner Rotator
for my header?
Yes, you can use the Banner Rotator feature in the Widget Wizard to rotate different headers.
Make all your headers the exact same size, e.g., 900px X 150px.
Go to Page Layout > Header. Make sure the Color option is set to Transparent. Then choose the Avanced
Header option. Set the height to 150 (or whatever your header height is). Leave padding at zero. Now open
the Designer and go into the Design view.
Right click and choose Widget Wizard > Images > Banner Rotator. Choose Edit Settings > Add New
Banner. Uncheck "Use standard banner size" (important!). Enter the location of header #1 on your hard
drive. For the URL, simply type the URL of your Home page (e.g., index.html) and ignore the Insert
Affiliate Link button. This will mean that if the header is clicked from any page, the visitor will be
taken back to your Home page, as they should be. Keep adding headers until you have added all your
versions. Just make sure the URL is the Home page for each one.
Tip: Go into the Source view in the Designer and make sure there's nothing else there
except the token for the banner rotator. Remove any <p></p> tags and non-breaking spaces
( ).
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Things You Never Thought You
Could Do with the Category Heading
To add a category header, go to Web Pages > Other > Category Heading.
In the Category Name field you can add HTML and CSS so you can pretty much do anything you want. You can
add padding, a border, a background colour, a background image, a bullet image, etc. Some of these things
you can do in the Appearance and Background sections, but anything additional you want to do, you can do
directly in the Category Name field.
You can also use the Category Heading to add a space between sections of your navigation menu. Just put the
break tag <br> or a non-breaking space ( ) in the Category Name field and nothing else.
You can use the Category Heading to put a line under another Category Heading or between sections of your
navigation menu. You can use the <hr> tag for the line and fancy it up by changing the size and
colour, like this:
<hr size="4" color="red">
The colour may not show up in all browsers, so be prepared to see a gray line in some browsers (it's the
default horizontal rule colour).
However, it's more versatile to use CSS for the line. This code will produce a red, dotted line:
<div style="border-top: 4px dotted red;"><div>
You can even add an image or button in the middle of your navigation menu that links to a page on your Web
site or to another Web site! Just make sure the image is in your Resource Manager.
<a href="order-page.html"><img src="images/red-order-button.gif" border="0"></a>
Remember, in each case, you are adding the HTML or CSS to the Category Name
field.
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Yes, keywords can be
entered as a comma-delineated list.
If you copy a list of keywords with commas between them, and paste them into the Keywords box on the Page
Settings tab, XSitePro will automatically convert this into a list with one keyword or keyword phrase on
each line.
keyword one,keyword two,keyword three
The above will automatically become:
keyword one
keyword two
keyword three
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How do I Preview in
multiple browsers?
Until the companies providing browsers sit down and agree on standards as to how all browsers
will render HTML (including CSS), there are going to be discrepancies. FireFox is stricter in the way it
renders HTML (it adheres closer to the W3C standards), IE is more forgiving.
Check your Preview in multiple browsers like this:
In XSP, hit Preview (your default browser will come up, e.g., Internet Explorer). Check out how your site
looks in your default browser. Now copy the link that shows up in the address field in your default browser
(e.g., file:///C:/Users/Username/Documents/XSitePro-Data/Preview/31/index.html).
Open your secondary browser (e.g., FireFox)
and copy and paste that link into the address field. Hit enter and voila, you can view the same code in
another browser without having to change the default browser settings.
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How to use CSS to add a
shadow to an image in XSitePro.
Here is an awesome tutorial at "A List Apart" on how to add a shadow using CSS. It works
perfectly in XSitePro. "A List Apart" even provides you with the shadow image! http://www.alistapart.com/articles/cssdropshadows/
