Previewing Your Pages

We test all of our templates in as many of the current browsers as possible before they are added to our catalog. This testing lets us know quickly if something doesn't look quite right in a particular browser.

Before you place your web pages onto your web host's server, you should always preview each and every page in as many browsers as possible. For most of you, this will be IE7, Firefox 3, and possibly the latest version of Opera.  To do this, go to File > Preview in Browser and choose your options from the menu.

If you want to go the extra mile, you can subscribe to a service like BrowserCam.com that offers screenshots in dozens of possible scenarios, or you can choose a free service like BrowserShots.org.

While we all love surprises, it is wise to know beforehand if that long hyperlink or panoramic image you inserted is going to break your page layout. These kind of surprises we can all live without.

Test, test again, and then test once again.

Good Old Internet Explorer...?

Depending on your operating system (XP or Vista) and your version of Internet Explorer, it is highly probable that when you preview your local web pages you will receive a prompt that looks like the following:

To help protect your security, Internet Explorer has restricted this webpage from running scripts or ActiveX controls that could access your computer. Click here for options...

When you click, choose to allow this content. If you choose to not allow the content, some elements will not work.

Our templates contain some script tags, but absolutely nothing that is harmful or malicious! Some CSS may be contained within script tags, the javascript calendar has script tags, drop-down menus have script tags. Until Internet Explorer stops treating everyone like idiots, this is a nuisance that you have to live with.

Note that this warning applies only to pages viewed locally and not your pages once uploaded to the server.

Images, Links and Internet Explorer

There have been reports from users who add new images and then go to File > Preview in Browser but cannot see the new images. Others have reported that new hyperlinks do not work. This is a documented IE7/IE8 bug. At this time there is no fix, so we have to wait for a future update that hopefully clears this up.

We recommend that you also have the FireFox browser on your computer and preview your site in this browser. You will notice that your new images are in place and are as they should be. (It's always a good practice to preview your web in both IE and FireFox.)

When you publish your web, your images will be visible, your links will work correctly, and the issue will be resolved. Note that this only affects your local web until you publish and it does not affect anyone viewing your site.

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