Viewing Thread:
"Urusei Machie"

This is where I post problems and questions while I work on my Language/Travel website.

Link coming soon =)

Ah wonderful cjh :D thank you for that, and your presentation is quite impressive. I think that's 2 problems solved now. I'll just have to check over the date scripts and see if I can get them working.

Hmmm... wrote:
> From previous posts I thought you were nearly ready to launch?!?
>
> From some of these queries it looks like you have a fair way to
> go ;¬(

heh, these are either new things I thought up since then or issues like the 3 column thing, which I put off in the design but would really like to use. I think I even used tables for one page :(

The polls I wanted to do before but had problems but Garin said he can help me. Which hopefully he can because over the two weeks I've prepared a years worth already. A new poll every week, one for the langauge section, one for the travel section and a few others. So that's a few hundred polls ready.

My new deadline is the 18th December, though I'll try and get it up sooner. :)

As soon as I finish the title graphic I'll set up the coming soon page.

Afternoon all, and hey Machie, how's it going :)

Well, where to start? Let's get the basics out of the way first ...

Machie:
"Okay not sure how this might be done. I have an image that when clicked, takes you to another page."

This will be just like a regular link, expect rather than just put a bit of text between the <a> element, you'd need to add the <img> element, for example:

<a href="link.htm">[B]<img src="[I]image.jpg[/I]" alt="my image">[/B]</a>

Nice an easy :)

I'll let Garin field the Daily Image/Link change feature query, as I don't want to step on any toes if he's already putting together something.

Machie:
"I tried the code, it came up with 10:26am o11 19th November 2006 Rather odd, it changed the 'n' into '11' for some reason."

It did this because n is a special character within the date function (it gets replaced with the month as a number, 11 being the 11th month, November) ... so you need to escape this letter with a back-slash, so you'd need <?=date('g:ia o\n jS F Y',time())?>. To be safe, you can also escape the 'o', just in case later versions of PHP make use of it.

For the other two layouts, try:

<?=date('l jS F Y',time())?>
<?=date('g:ia \o\n l',time())?>

... or if PHP short tags is off:

<?php echo date('l jS F Y',time());?>
<?php echo date('g:ia \o\n l',time());?>

Machie:
"This of course is a waste and I know there's a simple way to do this instead."

You can refer to a group of styles by more than one name, so for your example, you could do:

[B].menu, [U]menu2[/U][/B] {
font-family: arial;
font-size: 16px;
font-weight: bold;
}

.menu { color:#888888; }
.menu2 { color:#FFFFFF; }

or

[B].menu, [U].menu2[/U][/B] {
font-family: arial;
font-size: 16px;
font-weight: bold;
[I]color:#888888;[/I] /*set colour*/
}

.menu2 {
color:#FFFFFF; /*override colour*/
}

Glad to hear someone may find one of my guides useful :) But if you get stuck, of I've missed something, could you post it in that thread, rather than this one, so others can see it too?

From previous posts I thought you were nearly ready to launch?!?

From some of these queries it looks like you have a fair way to go ;¬(

3 columns in CSS

I mastered 2 columns no problem, float left, float right easy peasy. But when it came to 3 columns I could never get them to work and they'd mess up. :( Is there a simple way to have 3 columns and be able to change their width etc.

4 columns in CSS

Same as above but with 4 :)

Polls

Okay this one is my Holy Grail, I've been after it since April and it's now almost late November :) It's quite simple, a question, the choices, a submit button, a text link to results underneath. The results appear on a seperate page, and displayed in bar graphs. I suppose I can use php. I think Garin said he might be able to help me with this :-) Doesnt need to be advanced though I would like it to stop people from voting more than once.

Print This / Email This

You see these on lots of sites. Most of them seem to be in popups, my question is how come popup blockers dont block these? Or do some block them and I should stick them on their own page? The 'Print This' is simple enough just another page without all the graphics but the 'Email This' I wouldnt know how to send content. I mean I've done forms before but they send me information, not the other way around.

Comments

This one I'd like to have for my blog, news and polls. However I think I should look at some scripts to see what control I can have over the comments as I wont be able to monitor them all the time and I'd like some protection from spammers. I suppose I should do it in php also? Something like this would be fine link well maybe not in text bubbles :P but the main article at the top, followed by the comments, and then the form at the bottom to add your own comment. With name and email required. Oh a preview would be nice but not important.

Fewer Styles

The h1, h2, h3 thingies are important to search engines I read somewhere. So I have to use them for my main titles/buttons etc. I've noticed that I tend to create too many styles. For instance I might have two styles but the only difference between them is their colour, one black one white. This of course is a waste and I know there's a simple way to do this instead.

Example...

.menu {
font-family: arial;
font-size: 16px;
font-weight: bold;
color:#888888;
}

.menu2 {
font-family: arial;
font-size: 16px;
font-weight: bold;
color:#FFFFFF;
}

----

Okay a few more problems, I'll do a quick search on some of them to see if I can solve them myself. There are some main features there so hopefully it'll be small problems after all these are done. Like using image maps, which I think cjh has already done for me :)

Well I was hoping to avoid php but I guess I can't :-D

I tried the code, it came up with

"10:26am o11 19th November 2006"

Rather odd, it changed the 'n' into '11' for some reason.

I think I want two version.

- Sunday 19th November 2005
- 10:32AM* on Sunday

12 hour clock

The first, for the main page (maybe) and the latter for people working out their time zones.

Can I get the servers time on here too? I want it for the main UK page. As not everyone has the correct time on their PC.

I think I would also need the servers time so I can do a "what time is it in X" page. So for Singapore it would have to be [server time]+8hrsAM/PM on [date]. Hopefully that wont be too difficult to do.

----
RE:Daily Image

I'd like to keep it simple but I'm worried that in the end I might have 5+ of these daily changing images running. Which might be too much for an admin area. I'd be fine modifying a text file though :-) Can I have a look at the code please Garin?

While I wait I'll play around with that time display to see if I can get it to display what I want. ^^

Machie wrote:
> Just testing the javascript now for the user time. Is PHP the
> only way I can display the serve time? Or could I use a Perl
> script instead? The server time is for my UK main page, the user
> time is for the section on timezones.

PHP is an easier way to do it as you can embed it in your page. You can do it via Perl too but then you need to use server side includes as well. So in my opinion, its best to just change the file extension on your pages to .php (which you'll need to do anyway for other dynamic elements) and then can just put
<?=date('g:ia on jS F Y',time())?>
which displays 11:30pm on 18th Novemenber 2006 I think. If you want to change the format, have a look at the table on this page http://uk.php.net/date and just replace the characters between the ' ' as needed.

> So I wanted to do it daily for my site as something a little fun
> for users, but I'm not sure I'd be able to come online daily and
> change it manually (especially if I'm travelling), so it would
> be nice to have something in place to do it for me. "What
> country is this?" title, then the map (which should change
> daily) and clicking the map will take you to the countries
> profile page. So I guess it's a queue rather than a rotation.

Easy enough then, it depends how much effort you want to go into in regards to administrating it. If you want an admin area for it you can find numerous image rotation scripts in php which should be easy enough to modify. If you're happy enough just modifying a text file every so often I can show you the code for it as its quite trivial.

Just tried that code, it works, but it needs some editing. Just need the one time :S

"Your Local Time: 23:16 on Saturday
Website Business Office: 18:16 on Saturday"

Thanks guys :)

Just testing the javascript now for the user time. Is PHP the only way I can display the serve time? Or could I use a Perl script instead? The server time is for my UK main page, the user time is for the section on timezones.

@Garin

No rotation really. I'm borrowing ideas from IMDB, where they have the quote of the day thing. Well in the quiz I did a question where they had to give the name of the country by looking at the map of it.

So I wanted to do it daily for my site as something a little fun for users, but I'm not sure I'd be able to come online daily and change it manually (especially if I'm travelling), so it would be nice to have something in place to do it for me. "What country is this?" title, then the map (which should change daily) and clicking the map will take you to the countries profile page. So I guess it's a queue rather than a rotation.

Hope this gives you an idea of what I'm doing, I have other uses for it too though. Like a "picture of the day" for my photography, clicking it will take you to a bigger version.

In the quiz the answer was India, most got it right

Machie wrote:
> Daily Image/Link change feature

Yes its possible, can do it via javascript or server side (PHP). You'd need to explain a little more how you'd want the rotation to work before can advise further though.