I'm building a new website for myself and soon I need to do another one for school so I thought it would be nice to learn CSS and use it. Now I've done some basic tutorials which explain about how things work but I can't find a good tutorial on how the implementation works. There are some sites which offer designs and the code but I'm not looking for that.

For example something I've been searching for is how to do the links. I have a menu with links and a box with the content of the site. What's the proper implementation of this. Make an inline frame in the box and use it, write a number of html files which each contain the content for a link + the menu which all link to 1 style sheet, a mix of both?

Hope somebody can help me [img]smile.gif[/img]

<span style="color: lightblue">What DOCTYPE are you working in?

Use dreamweaver or MS Frontpage. It saves you alot of trouble.

<span style="color: lightblue">No, those tend to cause more trouble than they solve. Especially Frontpage. They can be handy sometimes, but there is simply no excuse for making webpages without knowing atleast basic XHTML and CSS.

Is this a simple project that isn't for a computers class, then just skip the whole programming designing thing and go to geocities or 20fr or something like that.

<span style="color: lightblue">Geocities? GEOCITIES? Sir Degrader, please go wash your mouth out. [img]tongue.gif[/img]
Whether or not it is a school project doesn't matter: sites which are made solely using these "easy ways" are always inferior. Always.
No, the only tools for Webdesign are Vim and a validator.

There are so many ways to go... it's almost ridiculous.

First off, are you a programmer-type? If so, then consider CSS to be equivalent to a set of includes or subroutines (leastways, that's how I understand and have used them). If not, then consider them to be a way to store things that you use repetitively (like defining backgrounds, fonts, and so on) so that you can have it in one place and use it in multiple places. True CSS programmers may disagree, and I welcome it [img]smile.gif[/img]

Second, there are two ways to address problems like your menuing. Do you want to decide on the tool, then fit the job to the tool? Or do you want to decide on the job, and then find the tool for the job?

The reason I say this is that I've used static pages, dynamic pages, frame sets, and more in my web development, and I've found (so far) that Javascript is the easiest tool for menus. Why? Because someone has already written JS scripts for it that you can get for free, so you can just copy and tweak.

Downside is browser compatibility. Not all browsers support JS, nor do they all support dynamic HTML, nor Front Page extensions, nor any other cool things you can come across. If you have to work with multiple browsers, you end up being limited.

All that being said, I'd pick up a quick primer on CSS (a Sam's book, or a Dummies book, or an O'Reilly book, or something similar). Get your local (online) bookstore, or check it out at the library.

Use that, start at the beginning, and work the examples. Use your own project in the examples and you can save some time, but remember to start small.

Once you're there, you can decide whether to fit the tool to the job or the job to the tool.

<span style="color: lightblue">Bungleau, javascript has one other disadvantage: it doesn't degrade. CSS menus on the other hand can degrade to simple lists. CSS is powerful. But the way to include menus in the HTML depends strongly on the DOCTYPE. I can almost guarantee that (i)frames are the wrong thing to do, for reasons other than frames being evil and inaccesable.

Sir Degrader I won't use any what you see is what you get program. I want to know what's happening and write it myself. Even if the code those programs output would be clean something they don't do now.
The only thing I do use is quanta+ because it has some nice features I like so I don't have to type everyting (autocompletion, tabs, syntax highlighting)

Bungleau, I use an external style sheet (that would be the include or not? I haven't programmed that much) which the structure but I use it to store some repetitive things as well

I think you have the wrong idea of menu. This is what I've got now. So it's not about rollovers and the like just how to change the page now. Only change the content or just a new page with the menu in it as well. (note: works in firefox haven't tried anything else yet ;) )

I won't use somebody else's scripts mostly anyway cause I want to know how it works myself [img]smile.gif[/img] It's easier to find errors then. Depends on how much cool things you want to do with them. I just want a basic site not too flashy. I have completed a few tutorial (W3C, echoecho and read a few others) but most of them just focus on how to do the tags and positioning. But I'll probably go to the library today so I'm going to see if they have something.

Lennon I don't know which Doctype I use. I found a little tutorial which was OK but I have my doubts about the links. They just open a new html file which has the menu in it again.

I use div id so I can get javascript to access them maybe if I could let JS just write a html file in the element.

<span style="color: lightblue">Egad, you need a better tutorial. :D That code is truly ugly... hold on, I'll find you a better one. [img]smile.gif[/img]

EDIT: this one seems alright.

EDIT again, since I read your post properly this time. Firstly, you can get rid of all that Javascript. You don't need it for this. To change between pages is quite simple: &lt;a href="url to new document"&gt;the text to be linked&lt;/a&gt; . The quotes are mandatory. Your links won't go anywhere since they don't have an href element.
Secondly, your opening line is a div. This is half the reason you need better tutorials [img]tongue.gif[/img] Your first line should be your doctype, the next html, the third head; . &lt;div&gt; can only go in body, and nested in other block level elements.
Thirdly, all tags should be in lower case. In HTML 4.0, this doesn't matter, but in XHTML 1.0 (which you realy should be using), it matters alot. As in, realy alot.
Fourthly, before you go too far, familiarise yourself with the validator. It will help alot.

[ 01-03-2005, 06:45 AM: Message edited by: LennonCook ]