EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Soon, all organizations will have a webpage. It should be obvious that for these webpages to be useful, the contents of the webpages must be accurate and up-to-date. However, most of the people supplying information to be placed on the webpage are not schooled in the computer languages and jargon that is necessary for the successful installation and maintanence of a webpage. Yet, the non-technical people would like to retain control over the content of the webpage (that is, what is actually said) describes one way that this is being accomplished in webpages that are already on the Web.
Webpages are written in a language called Hyper Text Markup Language (or html for short.) Typically, this language is foreign to the people who should be performing webpage maintanence. Also, the webpage images are created and placed in the .jpg or .gif file formats (described elsewhere) and the sound files are put into the .au or .wav formats. It is possible (and probably desirable that the webpage maintainers learn how to create these files, using non-Web computer software.)
One of the purposes of this document is to show that the webpage maintainer(s) need not write in html. There is a better way.
It would be preferable for the maintainers of the webpage to be able to produce what is needed in simple terms, as lines of text, rather than lines of computer commands, This document describes how this can be done. that is to say, this document describes how to get done the job of webpage maintanence by non-technical personnel, without yielding control.
Members of this organization are encouraged to submit information for display in the organization's webpage.
INTRODUCTION
A computer program, called jhlHTML.exe, has been written to read the lines of text (which are supplied by a User, or webpage maintainer) for insertion into a webpage and to translate the lines of text into the html language. This program is executed by the webmaster, only. The individual(s) maintaining the information content of the webpage, hereinafter refered to as User, supplies the webmaster with only a simple text file. (note: the User must also supply to the webmaster the .jpg or .gif image files for inclusion into the webpage.) Using a translation program in this manner means that the User does not need to be familiar with any of the details of the html computer language, yet the user will still have quick access to supporting a webpage for an organization and retain complete control over the webpage content.
The User maintains a set of .txt files, one for each of the 'pages' of the webpage. When a change is to be made, the User modifies the contents of the .txt file. Then, the User sends this file by attaching the file to an email to the webmaster of the organization. That is to say, in order to maintain the webpage of the organization, it is only necessary to change the contents of the .txt files. Then, when a change is to be made, the text file must be attached to an email to mailto:jhl@utulsa.edu .
When a .txt file is prepared, the User should make sure that the text file does not contain lines longer than eighty characters and do not contain either '<' or '>'. Also, make sure that the Subject of the email is the name of the .txt file and nothing more (the webmaster already knows why you are sending him the file) must also be sent as attachments to the email to the webmaster.
The .htm files will be created by the organization's webmaster by using the text to html translation program. The html files will then be uploaded to the host (Server) computer. The access to the Server computer to modify files on the Server is highly restriced for security reasons. The scheme for file submission has been selected to allow a User to update a file on the server by sending an email to the webmaster, yet not violate any security restrictions that have been set up by the Server computer.
For those Users who require greater control over the format of the webpage a number of commands are made available for insertion into the .txt files by the User. These people need to read the more technical sections, below.
Here is the list of files to be maintained (the .txt files):
For the Tulsa-Celle Sister City Partnership Webpage, the files are:
Left Hand Side Menu Item Text File Name html File Name
_____________________________ ________________ ______________________
Calendar cellecal.txt cellecal.htm
Information celleinf.txt celleinf.htm
Committees cellecom.txt cellecom.htm
Projects celleprj.txt celleprj.htm
For the Chamber Music Tulsa, the files are:
Left Hand Side Menu Item Text File Name html File Name
_____________________________ ________________ ______________________
The Program Schedule cmtma.txt cmtma.htm
The History of Concertime cmthist.txt cmthist.htm
What is Chamber Music? cmtcham.txt cmtcham.htm
The Mission of Concertime cmtinfo.txt cmtinfo.htm
Donations to Concertime cmtdonat.txt cmtdonat.htm
Artists files xxxxxxxx.txt xxxxxxxx.htm
where xxxxxxxx is the name of the performing group, e.g., haydn for the
Haydn Trio Vienna
For the Higher Education Cultural Roundtable, the files are:
Left Hand Side Menu Item Text File Name html File Name
_____________________________ ________________ ______________________
Roundtable Calendar hecrcal.txt hecrcal.htm
Roundtable Representatives hecrrep.txt hecrrep.htm
For the Tulsa Opera Board, the files are:
Left Hand Side Menu Item Text File Name html File Name
_____________________________ ________________ ______________________
Home operma.txt operama.htm
Opera Headline News operaohn.txt operaohn.htm
Contacts operacnt.txt operacnt.htm
Calendar operacal.txt operacal.htm
Committees operacom.txt operacom.htm
Board Meetings operabme.txt operabme.htm
New Board Member Information operabmi.txt operabmi.htm
Projects operaprj.txt operaprj.htm
TECHNICAL INFORMATION
When a computer user displays an internet screen on his local computer, the work of displaying the webpage is done by a program called a browser. This program executes on the user's local machine. Usually, this browser is called Netscape or Internet Explorer.
When a webpage is requested by the user, the browser asks a remote computer, by way of the internet, to supply one or a even a large set of files containing a strange language called the Hyper Text Markup Language (or html, for short) addition to supplying the text, i.e., the words that are to be displayed, the html files contain information that instructs the browser with regard to how the text and images are to be displayed.
When a user asks for a webpage to be displayed by the user's browser on his own computer, the local computer makes a request of the appropriate server computer (where the files that comprise the webpage are held) to send to the local computer all of the files to generate the requested display. Essentially any user may request (and get) all of the files. However, to maintain a webpage, files must be sent in the opposite direction, i.e., to the server. This is a problem. A browser can not do this. A secure server computer will not allow just anyone to modify any files on the server. This requires special authority. This permission is given to the webmaster, and no one else in the outside world. Therefore, the webmaster is responsible for installing all of the webpage files onto the server computer.
All of the files for a typical webpage fall into only a few categories: .htm for the text and instructions, .jpg and .gif for images and .au (and possibly .wav) files for sound recordings to be played while viewing the webpage screens.
There are no text (.txt) files on the server because the server and local browser do not speak this language. However, to maintain a webpage, it is convenient for a user to create and maintain .txt files. Nevertheless, the .txt files must be converted to the .htm files that the browser does understand. This translation is the job of the webmaster.
THE TRANSLATION PROGRAM, jhlHTML.EXE
A program has been written to read the lines of text (which are supplied by a user) for insertion into a webpage and to translate the lines of text into the html language. The user maintaining the information content of the webpage supplies the webmaster with only a simple text file. (note: the user must also supply to the webmaster the .jpg or .gif image files for inclusion into the webpage.) Using a translation program in this manner means that the user does not need to be familiar with any of the details of the html computer language yet the user will still have quick access to supporting a webpage for an organization and retain complete control over the webpage content.
Nevertheless, as simple as this process can be, the user preparing text for the webpage needs to know how the text should be organized so as not to confuse the translation program.
The following is the description of a simple screen. A full display may be comprised of a set of screens, each occupying a different part of the computer display. This can get a little complicated, so we will limit our discussion here to a simple single screen.
The screen is broken into parts, called paragraphs. The paragraphs are strings of text or instructions to the translation program. Paragraph are separated by a blank line, a line containing no printable characters.
The first paragraph in each .txt file is comprised of a single line, which is the title. This will appear first, on the top of the screen, followed by a simple colored horizontal line. The title is displayed in a larger font than the rest of the screen. If this line is blank there is no display of a title or the horizontal line.
All of the remaining parts of the screen contain information which have been organized into paragraphs, each of a particular type. The allowed types are as allowed:
1. A paragraph that is written so that the computer browser is
allowed to rearrange your text to space the text and arrange the
lines to make a 'reparagraphed' section of text. (normal Paragraphs)
2. A group of lines of text that is to be displayed exactly as it
is typed. That is, the browser is not to be allowed to reparagraph
these lines of text. (Literal paragraphs)
3. A line that causes an image, held in a file with a file extension
.jpg or .gif, to be displayed at this spot, properly centered on
the screen. Note that .jpg files that contain images of at most
640x480 picture elements (pixels) work very well. (Images)
4. Other commands listed below. (Commands)
The user who wants to prepare a screen writes the text to be displayed into a file, called a text file, which is created with a very simple text editor, like NotePad from Microsoft or SCIEDIT from SCI. Alternatively, the files may be created with a word processor such as Microsoft Word 97 and creating the text file by clicking File>Save-As> MS-DOS Text with Line Breaks(*.txt).
Please take note of the fact that the text files must be comprised of lines that are no longer than eighty characters, otherwise the translation could produce spacings that could be quite undesirable. In writing the text file the user should avoid the use of the '<' and '>' characters as these could cause the browser to become confused and cause nasty things to happen in the display. This happens because the browser thinks that these are actual html command (which these are not)
( Please notice that the font size is being changed in the display. )
The text file is given a name consisting of one to eight alphanumeric characters. The text file is given a file extension of .txt. That is, if a screen called 'sample.htm' is desired, a file called 'sample.txt' is given to the translator program, which reads the text file and creates the .htm file that is ready for upload to the server computer.
The paragraphs are separated by either a blank line or a command to the translator program. These commands are: %P for Normal Paragraph (to allow reparagraphing by the browser) , %L for a Literal Paragraph, %I for an Image that is to be displayed centered on the page, %J for an image that is to be displayed right justified on the page (to allow text to flow to the left to produce a rather pleasing change to the more sterile one thing over the other), %S to supply spacing (vertical whitespace), %F to change the font size, or a blank line, which is the same as a %P. Also, %W is available to play a sound clip when the webpage is loaded. There are also two useful commands %B to cause the remainder of the line to be printed in boldface, and %E to cause the remainder of the line to be printed in boldface italics.
In addition to the above, the author of the .txt file may insert html tags directly into the .txt file. These commands will be translated literally into the .htm file produced by the program jhlHTML.exe.
Each of these command is to placed starting always in column 1, alone on the line, except the other arguments that are expected by the command (e.g., the image file name with %I.)
When a line in the text file ends with a valid email address expressed in the form: mailto:jhl@utulsa.edu, then the translation program will create the proper code to display the email address in a color different from that of the normal text and at the same time, prepare the page to allow the user to 'click' on the email address to automatically start the email composition process to sent an email immediately.
A good example for the use of images and sound clips can be seen in the companion document Images and Sounds in Webpages
COMMANDS TO THE .txt TO .htm TRANSLATION PROGRAM
Insert as desired the following commands in the input text (note that the
command must be given in column 1 of the text file) (also note that the
command itself will be consumed in the translation process as these are
commands to the translator, therefore these will not be seen in the webpage):
%P The following is to be paragraphed by the browser.
%F [size] Change the size of the font to 'size'=1,2,...
%L The following is to be output literally (without
reparagraphing by the browser)
%C Center the following text, line by line.
Boldface the line if the line starts in column 1
%S Provide vertical white space
%B Display the remainder of the line in boldface
%E Display the remainder of the line in italics
%U [URL] [text] Insert a reference to another .html file (centered
on the page)
%V [URL] [text] Insert a reference to another .html file (not centered
on the page)
%I [file_name] [text] Insert a reference to an image, to be centered on
the page and put 'text' for the LYNX ALT option.
%J [file_name] [text] Insert a reference to an image, to be right justified
on the page (to allow text to flow around the image
to the left of the image and put 'text' for the
LYNX ALT option.
%W file_name Cause the .AU sound file to be played
This document, per se, has been written as a simple text (.txt) file so that
it can be converted into a sample screen to show, as a case study, a webpage
screen with the different possibilities for information presentation.
This document describes how to submit the text, images, and sounds for
inclusion in the webpage. That is, for information to be included in the
webpage must be submitted to the webmaster following a set of rules, which
have each been adopted for specific reasons.
Please examine the file sample.txt . It is this file that produced this display.
Document Prepared: jhl 9/13/01