Show/Hide

Help Center

Publishing Web Pages with KompoZer

If your pages exist only on your local hard disk, you can privately view your HTML pages. KompoZer lets you publish your pages to a remote computer called a web server.

When you publish your pages to a web server, KompoZer copies (uploads) your pages to a computer that lets others browse your pages. Most ISPs provide space on their web servers for web page publishing. To find a web server where you can publish your pages, ask your ISP, help desk, or system administrator.

Publishing a Document

To publish a document:

1. Open the HTML document that you want to publish, or create a new KompoZer document.
2. When you're ready to publish the document remotely, click the Publish button .

   If you have published this document before, KompoZer remembers the document's publishing settings and starts publishing the document. While publishing is in progress, KompoZer displays a publishing status dialog box.

   • If you have never published this document before, KompoZer displays the Settings tab in the Publish Page dialog box so you can enter information about the document's remote publishing location. See Publish Page - Settings for more information. When you're done entering information, click Publish.
   • If you have never saved the document, KompoZer displays the Publish tab in the Publish Page dialog box, so you can enter the document's filename. See Publish Page - Publish for more information. After entering the filename, click Publish.
3. To browse your published page, click the Browse button. Test the page's links and make sure there are no missing images.
4. Continue editing the page as necessary. When you're ready to update the remote page with your changes, click the Publish button.

When you publish a document for the first time, KompoZer changes the document's file:/// URL to an http:// URL to indicate that you are now editing the published document. If you want to save the document locally (on your computer's hard disk), click the Save button. You'll be prompted to choose a filename and location on your hard disk for the document.

[ Return to beginning of section ]

Tips for Avoiding Broken Links or Missing Images

• Make sure your KompoZer filenames end with the .html or .htm file extension. Make sure your image filenames end with the .JPG, .GIF, or .PNG file extension. Don't use spaces or other special symbols in your filenames. Keep your filenames short and only use lowercase or uppercase letters and numbers.
• If your images appear as broken links when you browse a document on the web server, you may have forgotten to include the images when you published. Open the File menu, and choose Publish As to display the Publish Page dialog box. In the Publish tab, make sure you check "Include images and other files" and then click Publish.

For more troubleshooting tips, see Solving Common Publishing Problems.

[ Return to beginning of section ]

Updating a Published Document

To update a published document:

1. In a KompoZer window, open the File menu, and choose Recent Pages, then select the document from the list.

   Alternatively, browse to the location of the document you want to update by entering the document's HTTP address (the document's web address) in the Navigator browser's Location field.

2. Open the File menu, and choose Edit Page.
3. Edit the document as necessary.
4. When you're ready to update the remote page with your changes, click Publish in KompoZer's toolbar.

Tip: To delete a page or image you've published on a web server, you must use an FTP (File Transfer Protocol) program. You also must use an FTP program if you want to create subdirectories or to rename files on the web server. Ask your service provider if they recommend a particular FTP program. You can usually find information on FTP programs in the Help or Support sections of your service provider's web site. FTP programs are also available from shareware sites such as ZDNet Downloads.

[ Return to beginning of section ]

Changing the Filename or Publishing Location

To change a document's filename or publishing location:

1. In a KompoZer window, open the File menu, and choose Recent Pages, then select the document from the list.

   Alternatively, browse to the location of the document you want to update by entering the document's HTTP address (the document's web address) in the Navigator browser's Location field.

2. Open the File menu, and choose Edit Page.
3. Edit the document as necessary.
4. Open KompoZer's File menu and choose Publish As. KompoZer displays the Publish tab in the Publish Page dialog box.
5. Enter a different page title, if necessary.
6. Enter a different filename for the page, if necessary.
7. From the Site Name list, choose the publishing location you want to use. To set up a new publishing location, click New Site. See Publish Page - Settings for more information.
8. Click Publish to save the document to the new location.

[ Return to beginning of section ]

Creating a New Publishing Site

If you plan to publish documents to more than one remote location, you can set up KompoZer to save the publishing information for each remote site you use, so that you don't have to enter it each time you want to publish.

To create a new publishing site, begin from a KompoZer window:

1. Open the Edit menu and choose Publishing Site Settings. KompoZer displays the Publish Settings dialog box.
2. Click New Site.
3. For "Site Name," enter the nickname by which you want to refer to this publishing site.

   For example, if you will use the new site to publish documents related to the "Meteor" project, you might want to use the site name "Meteor". Site names remind you about the types of documents you publish at each site.

4. For "Publishing address," enter the complete URL provided to you by your ISP, system administrator, or web hosting service. This URL must begin with either ftp:// or http://.

   The publishing address specifies the location where documents are published (uploaded) at this site. If you are not sure what to enter, ask your ISP or system administrator.

5. For "HTTP address of your home page," enter the complete URL that you would enter in the Navigator browser to view pages at this site. Do not include a filename or subdirectory as part of the URL.

   This URL must always begin with http://. In some cases, this URL is the same as the publishing address. If you are not sure what to enter, ask your ISP or system administrator, or else leave it blank.

6. For user name, enter the user name you use to log in to your ISP or web hosting service.
7. For password, enter the password for your user name.
8. Select "Save Password" to save your password securely using Password Manager so that you don't have to enter it each time you publish pages at this site.
9. Click OK.

[ Return to beginning of section ]

Changing the Default Publishing Site

If you have set up more than one publishing site, but you typically use only one site for most of your publishing needs, you can designate the site you use most often as the default publishing site. KompoZer will use the default publishing site for all documents that you publish, unless you specifically choose an alternate site.

Regardless of how many sites you've set up, you can always publish a document to a different site by choosing Publish As from KompoZer's File menu. See Changing the Filename or Publishing Location for more information.

To choose the default publishing site, begin from a KompoZer window:

1. Open the Edit menu, and choose Publishing Site Settings. KompoZer displays the Publish Settings dialog box.
2. Select a publishing site from the list.

   If you only have one publishing site set up, KompoZer uses that one as the default site.

3. Click Set as Default.
4. Click OK to confirm your changes.

[ Return to beginning of section ]

Deleting a Publishing Site

Deleting a publishing site removes the site's settings from KompoZer. If you later wish to publish to the site, you must re-enter the site's settings.

To delete a publishing site's settings, begin from a KompoZer window:

1. Open the Edit menu, and choose Publishing Site Settings. KompoZer displays the Publish Settings dialog box.
2. Select a publishing site from the list.
3. Click Remove Site.

   KompoZer only removes the site's settings; the remote site itself is not affected.

4. Click OK to confirm your changes.

[ Return to beginning of section ]

Publishing Settings

This section describes KompoZer's publishing settings. For information on KompoZer's general and new page settings, see KompoZer Preferences.

Publish Page - Publish

The Publish Page - Publish tab lets you specify where you want to publish a document. These settings apply to the current document.

If you are not already viewing the Publish Page - Publish tab, follow these steps:

1. Open the File menu and choose Publish As. The Publish Page dialog box appears.
2. Click the Publish tab.

• Site Name: Lists all the publishing sites you've created, so you can choose the site that you want to publish to. To create a new site, click New Site.
• Page Title: Specifies the document's page title as it appears in the browser window's title bar when you view the page in the browser. The document's page title also appears in your list of bookmarks if you bookmark the page.
• Filename: Specifies the document's filename. Make sure you include the .html or .htm extension in the filename.

• Warning: If a file on the remote site you're publishing to has the same filename as one you're uploading, the newly uploaded file will replace the existing one. You will not be asked to confirm the action.

• Site subdirectory for this page: If you leave this blank, KompoZer publishes the page to the main (root) publishing directory at this site. If you want to publish the page to a remote subdirectory that resides underneath the main publishing directory at this site, enter the name of the subdirectory or choose it from the list. KompoZer keeps track of the locations you type here, so you can select from a list of remote locations you've previously used. Keep in mind that subdirectory names are case-sensitive.

• Note: The site subdirectory you choose must already exist at the remote server.

• Include images and other files: If checked, KompoZer publishes any images and other files referenced by this page. You can choose to publish these files to the same location as the page, or else you can choose to publish these files into a remote subdirectory that exists underneath the main publishing directory.

Tip: To create remote subdirectories or delete published pages or images, you must use an FTP (File Transfer Protocol) program. Ask your service provider if they recommend a particular FTP program. You can usually find information on FTP programs in the Help or Support sections of your service provider's web site. FTP programs are also available from shareware sites such as ZDNet Downloads.

[ Return to beginning of section ]

Publish Page - Settings

The Publish Page - Settings tab lets you specify your login information for the remote publishing site, as well as the publishing settings for the remote site. These settings apply to the current document and any other files you publish to this location.

If you are not already viewing the Publish Page - Settings tab, follow these steps:

1. Open the File menu and choose Publish As. The Publish Page dialog box appears.
2. Click the Settings tab.

• Site Name: Specifies the nickname you want to use for this publishing site. Enter a short name that will help you identify this publishing site.
• Publishing address: Specifies the complete URL provided to you by your ISP or system administrator. This URL should begin with either ftp:// or http://. This name is often referred to as the "host name" or the "host server name".

• The publishing address specifies the location where documents are published (uploaded) at this site. If you are not sure what to enter, ask your ISP or system administrator.

• HTTP address of your home page: Specifies the complete address of your publishing home directory. This is the web address of the home page at your web site. Do not include a filename or subdirectory as part of the URL.

• This URL must always begin with http://. In some cases, this URL is the same as the publishing address. If you are not sure what to enter, ask your ISP or system administrator, or else leave it blank.

• User name: Specifies the user name you use to log into your ISP or network.
• Password: Specifies the password for your user name.
• Save Password: Select this to encrypt and save your password securely using Password Manager so that you don't have to enter it each time you publish pages at this site.

[ Return to beginning of section ]

Publish Settings

The Publish Settings dialog box lets you create, edit, and delete publishing site settings, and also lets you set the default publishing site.

If you are not already viewing the Publish Settings dialog box, follow these steps:

1. Open the Edit menu and choose Publishing Site Settings. KompoZer displays the Publish Settings dialog box.

• New Site: Lets you specify settings for a new publishing site. KompoZer adds the name of the new publishing site to the list of available publishing sites.
• Set as Default: Sets the selected publishing site as the default publishing site. Typically, the default publishing site is the remote location that you most often use for publishing documents. All documents you create or edit will be published to the default publishing site, unless you specifically choose an alternate site in the Publish Page dialog box.

• To publish a document to a different remote location, open the File menu and choose Publish As to choose a different publishing destination.

• Remove Site: Removes the selected site and its settings from KompoZer.
• Site Name: Specifies the name by which you want to refer to this publishing site.
• Publishing address: Specifies the complete URL provided to you by your ISP or system administrator. This URL should begin with either ftp:// or http://.

• The publishing address specifies the location where documents are published (uploaded) at this site. If you are not sure what to enter, ask your ISP or system administrator.

• HTTP address of your homepage: Specifies the HTTP address of your publishing home directory. Do not include a filename or subdirectory as part of the URL.

• This URL must always begin with http://. In some cases, this URL is the same as the publishing address. If you are not sure what to enter, ask your ISP or system administrator, or else leave it blank.

• User name: Specifies the user name you use to log in to your ISP or network.
• Password: Specifies the password for your user name.
• Save Password: Select this to save your password securely using Password Manager so you don't have to enter it each time you publish pages at this site.

[ Return to beginning of section ]

Solving Common Publishing Problems

If any of your files fails to publish, the Publishing Status dialog box displays an error message that can help you determine what went wrong and how to fix it. Click the Troubleshooting button in the Publishing Status dialog box to get help on solving your publishing problem.

If you are still unable to publish a file, save the file to your hard disk by opening KompoZer's File menu, and choosing Save. You can then open the file at a later time to try to publish it. To quickly locate the file later, open KompoZer's File menu, and choose Recent Pages.

Verifying Your Publishing Settings

To verify your publishing settings:

1. Close the Publishing Status dialog box, if it is open.
2. Open the Edit menu and choose Publishing Site Settings.
3. In the Publish Settings dialog box, confirm that the site settings are correct for the site you are trying to publish to. If you're not sure, check with your ISP or web hosting service.
4. • Verify that you correctly entered the publishing settings. You may have accidentally mistyped one of the settings.
   • Verify that you entered the correct publishing address. Web hosting services or ISPs may refer to the publishing address as the "server name", the "hostname", or the "server/host". They often specify the publishing location as ftp.myisp.com/username, where username is your user name.

     For the publishing address to be correct, you must precede the publishing location with either ftp:// or http://. For example, the correct publishing address for the above-mentioned site would be ftp://ftp.myisp.com/username.

[ Return to beginning of section ]

Checking Your Filenames

Examine the names of any files that failed to publish. Make sure that the filenames:

• Use only numbers or lowercase or uppercase letters. While it's acceptable to create filenames that use uppercase letters, you can avoid potential errors in later locating the published file if you only use lowercase letters in your filenames.

  When you publish files to a web server, filenames become case-sensitive on the web server. It may be harder for you to remember files names that use only uppercase letters or that use a mix of uppercase and lowercase letters.

  For example, when you try to locate a published file by typing the filename's web address into Navigator's Location field, you must enter the filename exactly as you created it, using the same combination of uppercase and lowercase letters.

• Don't use punctuation characters or spaces. Underscores ( _ ) or hyphens ( - ) are OK.
• End with .html or .htm (for KompoZer filenames).
• Use less than 32 characters.

[ Return to beginning of section ]

Fixing Publishing Errors

If one or more of your files fails to publish, look at the messages KompoZer displays in the Publishing Status area of the Publishing dialog box. You can use these error messages to help determine what went wrong and what to do to fix the problem.

[ Return to beginning of section ]

[Home] [Next] [Previous]

Copyright © 2004-2009 Contributors to the Nvu, KompoZer Help Documentation Project.