My current favorite book

I cannot help being book fickle, so honesty compelled me title this post thusly; Adobe Dreamweaver CS3 How-To's: 100 Essential Techniques, by David Karlins, made my week. I know I talked about this book in a previous post, flush with my web success I decided it deserved a second mention.

After spending the last ten days transferring existing resource center pages to the new library template, Thursday afternoon I finished the site and was ready to create the menu include and "put" everything on the review server for a test drive. The new template is library specific, none of the menu options within its header link to resource center pages. Therefore my side menu has to function as a stand-alone feature allowing users to maneuver through both the resource center and library site independently while still co-existing. I narrowed my choice to drop down menus (ungainly for my purpose) or spry menus and determined using a spry menu widget would solve the problem nicely.

Relatively sure the process could be painless, grabbed my Dreamweaver books for a how-to refresher. 100 Essential Techniques had several short chapters on using spry widgets and menus. With the book on my desk and site map nearby for reference, I created a three level menu. Next came the color options - or rather lack of color in this instance. I wanted only the palest of colors for rollover effect and absolutely no color on the menu itself so it would blend with the existing template palette. This was a bit trickier as the book had no specifics regarding individual css commands associated with the menu (there were general instructions). I started at the top of the css menu and assessed each to remove or add color as needed.

It was then time to "put" my pages on the review server and I gleefully sent my folders, images, and spry menu items. Thankfully the review server is immediate and I was able to check my work without the regular two hour delay.

IT WORKED!

Let me say that again.

IT WORKED!

And, even better, it was not hideous. I ignored it for a day and checked all of the menu links with a fresh eye on while working on Saturday (it was my summer weekend schedule). One task down, another equally daunting one awaits me as I continue my quest to get page content from others on the committee. That is a complaint for another day.