Making a Mac friendly Website!

[Mark Leavesley \(SRL\)]

Hi,

Firstly, apologies for the crossposting. I'm not a Mac guy and I want to
appeal to the largest audience possible.

I have an extranet that is using IIS and works more or less fine on IE for
Windows. It does not work on IE for Mac or any other Mac browser. This is
partially down to the sloppy JavaScript that IE allows but also because
we're using ActiveX controls. I have tried to find a contract Mac developer
to help but to no avail so now I'm looking for advice on how to tackle this
myself.

I can get my hands on a G4 running OS 9.x but I need to know how to
duplicate the functionality provided by the ActiveX controls, which is
client-side file selection and printer control, specifically, but not
necessarily identical to:

Persits XUpload [url]http://www.aspupload.com/xupload.html[/url]
MeadCo's ScriptX [url]http://www.meadroid.com/sx_intro.asp[/url]

If anybody can point me in the right direction, or could even do the work
for us (prefer UK based contractors), I would be most grateful.


TIA,

Mark Leavesley
Site Reports Ltd.


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[Richard Manley-Reeve]

In article <8Rj9b.10896$zo.96164917@news-text.cableinet.net>, SRL\
<mark@sitereportsltd.com> wrote:

> Hi,
>
> Firstly, apologies for the crossposting. I'm not a Mac guy and I want to
> appeal to the largest audience possible.
>
> I have an extranet that is using IIS and works more or less fine on IE for
> Windows. It does not work on IE for Mac or any other Mac browser. This is
> partially down to the sloppy JavaScript that IE allows but also because
> we're using ActiveX controls. I have tried to find a contract Mac developer
> to help but to no avail so now I'm looking for advice on how to tackle this
> myself.
>
> I can get my hands on a G4 running OS 9.x but I need to know how to
> duplicate the functionality provided by the ActiveX controls, which is
> client-side file selection and printer control, specifically, but not
> necessarily identical to:
>
> Persits XUpload [url]http://www.aspupload.com/xupload.html[/url]
> MeadCo's ScriptX [url]http://www.meadroid.com/sx_intro.asp[/url]
>
> If anybody can point me in the right direction, or could even do the work
> for us (prefer UK based contractors), I would be most grateful.
>
>
> TIA,
>
> Mark Leavesley
> Site Reports Ltd.

Some of this functionality is available by using PHP, for example file
upload/management and generating PDFs, but I don't think you'll be able
to replicate all the functions of the activex controls


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[Mark Leavesley \(SRL\)]

PHP is server side, there is no problem with ASP and Macs.

XUpload uses a native Windows file-select dialog and integrates with
ASPUpload, I need a Mac component that does the same, or something similar.

Thanks for your input.


Mark


"Richard Manley-Reeve" <MY_FIRST_NAME@manley-reeve.com> wrote in message
news:150920031606076717%MY_FIRST_NAME@manley-reeve.com...

> In article <8Rj9b.10896$zo.96164917@news-text.cableinet.net>, SRL\
> <mark@sitereportsltd.com> wrote:
>

> > Hi,
> >
> > Firstly, apologies for the crossposting. I'm not a Mac guy and I want to
> > appeal to the largest audience possible.
> >
> > I have an extranet that is using IIS and works more or less fine on IE

for

> > Windows. It does not work on IE for Mac or any other Mac browser. This

is

> > partially down to the sloppy JavaScript that IE allows but also because
> > we're using ActiveX controls. I have tried to find a contract Mac

developer

> > to help but to no avail so now I'm looking for advice on how to tackle

this

> > myself.
> >
> > I can get my hands on a G4 running OS 9.x but I need to know how to
> > duplicate the functionality provided by the ActiveX controls, which is
> > client-side file selection and printer control, specifically, but not
> > necessarily identical to:
> >
> > Persits XUpload [url]http://www.aspupload.com/xupload.html[/url]
> > MeadCo's ScriptX [url]http://www.meadroid.com/sx_intro.asp[/url]
> >
> > If anybody can point me in the right direction, or could even do the

work

> > for us (prefer UK based contractors), I would be most grateful.
> >
> >
> > TIA,
> >
> > Mark Leavesley
> > Site Reports Ltd.

>
> Some of this functionality is available by using PHP, for example file
> upload/management and generating PDFs, but I don't think you'll be able
> to replicate all the functions of the activex controls
>
>
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[Marc]

Mark Leavesley (SRL) wrote:

> I have an extranet that is using IIS and works more or less fine on IE for
> Windows. It does not work on IE for Mac or any other Mac browser. This is
> partially down to the sloppy JavaScript that IE allows but also because
> we're using ActiveX controls. I have tried to find a contract Mac developer
> to help but to no avail so now I'm looking for advice on how to tackle this
> myself.

This also means Netscape/Mozilla users on any platform won't be able to
access all the features.

When I'm doing web dev, I usually aim to make it look good & work in
Mozilla - because I know that all other browsers will be able to display it.

MW

[Doc O'Leary]

In article <k9l9b.10956$ZB1.97104017@news-text.cableinet.net>,
"Mark Leavesley \(SRL\)" <mark@sitereportsltd.com> wrote:

> XUpload uses a native Windows file-select dialog and integrates with
> ASPUpload, I need a Mac component that does the same, or something similar.

No, what you need is to stop pretending you have a web site and put out
a proper app. Either that or rework you site to follow web *standards*
and stop trying to target it to specific platforms. Since you presume
the solution without giving any real details on the problem, it's hard
to say what direction you should take.

[Paul Mitchum]

Mark Leavesley (SRL) <mark@sitereportsltd.com> wrote:

[..]

> I can get my hands on a G4 running OS 9.x but I need to know how to
> duplicate the functionality provided by the ActiveX controls, which is
> client-side file selection and printer control, specifically, but not
> necessarily identical to:

[..]

If your goal is making a Mac-friendly web site, and one requirement for
your Mac-friendly web site is ActiveX, then you'll never accomplish your
goal.

[Jonas Voss]

Mark Leavesley (SRL) wrote:

> Firstly, apologies for the crossposting. I'm not a Mac guy and I want to
> appeal to the largest audience possible.

[snip ActiveX stuff]

If you want to appeal to the largest possible audience, then make your
solution webbased, instead of platformdependent.

Adhere to the standards, and use serverside scripting to achieve your
goals instead of relying on the client.

As you wrote in another post, ASP works fine with macs, and with
pretty much any platform. Stick with that.

--
| Jonas @ 55.75, 12.42 | <http://verture.net/> |

"Great things are afoot!"

[Mark Leavesley \(SRL\)]

ActiveX is not a requirement, but the functionality offered by these two is.
How that is achieved is neither here nor there, but the file selection must
be intuitive in the context of the what the user is familiar with, which
probably means an OS based file selection dialog.

Mark

"Paul Mitchum" <usenet@mile23.com.r3m0v3> wrote in message
news:1g1bxn5.1v17o8c13xec8rN%usenet@mile23.com.r3m 0v3...

> Mark Leavesley (SRL) <mark@sitereportsltd.com> wrote:
>
> [..]

> > I can get my hands on a G4 running OS 9.x but I need to know how to
> > duplicate the functionality provided by the ActiveX controls, which is
> > client-side file selection and printer control, specifically, but not
> > necessarily identical to:

> [..]
>
> If your goal is making a Mac-friendly web site, and one requirement for
> your Mac-friendly web site is ActiveX, then you'll never accomplish your
> goal.

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[Paul Mitchum]

Mark Leavesley (SRL) <mark@sitereportsltd.com> wrote:

> ActiveX is not a requirement, but the functionality offered by these two is.
> How that is achieved is neither here nor there, but the file selection must
> be intuitive in the context of the what the user is familiar with, which
> probably means an OS based file selection dialog.

Ahh. Then you're looking for <input type="file">. Not quite as slick or
nifty as the activeX control, but still a good fallback.

Some reference material: <http://makeashorterlink.com/?U1BE519E5>

Basically, on a Mac, the web is the web, and the Mac is not the web.

[Eric Pepke]

"Mark Leavesley \(SRL\)" <mark@sitereportsltd.com> wrote in message news:<8Rj9b.10896$zo.96164917@news-text.cableinet.net>...

> If anybody can point me in the right direction, or could even do the work
> for us (prefer UK based contractors), I would be most grateful.

You could hire me. I'd do it for airfare, room and board, and a
little pub money.

[Simon Slavin]

In article <k9l9b.10956$ZB1.97104017@news-text.cableinet.net>,
"Mark Leavesley \(SRL\)" <mark@sitereportsltd.com> wrote:

> Firstly, apologies for the crossposting. I'm not a Mac guy and I want to
> appeal to the largest audience possible.

Yeah, well I play in a heavy metal band and I want to appeal
to the largest audience possible. So I'm going to play in
the middle of a residential district at 3am on the chance
that we get more fans that way.

>PHP is server side, there is no problem with ASP and Macs.
>
>XUpload uses a native Windows file-select dialog and integrates with
>ASPUpload, I need a Mac component that does the same, or something similar.

And PHP uses the file-select dialog appropriate to whatever
platform the client is using: if they're running a browser on
a Mac, they get a Mac file-selection dialog and if they're
running a browser on Windows they get the Windows file-
selection dialog.

What you're asking for cannot be done. You have picked a
platform (ActiveX) which has nothing to do with the Web, it's
a Windows-only platform. The functionality of ActiveX will
never be duplicated for the Mac because it would open every
Mac browser to the huge number of viruses, worms and popups
that annoy Windows users.

You need to decide whether you're writing something which
should be done on the web (in which case you should stick to
standard web technologies like HTML and JavaScript) or
whether you actually need control over the hardware (in which
case you can give your users any program you want).

PS: Your cross-posting has meant that a huge number of people
will not respond to your post because they don't want to post
to all the groups you listed. Next time, pick one group until
someone tells you that you'll find better answers elsewhere.