Using Contribute without Dreamweaver Templates

[RoughDodge]

I have a newly created website that utilizes ASP includes and table less
design. My clients just love Contribute and would still like to use it. Is it
possible to still use Contribute with this design? Obviously, when the page is
opened the includes are visible and editable. Is it possible to add a tag to
the page that will lock Contribute but not effect the include tags? I?ve
inserted the standard DW Template tags, but the server side includes interfere
with them. Thoughts?

Thanks,
Daryl

[Gailg]

I'm in a somewhat similar situation. I am not using ASP includes, but I am
using server side includes. I created Dreamweaver templates that open up the
page for Contribute - but the editable part of the templates for Contribute is
not within the includes.

I am also using CSS for design - no tables. Unfortunately Contribute doesn't
always understand page layout with CSS. If you are using floats for page layout
Contribute may not properly reflect the look of the page. Only by viewing in
a browser will you see the true look of the page.

I can only add markup consisting of <div>s by saving them in Dreamweaver as
library items. Then Contribute can see them as Shared Assets.

Good luck
Gail

[Fractalice]

I'm doing something similar on my pages, except with PHP. Here is what I've
done:

On my server, I made a separate port for publishing. In Apache (but you can do
this in IIS) I made a group and then gave that group permissions to edit on the
port. I put whatever users I want into that group (these are the same users
that are made in Contribute).

On that port I turned on WebDav and told it to render all pages as plain text,
so my PHP code will get spit out instead of rendered on the port, hence the
passwording it so no one can see my code.

Then, in Contribute, I turned on the "protect scripts" so that no one can
delete the scripts. Right now, in my new CSS layout (still working on it today)
I've put all my header, side nav and footer code into dynamic loads, so all the
editors see in Contribute is a little code shield, a blank area and another
code shield. Anything they want to do goes between the two shields and
everything works without a problem, no need for template code or anything.

As for new pages, I constructed template pages that sit on the server, using
the same setup with some filler text where they need to edit. Every page also
has a hard link to my textstyles.css, so where they don't see all of the
formatting from my main.css file, they can at least see what the text will look
like and apply styles (they are limited to the styles that I defined).

This might have been a bit rambling, so if you have any questions about it,
please let me know.

[dcolburn]

That's way too much work to do with what by now any application purporting to manage modern web sites should do: display HTML/XHTML as per the W3C guidelines.