HTML Experts...

... I need your help.

I'm fighting with a problem I can't seem to lick. The page appears fine in IE. It seems that Opera and NS compatible browsers are having problems with it. I've tried several suggestions and nothing seems to work. The problem may be related to use of the BACKGROUND attribute with the TD tag. It's supposedly supported by NS but most of the table discussions seem to skip over it.

If you can't help, could you suggest a *good* HTML discussion board where I can get a response? I got nothing at gethighforums which is supposed to be highly rated.

The problem URL is www.10daystoagreatlife.com. View it in IE and it appears fine. View it with Opera and it blows up. Go to anybrowser.com and use the site viewer and it blows up.

Thanks for your help.

Rick Smith, "The Net Guerrilla"

Rick,

> If you can't help, could you suggest a
> *good* HTML discussion board where I can get
> a response?

You will always get an answer - and
quickly - from this great forum

http://www.ihelpyouservices.com/forums/

Harvey




PS. Have you seen the amazing start page ?

Harvey -

> You will always get an answer - and
> quickly - from this great forum

> http://www.ihelpyouservices.com/forums/

Thanks. I knew I could count of the great readers of this forum.

Rick Smith, "The Net Guerrilla"

Harvey -

> You will always get an answer - and
> quickly - from this great forum

> http://www.ihelpyouservices.com/forums/

This forum appears to be search engine oriented. Will they answer HTML questions here?

Rick Smith, "The Net Guerrilla"

Rick,

> This forum appears to be search engine
> oriented. Will they answer HTML questions
> here?

Definitely yes.
Try the section "Web Page Content"

Harvey

Harvey -

> Definitely yes.
> Try the section "Web Page Content"

Excellent. Thanks.

Rick Smith, "The Net Guerrilla"

Hi Rick,

Internet Explorer is real forgiving when it comes to displaying tables in web pages, but not Netscape. I took a look at your page in Netscape 4.6 and everything displayed fine, except that the text on the left was not centered properly over the background. After looking at the code I found the problem and figured out how to fix it.

First, you have your table width set to 720 pixels and your header image (1.gif) in the top row of the table, is 734 pixels wide. The table will expand to fit the image size if it exceeds the table's width, so you need to set your table width to 734 pixels.

In the second row of the table you have the left and right cell widths set to percentages. Since you want the text in the left column to center over the background image 2.gif, you should set the column widths to an absolute pixel width so that it will display properly in Netscape.

So I set the left column to 180 pixels wide which is the width of the background image 2.gif and set the right column to 554 (180 pixels minus 734).

Finally you need to use a shim to make sure that the left cell with the background image has the text centered properly. The shim will help to "hold" the text where you want to display it in Netscape. Just create a transparent 1 x 1 pixel gif file and then insert this image above the text in the left column. Once it is inserted, change its width to 180 pixels to match the width of the table background image 2.gif. Make sure the border is set to 0 on the image.

Once this is done, the text displays properly in Netscape.

Hope this helps,

Linda Locke




Dreamweaver Templates

Linda -

> Once this is done, the text displays
> properly in Netscape.

Thanks. I'll definitely try this. Your solution was the simplest *by far* of all the ones I got. It's the kind of solution I was hoping for.

Thanks again.

Rick Smith, "The Net Guerrilla"

Linda -

> Once this is done, the text displays
> properly in Netscape.

I must be doing something wrong. I made the changes you suggested.

1. Table width and cell width changes.

2. Added "spacer.gif" that I downloaded from somewhere, Boogie Jack, I think. It seems to be a 1x1 transparent gif. (The file I mean.)

3. Placed the img statement in the code where you said.

4. Changed the width to 180.

5. Tested in IE. The image shoved the text down too far in IE so I changed the height to 1. This was better but still down farther than I'd like.

6. Test with anybrowser like before. Symptoms better than before: the left graphic never appears but all text is now positioned properly, (except for the links being down too far like in IE).

7. Created my own 1x1 transparent gif and made appropriate changes in code. Called it "shim.gif."

8. Retested in IE. Text position is still too low like before *and* now there's a line across the graphic. I would guess the gif isn't transparent but that's what I selected in Paint Shop Pro when I created it.

9. Retested with anybrowser. Same symptoms as in #6.

So... we've made *some* progress but could you please tell what I've now done wrong and look at it again in NS?

Thanks.

Rick

Hi Rick,

I checked the page with the changes you made in Netscape 4.6 and 4.7 and IE 5.0 and 5.5 and it looks OK in all of them.

To move the text up higher just delete the space in front of the text.

I don't know why the background image for the left cell is not showing up in Anybrowser since it tiles just fine in the browsers I mentioned above.

There are some new features that are not supported by the older 3.x browsers and possibly putting a background image in a cell is one of them.

I try to design my web pages to look good in most browsers, but it's difficult to make your pages look perfect in older browsers if they don't support the newer code options. Most people have upgraded to the 4.x browsers and I design my pages to look best in them.

Also, the reason the line showed up for your shim.gif is because the border was not set to 0
in the code.

Linda