Add the Web Wiz Guide Forum

This lesson will overview the steps to add the Web Wiz Guide discussion forum to a FrontPage web site. Web Wiz Guide is a fantastic ASP application and it is free to download. To learn more from the programmer (Bruce Corkhill ) who created the Web Wiz Guide forum, visit http://www.webwizguide.info/info.asp

! SEE this FORUM INSTALLED HERE
.........Try out the forum, register, post and experiment

Steps:

1. Download the latest version of WebWizGuide Forum (WWforum) or locate a copy in the TeamCIA Share folder on the server.
2. Open your web with FrontPage.
3. Display your folder list.
4. Select the ROOT (the top folder) folder.
5. Drag and Drop the FORUM FOLDER into your ROOT FOLDER.
6. Locate the unzipped FORUM FOLDER called "FORUM."
   1. Note: Dragging and dropping this folder into your web will create a folder called "forum." This folder includes hundreds of files and several folders making up the entire ASP WWforum application.
7. The folder will be imported.
   1. NOTE: During import, FrontPage will ask you several questions:
      1. What name to name the DB connection?
              Name it WWforum
      2. Should the DB be stored in the FPDB folder?
              Answer YES
          
8. View the Steps...
    
9. Folder import looks like this...
   
    
10. A new Database connection needs to be made. FrontPage asks you for a name...
    
     
11. Name your database connection WWforum so it is representative of the application.
    
     
12. When asked to store the database in the "fpdb" folder, answer YES. This protects your database.
    
     
13. CONGRATULATIONS, you have imported about 500 files into 15 folders making up this ASP discussion forum!

Time to Configure the Application

1. Two files need to be edited in order to notify this ASP application where the database has been located.
2. File #1
   1. Locate common.asp inside the forum folder.
   2. Edit the database connection string.
   3. First, find this line....
      1. strDbPathAndName = Server.MapPath("admin/database/wwForum.mdb")
   4. Edit it to reflect your database location, like this...
      1. strDbPathAndName = Server.MapPath("../fpdb/wwForum.mdb")
      2. NOTE: ../ (dot dot slash indicates one folder up)
   5. Save and close this file.
       
3. File #2
   1. Locate common.asp inside the admin folder inside the forum folder.
   2. Edit the database connection string for the ADMIN part of the application.
   3. First, find this line....
      1. strDbPathAndName = Server.MapPath("database/wwForum.mdb")
   4. Edit it to reflect your database location, like this...
      1. strDbPathAndName = Server.MapPath("../../fpdb/wwForum.mdb")
      2. NOTE: ../../ (dot dot slash dot dot slash indicates two folders up)
   5. Save and close this file.
       
4. Congratulations, the ASP application is configured for your server with the database in the fpdb folder!

Time to Verify the Database

1. Click TOOLS, SITE SETTINGS, DATABASE TAB
2. Notice the new WWforum database is not verified.
   
    
3. Select the WWforum database and then click VERIFY. A checkmark will then appear.
   
    
4. Click OK to complete the verification.

Congratulations, the Database is Verified!
 

Last Step.

1. Recalculate the web site to make FrontPage check the database location and the database connection string in the global.asa file.
2. Click TOOLS, then RECALCULATE HYPERLINKS
3. 
    
4. Click YES, notice the status bar and how all the links and databases are being indexed.

Your Web Wiz Guide FORUM is COMPLETE!

What now?

1. You need to visit your forum and login as....
        administrator / letmein
2. You need to change the admin password.
3. You need to create forum categories.
4. You need to create forums inside of the categories.
5. You need to test out your forum.

How Do I Wrap My Design?

? The first question is always: "How do I wrap my current web design and DWT around this forum?"

The quick answer is....

1. modify...
   includes/header.asp
2. modify...
   includes/footer.asp

Yea RIGHT, How do I do that?

1. The secret is to build a table.
2. You need to open the table in the header.asp and then close the table in the footer.asp file.
3. For example:
   In the header.asp add:

<table> <tr>  <td width="20%">Your menu stuff goes here</td>  <td width="80%">

3. In the footer.asp add:

</td> </tr></table>

4. Notice: In the header.asp you opened the table with a table row and a cell to the left of 20%. Then you created a second cell of 80%. This second cell is CLOSED in the footer and the table row is closed as well as the table is closed in the footer! Doing this will then place the forum inside of the 80% cell.
5. Experiment with the header.asp and footer.asp files to wrap your design around the forum.

NOTE: I would make a copy of the header.asp and footer.asp files BEFORE you modify them.

---

Need MORE HELP? Review this....

Help the Header.asp file

Here is what a table looks like in design view when added to the header.asp page

The Table code for header.asp

<table border="1" width="760" id="table1">

            <tr>

                        <td width="760" colspan="2" align="center">Site Banner Here</td>

            </tr>

            <tr>

                        <td width="160">&nbsp;</td>

                        <td width="600">&nbsp;

 NOTICE: The last <td tag (table cell) is NOT closed. Also notice that the last <tr> tag is not closed here in the header.asp file. It gets closed in the footer.asp page. (see below)

 

The Footer.asp code

<!-- footer -->

</td>

            </tr>

</table>

 

</body>

</html>

 

NOTICE: The closing of the html tags. The table cell gets closed </td> then the table row gets closed </tr> and finally the table gets closed </table>

 

! View a Sample Install of
the Web Wiz Guide Forum HERE

This lesson has been read times