TECH Ping! Need to Wake Up a FrontPage Website Old, Old Tech. Where Can I Find Skills?

05.13.16 | chickensoup

[Chickensoup]

Have a need to use my rickety old website. It is a 200 page FrontPage monster which has been sitting out at my ISP for quite a few years with little updating.

I have recently been approached about restarting my column nationally. Am so excited!

I would like to use the webpage as the vehicle and realize that it will need to be upgraded.

I run WIN7. There is no extension left for Frontpage and the software currently does not recognize the website, there isn't even a screen to put in the username and code. The ISP states that FTP is in place.

Some places I go say that my os is at fault and I tried running in XP mode. Different screens but didn't get any further. Would I need to find an old computer with XP on it?

What I need is someone who can help me connect and help me get it running so I can change content daily and make some hyperlink changes.

I know I should be using something else, I know that there is great difference of opinion between MS users and the world, I know that I am an ignorant slut. I get it.

What I need to know most, though, is where can I find someone with this skill set. The last two website folks I spoke to did not even know what frontpage was. I need someone who can help me fire up this creaky tech behemoth

[Chickensoup]

I got into the site and am able to change the page.

What I will need is direction on how to find someone who could tell me how to change some of the website details like copyright dates and some hyperlink names.

I have to get rid of the old amazon bookstore. Talk about dead links.

[Wilum]

thoughtomator,

Thanks for the link, my daughter is in need to learn code and this looks exactly what she's been looking for.

Thanks again,
Wilum

[thoughtomator]

Quite welcome, may she learn much from it!

[minnesota_bound]

Thanks for the tip about bluegriffon. I see they have add ons that would make it like Dreamweaver CS6 I use. I tried the newer Dreamweaver CC15 version but I hate the layout and the cost.

[US_MilitaryRules]

I have a similar issue with an old FP website. Will follow this thread and try some of the ideas here. Thanks and Good Luck.

[Kirkwood]

Why waste your time? Just build a site with modern tools.

[dayglored]

> Why waste your time? Just build a site with modern tools.

Maybe because it's "a 200 page monster" site and redoing from scratch is much too much effort/time?

[NewJerseyJoe]

I, too, still use FrontPage for a couple of websites. I know I need to update to something newer, but just haven’t had time. But in the meantime, my host (HostGator) does have a feature that allows me to still update my content — it’s a File Manager function that allows me to drag-and-drop new HTML files.

Not a perfect solution, but, as I said, it works for now, until I find the time to rebuild the website on a new platform.

[Kirkwood]

So you’re telling me there are 200 pages that can be easily hacked because they don’t have modern code and the site owner can’t use modern controls that would attract viewers. The site was poorly designed in the first place if the content can’t be stripped out.

[ßuddaßudd]

FrontPage,, was the first software I actually bought,, back in 1997 or so..
It was fun

[Wilum]

Please add me to the tech ping

[Pollard]

WordPress or another CMS (content management system) although WordPress is the easiest Full Featured CMS. There are others and some are even easier for those not looking for as many bells and whistles. http://get-simple.info/ is one that doesn’t require a database

Both of the above and in fact, most CMSs allow pasting/inputting html directly into the editor which would make it pretty easy to transfer your content over. You can also paste formatted content(copy from front end) and it will pick up on the html tags so your headings remain headings, lists remain lists etc.

Front Page is the worst for outputting clean html. If you want to use something similar, find an older copy of dreamweaver. Much cleaner code, easy to use, has ftp connection to upload your files/site.You can pick up dreamweaver 3 or 4 on ebay for cheap. iirc, dreamweaver will clean up front page code pretty well.

pm me if you have any questions on the above

[ShadowAce]

You’ve been added. Welcome Aboard!

[US_MilitaryRules]

I used to do my website with FP and it was easy. I have tried the wordpress stuff and you can’t start with a blank page? So I gave up. This was years ago. I guess I should try it again.

[dayglored]

> So you’re telling me...

I'm not the owner of the site, I've never seen it, or its source. I'm not telling you anything, just saying it's possible Chickensoup doesn't have the resources to rewrite from scratch.

> The site was poorly designed in the first place if the content can’t be stripped out.

I would (as a general rule) agree. But have you ever done a 200 page site using the FrontPage Extensions? I haven't, so I don't presume to judge. I guess you have?

[zeugma]

This one appears to be still alive. It’s free. http://www.bluegriffon.org/

I've looked at that before, and figured I'd give it a go. Neither ubuntu version would work for me. Right now I'm using bluefish because I can't seem to get a copy of Quanta Plus, which I used for years to work under Linux Mint. I really liked Quanta Plus because I was able to fully customize all the keyboard shortcuts to do exactly what I wanted. Oh well, guess I'll keep plugging along with Bluefish...

[TomGuy]

Not sure this will help, but I have FP98 on my Win7 computer. I only use the fpeditor, which is all I wanted when I put FP98 on this machine.

IIRC, I had to ‘add’ some fp**.dll to make fpeditor work.

I just tried fpexplorer.exe and FP Server Administrator. Both respond with a pop-up that I need fp30wec.dll. I do not have that dll in any of my old archieves.

I frequently use the fpeditor part to create or edit htm documents to post on Freerepublic. I don’t use the other parts of FrontPage, as they are too antiquated.

As I recall, I could not ‘install’ FP98 onthe Win7, I just copied the FP directory from the old XP directory and managed to get the fpeditor.exe to work.

[Varmint Al]

I use Kompozer to edit my VarmintAl.com web site. It works great and it is free. I started with FrontPage 2000, but have given up on Windows. Now I use Linux, but Kompozer works on Windows computers. I am writing this with Kompozer.

I use FileZilla for uploading and downloading files from my computer to the hosting site. It is also free and works very well. I have a folder on my computer that contains my website. I edit the site locally and then upload the changes with FileZilla.

Good Hunting... from Varmint Al

[Varmint Al]

I messed up the first two links. My bad.

I use Kompozer to edit my VarmintAl.com web site. It works great and it is free. I started with FrontPage 2000, but have given up on Windows. Now I use Linux, but Kompozer works on Windows computers. I am writing this with Kompozer.

I use FileZilla for uploading and downloading files from my computer to the hosting site. It is also free and works very well. I have a folder on my computer that contains my website. I edit the site locally and then upload the changes with FileZilla.

Good Hunting... from Varmint Al

[Pollard]

Well it kind of depends on the theme but most do tend to have things like a header, menu and sidebars built in. Those are things that are very common for a site to have and would have to be manually built with html but with a CMS, they can be sort of dynamic. For instance, a primary menu can have all new pages automatically added to it which saves from having to do it manually. Most every website has some kind of menu and even a manually built menu is quick and easy in a cms. Usually a drag and drop kind of thing. Any cms is usually going to be a time-saver in the end, however, it does take time to learn the cms itself.