HELP!!!!! Netscape is giving me trouble!!!

[Saz]

I'm putting a website together for a local group of motorcyclists, and the design was going great - til I just checked it in Netscape!!!!!

The top frame (yes I know most of you don't like them, but that's how the guy wants it!) is used for the navigation and includes a graphic made to resemble the speedo/rev counter on a bike with a road behind it. The road and the 'casing' for the dials is one image, and is set as the bg of a table cell. I've then placed a table in the centre of this cell, divided into 3 separate cells, for the speedo, rev counter and logo. It looks great in IE, but for some reason, Netscape formats the inner table completely wrong. Can somebody please take a look and tell me why this is happening?? Thanks guys.

[lynlimz]

Hi,

(Had to Install Netscape 4..haah)

I believe your problem lies in your table.
can you please verify that the 3 images, add to favourites, site updates and the S image..be in the same table. with 3 columns

like:

+---+---+---+
| 1 | 2 | 3 |
+---+---+---+

[Saz]

Yep - that's basically it. Something I thought was simple enough for Netscape to handle. Obviously I was wrong!!!

[creole]

saz...

Netscape can handle it, but the problem lies in the way it handles table backgrounds.

If you assign a background to a table in IE, then you will get that background across all cells.

If you assign a background to a table in NS, then EACH CELL takes that background as it's own. Meaning that the background will start from the top left corner of each cell like what is happening on your page.

All you have to do to solve it is nest the existing table (minus the background) inside another table that HAS the background. Use only one cell for the master table and your problem is solved.

[Saz]

Creole, I know that NN has problems formatting table backgrounds - I've come across that problem before!!!

That's not the problem here.....

I created a table which I split into 3 rows. The bottom 2 rows are split into columns and are used for the links to all the pages within the site. The top row was kept as one large cell (I'll refer to this as the master cell, or I'll end up confusing myself as well as everyone else!!), which is set with a bg image (the road and dial casing). A completely separate table is created inside this master cell, centred, and is made up 3 cells all in a row. Each cell contains one image but done as an <img> not as a cell or table background.

When I called the site up in netscape, the cell that should have been to the right (the speedo) was above the left-hand cell (the rev counter) with the middle cell to right. This consequently made the table too 'tall' for the master cell, making the master cell 'taller' and consequently causing the bg image to repeat!!

I've looked at the source code over and over again, but I can't find the problem!!

[creole]

I'll take a look at it tonight.

[mmj]

Screenshot!
http://www.mostlyamphigory.com/temp/sazshot1.gif

Yes, it does look bizarre in Netscape.


[edit]

Ok, finally I have found a way to fix it... remove one of the attributes from the IMG tag of the first image, and that fixes it.

Your IMG tag looks a bit like this:
<img src="images/revs.gif" width="97" height="97" style="cursor:hand" onmouseover="self.status='* Click Here For Latest Site Updates *'" onclick="javascript:openWindow1('updates.htm')">

It seems to be a bug in netscape tp have that many... Maybe you could do the site updates in a different way:

<a href="updates.htm" target="newupdateswindow"><img src="images/revs.gif" width="97" height="97" onmouseover="self.status='* Click Here For Latest Site Updates *'"></a>

This would also have the effect of opening a new window for the updates... it's not quite the same though...

Maybe you could drop the style="cursor:hand" ?

[OneChance]

You need to put a transparent gif background in the table that contains the three images, and you also need to remove the cursor:hand thing (Netscape doesn't like it). Also, after your first <td>, remove the div and center tags; you don't need it and you already have align=center inside that <td>. If you need me to post the entire source code, let me know.

[Saz]

Thanks guys! What would I do without you???!!!!

One Chance, I knew that NN wouldn't support the cursor:hand tag as I have a list of which commands are supported by which browser version (courtesy of W3Schools Online), but I assumed that NN would just ignore it. I'll try removing just them first, to see if that fixes it....if not, I'll give some of the other things suggested a try.

See, I've always said I'm more a graphics person than anything else!!!!!!

[lynlimz]

LOL
Sorry I didn't come to your aid earlier. Had to format my computer. Internet had big bigproblem. YICKS!

Did you managed to fix it yet?

[OneChance]

Well, you'll have to at least add the transparent gif background so the parent td's background can show through in Netscape.

[mmj]

Onechance that is a good idea! I've always just avoided inheriting backgrounds because of netscape's background problems, but yours sounds like a good idea.

[Saz]

It's working!!!!!

I added a transparent gif bg to each of the 3 cells with the dials in and took away the cursor:hand tag, then hey presto!

Thanks guys!

[mmj]

The images don't look very clickable any more - without the cursor:hand.

It was working for me with the rightmost image (add to favorites) having cursor:hand. You might like to experiment with that.

As for the leftmost image, well you could make it into a link to null so that it is a hand cursor. I cannot remember how to link to nothing anymore, but it did nothing, not even loading a blank page or refreshing the page. Then, your javascript would still work, but the browser would also realise that it is a link, and give a hand.

It's just an idea, and I've never implemented it, except for a very long time ago...

[Saz]

mmj, that's precisely why I put the cursor:hand tag in there. Originally, I had the site updates as a standard link, which naturally gave me a hand on mouse-over, but the add to favourites didn't have a hand on mouse-over and it looked 'un-balanced' not to mention confusing. Its definately something I'm going to have to work on. Users associate a hand with something they can click on - no hand = no click!!!!

I've also noticed that in NN my rollovers don't work and the site updates window doesn't pop-up! Very strange as I'm using the exact same scripts as I use on all my other sites and they work fine in NN!!!!!

[OneChance]

You can try the following for your speedo.gif table cell:

<td width="100" height="125" valign="bottom" align="right"><a href="javascript:void(0)"
onmouseover="window.status='* IE Users Click Here To Add The ASB Website To Your Favourites *'; return true"
onmouseout="window.status=''; return true" onclick="window.external.AddFavorite(top.location.href,top.document.title)">
<img border="0" src="images/speedo.gif" width="97" height="97"></a></td>

Also, if I save that top frame and all of its elements to my hard drive and view it in Netscape 4.x, the rollovers do work.

[Saz]

Thanks for that OneChance....the javascript:void(0) is what i was missing. For the life of me, I just couldn't work it out.

As to the rollovers...that is strange!

[Saz]

it didn't work!!! Don't know about NN, but in IE, it opens another window and tries to find the location "javascript:void(0)" Oddly though, this only happened on the server.......and not with the web saved to my hard drive!!!!!

[lynlimz]

if you're tyring to achieve a no-link effect, use #

href="#"

javascript:void(0);
javascript:void();
javascript:

all don't work or had browser compatibility issues...so i ended up using #

[Saz]

Lynlimz, you're a darling!!!!!

Uh oh....that didn't work either!!! It opened a copy of the navigation bar in the main frame!!!!

[OneChance]

Hmm, that's weird. I tested the code above and it worked fine for me. I'm using IE 5.5 and NN 4.08 on Win98. Of course, NN did nothing like it's supposed to when I clicked on the speedo.gif. Saz and lynlimz, what browsers and OS's are y'all using?

[lynlimz]

oh. LOL
I'll have a look at the code when i return.

I can use any browser. WHY? haha

[Saz]

I'm using Win ME (hubby's choice, not mine!) with IE 5.5 and NN 4.6

[Saz]

OneChance, I just tried your code again and it's working now...in IE anyway (I have to rig up my husbands laptop to test it in NN - I'll do that later). All I can say is my PC must have been playing up yesterday or something.

[Saz]

Right....this has got to be something to do with Win ME. One minute that code is working, next minute it's opening another window and looking for 'javascript:void(0)!!!

I've changed the code back to what it was originally, without the cursor:hand tags and put alternate text in so that users will see that they should click there even though there's no hand!!!

These things are sent to try us I guess!!!!