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Creating Flash Based Tabs in iWeb

D

ddaddy2420

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Jul 4, 2008
11
0
I am looking for a way to create flash based buttons in iweb - similar to the ones at the top of these forums that have, "Mac Rumors, Page 2, iPhone, buyer's guide, etc..."

I want this as a navigation bar for my site that is a little catchier than just creating a box with text that can change colors.
 
if you want to have a flash based navigation you will have to create it in flash. you can't do this in iweb alone.
 
As stated you cannot design flash navigation with iweb but you can use it with iweb.
this iWeb site has a flash navigation.
 
If you don't have access to flash consider using a CSS solution.

Check out these links:

http://www.alistapart.com/articles/slidingdoors/

http://css.maxdesign.com.au/index.htm

The second link leads to a website with many different menu possibilities using css and unordered lists. You may be able to look around there and find something helpful.

Again these are not flash solutions, but very effective nonetheless. If you are dead set on flash perhaps another forum member will be able to help out.

Good luck!
 
You can have a flashy looking navigation menu that changes colors and/or animates in some way without using Flash. I would strongly recommend avoiding Flash for this and instead using html, css, and/or javascript if needed. Flash is useful for certain things, but a Flash based navigation is generally not a great idea.
 
cromwell64 said:
You can have a flashy looking navigation menu that changes colors and/or animates in some way without using Flash. I would strongly recommend avoiding Flash for this and instead using html, css, and/or javascript if needed. Flash is useful for certain things, but a Flash based navigation is generally not a great idea.
Click to expand...
Would you please elaborate why it is not a good idea. I use flash navigation on my iweb site and it has solved a lot of problems I had. But as a relative novice to web design I might do something wrong without knowing it.
Thank you.
 
Mitou said:
Would you please elaborate why it is not a good idea. I use flash navigation on my iweb site and it has solved a lot of problems I had. But as a relative novice to web design I might do something wrong without knowing it.
Thank you.
Click to expand...

Because flash (the plugin) should never be required to use your website.


--


Flash is a plugin, therefor not everyone has it, the iPhone is a good example of this but it also becomes a problem with desktop browsers. Then they might not have the right version or something... Javascript and CSS are standards and built into the browser.

Some people turn flash off because they are on low bandwidth connections, they dont like ads, security reasons, or just because they dont like it.

Flash makes for poor accessibility. The the viewer has the text size turned up in his or her browser because they have poor eyesight the flash navigation wont honor those settings.

If the user is reliant on a screen reader then flash is almost impossible for them.



--


Making a standards compliant navigation bar that rivals flash isn't hard these days...
 
Navigation menus are one of the least appropriate places for flash. If flash is unavailable than a user is left with now way of navigating the site at all. And menus are almost always done in a way that it could be done with html, css, and javascript.

It is most often a very poor choice when it is a flash menu on an otherwise html site. That generally means the "developer" didn't really know his tools or even what the implications of using flash for that purpose would be.

There are many scenarios, anecdotes, and reasons that make flash a poor choice for this it would be hard to list them all.
 
Thank you both for your reply. I am now going to try to justify a couple of counterpoints to your comments which I do appreciate. Not everyone uses flash, true, but then if an alternative is provided on the page that has a flash menu then the problem is eliminated. (in my case I have done that, but it is certainly not a better way to find my articles)
The item about visually impaired accessibility is not part of iweb anyway thus it does not make much difference in our case. iWeb is terrible for the visually impaired.
Finally do you think that the expected audience for the site is relevant. Again in my case my site is about iweb, it is of no interest to people not using iweb and therefore a mac. This in itself gave me the confidence that they had relatively compliant equipment.
Am I wrong in my thinking?
 
If you have another means of navigating the website other than the flash navigation, then I don't see much of a problem with it as long as the other navigation is easy to use or provides the same functionality.

Generally though it is a bad idea to use Flash for navigation and building standards based/accessible sites is the ideal way of doing things for a number of reasons.
 
Don't use javascript/CSS instead of Flash.
I hate klunky AJAX navigation systems trying to be "Flashy".
If you want Flashy effects, just use Flash.

You can teach a hippo to twirl around on one toe, but that does not make it an acceptable substitute for a ballerina.
 
snickelfritz said:
Don't use javascript/CSS instead of Flash.
I hate klunky AJAX navigation systems trying to be "Flashy".
If you want Flashy effects, just use Flash.

You can teach a hippo to twirl around on one toe, but that does not make it an acceptable substitute for a ballerina.
Click to expand...

The OP wanted to make flash navigation in iWeb I Think it's very unlikely that he'll be able to do it at all.
 
I realize he's not going to be authoring a Flash navigation in iWeb. (by now, so does he)
I'm not sure I understand the reason for wanting to do it.
If you have the wherewithal and skills to produce a decent Flash menu, why would you need iWeb?
It's fun to produce flashy navigation systems, but the virtues of Flash are really mostly about effective content presentation.
 
snickelfritz said:
I realize he's not going to be authoring a Flash navigation in iWeb. (by now, so does he)
I'm not sure I understand the reason for wanting to do it.
If you have the wherewithal and skills to produce a decent Flash menu, why would you need iWeb?
It's fun to produce flashy navigation systems, but the virtues of Flash are really mostly about effective content presentation.
Click to expand...
this is interesting because I can do flash but I love iWeb. I am not a web designer but I like to play one. I have produce I think several very decent sites with iweb and this one
has flash navigation. It has an alternate navigation which is a link to one page with all the articles links on the page. It does not make it easier to find them it only provides an alternative. This to say that you might be able to do flash and not use dreamweaver or other apps. I find iweb one of the easiest program to use for non designers. It seems to me that in the forums that I visit there are a lot of misconceptions and snobbism about it. It is made for amateurs not professionals but it should not be looked down on and it can be aided by additions like flash.
I would like some feedback on my site please.
thank you
 
I originally posted this for the simple reason of wanting to create a website that was a bit more than what iweb can do. I have come to the conclusion that I don't have the time to put in to learn flash, dreamweaver,etc...

I am putting together a website for a friend and his new business. It doesn't have to be this grandiose flash based website, however, a few flashy tabs wouldn't hurt.

iweb so far has been the easiest for me and i was hoping to be able to add on to it without spending too much money for things like bannerzest, etc... I don't need to use flash, I just want something more than the standard navigation tabs. Any help is appreciated.

Here is the site if anyone has any ideas. www.rehabandperformance.com

Oh and i really have no clue as to how i am supposed to add CSS to this site. I have tried to add html to my site using the textedit program but i can't seem to pull up the html, all it does is pull up the site without html. http://css.maxdesign.com.au/listamatic/vertical11.htm

This code on this site above - i am guessing will give me that type of menu, but i have no idea how to add it to my iweb site. I am pretty sure that i can't simply add it into the html snippets. So what do i do?
 
ddaddy2420 said:
Here is the site if anyone has any ideas. www.rehabandperformance.com

Oh and i really have no clue as to how i am supposed to add CSS to this site. I have tried to add html to my site using the textedit program but i can't seem to pull up the html, all it does is pull up the site without html. http://css.maxdesign.com.au/listamatic/vertical11.htm
Click to expand...

Overall, as you are not a designer, this is a good site look for your friend. It is clean and has some adequate white space. Just a quick critique: take of that "scrolling marquee." It instantly degrades the professionalism. Try styling it under the "Physical Therapy & Outpatient Rehabilitation" in italics.

One other thing - that red is often too harsh on the eyes. You have used it in a slightly less-overbearing manor, but I might still suggest making it a darker, or more subtle red.

As far as not being able to see the html code for TextEdit, try going to preferences>open and save> and uncheck "ignore rich text commands in HTML files." I've heard this will work, but I haven't varified. Alternatively, you could use my favorite, free text editor, TextWrangler.
 
yea i am still playing around with the contact us page. I am using that as my test page. I thought the scrolling marquee looked really lame as well but the owner of the business wants that type of thing on there. He wants a site to be more along the lines as these two.

http://www.sovereignrehab.com/index.asp

or this

http://www.atlantarehab.com/

I guess this sort of stuff is out of iweb's reach. I was hoping to avoid purchasing bannerzest, but i may have to. As far as placing the css code, i was able to open the .css file to modify the navigation links, seems kind of annoying to have to update that file by itself each time a change to the site is made.

Where would i add this code for a navigation bar similar to these on this site?

http://css.maxdesign.com.au/listamatic/horizontal34.htm

Can i just place the css code anywhere on the css page and then add the html in as a snippet?
 
ddaddy2420 said:
yea i am still playing around with the contact us page. I am using that as my test page. I thought the scrolling marquee looked really lame as well but the owner of the business wants that type of thing on there. He wants a site to be more along the lines as these two.
Click to expand...

You're selling a site that you made in iWeb to someone?
 
Not so much as selling, more along the lines of helping him out. The problem is he wants something a bit more flashy than what you get with iweb.
 
would help if you explained what static styling is?

Still looking for an answer to adding in the css text and where to add it? Do i add the css to the css file and then add the html as a snippet? I tried that and it didn't seem to do anything.
 
tuffluffjimmy said:
You're selling a site that you made in iWeb to someone?
Click to expand...
I have come across a couple of people who make a nice living using iweb. Because it is so fast and easy they are selling sites at extremely low prices and they are getting the customers.
Good for them if they can! why be so critical?
 
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