How to Create and Update Manuals in the dml Website

Step 1: Before starting to update, make sure you have stored on your computer or P: drive your manual content in MS Word.

You need to convert the Word files into Web Page by clicking on File > Save as > Other Formats… option. Then scroll down the "Save as Type" and choose "Web Page" option.

File name should be “softwarename_manualtitle.htm” (for example: “adobepagemaker_storyeditor.htm”). (Make sure to label that file in a way that there are no blank spaces between words, e.g. adobe_pagemaker_story_editor).

Once you have done that you will see the Web Page format document, as well as the automatically generated image folder containing the pictures for your manual.  

They should look like this:

Step 2: Now, copy that image folder to the manuals folder within the dml folder (I:\IT\IT Individual Web Sites (Production)\dml\manuals).

Step 3: Next, click "Site > New Site" from the menu.

 

In the window that opens, choose the “Advanced” tab.

In the window that opens, enter a name for your site and then click right side folder icon at “Local root folder” and browse to "I:\IT\IT Individual Web Sites (Production)\dml" folder. Uncheck "Enable Cache" option.

Then click “OK” at the bottom. You have just defined a new working local site from which you can make changes to the dml manuals.

Step 4: Now either click on the option entitled “More…” or select "File > New" from top menu.

In the window that opens, choose the “Templates” menu option. The following screen should appear:

In the left panel, called “Templates for…”, choose the website you just created.

In the middle panel you will see two templates – “istemplate” and “manuals_template”. The (manuals_template) is a template for storing only the contents (Web Page) of your manual. **The (istemplate) is a template used for a placeholder--we are not using this template anymore--instead use "stub.asp" in the manuals folder.**

Step 5: Double-click on “manuals_template” to create a new file.

As soon as the web page is created, click on File, then Save as… then navigate to: I:\IT\IT Individual Web Sites (Production)\dml\manuals\contents and save there. 

You should save the document under following name format “softwarename_manualtitle_content.asp” (for example: “adobepagemaker_storyeditor_content.asp”).  And, make sure you save your file as a .asp file.

Step 6: Open the Word html document you had saved as a Web Page in Step 1 (for example: “adobepagemaker_storyeditor.htm”) and then clean up some of the possible (Word → Dreamweaver) conversion errors by choosing “Clean Up Word HTML” from the Commands menu, as shown below:

Step 7: Now you are ready to input the actual contents of your manual to this page. Just copy the entire contents of the Word html document and paste in “EditRegion” of the template.


Step 8: Now, highlight the title of your manual page.

Under the Properties panel, select "Heading 2" under "Format" option to change the font style of your header.

Step 9: The next thing you need to do is to make sure that your images will be accessible online. All you need to do is find out under what name you have saved your images in the manuals folder (the name of your images file will be the same as the name of the Web Page document you initially created from Word).

Let's say that for example that image folder name was "adobepagemaker_storyeditor_files" and you have saved it in the "manuals" folder.

Then click on your first picture in Dreamweaver and you will see the field named "Src" on the toolbars below: 

Click inside of "Src" box above and go to the first line. (click "Home" to do it)

Now you need to type in: http://www.depauw.edu/it/dml/manuals/ in place of everything that precedes the name of your image (e.g. if the image file name is "image002.jpg" then it shows like this: http://www.depauw.edu/it/dml/manuals/adobepagemaker_storyeditor_files/image002.jpg).

Then do the same for the rest of your images. Save your work.

Step 10: Now you need to open up "stub.asp" file at manuals folder and select "save as" to save it in I:\IT\IT Individual Web Sites (Production)\dml\manuals folder. 

The save format should be “softwarename_manualtitle.asp” (e.g. “adobepagemaker_storyeditor.asp”). This should be the same file name like your content page except without "_content" at the end of file name.

Step 11: Next, copy the line of code below:

<!--#include virtual="/it/dml/manuals/contents/adobepagemaker_storyeditor_content.asp" -->

Now change the view mode to "Code" and select lines 53 and paste the above code to replace them.

Step 12: Then change the “adobepagemaker_storyeditor_content.asp” part of it with whatever name you gave your content file. (make sure "_content.asp" is at the end of file name)

Save your work.

**To add a link from the dml website to your manual and upload the manual to the remote server, you need to contact your supervisor. That's all !!!