Dreamweaver - How to convert from FP to DW

Author

How to convert from FP to DW

Pete Kipe

2004-06-02, 11:15 pm

I built a web site with FP 2002 that has been in production for nearly two
years. What is the best way to begin using DW to manage the site? I have
not been able to find any means of importing the site into DW -- am I
missing something?

Thanks,

Pete

David B

2004-06-02, 11:16 pm

Pete Kipe wrote:

> I built a web site with FP 2002 that has been in production for nearly two
> years. What is the best way to begin using DW to manage the site? I have
> not been able to find any means of importing the site into DW -- am I
> missing something?

I had a huge FrontPage site that I wanted to convert to Dreamweaver, but
none of the conversion tips or tools worked for me. I finally went back
to square one and just began hacking away. Since I had so much to learn
about web design anyway, I found it easier to just create new pages,
then paste in the content from my FrontPage sites, after I sanitized it.
I'm still working on it, as I have so many pages and am developing some
new sites at the same time.

I don't know what stage of web design you're at, but if you haven't
worked with things like cascading style sheets, server side languages
and databases, this might be a good time to learn, because they can make
your job a lot easier in the long run.

Murray *TMM*

2004-06-02, 11:16 pm

Here's how I would do it -

1. I'd define a Dreamweaver site that points to a location on your hard
drive for the local site's root, and to the current FP site as the remote
site
2. I'd use Dreamweaver (if your host supports FTP connections) to download
the remote site to the root of the site you just defined on the hard drive.
This will
pick up all the pages *after* webbot action so that shared borders and all
are already present. This will also pick up all of the server script
(Note - in the event that you are not able to connect using FTP since some
FP hosts block that protocol, you will have to use a third party 'site
copier' like Black Widow, QuadSucker, or WebCopier, to connect and download
using http protocols. Doing it this way will *not* retrieve any of your
server-script code. You will have to recreate that in Dreamweaver).

3. I'd create a DW template for the pages that captures the "shared border"
effect.
4. I'd copy and paste content from the FP pages to the template child pages
and then save the new child pages with an easily identifiable nomenclature
that is distinct from what was used on the FP site.
5. When the basic site is completed, I'd upload to some staging area, and
by using the browser, I'd verify that the site (as it exists remotely) is
complete.
6. Then I'd create a new DW site in a new location on the hard drive,
connect to and download all the files from the staging site.

You now have a complete site (minus any of the FP extension server-side
code) that has no FP footprint.

--
Murray --- ICQ 71997575
Team Macromedia Volunteer for Dreamweaver MX
(If you *MUST* email me, don't LAUGH when you do so!)
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"Pete Kipe" <pkipe@corpdatasys.com> wrote in message
news:fO6dnXjRAvnl6CDd4p2dnA@giganews.com...
> I built a web site with FP 2002 that has been in production for nearly two
> years. What is the best way to begin using DW to manage the site? I have
> not been able to find any means of importing the site into DW -- am I
> missing something?
>
> Thanks,
>
> Pete
>
>