Comments on: Making Websites Without Serverside Scripting http://www.terminally-incoherent.com/blog/2008/05/19/making-websites-without-serverside-scripting/ Utterly random, incoherent and disjointed rants and ramblings... Thu, 20 Nov 2008 10:12:33 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.0.5 by: Luke Maciak http://www.terminally-incoherent.com/blog/2008/05/19/making-websites-without-serverside-scripting/#comment-9103 Tue, 20 May 2008 14:12:06 +0000 http://www.terminally-incoherent.com/blog/2008/05/19/making-websites-without-serverside-scripting/#comment-9103 <strong>@Tino</strong> - thanks for bringing up m4 Tino! I never used it, but it does seem like a more "accessible" way of doing this stuff. Then again, maintenance seems like a pain in the ass due to the fact you need to "re-compile" the thing. It's an interesting alternative. <strong>@Gamberoni</strong> - well, I wasn't really interested in menus. I wanted to have a page template with a header (with all the css, and javascript links), footer and a sidebar that would be in one place where they could be edited easily. In most server side languages you can do something like this when you create a new page: <pre lang="php"><?php include "header.php"; ?> <?php include "sidebar.php";?> <!-- your content goes here <?php include "footer.php" ?></pre> I wanted something like that - to be able to import these static documents all over the place. If you don't do this the maintenance becomes a nightmare since you have to copy and paste your stuff all over. Then when something changes you have to go back and edit every single file. @Tino - thanks for bringing up m4 Tino! I never used it, but it does seem like a more “accessible” way of doing this stuff. Then again, maintenance seems like a pain in the ass due to the fact you need to “re-compile” the thing. It’s an interesting alternative.

@Gamberoni - well, I wasn’t really interested in menus. I wanted to have a page template with a header (with all the css, and javascript links), footer and a sidebar that would be in one place where they could be edited easily. In most server side languages you can do something like this when you create a new page:

<?php include "header.php"; ?>
<?php include "sidebar.php";?>
<!-- your content goes here
<?php include "footer.php" ?>

I wanted something like that - to be able to import these static documents all over the place. If you don’t do this the maintenance becomes a nightmare since you have to copy and paste your stuff all over. Then when something changes you have to go back and edit every single file.

]]> by: Gamberoni http://www.terminally-incoherent.com/blog/2008/05/19/making-websites-without-serverside-scripting/#comment-9100 Tue, 20 May 2008 13:16:31 +0000 http://www.terminally-incoherent.com/blog/2008/05/19/making-websites-without-serverside-scripting/#comment-9100 Have you looked at what Steve Gibson has done with just css? Try http://www.grc.com/menudemo.htm -- I think this is close to what you were trying to achieve? Have you looked at what Steve Gibson has done with just css? Try http://www.grc.com/menudemo.htm — I think this is close to what you were trying to achieve?

]]> by: Tino http://www.terminally-incoherent.com/blog/2008/05/19/making-websites-without-serverside-scripting/#comment-9099 Tue, 20 May 2008 11:58:14 +0000 http://www.terminally-incoherent.com/blog/2008/05/19/making-websites-without-serverside-scripting/#comment-9099 I have been in a similar situation, where I did not dare to rely on a working php install when setting up a website. Since I am not a big fan of javascript my solution was quite different. I created a number of m4 macros and had html/m4 source files that relied on the macros for navigation menus, header, footer etc. People who used the system needed to remember to run 'make' every time they changed the source files to generate the static html files. Some people would probably say its better to go all XML and xsl transforms for something like this. Then one can generate nice print-formatted content from the same source files etc. But that just seemed a bit too overpowered for the simple things I was doing. I have been in a similar situation, where I did not dare to rely on a working php install when setting up a website. Since I am not a big fan of javascript my solution was quite different.

I created a number of m4 macros and had html/m4 source files that relied on the macros for navigation menus, header, footer etc. People who used the system needed to remember to run ‘make’ every time they changed the source files to generate the static html files.

Some people would probably say its better to go all XML and xsl transforms for something like this. Then one can generate nice print-formatted content from the same source files etc. But that just seemed a bit too overpowered for the simple things I was doing.

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