Working with FrontPage 2003 | Sams Teach Yourself Microsoft Office 2003 in 24 Hours

Two Web chapters are not nearly enough time to master FrontPage 2003, but you can gain a quick understanding of the product in this and the next Web hour and learn what's in store if you want to further your skills.

When you want to create a Web page, you can select File, New. You then have the option of creating a single Web page or a complete Web site (a collection of Web pages, the first of which is called the home page ).

Figure Web 1.3 shows the many wizards and design templates that appear when you want to create a new Web page. These design options appear when you select File, New and then select One page Web site from the task pane. The resulting Web site you create does not have to remain a single page, but it begins as one. Some of the Web pages you can create are

One Page Web ” Creates a blank Web page
Corporate Presence Wizard ” Begins a step-by-step wizard that generates a Web-site structure for a large organization
Discussion Page Wizard ” Helps you create a Web page that enables users to chat back and forth in a bulletin-board text format
Customer Support Web ” A Web page designed for a Help support staff to help users of products and services
Database Interface Wizard ” A Web page that connects to Access and other types of databases so that you can manage and display database information over the Internet, such as an inventory or product-order system

Figure Web 1.3. FrontPage 2003 offers several Web-page templates and wizards.

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All Web pages you create with FrontPage contain basic HTML editing tags that enable the Web page to operate in an Internet browser. You can see the bare-bones minimum, HTML-based, blank Web page contents in Listing Web 1.2. These HTML commands form the basis of all Web pages. FrontPage adds even more HTML tags when you create a Web page. As you can see, many HTML commands, called tags , are enclosed in angled brackets. Often, a command begins with an opening tag (such as <title> ) followed by a closing tag (such as </title> ), indicated with a forward slash. Fortunately, you do not have to be a master of HTML specifics when you first begin learning FrontPage; you only need to be aware of them and be able to recognize what HTML is at this point.

Listing Web 1.2 All Web Pages Contain These Fundamental HTML Commands

 <html>   <head>   </head>   <body>   </body> </html>

Although HTML is rather simple compared to major programming languages such as C++, HTML is cryptic and you can already see that working in the graphical environment that FrontPage 2003 provides is much simpler than mastering HTML commands.

The initial tags shown in Listing Web 1.2 are only sufficient to define a blank Web page, and it's your job to fill in the page with text, graphics, and other elements. As you add these elements, FrontPage adds all the necessary HTML command tags that will produce the page you desire inside your users' Web browsers.