FOR DESIGNER AND DEFELOPER

FrontPage Tutorial

Using the Discussion Web Wizard

To create a protected web to restrict or monitor user access on a server that supports self-registration through a web browser (UNIX hosts), you must first create a discussion web as a sub-web to the root web. (Windows NT security and Microsoft IIS do not allow self-registration through a web browser.) Your host must also allow sub-webs to be created on the server.


At best, the FrontPage discussion web created with the Discussion Web Wizard is basic and will be hard to maintain, edit and may become unstable if you try to create it in your root web.


The form handler will remember and prompt you each time you access the discussion web. Your posts will automatically include your username. FrontPage will handle all the details for you, so you don't need to use additional scripts and a CGI bin.


To create a sub-web, open your root web, select File New Web from the menu and select the Discussion Web Wizard. Follow the instructions to create your web, then edit it to match the look of your root web using text and graphics of your choice. Publish, then test the discussion web (as a sub-web) to make sure it looks and works the way you want it to, making the necessary changes. Read the documentation FrontPage provides as you create and edit your new discussion web. Neat, huh?


Once the discussion web is in place on the server, you can link to it from the index page of your root web and leave it at that, or take it a step further and create a user registration form (UNIX supported) so visitors to your discussion forum have to access it through a user name and password.

The 'Enter Network Password' screen will automatically prompt your discussion web visitors when they go to the discussion web. Good reasons for creating a user registration form are 1) you can restrict access to a protected web, and 2) you can monitor access to the web, and 3) your user's names are unique so no one else can post using someone else's name.

Test your discussion forum by posting questions on topics as the moderator, or assign a helper with permissions as a moderator. You also might want to add some posting guidelines to your new web.