Splitting up a html page and loading it through header? - html

I am using HTML5, and would like to speed up the creation and editing of my standard HTML template by splitting it into three separate HTML files.
header.html
content.html (this will be edited and will have other names e.g. home)
footer.html
I have looked at the following resources, but I am not sure if this is possible or how to go about it.
http://www.w3schools.com/html/html_head.asp
http://www.w3schools.com/tags/tag_link.asp
In PHP I would just include the files in the right order. Is there an equivelant in just a plain HTML site?
I have googled this, but I don't think Im searching for the right term. I would appreciate any information, or resources available!
Thanks for your time!

For just a static HTML site, there is no html-only way to include files the way you are trying to. You may be able to use server-side includes depending on your server, but by that point, you might as well just use PHP.
Another option would be to make extensive use of Javascript to load the page pieces after the main part of the page is already loaded.
In all cases, though, you will have a major reduction in performance, since a server request is slow. If you need to use templates, just use a dynamic language like PHP.

You can't do it cleanly with HTML. You could use iFrames, but that's far from clean. The optimal solution would be to use PHP. It will also save you the requests from the browser.

You can do it via include files in SHTML or through some server-side processing which can combine the files into one HTML output stream when a user requests the URL. Standard HTML isn't processed on the server so you'll need to use some server-side technology such as .NET, ASP, PHP, CGI, etc.

There is no way to do this with plain HTML. You could do it using JavaScript to load the different pages into their place after loading the main page. But that seems somewhat stange and unnecessary.

The easiest way that I know how to do this is to use a Model-View-Controller (MVC) style framework of some sort. I would use CodeIgniter, which is created with PHP. It's light (2.1 is VERY fast), has incredible documentation, is super easy to understand (even if you don't know much about PHP), creates clean URIs, and will allow you to build dynamic websites (which is what you're wanting to do) with great ease. Your separate pages (called "views" in MVC terminology) will be able to load in the order you choose; in as many controller methods as you need. It's fantastic!
The following are some resources that will help explain what I'm talking about:
CodeIgniter User Guide - Model-View-Controller:
http://codeigniter.com/user_guide/overview/mvc.html
CodeIgniter User Guide - Views
http://codeigniter.com/user_guide/general/views.html
Here are some resources to help you get started with CodeIgniter:
CodeIgniter User Guide:
http://www.codeigniter.com/user_guide
CodeIgniter From Scratch Series by Nettuts+:
http://net.tutsplus.com/sessions/codeigniter-from-scratch/
Here are some resources that you may want if you need to learn more about PHP to start:
http://www.php.net
http://net.tutsplus.com/tutorials/php/the-best-way-to-learn-php/
I hope this helps, and let me know if you need any more help or a clearer explanation. Good luck!

The question is what kind result are you expect? Your question looks like you don't have experience but you feel that is something wrong with your architecture. Do you need it for any bigger webpage or for something smaller? Try to find any CMS and it will have solution to make your work more clear:) If you want to make any experiments, start from begin. You can have one layout and more content files. If your website is simple try with
<body><div>header</div><div><?php include('content'.addslashes($_GET['id']).'.php') ?></div>
<div>footer</div></body>
Don't use iframe, this is deprecated solution:)

In HTML5, you can embed (but not include) HTML documents with the object element, with the iframe element, and with the embed element.
<object data="include-me.html" type="text/html"><!-- fallback content --></object>
<iframe seamless src="include-me.html"></iframe>
<embed src="include-me.html" type="text/html"></embed>
embed
Using embed might be a bit shaky, not least because it’s intended "for an external (typically non-HTML) application or interactive content". When it doesn’t render the HTML document, try to remove the type attribute (at least it then worked in Chromium).
iframe
Using iframe might work for you in combination with the seamless attribute (beware of browser support). The HTML5 (CR) spec has an example:
An HTML inclusion is effected using this attribute as in the following example. In this case, the inclusion is of a site-wide navigation bar.
<!DOCTYPE HTML>
<title>Mirror Mirror — MovieInfo™</title>
<header>
<h1>Mirror Mirror</h1>
<p>Part of the MovieInfo™ Database</p>
<nav>
<iframe seamless src="nav.inc"></iframe>
</nav>
</header>
...
object
The HTML5 (CR) spec has an example:
In this example, an HTML page is embedded in another using the object element.
<figure>
<object data="clock.html"></object>
<figcaption>My HTML Clock</figcaption>
</figure>

Related

Common Menu/Masthead for websites using HTML5

When learned to make JSP pages, I was taught to use a common menu page separate from all other pages and then import the menu page to each page using <jsp:directive.include file="menu.jspx" />.
Is there a similar way to do this in HTML5? Or is there a better way to include a common menu/masthead on every page using HTML5?
No, html5 doesn't do this.
What you were doing in JSP was a server-side include.
What you are asking for is a client-side include, those don't exist in html5.
I you had a good reason for loading something client-side, you could use javascript.
Look into AJAX. A lot of .js libraries have good support, to make it easier.
jQuery for example has a load() function which takes some of the pain away.
I don't recommend using something like that for a navigation menu though.
Server-side includes would be better.
If you're simply working on a small project, maybe you're doing it locally, and you just want to make it so you don't have to copy-paste chunks of the page everywhere, php is an easy way to do it.
Use something like XAMPP to run php on your machine in an easy-to-follow way.
Then use php's include function, as demonstrated here: PHP Include to do what you want.
The standard way to do this is to use Server Side Includes. Most servers support this.
Further reading here

Embeding a secondary HTML file within a webpage

I still don't feel comfortable repeating HTML for things like menu code, header, footer and most importantly a quick links/news panel on each page. Also it seems a little inefficient to keep sending the same repeated html for each page.
For the moment I have written a small program which reads these sections from my index.htm and replaces the relevant sections within all other pages in that directory. However things have started to get considerably more awkward now that I have extra pages like a Message Forum and Image Gallery, both of which require their own index.htm in their respective sub directories.
So the question is should I be using object, iframe or SSI?
Has anyone successfully used the object tag to embed a separate HTML file within a page? SSI would do the job except that the repeated HTML is still being sent across the web on every page change and different include lines would have to be used on the PHP pages. What about using IFrames, I know they are not strict XHTML1.0 compliant but I seem to recall rumors that they are going to br supported in HTML5 again, does that make them a good bet for the future?
The easiest way to solve this problem is by using a scripting language (PHP, Python, ASP) and templates. You can create the basic structure for your site in a master template, then use the scripts to pull in only the content that changes.
For a particularly good example, see Django's template system.
Each of your pages could call a JavaScript function in an external boilerplate.js file. That function could add boilerplate elements to the page, using the DOM.
That said, you might not want to do this, nor use IFrames, for SEO reasons! (Also, your pages would not fail gracefully if the client disabled JavaScript.)
To me it seems better to have a more search-engine-friendly page and put up with the transmission of duplicate markup. Server Side Includes (or any server-side scripting language) would give these qualities while also making it easy for you to change the boilerplate on all pages at once.

How do I create some HTML help pages, with the same content at the top and bottom, without php or ASP etc?

I want to create some html help pages, separate html pages.
However, I want to have the same content on the top and bottom of the pages.
In the past I've used PHP or ASP, with header and footer files.
I've then had to do view source and save these pages to get what I want.
I just wondered if there an easiest way to do this ?
EDIT:
The pages are for use with software using a web object not a normal browser. So there won't be a web server
If your web server supports it, you could do server side includes
You could use frames, but it's not necessarily advisable (for one, it breaks navigation).
You could use XML files with an XSLT stylesheet to turn them into HTML documents that share similar elements.
You could use PHP or another server-side language to generate the pages, and then use a recursive download tool (such as wget) to turn them into HTML.
EDIT: you're basically asking whether the "standard-ish" subset of HTML supported by your component of choice provides a way of including data from a common file, just so you won't have to include the data in every HTML document.
The answer hovers somewhere between "no way" and "maybe your component has a few tricks to do that".
The sane thing to do here would be to have a tool generate the HTML documents from a common template. Could be XML + XSLT, PHP/ASP/whatever, or a fully-fledged CMS (this actually helps let non-technical users write the document contents).
It's awful, but you could include a JS file that uses a bunch of document.write("...") to include common elements. Not SEO friendly.

Can HTML code be attached to HTML page like CSS file?

Can HTML code be attached to HTML page like CSS file ?
So that if part of HTML code is replicated in all pages , I can put it in one file and then easly modify it .
Thanks,
Ahmed.
Yes it can, using frames. Not recommended though.
Example:
<frameset cols="10%,90%">
<frame src="navigation.html">
<frame src="content.html">
</frameset>
This code would allow you to reuse the content of file navigation.html. All links clicked on page content.html would change the content of that frame, and the navigation would stay as it is.
Using frames has many disadvantages (search engine problems, usability, linking, scrolling etc.) and shouldn't be considered in modern web sites (except on very rare occasions).
Not in plain HTML, no. (Sadly)
As Gregory says, you could look into Server Side Includes - they are parsed by the Web Server.
Alternatively, if you have PHP, you can do an include():
<?php include "header.html"; ?>
You may want to have a look at SSI (Server Side Includes):
Server Side Includes (SSI) is a simple interpreted server-side scripting language used almost exclusively for the web.
The most frequent use of SSI is to include the contents of one or more files into a web page on a web server.
Also, consider:
However, while HTML allows the direct inclusion of CSS, JavaScript and Image files into a web page it has never allowed direct inclusion of HTML. There are several tricks to achieve this, each with their own problems. These include:
Using an IFrame, which includes content in a clearly separate, fixed size area.
Converting the HTML code into a JavaScript program that inserts the HTML into the DOM.
Using JavaScript with Ajax to load the Html. Internet Explorer will generally not allow this to work directly from the file system due to security concerns.
Not possible with pure html, if you are using a server-side language however, usually there is such function available, for example in PHP, there is include or require functions to include files.
PHP Example:
include ('file.html');
I would recommend you to go with the first (server-side) approach if you are using a server-side language.
I don't think it's possible with just HTML, you might be able to get away with it if you use a bit of JavaScript... of course if JavaScript is disabled your site wouldn't work.
That said have you considered using a scripting language such as PHP? You could include your html page in whenever you desire, you then only have to modify / maintain one file.

Is there a way of including HTML pages without needing any javascript or server-side code, only HTML

Is there a way of including HTML pages without needing any javascript or server-side code, only HTML.
Basically I can't be sure if the server supports server side includes. I don't want to use javascript and I don't want to use any PHP or other server side functionality.
Is there any way to do this. At the moment I suspect not, but would be very interested if it were possible.
Use some frames in your page
HTML frames allow authors to present
documents in multiple views, which may
be independent windows or subwindows.
<iframe></iframe> is the tag you need to include inline floating frames.
Quick tip with iframes: Be sure you open and close the tag explicitly, if not some browsers will complain
You can use framesets.
HTML imports, part of HTML Components, aims to do exactly this.
HTML5rocks offers a great tutorial to get started with HTML imports.
According to can I use, only Chrome is supporting HTML imports today.