Frontpage is Dead - Conversion to Expression (Web) Almost Impossible

  • Thread starter Thread starter SB
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Thanks - that's encouraging. I have just downloaded SPD - soent all
afternoon in Pret on The Cloud (for free!!). Have to try importing my
FP site into it. But I'm wondering how to retain the FP theme? It uses
style sheets, and a bunch of graphics (for the background and bullet
points). And I'm wondering how the page and graphics links will remain
connected. But I don't have shared boarders thankfully. CJB.
Click to expand...


Don't import

open fp
backup your site
http://accessfp.net/backupfp.htm

then open expression web or sharepoint designer 2007 and browse to the
location of your web .... select it and open it ..

it really is that simple... that way you have all you should have no half
measure like with inporting which can and will miss things.

make sure you set up sharepoint designer 2007 or expression web .. with sp07
choose the ew 1 ebook
Setting up Expression Web Ebook ( Free )
http://any-expression.com/expression-web/ebooks/setting-up-expression-web-ebook.htm

if you want some free well coded validating templates to play with (spd 07
does not have any - and the ew one's leave something to be desired) then pop
along to http://www.frontpage-to-expression.com/site-templates/ where there
are 17 different layouts which will can be made available from within the
prog itself.. they are dwts with basic pages and there are tutorials to help
even if you dont use them its good to practice with.

This tutorial will help you with further aspects.
http://www.experts-exchange.com/art...grating-from-FrontPage-to-Expression-Web.html

If you want to keep your theme then you will have to save the style sheet
and the graphics and put it together as a template to be turned into a
dwt....

Free Expression Web Dynamic Web Templates Ebook
http://any-expression.com/expression-web/ebooks/expression-web-dwt-ebook.htm

actually sounds like a good idea for a tutorial ... but not sure I want to
encourage people to use a look everyone has ... perhaps it could be based on
custom designed theme!.. have to think about that one:)

anyways .. thats your best way forward.. .shout if you need any help

Tina
Expression Web Tips Ebooks
Launch price $7 - 26 EW Tips each. Bundle $13 vol l & ll
http://any-expression.com/expression-web/ebooks/
 
Don't import

open fp
backup your sitehttp://accessfp.net/backupfp.htm

then open expression web or sharepoint designer 2007 and browse to the
location of  your web .... select it and open it ..

it really is that simple... that way you have all you should have no half
measure like with inporting which can and will miss things.

make sure you set up sharepoint designer 2007 or expression web .. with sp07
choose the ew 1 ebook
Setting up Expression Web Ebook ( Free )http://any-expression.com/expression-web/ebooks/setting-up-expression...

if you want some free well coded validating templates to play with (spd 07
does not have any - and the ew one's leave something to be desired) then pop
along tohttp://www.frontpage-to-expression.com/site-templates/where there
are 17 different layouts which will can be made available from within the
prog itself.. they are dwts with basic pages and there are tutorials to help
even if you dont use them its good to practice with.

This tutorial will help you with further aspects.http://www.experts-exchange.com/articles/Web_Development/Software/Exp...

If you want to keep your theme then you will have to save the style sheet
and the graphics and put it together as a template to be turned into a
dwt....

Free Expression Web Dynamic Web Templates Ebookhttp://any-expression.com/expression-web/ebooks/expression-web-dwt-eb...

actually sounds like a good idea for a tutorial ... but not sure I want to
encourage people to use a look everyone has ... perhaps it could be basedon
custom designed theme!.. have to think about that one:)

anyways .. thats your best way forward.. .shout if you need any help

Tina
Expression Web Tips Ebooks
Launch price $7 - 26 EW Tips each. Bundle $13 vol l & llhttp://any-expression.com/expression-web/ebooks/
Click to expand...

Thank you for your advice. Silly question - what's a dwt file?

Chris B.
 
Thank you for your advice. Silly question - what's a dwt file?

Chris B.

sorry Chris....

its a dynamic web template .... its sort of a theme on steriods;)

let us know how you get on.. and shout up if you get stuck at any point ...

I've just installed wp over and over and over again .... to get it right in
moving my blog on the new host ..... each time i find something i did wrong
lol ... would be fun if i had'nt had to move computers too and to deal with
a bunch of offline things..... the second stage will be harder ... i swore i
wont make a theme till i can actually do it and know how to validate it so
will be immersed in morten's ew and wp tutorials at some point after other
projects are finished..... - the point being - enjoy the journey ;)

Tina
Expression Web Tips Ebooks
Launch price $7 - 26 EW Tips each. Bundle $13 vol l & ll
http://any-expression.com/expression-web/ebooks/
 
Thank you for your advice. Silly question - what's a dwt file?

Chris B.

sorry Chris....

its a dynamic web template .... its sort of a theme on steriods;)

let us know how you get on.. and shout up if you get stuck at any point ....

I've just installed wp over and over and over again .... to get it right in
moving my blog on the new host ..... each time i find something i did wrong
lol ... would be fun if i had'nt had to move computers too and to deal with
a bunch of offline things..... the second stage will be harder ... i swore i
wont make a theme till i can actually do it and know how to  validate it so
will be immersed in morten's ew and wp tutorials at some point after other
projects are finished..... - the point being - enjoy the journey ;)

Tina
Expression Web Tips Ebooks
Launch price $7 - 26 EW Tips each. Bundle $13 vol l & llhttp://any-expression.com/expression-web/ebooks/
Click to expand...

Ok - thanks everyone for your help and interest.

I have now copied my FP web and then opened it into SPD. I see how
this works - up to a point. However I need to preserve the FP Theme(s)
and the style sheet files don't seem to work - in particular w.r.t
horizontal lines and bullet points and fonts. Luckily I don't use
shared borders!! How can I convert a FP Theme into SPD. This might
seem lazy but I have hundreds of pages to convert. And with FP you can
apply a Theme to the whole web site in one go - easy.

Thanks - Chris B.
 
Ok - thanks everyone for your help and interest.

I have now copied my FP web and then opened it into SPD. I see how
this works - up to a point. However I need to preserve the FP Theme(s)
and the style sheet files don't seem to work - in particular w.r.t
horizontal lines and bullet points and fonts. Luckily I don't use
shared borders!! How can I convert a FP Theme into SPD. This might
seem lazy but I have hundreds of pages to convert. And with FP you can
apply a Theme to the whole web site in one go - easy.

Thanks - Chris B.



Is this a custom theme?
whats your site link?

You just make a page with the elements of what you want..... if its a
generic theme ... .why not design something unique to you?

just look for the background graphic and any other images you want .. they
will be there in the folder list in the themes

When you say 'copy' your fp web .... hope you mean you published your site
to a new web on your hd? ...do it any other way and you are bound to lose
something....

a fp theme is so badly coded .... you really dont want to use any coding
from it ....

if you want to play about with a dwt ... these free Site Templates will let
you do that with spd ... which dont have the generic dwts that expression
web has as far as i can remember...

http://www.frontpage-to-expression.com/site-templates/

with a dwt you can apply the template to the whole site in one go - and have
a lot more control over it than a theme ... with a dwts editable and non
editable regions...

see my free dwt ebook to help you get started
http://any-expression.com/expression-web/free-dwt/

and follow the setting up ebook also free for expression 1 .. that way you
will be set up and it will cause you less problems.

Tina
F ree Expression Web Toolbar - Expression Web and Web Design Resources
http://frontpage-to-expression.com/expression-web-community-toolbar.html
Just posted new links to the toolbar - Make YOUR suggestions
Will work in FireFox IE and Safari
 
Thank you. I have two themes - one FP and one custom. I don't mind
losing the FP one (tropo), but the tall ship / sailing one I'd like
to keep.

The other issue with the FP pages are that they are full of <div></
div> and <p text="xxxx"> kind of tags - most of which are redundant.
The only way of getting rid of these is to use use Edit # Find /
Replace - but there are so many varieties of redundant tags. FP is/was
too good at producing bloated HTML!!!

Examples of the themes are at:

http://chrisbrady.itgo.com/

http://chrisbrady.itgo.com/tallship/wantosail.htm (keep sound down)

Thank you -

Chris B.
 
So there are at least four ways to convert from FP into SSD or EW or
Dreamweaver ... ?

1. copy FP web from HD to HD and *import* into SSD or EW or
Dreamweaver

2. copy FP web from HD to HD and *open* into SSD or EW or Dreamweaver

3. publish FP web from HD to HD and *import* into SSD or EW or
Dreamweaver

4. publish FP web from HD to HD and *open* into SSD or EW or
Dreamweaver

5. ...ditto all ... but import FP web from server ... etc.

I have over 100 pages - all with one of two FP themes - but do not use
FP extensions - but there's loads of Javascript. I need an easy way
convert all of these.

Please what is the best way? Thanks - Chris B.
 
For SPD and EW Only your # 4 will work at getting the entire site
(Just Open the FP Site in SPD or EW - Do not Import it!)
- all of your options that say import will NOT get the entire site

--

_____________________________________________
SBR @ ENJOY (-: [ Microsoft MVP - FrontPage ]
"Warning - Using the F1 Key will not break anything!" (-;
_____________________________________________


So there are at least four ways to convert from FP into SSD or EW or
Dreamweaver ... ?

1. copy FP web from HD to HD and *import* into SSD or EW or
Dreamweaver

2. copy FP web from HD to HD and *open* into SSD or EW or Dreamweaver

3. publish FP web from HD to HD and *import* into SSD or EW or
Dreamweaver

4. publish FP web from HD to HD and *open* into SSD or EW or
Dreamweaver

5. ...ditto all ... but import FP web from server ... etc.

I have over 100 pages - all with one of two FP themes - but do not use
FP extensions - but there's loads of Javascript. I need an easy way
convert all of these.

Please what is the best way? Thanks - Chris B.
 
Easiest way:
Make a backup of the website - there should always be an up to date backup.
Open the website in SD or EW.


Do NOT import - except when using the EW Import Wizard and you have the login credentials for the site. Importing without the credentials will leave bits of the website behind - often the important bits.

Do NOT copy. A FrontPage website contains _vti* folders, and the contents of these files are unique for each website, even if one website is an "exact" copy of another.

For Dreamweaver - never used Dreamweaver, probably never will, but Dreamweaver does not use the _vti* folders.
--
Ron Symonds
Microsoft MVP (Expression Web)
http://www.rxs-enterprises.org/fp/wf-menu.aspx

CJB presented the following explanation :
So there are at least four ways to convert from
FP into SSD or EW or Dreamweaver ... ?
Click to expand...
1. copy FP web from HD to HD and *import* into
SSD or EW or Dreamweaver
Click to expand...
2. copy FP web from HD to HD and *open* into
SSD or EW or Dreamweaver
Click to expand...
3. publish FP web from HD to HD and *import*
into SSD or EW or Dreamweaver
Click to expand...
4. publish FP web from HD to HD and *open* into
SSD or EW or Dreamweaver
Click to expand...
5. ...ditto all ... but import FP web from
server ... etc.
Click to expand...
I have over 100 pages - all with one of two FP
themes - but do not use FP extensions - but
there's loads of Javascript. I need an easy way
convert all of these.
Click to expand...
 
If the credentials (UserId and Password) for the source website are used, the Expression Web Site Import Wizard actually publishes the source website to the destination - so it does get everything.
--
Ron Symonds
Microsoft MVP (Expression Web)
http://www.rxs-enterprises.org/fp/wf-menu.aspx


Stefan B Rusynko expressed precisely :
For SPD and EW Only your # 4 will work at
getting the entire site (Just Open the FP Site
in SPD or EW - Do not Import it!) - all of your
options that say import will NOT get the entire
site
--
Click to expand...

_____________________________________________
SBR @ ENJOY (-: [ Microsoft MVP -
FrontPage ] "Warning - Using the F1 Key will
not break anything!" (-;
_____________________________________________

So there are at least four ways to convert from
FP into SSD or EW or Dreamweaver ... ?
Click to expand...
1. copy FP web from HD to HD and *import* into
SSD or EW or Dreamweaver
Click to expand...
2. copy FP web from HD to HD and *open* into
SSD or EW or Dreamweaver
Click to expand...
3. publish FP web from HD to HD and *import*
into SSD or EW or Dreamweaver
Click to expand...
4. publish FP web from HD to HD and *open* into
SSD or EW or Dreamweaver
Click to expand...
5. ...ditto all ... but import FP web from
server ... etc.
Click to expand...
I have over 100 pages - all with one of two FP
themes - but do not use FP extensions - but
there's loads of Javascript. I need an easy way
convert all of these.
Click to expand...
 
You could try Expression Engine Core and it is free to download and use
it. The link is here:

<https://secure.expressionengine.com/download.php?ACT=agreement&id=34>

Although it is not as easy as FrontPage 2003, it by far a better product
to start using HTML/XML/XHTML and CSS and to learn properly the
intricacies of this new technology!

The main website is here:
<http://expressionengine.com/>

The communities forum is here:
<http://expressionengine.com/forums/>

The user guide is here:
<http://expressionengine.com/docs/>

hth
 
Publish .... all files
that way you KNOW you have everything any other way .. you can lose
something ... even if you think you havent. Its also the easiest method you
can make a web before hand (empty is best) and name it or just do it on the
fly.

as for cleaning ... find and replace isnt the only method there are quite a
few others.

Have a read of this
http://www.experts-exchange.com/art...grating-from-FrontPage-to-Expression-Web.html

Should get you started.

Migrating is not just a matter of having a new design you also have to clean
the old code and remove the old template/theme

since you want to remove the themes (but on one keep the graphics) ...

first backup three times
on your working web

do global removal for a few things

use fp to remove the theme
if you need the navigation you need to keep a note of it

if you have a doctype replace with the new one if you don't use the <html>
as as the hook to remove and replace with doctype and <html>

then open you folder list
look through the files by eye .. anything you want to remove?
any graphics hanging around in the root? - if so move them to your images
folder
look through the images (I think my article says how) to remove unlinked
images
then start with the first page in folder list ... open it and select all use
formatting - remove formatting use clean styles from the apply styles task
pane/panel
In Code View right click and choose 'Reformat HTML' you will be amazed at
how many errors this will correct. Used in conjunction with 'Optimize HTML'
which is right next to it on the dialog box and if your using a XHTML
doctype the 'Apply XML formatting rules' selection on the same dialog box,
will drastically reduce your error report and save you a LOT of time.

also use queries
http://any-expression.com/expression-web/tutorials/expression-web-querys.htm

only THEN ... look through the code to see what was missed and use find and
replace

if removing tables use table to text as well....

once you are sure that all the crap is gone

then apply your new template .. by making it a dwt dont forget to put
ediables around your description and keyword metas so that you had before
(dont worry if you dont) will be retained.... use page properties to insert
them or add to them or change them .. this is on the right click in design
view..

now i've to a bit mixed up if you have expression web or sharepoint designer
or are still with fp or what version you have.. quite a bit of that you can
do in fp03 ...

having expression web or spd07 tell you that there are errors though is only
in those .... enough to upgrade just for that...

there are lot more tweaks you can do too.

as far as dreamweaver is concerned I don't have a clue ..I prefer to use a
product that can do the same job but is much much cheaper;) .. both have
flaws but as with anything its the nut behind the wheel doing the driving;)

Tina

Migrating from FrontPage to Expression Web Ebook v2.0
New version includes help for EW 3.0
Find out how to transition from fp to ew with ease
http://www.frontpage-to-expression.com/ebook.html
 
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