Please help me as I'm going insane!

I used to knock together web sites in Dreaweaver using frames, but from what I have been hearing and reading, this is a big no no!

The thing is I used to set my nav bar in one frame and the content in another. This worked well because once the menu bar had loaded, that was it - it didn't have to load again, so the only thing that changed was the content in the other frame.

I am trying to use a non frames method of creating pages within dreamweaver, but am struggling! I am currently trying tables to set my pages ie. nav bar in one cell, content in another cell - all in one table. It looks fine but I cannot seem to name individual cells within a table (like you could in frames) hence I have no destination for my content once the buttons have been pressed. If I link my buttons to display the content in a new page the nav bar will have to load up for each page!?!

All I want to achieve is a nav bar that LOADS UP ONCE on the home page.

Most sites seems to use this method but I can't work it out.
I would be eternally grateful for any advice no matter how obvious you may think it is!

Many thanks in advance

Craig

The nav bar DOES only load once ! You seen to mis-understand the function of HTTP and the web browser. If you've never been to a site before, the nav bar loads the first time and it may take a few seconds longer. The browser CACHES the nav bar images (and the page for that matter) and subsequent pages that use the SAME nav bar get loaded from the browser CACHE, it does NOT get loaded again from the site's servers. Therefore your argument of using frames to avoid 're-loading' the navbar doesn't hold water.

Once you get over that idea, you have plenty of options -- the best of which is to use CSS and HTML to achieve what you want. Unless you're changing the nav bar images for every page - which would not make sense anyway - you're not looking at any increased load times.

I would suggest a couple of excellent books to head in this direction:
http://www.sitepoint.com/books/html1/
or http://www.sitepoint.com/books/css2/

Then there is this CSS alternative to frames:
http://www.456bereastreet.com/archiv...v2_fullheight/

I think what you are wanting to do is have just one file to update when you add/change links??
To do this without using frames, you can use server side includes (SSIs). There are a few ways to do this. Just do a search on SSI or server side includes, and you will find a ton of tutorials on how to achieve this.

A big thanks to both of you for your comments, you are so kind - they are proving invaluable in helping me finding the solution to my web woes!

If I could ask you both to indulge a little further it would really help me.

I produce web pages in dreamweaver in the "design" view (I create my nav bar in Photoshop then edit, slice and optimize in Imageready) and I have never even looked at the code/html aspect as Imageready provides a html version of my nav bar complete with rollover buttons etc. which when opened up in Dreamweaver sits perfect in it's own table and is fully functioning. This would be then placed in "Frame 1" (top of the screen).

I would then click on a nav button and attach a link and assign it to make the contents appear in another frame "Frame 2" (bottom of the screen).

To get around the Frame problem, I was going to try the following method: (and I apologise in advance if I a sound thicker than the off spring of a TV wheather girl and a village idiot!) Set my entire page up in one table (say the home page) showing the nav bar and contents for the home page, then when a button is pressed in the nav bar (eg Services) this would open up a new page displaying the exact same table, (including the same nav bar) but I would have changed the content to diplay the relevant information to the Services page.

From what you said (LadynRed) my nav bar would have already loaded in the home page so when someone clicks on Services only the Services content would update on the new page. Is this correct!?!

Or (Angele803) should I be looking at trying to figure out how to code SSI, which I must admit looks exceptionally complicated for my little noggin!

I am really trying to learn from you both but my lack of web lingo and fear of coding is hindering me somewhat!

I greatly appreciate your help.

Craig

First, what you REALLY need to do is learn HTML and hand-code your sites. DW's design view creates some of the UGLIEST code left on it's own. Using ImageReady to create HTML code is equally BAD. Learn HTML from the ground up and forget DW Design view and ImageReady's horrid slices and code.

You also need to avoid opening new windows all over the place. They are just not a good practice.

Why frames are bad: http://www.karlcore.com/articles/article.php?id=2