FAQ

What's New FAQ Problems Suggestions Download

This page contains the questions that you have asked me and hopefully I've answered.

Additions: You can now Download this htm file so you can view it offline by clicking here.

Revisions: This is a revision to Q12 for Fastnet users. Please view up to date instructions here!

  1. How do I make text in a scrolling text box field wrap automatically?
  2. Tips on using fonts in a Web page.
  3. When I create a new web on the Personal Web Server, FrontPage creates a document named "default.htm". Can I specify a different name for the default page?
  4. I've created a WebBot Save Results form but when I tested it with my browser I got the message, "Repost Form Data?"
  5. I added some Extended Attributes to my Web page buttons but they disappeared.
  6. Is there a way to specify the default settings of a table?
  7. I inserted a trademark symbol (™) in one of my documents but it doesn't appear correctly in Netscape Navigator.
  8. How do I stick extra spaces in a line of text?
  9. How do I keep FrontPage from breaking up two word proper nouns (like "Chris Skardon")?
  10. FrontPage double spaces my paragraphs. Can I single space them?
  11. I've created a guest book using the Save Results WebBot. Is there a way I can make the URLs and e-mail addresses active links?
  12. Can I create a form and have the results e-mailed to me? (Fastnet Users click here)
  13. I can't Upload my Files to the Server HELP!
  14. I have made my website using frames but I can't get rid of the borders surrounding the site. How can I get rid of the Borders?
  15. I've made my site but I want a counter on my page. I know Fastnet has one on offer but I can't figure out how to use it.

I've inserted at scrolling text box into my form; however when I went to try it in my browser the text doesn't wrap when I reach the end of the box, the box just scrolls horizontally. Is there a way to get text to wrap?

Naturally you would think that a scrolling text box would be like a little version of the Notepad, instead of behaving like a one-line text box. To get the text to wrap you need to set a simple property by using the extended attributes dialog box in FrontPage 97 Editor.

After adding the scrolling text box to your document bring up the box's Scrolling Text Box Properties dialog box (either right click on the text box and select Form Field Properties, or left click on the box and hit Alt-Enter). Click the Extend... button. Click the Add... button. In the Name field type "wrap" (without the quotes); in the value field type "virtual" (without the quotes). That's it.

This box doesn't wrap:

And this one does:

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Tips on Using Fonts...

FrontPage 97 includes font selection controls similar to a word processor, allowing you to use any font installed in your system in your FP97 documents. Before using non-standard fonts on your Web pages, remember that only users that have those same fonts installed on their systems will be able to view the document as you intended. In other words, if you select Viner Hand ITC as the body font for your Web page, viewers of that page must also have Viner Hand ITC installed on their systems. This problem is further complicated by the fact that most Macintosh fonts have different names than their Windows 95 equivalents.

There are three fonts that viewers of your Website are almost guaranteed to have on their systems. These are Times New Roman (a serif font and the FrontPage 97 default font), Courier New (a mono spaced font also called Courier on Macintosh systems) and Arial (a sans-serif font also called Helvetica on the Macintosh). If you want to use a font other than these three, that's okay; be sure you also add one of these three fonts after your specialized font in the <font face=""> tags.

Times New Roman is the default font so you don't need to do anything special to use it. Remember, anytime you want to change any text in your Web page to the default settings, select the text in the FrontPage Editor, then choose Remove Formatting from the Format menu.

If you want to use a standard sans-serif font, follow these steps to insure the document will display correctly on both Windows 95 and Macintosh based browsers:

  1. Select the text you wish to modify in the FrontPage 97 Editor.
  2. Choose Arial from the drop down font menu on the tool bar (or choose Font... from the Format menu, then choose Arial).
  3. Select HTML... from the View menu.
  4. Locate the section of your document that contains the tag: <font face="Arial">. Note that there may be other items in the font tag (for example, your font tag might look something like: <font color="#FFFFFF" size="1" face="Arial">. All we're interested in is what's between the face quotes. Leave the rest alone.
  5. After the world Arial type: ",Helvetica". Don't forget the comma. The tag should now read something like: <font face="Arial,Helvetica">.
  6. Go back to step 4 if you have more than one <font face="Arial"> tag in the document (you probably do).
  7. Close the HTML editing window. That's it!

If you want to use a standard mono spaced or typewriter style font follow these steps to insure the document will display correctly on both Windows 95 and Macintosh based browsers:

  1. Select the text you wish to modify in the FrontPage 97 Editor.
  2. Choose Font... from the Format menu.
  3. Click the Typewriter check box, and choose Courier New in the Font selection box.
  4. Click the OK button. That's it!

If you want to use a non-standard font in your Web page, follow these steps to insure the document will display as closely as possible to your original design in all browsers. In this example, we will use Verdana (a popular Windows 95 sans-serif font) as the non-standard font. Substitute the font you wish for Verdana in the steps below.

  1. Select the text you wish to modify in the FrontPage 97 Editor.
  2. Choose Verdana from the drop down font menu on the tool bar (or choose Font... from the Format menu, then choose Verdana).

Because Verdana is a non-standard font, we add secondary fonts to display in the user's browser in the event they don't have Verdana installed on their computer. Verdana is a sans-serif font, so Arial is a good second choice (with Helvetica as the Macintosh equivalent). If you're using a serif font, you may want to use Times New Roman as your secondary choice.

  1. Select HTML... from the View menu.
  2. Locate the section of your document that contains the tag: <font face="Verdana">. Note that there may be other items in the font tag (for example, your font tag might look something like: <font color="#FFFFFF" size="1" face="Verdana">. All we're interested in is what's between the face quotes. Leave the rest alone.
  3. After the world Verdana type: ",Arial,Helvetica". Don't forget the commas. The tag should now read something like: <font face="Verdana,Arial,Helvetica">.
  4. Go back to step 4 if you have more than one <font face="Verdana"> tag in the document (you probably do).
  5. Close the HTML editing window. That's it!
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When I create a new web on the Personal Web Server it creates a page named "Default.htm". I want it to be "index.htm". Can I specify the default page name?

Web servers have the option to specify a default page that will load automatically when the user enters your domain name in their Web browser. The default page is usually something like "index.htm" or "home.htm". If you don't have a correctly named default page on your server, your users will get a directory of files instead. When you create a new web, FrontPage checks the settings on your server to determine what it should name the default page. So to change the default page name, you need to change a setting on the server and not in FrontPage.
To change the name of the default page on the Personal Web Server follow these steps:
Make sure the Personal Web Server (PWS) is running. You should see a small icon in the bottom right of the task bar.
  1. Right click on the PWS icon. From the pop-up menu choose Administer. Your Web browser will start and you'll see the Personal Web Server administration page.
  2. Click the WWW Administration link, then click the Directories tab.
  3. Scroll to the bottom of the page. You'll see a check box labeled Enable Default Document. Make sure it's checked.
  4. Below the check box is a text box labeled Default Document, which is where you specify the default page name on the server. Enter the name you wish.
  5. Click the OK button at the bottom of the page.

That's it. The next time you create a new Web on your PWS, FrontPage will name the default document based on the information you entered on the PWS administration page.
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I've created a WebBot Save Results form but when I tested it with Netscape Navigator I got the message, "Repost Form Data?" Is there a way to fix this?

FrontPage 97 sticks a line of code into your HTML document that you cannot remove in the FrontPage Editor. The line looks like this: <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1">. It seems that for some reason this line causes pages in Netscape Navigator to automatically reload a second or two after they initially start loading. Normally this doesn't cause a problem, other than a quick flicker when the page is loading that is hardly noticeable. However, it does cause a problem when you're using a Save Results WebBot and a custom confirmation page.

If you don't specify a custom confirmation page in the Save Results WebBot's settings you won't have this problem. However, if you want to use a custom confirmation page (you probably should - the default page is really ugly) you can fix the problem by removing the line from that page.
Removing the offending line is easy, but care must be taken to remove the entire line and nothing more. I recommend that you make a backup of your confirmation page first. Follow these steps to make a back up copy of your page:
  1. Switch to Folder View in the FrontPage Explorer.
  2. Select your confirmation page (so that it's highlighted).
  3. Choose Copy from the Edit menu.
  4. Choose Paste from the Edit menu. If your original page was called (for example) confirm.htm you should now have a backup called confirm_copy(1).htm.

Follow these instructions to delete the offending line:

  1. Switch to Folder View in the FrontPage Explorer.
  2. Right click on your custom confirmation page.
  3. Choose Open With... from the pop-up menu.
  4. Double click Text Editor (notepad.exe) in the Open With Editor dialog box. Note: your choice may be different if you have changed your default text editor in the FrontPage Explorer options.
  5. You should now see the raw HTML code in the Notepad window. You'll see black boxes where the line breaks should be. Use the horizontal scroll bar to scroll over so you see the line <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1">. Be aware that the line will probably have a line break in it and may look like this: <meta http-equiv="Content-Type"content="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1">.
  6. Select the line, starting with the black box directly before the line (so that the black box will be selected) and ending with the final greater-than symbol (>). Don't select the black box immediately after the line.
  7. Delete the line (press the Delete key on your keyboard).
  8. Close the Notepad window. Click Yes when asked if you wish to save changes.
  9. That's it! Test out your page to make sure it works (you should use Netscape Navigator to test as that's the browser the problem affects). If you experience errors you probably deleted more (or less) than you should have. Replace the original copy with the backup copy and try again. If everything is working you can delete the backup copy (select it in the FrontPage Explorer and choose Delete... from the Edit menu) to save space on your server.
It's very important to note that if you ever open your custom confirmation page again in the FrontPage Editor, FrontPage will stick the line back in for you (there's no way to disable this). You'll have to repeat the above process if you ever need to make modifications to your page.

Alternatively you can use an FTP program to download the page, make the change and upload it back to your server. The above method requires fewer steps.
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I added some extended attributes to a button with a link, and when I saved my page they disappeared. How do I bring them back?

It seems that there is a bug in FrontPage 97, in that when you save a document for the first time, or when you save the document using Save As, FP97 will strip the extended attributes from your document.
The best way to avoid this problem is to use the following guidelines when creating new pages.
If you're creating a new page first start the FrontPage 97 Editor then click on the New button (or select New... from the File menu). Immediately save the blank page to your Web server. Go ahead and edit the page as you wish, adding extended attributes where desired. When you're ready to save changes click on the Save button, or choose Save from the File menu. Your extended attributes should remain intact.
If you want to save an existing page under another name first open the page in the FrontPage 97 Editor. Choose Select All from the Edit menu. Next choose Copy from the Edit menu. Choose Save As... from the File menu and enter the desired name and path in the Save As dialog box. Next choose Select All once again, then choose Paste from the Edit menu. Click the Save button or choose Save from the File menu. Your extended attributes should be intact.
There's a cosmetic bug in the FrontPage Editor in that when you have selected something (in this case the entire document) then choose Save As..., the selected area (which should be white on a black background to indicate that it's selected) becomes black on a white background, which makes it appear as though it's no longer selected. It is still selected; in fact if you clicked the mouse button to deselect your selection you would then be working on a page that appeared as though it's colors had been inverted. Not to worry, once you select Paste your screen will appear normal again.
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Is there a way to specify the default settings of a table, so that it will be 50% in width for example?

The Insert Table button on the toolbar is a handy way to insert a table. Although it isn't apparent, changing the settings in the Insert Table dialog box sets the defaults.
Choose Insert Table... from the Table menu. Change the settings to the desired default values. Click OK. The next time you insert a table using the Insert Table button on the toolbar the table appear with the specifications you set.
If you just want to set the default settings without inserting a table, follow the directions above (which will insert a table) then click the Undo button on the toolbar. FrontPage will remember the default settings.
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I inserted a trademark character (™) in one of my documents but when I viewed it with Netscape Navigator it appears as &trade;. What's wrong?

Yet another quirk in a Microsoft product that causes problems with Netscape Navigator. Fortunately there are easy workarounds. In this case, when you insert the trademark symbol using the Symbol dialog box, FrontPage 97 inserts Microsoft's own &trade; HTML markup. To correctly insert the trademark symbol you should insert an HTML markup instead. It's not WYSIWYG in the FrontPage Editor, but it works fine.
Follow these steps to insert a trademark symbol in your document:
  1. Choose HTML Markup... from the Insert menu.
  2. In the HTML Markup window type these characters: &#153;
  3. Click OK. You'll see a yellow box with a question mark in it in your document. Don't worry, your trademark symbol will appear correctly in Netscape Navigator and Microsoft Internet Explorer.
You must use the above method to insert the HTML code in your document. If you choose HTML... from the View menu and try to insert the &#153; characters this way, FrontPage Editor will change them back to &trade;.
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When I press the space bar in the FrontPage Editor I can only insert one space. Is there a way to add extra spaces?

HTML specifications say you can only have one space in a row. To insert an extra space you need to insert what is called a "non-breaking space", or in HTML language: &nbsp;. Fortunately there's an easy keyboard shortcut.
To insert extra spaces press and hold the Ctrl and Shift keys on your keyboard then hit the spacebar.
Here    is    an    example.
Since HTML doesn't allow the "tab" character either, you can use non-breaking spaces to indent paragraphs.
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When I type in two word proper nouns (like Matt Marini or Chris Skardon) at the end of a line FrontPage will break them up (the second word wraps to the beginning of the next line). How can I prevent this?

You can easily keep two word proper nouns from wrapping (or any other bit of text that has a space in it) by using a "hard" space between the words.
To insert a hard space simply hold down the Ctrl and Shift keys and press the spacebar. You can also use this technique to insert extra spaces in a line.
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When I press return at the end of a paragraph FrontPage inserts a double space. Is there a setting I can use to have my paragraphs single spaced?

Standard HTML specifies that paragraphs will appear as double spaced. You can easily make single spaced paragraphs by inserting line breaks where you want the paragraphs to end.
To insert a line break hold down the Shift key and press Enter. You could also choose Break... from the Insert menu, then select Normal Line Break. Shift-Enter is obviously much easier.

Here
is
an
example.
You'll notice that when you press Shift-Enter to insert a line break, the FrontPage Editor will mark this as an arrow with a left hook. You can hide these by clicking the Show/Hide ¶ button on the toolbar. This will also hide form outlines and other guides.
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I've used the Save Results WebBot to create a guest book. I want the e-mail address and Website URLs to be active links. Is there a way to automatically do this?

There's no way to make the links active automatically, but you can do it by hand quickly and easily thanks to a feature of the FrontPage Editor.
Here's the easiest way to make a link active on an existing page.
  1. Open the desired page in the FrontPage Editor.
  2. Click just to the right of the URL or e-mail address you want to make active.
  3. Press the space bar. FrontPage will make the URL or e-mail address into an active link.
  4. In addition to making the link active you've just added an extra space to your document. You can leave it if you wish, but if you want to delete it don't press backspace (that will "deactivate" the link). Press the left arrow key on your keyboard, then hit the Delete key.
If you're typing text into a document and you type an e-mail address or URL, the FrontPage Editor will make it into an active link as soon as you press the space bar. If you don't want it to be an active link just hit the backspace key on your keyboard. The FrontPage Editor will remove the link, but it won't delete the space after it unless you press the backspace key again.
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The Save Results WebBot will save form results as a file in my Website, but can I have the form results e-mailed to me instead?

There's two ways to accomplish this. One is with a CGI program, and this is the preferred method. There are several of them available, and which one you use depends on what server you are running. If you are using an ISP to publish your Website, contact them; they may have a CGI program you can use, or at least give you information about what will work with their type of server.
For Fastnet Users click here for information on setting up forms to use the Fastnet CGI Mailing program

You can create a form to be e-mailed to you in FrontPage 97 (FP97) without using a CGI program, but I recommend against it for several reasons. For one, the browser of the person submitting the form must be compatible with this type of form. Microsoft Internet Explorer (MSIE) 3.0 is not, and neither is the America Online 3.0 Web browser. Netscape Navigator will work, and MSIE version 3.01 will also work provided the user has installed the Microsoft e-mail software. Second, when the user clicks the Submit button Netscape Navigator will give them a message that the form is going to be e-mailed and that their privacy may be compromised. This is not only distracting, but the message is worded in such a way as to make many users think twice about submitting the form. Finally, if the form does get e-mailed to you it will be unformatted and difficult to read.
If you still insist on using an e-mailed form in FrontPage 97 here's instructions on how to do it.
  1. Open or create a page with the form you want mailed to you in the FrontPage Editor.
  2. Right click on the form, then choose Form Properties... from the pop-up menu.
  3. Make sure the drop down menu in the Form Properties window says "Custom ISAPI, NSAPI, or CGI Script". Click the Settings... button.
  4. In the Action text box type "mailto:" and the e-mail address you want to the form e-mailed to (example: "mailto:chris@jazzpiano.com").
  5. Make sure the Method drop down menu says "POST". Click OK, then click OK once more to close the Form Properties window.
You can always forget about the form add a simple "mailto" link in your page that will work with almost any browser out there. Just type your e-mail address on a page. The FrontPage Editor will turn it into a link automatically when you type the next character. If you want to create a "mailto" link connected to text that's not your e-mail address, (example: "To send me e-mail click here.") first select the text, then click the Create or Edit Hyperlink button on the FrontPage Editor's toolbar. Click the World Wide Web tab, type your e-mail address in the URL text box, then choose mailto: in the Hyperlink Type drop down menu. Click OK to close the window.
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I want to be able to post forms to my E-mail address but I don't know how to set up my forms to use the Fastnet CGI Mailing Service

Follow the Instructions Below to set up the Buttons at the bottom to send Forms to your E-mail address.
First you need to design the Form Once you have all the Boxes, Radio Buttons, Check boxes etc that you want you'll need to edit each of their properties to give them a Meaningful name. You can do this by either Double clicking on the Box (button etc) or Right-clicking on it and Selecting 'Form Field Properties'. In the Field Properties box Change the Name of the box to something meaningful to you. For instance if the Box was for someone to Put their name into you would Name the Box 'Name' This way when the form is sent to you it will say 'Name : Chris' in the E-mail.

Once you've done that for all the Boxes make two buttons on the bottom of the Form Edit one of them (double Click or Right-click Form Properties) and change the Radio-button to 'Reset' then click OK. Next Edit the other Button and Change the Radio-Button to Submit (default is Submit).

Click on the 'Form...' button. This will bring up a box called 'Form Properties'. In the Form Handler section leave it as 'Custom ISAPI, NSAPI or CGI script' and click on 'Settings'. In the Action Box type :
http://home.fastnet.co.uk/cgi-bin/genmail.cgi
In the Method Box Select :
POST

Click OK to close the Form Handler Settings Box down. Next in the Form Properties Box goto the Hidden Fields Section and Select 'Add...'. You have to put in three different Hidden Values in These are :
Name : 'Recipient'
Value : 'Your E-mail Address'

Name : 'Subject'
Value : 'The Title which the E-mail will have for instance a form sending back feedback could have the title Feedback'

The Next two below here are a choice you can use one or the other NOT Both They are responsible for what the Form tells the User after they have submitted it :

Name : 'Response'
Value : 'Something to say Thanks or Whatever'

Name : 'Goto'
Value : 'The Address of a Page on your Web to say Thanks or Back to the main page Whatever Takes your Fancy'

Close down all the Boxes and your page is set now whenever someone submits a form to you, you will recieve an E-mail with all the Information they filled in Be it name or something else.
It doesn't matter how long the Names of your boxes are or if they are more than one word, Also as you will only have to type this in once don't make it short-hand that will only annoy you in the long run.
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I've designed an amazing Web site but I can't seem to upload it to the Fastnet Server. How do I do this?

This is easily done using most FTP programs. I personally use Bullet Proof FTP which I find to be good as it handles Long File-names, Cute FTP 95 is the most easily available FTP Client and can be downloaded from Fastnet if need be, so the below text is for Cute FTP.
The Download page on this site has a link to a copy of Cute FTP - Click HERE to go there.
Connecting.
  1. Start up Cute FTP (you'd be suprised how many people forget this ;))
  2. Goto FILE - QUICK CONNECT (CTRL - C)
  3. In the HOST ADDRESS box type :
  4. home.fastnet.co.uk
  5. In the User name type your username Whatever that maybe - ie the one you use to log onto Fastnet (be it Skardon..... like mine not likely though)
  6. In the password box type your password (******** is mine ;))
  7. Click OK

Uploading.

  1. Highlight the files you want to upload to the server in the Left Hand box....
  2. Drag them across to the Right hand side box (or click the 15th button along [looks like an Arrow pointing UP with files next to it])
  3. Now all that is left to do is check the files.... (see below)

Checking Files : What to look for.

  1. Make sure none of the names of the files in the Right hand box contain the symbol (~) unless you specifically named them that way.
  2. Make sure that none of the names of your files start with a Capital letter. (I had this problem before it says user Access denied when you try to view the site on the web.
  3. Make sure that if you linked to say ABOUTME.HTML you rename all the endings of the files from HTM to HTML by highlighting the file and right clicking on it and select rename.

Check your site.

  1. To do this load up your browser be it IE4 or Netscape Communicator 4.0 (obviously Netscape is better due to the fact that it isn't MS)
  2. Goto : http://home.fastnet.co.uk/**username**
  3. where **username** is enter your user name for example my username is 'skardon' so my address is : http://home.fastnet.co.uk/skardon/
  4. If it works then niiice. If it doesn't tell me and I'll look at it and try to sort it out for you.
Please note paragraph 3, section 3. Make sure files aren't HTML if you can help it it'll make your life a lot more easy. Trust me I was stumped by this for ages.
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I have made my website using frames but I can't get rid of the borders surrounding the site. How can I get rid of the Borders?

You can't do this directly through FrontPage unfortunately and so will have to do so through the wonders of Notepad.
To get rid of borders on all frames, put the following parameters in the outer most frameset tag:

frameborder="0" framespacing="0" border="0"

If you open the source in notepad, the 'frmain.htm' page would look something like:

<frameset rows="72,*" cols="120,*">
<frame src="frhome.htm" name="frhome" marginwidth="4" marginheight="1" scrolling="no">
<frame src="frbanner.htm" name="frbanner" marginwidth="4" marginheight="1" scrolling="no">
<frame src="frindex.htm" name="frindex" marginwidth="4" marginheight="1">
<frame src="frone.htm" name="frdisplay" marginwidth="4" marginheight="1">
</frameset>

You would change the frameset tag from

<frameset rows="72,*" cols="120,*">

To:

<frameset frameborder="0" framespacing="0" border="0" rows="72,*" cols="120,*">

This would get rid of the borders on the frames.

The Frame Border Tags

frameborder: controls whether you have a 3-d border or not, it can appear either on a frameset or frame tag, if it is not on the frame tag, it is inherited from the frameset. This tag more or less works the same in Netscape and MSIE, if you let it default (don't use it) for On and use "0" for Off. Officially MSIE uses "1" and "0", and Netscape uses "YES" and "NO"  

framespacing: this is for MSIE, it is the width of the border in pixels. This can either be on the framset tag or the frame tag, if it is not on the frame tag, it is inherited from the frameset tag.

border: this is for Netscape, it is the width of the border in pixels. According to Netscape, this can only be used on the outermost frameset tag.
This will clear all the borders off. The best option is to go for either all borders on or all off, but should you want to have partial borders just play around a bit and see what happens.
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I've made my site but I want a counter on my page. I know Fastnet has one on offer but I can't figure out how to use it.

Well Fastnet do indeed have a counter on thier system and to use it you have to insert a bit of code (see below).
To add a counter add this bit of raw HTML into you're webpage where you would like the counter :

<<center><img src="/cgi-bin/Count.cgi?dd=C&ft=1&pad=0&df=***.dat" align=absmiddle></center>

Where *** = a name suitable to you're site like BB.dat for mine, or fpage.dat for here etc..
This should work and you can have as many of them as you want. You can change the image should you want goto : http://home.fastnet.co.uk and click on the Extra Features bit to find out about changing the image.
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Frontpage 97/98 are trademarks of Microsoft. All other products mentioned are registered trademarks or trademarks of their respective companies.

Questions or problems regarding this web site should be directed to skardon@fastnet.co.uk.
Copyright © 1998 Chris Skardon. All rights reserved.
Last modified: Friday December 11, 1998.