Notice you are told the name catalogue you are publishing. At any point you can jump to the end ('Publish') or move back and forth with the 'Previous' and 'Next' buttons - your current changes are remembered. When ready, click 'Next' to continue....
This dialog is called from the Catalog menu. The menu calls the dynamic web page version of the NetPublish Assistant wizard. The wizard UI is the same as for static page publishing. If you want to see how the NPA wizard looks in the Mac UI, see the static page FAQ
Notice you are told the name catalogue you are publishing. At any point you can jump to the end ('Publish') or move back and forth with the 'Previous' and 'Next' buttons - your current changes are remembered. When ready, click 'Next' to continue....
The built-in sites plus or any sites you've added - or customised from built-in ones - will be listed here; built-in sites are listed in bold type. If you know that you don't need to alter the template code, such as when re-using a previous template, you can jump straight to the publish stage using the 'Publish' button. Otherwise click 'Next'...
This page enables you to add a site title, link to your own logo artwork and attach your own HTML headers/footers to exported pages.
This page allows you to set up queries to allow the user to search your site. There is a text description of the template. You can choose from several layout options each of which has a thumbnail (list at left), the fields displayed (list at right). Use the field listing to set the scope of the search. When you click on a field in the field listing (bottom right), the 'Search Operator/Options button becomes available. Clicking it opens this dialog where you can apply additional customisation to fine tune your searches:
You can even - if you understand HTML and JavaScript - alter the template code:
You can choose a different CSS is there is an option to do so. If you desire you can preview your settings for the template in a web browser - click 'Preview Webpage'. When ready, click 'Preview' or 'Next'...
The Result layout is that used to display the results of searches carried out by the user. You can opt to 'Summarize search criteria' to indicate the value(s) searched for and the number of results. The default sort order of matching results is the Filename but you can choose to use another field instead. You can choose the size at which the thumbnail is displayed:
You can only use the values listed and it is recommended you don't use a value higher than the size in your catalogues (i.e. don't show 112 pixel thumbnails as 256 on the web page) as they will not look as good as you'd wish due to the scaling. You can select the action that results from clicking a thumbnail:
When ready, click 'Publish' or 'Next'...
This template is for a single item detail page. There are layout and field options as before, plus code and web preview options. You can choose the source image for your detail view...
Note that the 'Preview' option presumes you have already created Screen Previews. Clearly if you select 'Original', you original needs to be a format that can display in a web browser, e.g. JPEG is fine but TIFF isn't. You can also set the long side (in pixels) to be used for the detail page image...
You can type in type in your own value as well as those listed. It is not clearly documented but it appears that previews and thumbnails will be resized on export to match this figure. There is also an option to link to the original image by clicking this detail page image. You can optionally offer a link to download the original file and decide what action - including no action - occurs when the user clicks on the preview:
When ready, click 'Publish' or 'Next'...
This is your lightbox/shopping cart/collection page. Note you'll need to write your own code to link this to an e-commerce application of your choice if you want a payment option. That latter is not included in NP. The options on the page are basically as for at results page.
When ready, click 'Publish' or 'Next'...
If you've customised the template you may want to save it. Before doing so you can alter the text shown in the 'Description of Site' box. You can only save copies of built-in templates - as their code is embedded. Saving existing copies/custom sets will save over existing code. The default locations for saving templates and the final output pages is listed in the FAQ on NP's paths and folders and are:
Local custom or saved customised NPT sets:
C:\My Documents\Extensis\Portfolio\NetPublish\User Data\sites\web\
~/[user-defined-site-name]/NetPublish/User Data/sites/web/
Now your template code is safely stored you can publish the catalogue. Add an NP Server or choose one from those listed. You have the options to set passwords for editing/updating the site and/or for viewing it. In the latter case the user will be asked for a username and password. They can use any username plus the password you set here. You may leave both blank - it may be a good option for local testing.
Lastly choose whether to serve the catalogue in situ or to upload it. The latter has secondary options to upload previews and/or originals - tick the image types your site uses. Preview implies Portfolio's screen previews (what used to be called disk previews). If you are making a simple change to templates - i.e. an update - you can deselect these options. If there are new records you'll need to upload the image files again - sadly there's no option to only upload new image files (or if there is it isn't documented and the FAQ hasn't discovered it yet).
You'll most likely use the 'Publish Catalog from its current location' if you're using Portfolio Server and NP Server. However, if you have the client and NP on the same computer it is possible to dynamically serve a site from in situ without NP Server. The latter is a likely scenario for a personal site or when testing.
Click 'Publish' and you're done - the site is uploaded and served; you get a progress bar to show you when you're finished. You get a final wizard page with a link to the site (in Windows OS it shows the path).
If you just want to create an unaltered copy of a built-in template set (indeed, any template set), go to the Start Page, select your template set, click 'Publish' and save a copy of the site. Now click cancel to close NPA. You won't export your site but you will have a complete copy of the as-installed built-in template set that you can now customise to your own requirements.
Question: NetPublish Assistant - Dynamic web sites [FAQ00237.htm]
Last Update:- 09 August 2011
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