Help with new SM

Charly · December 29, 2013

Please forgive my ignorance and perhaps inability to articulate this. I still have my Legacy up and running, but in the background I'm desperately trying to build a new SM site to look good before launch. Which I'm having a few issues with:

1. When I try to use my Legacy About and FAQs text pages, it doesn't work in New and messes up the Legacy. Do I need to create new pages for these?

2. I created a page called Galleries. Clicked on Customize just this page, added folders of galleries on it. When in Preview, I click on a folder, it goes to a blank page instead of the folder images/galleries. And when I click on Exit, it will NOT save for later when clicked on! Please what on earth am I doing wrong here?

3. Continuation from 2: When I link the menu | Galleries | to the Galleries page link and click on it in the menu, again it goes to a blank page. I need to solve #2, to get this to work or did I miss something?

Not sure how to link my issues, but if you'll be so kind to tell me, they'll be up forthwith. If needed, I'm using the Isis design and think perhaps my new site is some how corrupted. In that case, how do I delete everything and start over w/o affecting my legacy site? I'm not computer illiterate (code yes) and the new SM is supposed to be easier, yet I'm about done with both sites. Tired of wasting money on sites I don't like and about to move else where...

:

Thank you for any assistance in advance!

leftquark · December 29, 2013

Hi Charly,
1. Part of the problem with the conversion is that there wasn't a way for you to create a page of text so what you did was create an empty gallery and set its description to the text you wanted. The New SmugMug lets you create a "Page" ... basically a blank page within your design that you can add anything else you want. I would recommend that you create 2 new "Pages" for your "About" and your "FAQ". Basically go to Create -> Page. When there, you can add in an HTML block with the code from your old "About" page. Repeat for the FAQ. Let me know if you need more detailed instructions. Then add these pages to your menu-bar.

2. Since you haven't unveiled your site yet (I assume your legacy page is still live) some things are a little tricky regards to how you view your site. When you click "Save for later", it keeps all the things you've done, but doesn't make it visible at all. The best thing is to click "Done" and then "Publish". Your new site is still unveiled (your legacy site will still be active) but it does make it easier for your to view your site when you click "Preview" or browser around when you're logged in. I'd recommend "Publish"ing instead of saving for later. That may be part of your problem.

Have you clicked on "Organize" and made sure that your folders are properly filled? Sometimes with the legacy to new smugmug conversion you need to re-organize your folders.

I think most of your issues stem from the fact that you clicked "Save for later" and not "Publish". When you click "Publish" it actually saves the code so you can see it. Clicking "Save for later" hides your changes from being visible, except when in the customizer. Try clicking "Publish" and see if #2 and #3 get fixed.

Charly · December 30, 2013

I cannot thank you enough Aaron!!! Now that I've published the site, it seems to be working. I've gotten a lot done this morning compared to many wasted hours yesterday. Now I know not to waste time and come here straight away.

:

Might you assist me further please? When checking my |Galleries| folders, I notice one of them is SM locked. Why is that exactly and how can I unlock it please? It brought in the text from the Legacy site on top of the images and I want it in a text box. Thanks!

Allen · December 30, 2013

Sounds like you are looking at the photo area of the gallery in "customize". The text you're seeing
is probably part of the gallery description. Get out of "customize" and look under "customize" "gallery settings"
is where you change the description. You can edit/delete it there and add a text box above the
photos to take it's place.

Charly · December 30, 2013

Allen wrote: »

Sounds like you are looking at the photo area of the gallery in "customize". The text you're seeing
is probably part of the gallery description. Get out of "customize" and look under "customize" "gallery settings"
is where you change the description. You can edit/delete it there and add a text box above the
photos to take it's place.

Thanks Allen, now I understand that part. But is it normal to have to customize that one gallery? I didn't have to do that with any others I've come across.

Also would appreciate a bit of HTML/CSS help. On my Legacy FAQs page I copied the HTML code and then pasted it into the new SM FAQs page. Things were off, so I got them to almost the way I wanted them to, but there's 2 issues:

1. Preface: Code is not my strong suit at all, so on the Legacy the STYLE TYPE="text/css" which are indents are in with the HTML code under edit. On the new SM page it wouldn't recognize the style type in the HTML box, so I put it in the CSS box. All worked good! YAY! But.... after I published the page, the style type doesn't work when I click on FAQs in the menu. Boo! lol What would one do in this case?

2. When it looked good during customization the bullet sentences didn't line up but were one right after the other. In the Legacy code there was a <p etc.> after each one. I put them in cuz with paste they were missing, but it did no good. So how would I get the bullets to line up like Legacy in the new SM site?

Thanks so very much for the help!!!!

ChancyRat · December 30, 2013

BTW, I clicked to visit a gallery, and I see that you have a different theme there. A light background theme instead of the darker grey. If this wasn't intentional, then I will guess you need to:
- go to the section to change (all galleries, where the light theme might be, for example)
- click the Theme tab on the black flyout, scroll to the bottom of the available themes
- click the My Themes, and choose the correct theme to apply.
- Apply it, then Done/Publish

You need to do this to each of your site sections to have the same and only one theme apply to the entire site.

ChancyRat · December 30, 2013

Oops, posted this to the wrong thread. Perhaps a moderator can delete it, or, just ignore. Sorry.

leftquark · December 30, 2013

Charly wrote: »

1. Preface: Code is not my strong suit at all, so on the Legacy the STYLE TYPE="text/css" which are indents are in with the HTML code under edit. On the new SM page it wouldn't recognize the style type in the HTML box, so I put it in the CSS box. All worked good! YAY! But.... after I published the page, the style type doesn't work when I click on FAQs in the menu. Boo! lol What would one do in this case?

2. When it looked good during customization the bullet sentences didn't line up but were one right after the other. In the Legacy code there was a <p etc.> after each one. I put them in cuz with paste they were missing, but it did no good. So how would I get the bullets to line up like Legacy in the new SM site?

Have you unveiled? If so, can you send us a link?

If you haven't, can you take a screenshot?

Charly · December 30, 2013

leftquark wrote: »

Have you unveiled? If so, can you send us a link?

If you haven't, can you take a screenshot?

I sure hope this works: Screenshots

leftquark · December 30, 2013

Charly wrote: »

I sure hope this works: Screenshots

Drop an HTML block with the following:

HTML:

<span class="FAQ_question">Question #1: Blah Blah Blah</span>
Answer goes here. This is the answer to blah blah blah question

Then go over to the CSS tab and add this:

.FAQ_question {
  color: grey;
  font-size: 20px;
  margin-left: -20px !important;
}

li {
  list-style-type: square;
  margin-left: 30px;
  padding-bottom: 0px;
  display: list-item !important;
}

ul {
  white-space: normal !important;
  margin-top: -5px;
}

/* Force linebreaks to have a break */ {
  white-space: pre-wrap;
  margin-left: 20px;
}

/* Disable all BR tags */
br {
  display: none;
}

/* Manually force <BR>'s using <BR class="keep"> */
br.keep, br.keep {
  display: block;
}

Basically what I've done is created a "span" that makes your questions a different text than the rest of your text. I indented all your text by 20 pixels so the "FAQ_question" had to be un-indented by 20 pixels to make it appear to the left of the answer. I then defined how the bullets should look. Lastly, an HTML block assumes you add in all your own line-breaks. That's a pain to add <BR> all over the place, so I forced the page to display the line-breaks. If you want to manually insert a line-break you can use the code: <BR class="keep">

Hope that's what you wanted

Charly · December 30, 2013

leftquark wrote: »

Drop an HTML block with the following:

Basically what I've done is created a "span" that makes your questions a different text than the rest of your text. I indented all your text by 20 pixels so the "FAQ_question" had to be un-indented by 20 pixels to make it appear to the left of the answer. I then defined how the bullets should look. Lastly, an HTML block assumes you add in all your own line-breaks. That's a pain to add <BR> all over the place, so I forced the page to display the line-breaks. If you want to manually insert a line-break you can use the code: <BR class="keep">

Hope that's what you wanted

Oh my Aaron, I certainly didn't expect you to go through all that trouble. Cannot thank you enough for your time and help!!!! <img src="https://us.v-cdn.net/6029383/emoji/nod.gif" border="0" alt="" >

It is very close, but I really wanted the box lines around it which contained it to the center. So I added what I had before and of course now the fonts are too big. I know I could change the box dimensions, but would prefer to adjust the text. I looked both in the HTML/CSS boxes but do not see where to change the font size. I played around a bit, yet couldn't get anything to work. My apologies for being bad at code stuff!

leftquark · December 30, 2013

How bout add a <div> around the entire HTML ....

HTML:

<div class="Charlys_FAQ">
<span class="FAQ_question">Question #1: Blah Blah Blah</span>
Answer to question #1 blah blah blah.

CSS:

.Charlys_FAQ {
   border: 1px solid white;
   width: 70%;
}
.FAQ_question {
  color: grey;
  font-size: 20px;
  margin-left: -20px !important;
}

li {
  list-style-type: square;
  margin-left: 30px;
  padding-bottom: 0px;
  display: list-item !important;
}

ul {
  white-space: normal !important;
  margin-top: -5px;
}

/* Force linebreaks to have a break */ {
  white-space: pre-wrap;
  margin-left: 20px;
}

/* Disable all BR tags */
br {
  display: none;
}

/* Manually force <BR>'s using <BR class="keep"> */
br.keep, br.keep {
  display: block;
}

Add's a box around everything called "Charlys_FAQ ... I've set the CSS to have it be a white box that takes up 70% of its area. Feel free to tweak. Is that what you wanted?

Charly · December 30, 2013

Aaron, again really appreciate your time and help! I've been playing around with the code for box/font/etc. and realized one indent is missing. Have to run out at the moment, but will play with it when I get back. Fairly certain, "fingers crossed", I'll be able to put the code together myself.

: You are the best!

Charly · December 30, 2013

leftquark wrote: »

How bout add a <div> around the entire HTML ....

Add's a box around everything called "Charlys_FAQ ... I've set the CSS to have it be a white box that takes up 70% of its area. Feel free to tweak. Is that what you wanted?

By golly I did it!!!!<img src="https://us.v-cdn.net/6029383/emoji/wings.gif" border="0" alt="" >barb<img src="https://us.v-cdn.net/6029383/emoji/wings.gif" border="0" alt="" > And it only took me about an hour! lol Most of that time trying to figure out how to block the text on answers. <img src="https://us.v-cdn.net/6029383/emoji/rolleyes1.gif" border="0" alt="" >

Aaron, thanks to your knowledge, patience and wonderful help, I was able to create the code I needed!!!! Just one more wee question and then I'm done for the day.

In Red is what I added/changed:

.Charlys_FAQ {
  border: 1px solid white;
  width: [COLOR=Red]100%;
  padding-bottom: 20px[/COLOR];
}

.FAQ_question {
  color: [COLOR=Red]grey[/COLOR];
  font-size: [COLOR=Red]18px[/COLOR];
  margin-left: [COLOR=Red]5px[/COLOR] !important;
}

[COLOR=Red].Answer {
  color: #D9D9D9;
  font-size: 15px;
  display: inline-block;
  margin-left: 30px;
  margin-right: 30px; !important;
}[/COLOR]

li {
  list-style-type: square;
  [COLOR=Red]color: #D9D9D9[/COLOR];
  margin-left: [COLOR=Red]90px[/COLOR];
  padding-bottom: 0px;
  display: list-item !important;
}

I cannot for the life of me figure out how to halve a line break. Maybe it's not even possible, but if it is, would you be so kind to show me the code that would go between the Question and Answer? And again you are the best!!!<img src="https://us.v-cdn.net/6029383/emoji/clap.gif" border="0" alt="" >

leftquark · December 30, 2013

Charly wrote: »

By golly I did it!!!!<img src="https://us.v-cdn.net/6029383/emoji/wings.gif" border="0" alt="" >barb<img src="https://us.v-cdn.net/6029383/emoji/wings.gif" border="0" alt="" > And it only took me about an hour! lol Most of that time trying to figure out how to block the text on answers. <img src="https://us.v-cdn.net/6029383/emoji/rolleyes1.gif" border="0" alt="" >

Aaron, thanks to your knowledge, patience and wonderful help, I was able to create the code I needed!!!! Just one more wee question and then I'm done for the day.

Wahoo -- glad it worked!

Charly wrote: »

I cannot for the life of me figure out how to halve a line break. Maybe it's not even possible, but if it is, would you be so kind to show me the code that would go between the Question and Answer? And again you are the best!!!<img src="https://us.v-cdn.net/6029383/emoji/clap.gif" border="0" alt="" >

The simplest is to just use an <HR> (change the color to whatever you want. You can select a color from this website, I selected a green, just as an example: http://html-color-codes.info/)

<hr style="width:50%; border-color: #04B404;" align="left">

or

<div style="width:50%; border: 1px solid white;"></div>

Charly · December 31, 2013

leftquark wrote: »
Wahoo -- glad it worked!

The simplest is to just use an <HR> (change the color to whatever you want. You can select a color from this website, I selected a green, just as an example: http://html-color-codes.info/)
<hr style="width:50%; border-color: #04B404;" align="left">
or
<div style="width:50%; border: 1px solid white;"></div>

Whoopsy, I totally described what I wanted wrong. My apologies! What I meant was a half of space, like when you hit return instead of a whole empty space, a half of one. But if that doesn't exist or look right, I now can add a line! <img src="https://us.v-cdn.net/6029383/emoji/mwink.gif" border="0" alt="" >

Figure I'd get my galleries all lined out to get me closer to the unveil, but not sure how to do that. When I move an image into a new SM folder/gallery it mess up my Legacy by removing it from live site. Do I need to upload all my images again? Sure a lot of work if yes, but at least I don't have thousands up!

denisegoldberg · January 1, 2014

Charly wrote: »

Figure I'd get my galleries all lined out to get me closer to the unveil, but not sure how to do that. When I move an image into a new SM folder/gallery it mess up my Legacy by removing it from live site. Do I need to upload all my images again? Sure a lot of work if yes, but at least I don't have thousands up!

The folder structure on new smug is deeper than the catalog structure on legacy - the two aren't really compatible.

If you don't have that many galleries have you considered unveiling and then moving the galleries into new folders?

--- Denise

Charly · January 1, 2014

denisegoldberg wrote: »

The folder structure on new smug is deeper than the catalog structure on legacy - the two aren't really compatible.

If you don't have that many galleries have you considered unveiling and then moving the galleries into new folders?

--- Denise

Oh my goodness Denise, no I hadn't considered that cuz I'm skeered.

But since I'm running into so much problems and am about 80% done with the new SM site, guess I might as well take the leap.

Here's hoping nothing goes wrong!

UPDATE: Well that was painless!

Help with new SM

Comments