Ten Ways to Exterminate Web Bugs in Java

Generation Code 39 in Java Ten Ways to Exterminate Web Bugs

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Avoiding markup and spelling faux pas Keeping links hot and fresh Gathering beta testers to check, double-check, and triple-check your site Applying user feedback to your site

fter you put the finishing touches on a set of pages (but before you go public on the Web for the world to see), it s time to put them through their paces Testing is the best way to control a site s quality Thorough testing must include content review, analysis of HTML syntax and semantics, link checks, and various sanity checks to make doubly sure that what you built is what you really wanted Read this chapter for some gems of testing wisdom (learned from a lifetime of Web adventures) as we seek to rid your Web pages of bugs, errors, gaucheries, and lurking infelicities

A sense of urgency that things must work well and look good on a Web site will never fail to motivate you to keep your site humming along That said, if you work from a visual diagram of how your site is (or should be) organized, you ll be well-equipped to check structure, organization, and navigation Likewise, if you put your pages through their paces regularly (or at least each time they change) with a spell checker, you ll be able to avoid unwanted tpyos

Your design should include a road map (often called a site map) that tells you what s where in every individual HTML document in your site and the relationships among its pages If you re really smart, you kept this map up-todate as you moved from design to implementation (In our experience, things always change when you go down this path) If you re merely as smart as the rest of us, don t berate yourself update that map now Be sure to include all intra- and interdocument links A site map provides the foundation for a test plan Yep, that s right effective testing isn t random Use your map to Investigate and check every page and every link systematically Make sure everything works as you think it should and that what you built has some relationship (however surprising) to your design Define the list of things to check as you go through the testing process Check everything (at least) twice (Red suit and reindeer harness optional)

By the time any collection of Web pages comes together, you re looking at thousands of words, if not more Yet many Web pages get published without a spell check, which is why we suggest no, demand that you include a spell check as a step when testing and checking your materials (Okay, we don t have a gun to your head, but you know it s for your own good) Many HTML tools, such as FrontPage, HomeSite, and Dreamweaver, include built-in spell checkers, and that s the first spell-check method you should use These HTML tools also know how to ignore the HTML markup and just check your text Even if you use HTML tools only occasionally and hack out the majority of your HTML by hand, perform a spell check before posting your documents to the Web (For a handy illustration of why this step matters, try keeping a log of spelling and grammar errors you find during your Web travels Be sure to include a note on how those gaffes reflect on the people who created the pages involved Get the message )

You can use your favorite word processor to spell check your pages Before you check them, add HTML markup to your custom dictionary, and pretty soon the spell checker runs more smoothly getting stuck only on URLs and other strange strings that occur from time to time in HTML files If you d prefer a different approach, try any of the many HTML-based spellchecking services now available on the Web We like the one at the Doctor HTML site, which you can find at www2imagiwarecom/RxHTML If Doctor HTML s spell checker doesn t float your boat, visit a search engine, such as wwwyahoocom or wwwgooglecom, and use web page spell check as a search string Doing so can help you produce a list of spell-checking tools made specifically for Web pages One way or another, persist until you root out all typos and misspellings Your users may not thank you for your impeccable use of language but if they don t trip over errors while exploring your work, they ll think more highly of your pages (and their creator) even if they don t know why Call it stealth diplomacy!

Keep Your Perishables Fresh!

New content and active connections to current, relevant resources are the hallmarks of a well-tended Web site You can t achieve these goals without regular (and sometimes, constant) effort, so you plan for ongoing activity The rewards can be great, starting with a genuine sense of user excitement at what new marvels and treasures may reveal themselves on their next visit to your site This kind of anticipation is nearly impossible to imitate (without doing what you ll have to do to keep things fresh in the first place)