How to maintain web pages on a Unix machine without having to use a Unix editor

This is a description of how to create and maintain web pages using a Macintosh computer with SimpleText as an editor, and how to get them to iacs5.ucsd.edu, the machine that houses undergraduate course accounts. This document assumes that you are using a Macintosh computer on campus at UCSD. These instructions will not work from machines located off-campus.

In order for your html files to be visible to people on the web, they must be placed on a "server." You have (or need to have) an account on such a machine, and iacs5 is such a machine. If you properly store your files on iacs5, you can both edit them and make them available over the Web.

The steps to creating and storing files on iacs5:

1. Mounting iacs5 as a remote fileserver
2. Creating files on the Remote Fileserver
3. Editing the files stored on the server.
4. Tracking progressive versions of the files, while under construction, using a Web Browser.

Mounting iacs5 as a remote fileserver

First you must create a connection between a campus Macintosh and iacs5. This is called "mounting a fileserver." Under this process, iacs5 will become an icon on the Macintosh desktop.

1. Goto the Apple menu and select the Chooser.

2. In the Chooser dialog box, first click on Appleshare, then go to the Zones menu and find ACS-iSSci1.

When selected, the "Select File Server" window will only offer one choice

iSSci1/sdcc4 Aufs

Selecting that choice and hitting the Okay button brings up a window where you enter your assigned iacs5 login and your password.

NOTE: this dialog box shows a login for "za12" - which is the Comm Dept account on iacs5. Your account and login will be something like co123wxz.

That finished, the next dialog box offers you another single choice, your login@iacs5.ucsd.edu.

Select that item and hit the Okay button again.

When you close the Chooser, you will see that there is a new icon on the desktop:

You can treat that just as you would any other disk icon - floppy or hard disk - with a capacity of around 1 megabyte.

Creating files on the Remote Fileserver

Now, open SimpleText and edit your file. open the fileserver:

And your file:

You will be presented with this window:

When the file is open on your desktop, proceed to edit it to taste. When you get the file into a state where you want to check your work with a Web browser, goto the "File" menu and the "Save As" option.

In the top window, make sure that you are saving the file to your iacs5 fileserver and - this is the important part - select "Text only with line breaks" in the "Save File as Type" window.

Editing the files stored on the server

The only thing to keep in mind is that your files must be maintained as "Text Only" files. When you re-open a file in a later work sesssion, SimpleText will convert a file from Text to "Normal" and you must do a "Save As" and change the format to "Text Only."

Tracking progressive versions of the files, while under construction, using a Web Browser

Now that you have a file on the fileserver, you can monitor your progress by viewing that file with a Web browser. Using the menu under the icon at the extreme upper right corner of the screen, "Hide SimpleText." Find the folder for Netscape and launch the browser application.

With the browser as the active application (running on the desktop), use the "File" menu and "Open Local" to find and open the file you just saved to the fileserver.

Now, working back and forth between SimpleText and Netscape, you can build files and links to your heart's content.

(c)Copyright 1985, 1996 by Bruce Jones

1. Sections used are reproduced entirely and without alteration
2. The following page footer is reproduced on each page:
   BJ's UNIX Primer - (c) Bruce Jones - 1985, 1996
3. Full credit is noted somewhere in the reproduction

Bruce Jones 			Department of Communication
bjones@ucsd.edu			University of California, San Diego
(619) 534-0417/4410		9500 Gilman Drive
FAX (619) 534-7315		La Jolla, Ca. 92093-0503

This page last updated on: Tue Jun 29 13:13:14 PDT 1999