Help With Template Customizing

I'm having the hardest time customizing the .html templates to match my site. Had no problems with editing the header and footer files that worked easy and turned out great.

The problem I'm having is every .html file in the templates folder for example login.html and signup.html for example look like greek when I view them. They include 100s of extra characters and code displayed in the browser.

Even if I do not touch the files in /templates on my server and only work with the ones in the original script download they appear this way. I'm scared to strip all the extra code that is showing up in browser view for fear of really mucking something up. Figure if it's there it's there for a reason so leave it alone.

Can some one please tell me how I can edit these pages to match my layout and actually have them display correctly.

Main Problem:
/templates/login.html straight from the original download not edited displays with all these extra codes as well as every other .html page in that folder.

I'll upload to another one of my sites just for example to show what I'm talking about..http://www.mentalcruelty.org/example/templates/login.html

Can you see how it's got all this extra code stuff in there? It's the same on every html file in that section from the original download except the header and footer files.

Other pages uploaded just for example:
http://www.mentalcruelty.org/example/templates/signup.html
http://www.mentalcruelty.org/example/templates/member.html

How can I fix it to display correctly?
Any help or suggestions would be so greatly appreciated.

Mindy

Hi Mindy,

I'm not a "PHP Master", but from what little I know, the html files in your templates folder are linked to the php files.
In other words, your clients will not go to http://www.mentalcruelty.org/amember/login.html
instead, they will go to
http://www.mentalcruelty.org/amember/login.php
And with in the php code of that page, /login.html will be included somewhere in there.

At least that's my understanding. I'm sure Alex can give us a better explanation on this. But I know what you are saying about the 100s of extra characters and code displayed in the browser - it looks like Hieroglyphics.
And if all else fails try the HelpDesk:
http://www.amember.com/support/
That always works out great for me.

Good luck,
Ted

i have searched the forum but i'm not finding an answer to this problem. i have downloaded the original file - footer.html. i have made changes to the file on the server and i keep getting random characters.

i'm using notepad to edit.

i have tried transferring in both binary and ascii modes.

i have changed the permissions of the templates folder and footer.html to 777 so that it's writeable.

i have uploaded the original and the original is overwritten on upload.

i have used two different ftp programs.

---

why am i getting gibberish and random characters?

thanks

---

screenshot of error is below

http://img121.imageshack.us/img121/204/amemberfooter.jpg

Tubby Would help if you either gave web page producing this error so we can see the source code or else post up the code for the footer in this thread.

Wiked cannot view the pages linked to in your original post.

How your amember site looks depends on 3 things: HTML, CSS and smarty.

Because the templates have smarty code in it ((almost) no PHP) you can't really edit it with a WYSIWYG editor - it messes up the smarty code and/or adds HTML tags that shouldn't be in some templates (like HEAD, BODY, TITLE tags). So that brings us down to what you do need to know... and that's HTML. Because when you do you'll see what's HTML and what's smarty.

Now CSS is something different. Personally I use Skybound Stylizer, it's almost a WYSIWYG CSS editor. The best in it's class. You can try and purchase it at www.skybound.ca (price is very reasonable and this tool will earn itself back).

So do you need to know smarty? Well, not in depth. Most of smarty code has been done by aMember, you only have to recognize it so you don't touch it or you can move it, perhaps even change a little bit. Smarty has excellent resources on the internet.

I hope this helps. If you need to know more or have a specific problem with a file. Just post it here and we'll help you. Or you can hire someone like Ken Gary or Miso to do it for you (my agenda is overfull right now).

i am well versed in smarty, php, html, css...

i'm using notepad to edit templates/footer.html

once edited, the file saved on the server changes from the original contents of the footer.html

Code:

{if $config.google_analytics}

{include file="google_analytics.js" sale="0"}

{/if}

</div>

<hr />

<p class="powered">&copy; <a href="http://www.cgi-central.net">CGI-Central.NET</a>, 2002-2006</p>

</body></html>

to...

Code:

{if $config.google_analytics}

{include fileo}

{include fil.js" saileo0"s}

/ifs}

</div>}

<hr />}

<p class="powered">&copy; <a href="http://www.cgi-central.net">CGI-Central.NET</a>, 2002-2006</p>}

</body></html>}

even when i upload the original - i get the same result. i have tried two different ftp programs. so unless this issue is server side, i need to figure out what in the script is producing this error. given that others have had the same issue, i presume that it's related to the script.

any help would be appreciated,
thanks

Did you uploaded in binary or ascii mode, sometime if you use the wrong upload mode that can cause error like that.

i personnaly use FileZilla it's free, simple tu use and very stable and you can choose in 3 mode for the upload; binary, ascii, auto

And you have better chance that issue is a server side problem not the script

i've used both winscp and filezilla. the only time it doesn't overwrite the file is if i use html code only. so if i end with a closing body and html tag, the footer.html file reads correctly. HOWEVER...it still outputs gibberish.

out of curiosity, what are the file permissions for your templates folder and the files within it? i think my client is on godaddy's servers as all of the files are set to 705.

I think sooqua has the anwer. You have to check winscp and filezilla for the upload mode that's being used. If the file permissions were the problem than you wouldn't be seeing anything at all.
But to answer your question the file permissions that I have for the templates is 644 and the folder 755

please note the original post. if anyone has any suggestions beyond what i have already tried, thank you.

i would like to know how the original poster was able to resolve the issue or if others have encountered this problem as well?

Ah I see.
Hmm, did you check the charset? You know UTF, Latin-1 and such?
Sometimes these things can screw up files dramatically.

k, didn't think of that. will give it a try.

ok, what is the charset supposed to be? i'm using filezilla and have it to autodetect.

Ok, in Filezilla set it to binary. This is NOT charset btw, but tranfser mode.

The character encoding (charset) is something different.
You can read about it here: http://www.patricktaylor.com/character-encoding
Notepad could mess a file up. Dreamweaver should be safe (make sure you edit aMember template files in code mode). Also any text editor that saves in a unix/linux friendly (in other words 'not retarded windows') mode will do the trick.

FileZilla recommended metapad so I added that just to see. Overall, I can't figure out what's going on. Will try on a different laptop to see if that resolves the issue.

Thanks

If character encoding is the problem than metapad or editpadpro should do the trick.

But make also sure you use the proper upload method - I _always_ use binary.

fyi, not sure what/how/why, but on this particular laptop, with my sprint broadband connection, i can not ftp files correctly.

i used a wireless connection and was able to make changes to the files without a problem.

thanks for the help

That's weird. You did use the same FTP program with the same settings?
I wonder what happens if you connect the laptop to the sprint broadband connection.
If this works also, than I think there's something going on with your desktop computer.

yep, same programs. tried fireftp (firefox), filezilla, winscp. when i connected wirelessly, i could edit files without getting the gibberishy errors. if i connected with sprint broadband, tried the same programs, no go.

still not sure WHY this is happening, just know that it's only on this laptop. i can use the broadband card on my desktop and ftp without a problem. it's definitely weird but at least i semi-figured it out.

thanks