Hi, I asked some of these questions a few days ago, but hadn't heard from anyone. So, I'll try rephrasing them.

When I first built the pages (off only one link, for testing purposes), it built something like 240 pages in the "pages/" directory. After I had made a few changes, I rebuilt them, only to find 850 pages or so built for that one link! Is this normal? Does it get worse with more links? If so, that seems like a huge load on the server, not to mention a drain on available web space.

Another oddity -- I set up a category with the one link underneath it. The category shows up fine, but when I click on it, the link does not show up below. The link is there if I search for it, use what's new, or look from the admin menu. I added another link from the user interface and the same thing happened. Any ideas what might be causing this. I'd sort of like my links to show up in my links list.

Is there anywhere that clarifies the use of templates/css/site_html_templates.pl/site_html.pl? Am I correct that css is only used with the html templates? As nice as css is capable of working, I hesitate to use anything that shows up differently in virtually every browser.

I think that's all for now. Thanks.

Dan

p.s. Two things that might be helpful...

1) My Links is at http://dankaplan.com/runninglinks/pages

2) The categories show the number of links in parenthesis, the links just don't show up after clicking on the appropriate category.

[This message has been edited by Dan Kaplan (edited April 06, 1999).]

OK, here's another thing I just noticed. The "Build All" does not give any errors, but it stops building after the first category that has a link in it (it's now building 1727 pages for that link!!). Maybe this should've been an installation question after all.

Dan

 
This is definitely not normal. What you have failed to say is what is on those pages. The content of the pages would give us an idea as to what is going on. Maybe if you provided a url so we could see what is happening?


No, this is not correct. The use of css and templates is unrelated. The css is used, by default in Links v2.0, regardless of whether or not you use templates.

Thanks for the reply. To answer your question, there's nothing on the numerous pages. That is, they are empty pages just like when you click on the categories.

Here is the URL of the category that is building all of the pages:

http://www.dankaplan.com/runninglinks/pages/Companies/

and here is a sample page being built:

http://www.dankaplan.com/runninglinks/pages/Companies/more1519.shtml

The worst I have seen is 3200 (the number at the end) pages being built.

As far as your answer to my css/templates question, I am playing with the Yahoo template, and it doesn't appear to make use of the css file. Or does it? Basically what I'm trying to say is that I'm confused which files relate to which.

I thought I read that you can either use site_html_templates.pl or the templates, but I know they work together. I've also read that templates and possibly css are not necessary.

Dan

 
I suspect that the problem is in the build routine. It is in a loop that has no end. It can be caused by something as simple as a typo or a statement put in the wrong place. Double checking everything you did against the installation instructions for the Yahoo template mod may help you find the problem.

If that doesn't help, see if the author of the Yahoo mod can help. Finally, if all that fails, I would back out the Yahoo mod and try it using the standard Links v2.0 and, once it is working, then reapply the Yahoo mod.


I do not know whether or not the Yahoo mod uses css or not as I still have not had a chance to download the mod and look through it.


In the default version of Links v2.0, you have the option of using templates or no templates. If you do not use templates, then you do your html coding in site_html.pl. If you do use templates, then you use site_html_templates.pl and the template files in the admin/templates directory.

Either way uses css, by default. You can disable css by 1) deleting the links.css file from the directory it is installed in and 2) remove all the pointers to the links.css file contained in site_html.pl or the template files. Actually, you can do 2) without doing 1) and that works as well, but I don't like orphanaed (unused) files laying around. However, the Yahoo mod you are using may use the style sheets and, if you want to use the Yahoo mod, removing the style sheets may not be an option.

Sure wish I could be of more help but, without having looked at the Yahoo code, I can't really answer your problem, just try to point you in the right direction. Good luck!

Bobsie,

Thank you very much for clarifying the templates and css usage. I think I more or less understand it now.

As far as the Yahoo mod and the loop, that still doesn't catch the problem. I first installed the standard Links v2.0, and I was having problems with the unusual number of pages being built. I then installed the Yahoo templates and played around with them while waiting for someone to bail me out after posting my first question(s). Thus, the Yahoo mod doesn't seem to have had any effect on the situation.

I don't believe I changed anything in the build routines. If I did, it was accidental. But I don't recall ever touching them. My server works fine with all the other scripts I have installed, but maybe it's worth reinstalling and see if something strange is going on. Is the build routine you mention the nph_build.cgi? Maybe I'll look at that again and see if there's anything suspicous there, not that I know what I'm looking for...

Dan

Well, I feel like a big ol' fool now! Problem solved. In case anyone runs into similar problems, here's what I found.

In the links.cfg file, there is the following section:

$build_span_pages = 0;

# Number of links per page.
$build_links_per_page = 0;

I had the first variable set to 1, which apparently was trying to break the lone link into numerous pages of zero! It was probably more confused than me.

Now I can turn my attention to actually getting it set up the way I want.

Dan

I've marked this down and will make it so Links doesn't throw itself into an endless loop in the next version..

Cheers,

Alex