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Site structure and page design for a Contribute site

To enable Contribute users to edit your website, keep the following points in mind when you structure it:

  • Keep your site structure simple. Don’t nest folders too deeply. Group related items together in a folder.

  • Set up appropriate read and write permissions for folders on the server.

  • Add index pages to folders as you create them, to encourage Contribute users to place new pages in the correct folders. For example, if Contribute users provide pages containing meeting minutes, create a folder in the site root folder named meeting_minutes, and create an index page in that folder. Then provide a link from your site’s main page to the index page for meeting minutes. A Contribute user can then navigate to that index page and create a new page of minutes for a specific meeting, linked from that page.

  • On each folder’s index page, provide a list of links to the individual content pages and documents in that folder.

  • Keep page designs as simple as possible, minimizing fancy formatting.

  • Use CSS rather than HTML tags and name your CSS styles clearly. If the Contribute users use a standard set of styles in Microsoft Word, use the same names for the CSS styles, so that Contribute can map the styles when a user copies information from a Word document and pastes it into a Contribute page.

  • To prevent a CSS style from being available to Contribute users, change the name of the style so that the name starts with mmhide_. For example, if you use a style named RightJustified in a page but you don’t want Contribute users to be able to use that style, rename the style to mmhide_RightJustified.

    Note: You have to add mmhide_ to the style name in Code view; you cannot add it in the CSS panel.

  • Use as few CSS styles as possible, to keep things simple and clean.

  • If you use server-side includes for HTML page elements, such as headers or footers, create an unlinked HTML page that contains links to the include files. Contribute users can then bookmark that page and use it to navigate to the include files and edit them.