This tutorial is a step-by-step guide for you to learn the basic procedures in Web Site Maestro.
Tip: print this out and read it while you're trying the program.
Installing
1. Put the Web Site Maestro folder in your Applications folder and put an alias of the application Web Site Maestro in your Apple menu.
2. Double-click the application and read the Welcome dialog. This will only appear once.
3. Continue and choose your (main) web folder which is the folder that contains a local copy of your web site.
4. Choose a destination folder for the WSM Output folder. This folder will be created by Web Site Maestro in which it will put a duplicate of your web folder (and any other web folder to be added later). You can also choose the default destination which is the same folder in which your web folder resides.
5. Click on the Preferences button, select the tab Miscellaneous and enter your FTP login data for your web site so that you are ready to upload your files to the remote server.
5.1. Enter the name of the remote server, for example "ftp.myhost.com" - without the quotes of course - or enter the IP number. Note that ftp-naming is case-sensitive.
5.2. Enter the name of the optional remote folder - if applicable - for example "pub". If you don't know this, ask your ISP administrator.
5.3. Enter your user name.
5.4. Enter your password and check 'Remember Password' if you wish.
6. Note that your login data will not be erased when you click on the Default Settings button. It will stay configured for the current web folder. When you add another web folder to Web Site Maestro at a later stage you can add additional login data.
Optimizing, viewing and uploading a web page
1. Launch Web Site Maestro if it's not open yet and click the Select button. You can choose a file from your web folder to have it optimized. Do it.
2. In one or two seconds the web page is optimized and you see the file noted in the Log together with the number of bytes saved. The optimized file resides in the duplicate web folder, as indicated in the Log's heading.
3. If you select the line in the Log, the View Code, View Page and Upload Page buttons are activated. Click on View Page.
4. Your browser will open the page and you can check if the page renders well after being optimized. You don't need to do that every time but it's nice that you can check it if you like.
5. Return from the browser to Web Site Maestro and click on View Code.
6. The text field will display the source code of the page. You can click the small triangle at the left to enlarge the text field. You can also edit the text, find and replace text and save the changes. Not something that you will do often, but you should know that you can do it when you feel the need. You find the usual edit and save commands in the Edit and File menu.
7. If you have already entered your FTP login data in Preferences, you may click Upload Page to upload the file to the remote server. The file will automatically be put into the right directory.
8. By now you have finished your first complete cycle. You see next to the Select button the Same Again button. This brings us to a new chapter.
Using another function instead of Optimizing
1. Suppose you want to check if the links in the file you just optimized are all correct, then you set the Function popup menu to 'Check Internal Links' and click the Same Again button.
2. The same file is checked for the validity of its internal links and you will probably see in the Log that no problems were found.
3. To see what happens if there is a broken link, you could temporarily remove a file (image?) used on the page. Click the Same Again button and see how useful this function is!
4. To be honest, in some rare cases Web Site Maestro could flag a broken link while it's not broken. If you come across such a thing, please send the original file to us and report the problem in your email to <bugs@tonbrand.nl>.
5. Likewise you can choose another function, for example 'Check Tags' or 'Convert Special Characters' to check if the file is OK.
5.1. The difference is that you can now add corrections to a page, for example a missing Width attribute or a converted character (ö instead of Ü). In the Preferences window you will see which options are at your disposal. Note that Help Tags are available.
5.2. Please note that if corrections are added, these are added to the duplicate page and that an existing optimized page will be overwritten. This is something you should keep in mind. Later we will explain how to deal with this.
6. The function not mentioned yet is 'Optimize and Upload'. This allows you, as the name suggests, to optimize a file and immediately upload it. Busy web masters will love this function because it saves a lot of time if you make many small changes in a lot of files. Later we will explain how this can be dealt with even better: with 'Smart Handling'.
Handling a folder or the entire web folder
1. Until now we worked with a single file. Of course, you can also choose 'Folder' and select a folder to handle all files in it in one pass. More interesting is "Entire Web Folder' because this means that you handle all files to a depth of 8 levels.
2. Let's try this: Select 'Entire Web Folder' and click the Start button. In no time your whole web folder is being optimized and you see every file as one line in the Log, with its name (or path relative to the WSM Output folder) and the savings in bytes.
3. To view a file you can select a line as explained before. But now you can also make various individual selections by holding down the Command key (Mac) or the Control + Alt key (Windows). You can also use the Select All command from the Edit menu. This multiple selection is only useful for uploading (because you can't view all files at the same time). If you click the Upload button, all selected files will be uploaded in one FTP session.
Smart Handling
1. In Preferences you can select 'Smart Handling'. If you do that, and you work with a folder or the entire web folder, only those files will be handled that you have worked on the same day.
2. Suppose you have optimized and uploaded your entire web folder that consists of 100 pages. A few weeks later you decide to change 20 pages. You work for a day on these pages and then you start optimizing your entire web folder with Smart Handling turned on. Only these 20 pages will be handled and if you had chosen the Optimize and Upload function, they are also transferred to the remote server - all with a single mouse-click!
Adding missing attributes and converting special characters
1. If you have a new web folder with newly dveloped pages, then it's useful to use the Check and Convert functions. If corrections are added, they are added to the files in the duplicate web folder. Only if you are satisfied with the corrections, you would copy these corrected pages to your original web folder.
2. For possible later corrections, you may choose to check the Add Missing... options and the Convert option in the first tab of Preferences. In that case, the corrections are added on the fly while optimizing.
The History Log
1. In the History Log you find what you have done in the past. For each function there is a separate Log. Access to the History Log is limited to prevent you from accidentally uploading an old file or do other unintentional things.
Adding a new web folder to Web Site Maestro
1. In the Configure menu you find the command to add a new web folder. The web folder in question will appear in the Web Folder popup menu at the bottom of the main window. This makes it very easy for you to switch from one web folder to another. FTP login data is switched for you as well.
2. If you are working with Web Folder A and you select a file from Web Folder B, you will be warned and Web Site Maestro will make the switch for you. This is particularly useful if you use the Drag & Drop feature and you drop a file (or files) from Web Folder B while Web Folder A is the current web folder.
Drag & Drop
1. There are various drag & drop possibilities:
1.1. You can drop files on Web Site Maestro's icon. This will launch the program if it's not open yet and execute the current function.
1.2. You can drop files on the drop spot just above the View Code button.
1.3. You can call the File Drop window from the File menu and drop your files on it. You can position that window somewhere on the desktop and have its position remembered - see Preferences.
Synchronizing the duplicate web folder
1. In the Extra menu you find the Synchronize Duplicate Web Folder command that you can also choose to have it executed at each startup of Web Site Maestro.
2. This command allows you to automatically add or refesh files or remove files from the duplicate web folder in accordance with the present state of the original web folder.
3. This is important because you should consider your duplicate web folder as the core of your actions. It is from here that you upload files. The original web folder is in fact your backup and serves for editing in your HTML Editor. This brings us to an important point: Do not open an optimized file in your HTML Editor because that will undo the optimizing! Also, don't delete your original files. Optimized files are very hard to read!
Conclusion
1. If you have carefully read this tutorial, you know enough to get started. There are of course more things to discover and to explain, but that you will experience while you're actually working with Web Site Maestro.
2. For more information you have the Manual, built into the program and as HTML file. You also have free support from the author of the program.
