Comments on: CSS Frames VS Standard HTML Frames

by: Rob

Tue, 21 Aug 2007 13:09:38 +0000

Just like to add the same thing happens in IE if you change all widths from 720px to 100%.

by: Rob

Tue, 21 Aug 2007 12:58:47 +0000

Great Example, but could you just explain one thng! I tried this with less content than you actually have and in IE6 the content gets pushed 10-20 px to the right of the header and footers. The same thing happens when you minimize the browser and start to minimize the page horizontally it gets to a point where the header and footer are stuck to the side of the browser but the content stops short and has a margin of 10 - 20px (again in IE6 but not Moz). Can this be fixed?

by: Martin

Mon, 04 Sep 2006 19:45:44 +0000

LKBM: You are right about the reloading, the hole page has to be downloaded from the server - not just the content frame. However, if big images such as banners are placed in - for example - the header, those would be cached by visitor browsers, hence only downloaded once. If no images are placed in the header, or footer, the overhead would anyhow be minimal. Don't really see what you mean by overflow:scroll. In the CSS Frames example I use overflow:auto for browsers that don't support position:fixed, which in this case give the same result as overflow:scroll, but in other cases would mean that the scrollbars would be visible automatically only when the element in question is overflowed. As for the position of the scrollbar it's at the far right because I overflowed the body selector. I could have used a overflowed content wrapper to get the scrollbar right by the content area and use overflow:hidden for the body selector, but so far I haven't managed to get that technique to be as cross-browser friendly as the one used in the CSS Frames Example.

by: LKBM

Sun, 03 Sep 2006 02:49:29 +0000

The real benefit of frames is that you don’t reload all the nav controls and such each time you go somewhere on a website. What’s done here could probably be done better with overflow: scroll. Or, it would more closely resemble the behavior of frames in that the scroll bar and focus would be at the right place. Maybe not better.

by: Martin

Wed, 31 May 2006 10:41:24 +0000

Tweaked, I belive the only way to do that would be with a client-side script, such as javascript, which would mean your site won’t work for about 10 -15% of the site visitors. Hence, not recommended if you wan’t your site to be accessible for as many as possible.

Although I don’t know Flash my guess is that it should be possible to make Flash intros etc be executed only once for a visitor. The reloading will of course take place for each page visit, but it won’t be visible for the visitor.
However, I know there are accessibility problems with Flash, both for visitors and search engines. It can look kind of cool and flashy, but if you wan’t high traffic and many visitors I don’t recommend Flash.

You could of course use standard HTML frames(frameset) to prevent reloading, but this would - as I mentioned in the article - break the unified model of the Web where Web pages are the atomic units of information represented by a unique URL.

Ok, if you wan’t to use Flash my suggestion is to let the Flash header and footer reload and use PHP or any other server-side scripting language to do includes for the header, content and footer.

by: Tweaked

Tue, 30 May 2006 17:58:36 +0000

Lets say you had links in the header (ex. menu) and wanted the links to open in the content section. How would this be done without reloading the header and footer each time like can frames do? I am asking this because I have a flash file in a header that I dont want reloaded each time.

by: Martin

Mon, 29 May 2006 11:36:38 +0000

Aussi said:
I really like the CSS frames example , but I would wan’t to have a link menu in the sidebar. Any suggestions?

Do you you wan’t the sidebar to be fixed and not scroll with the rest of the content? If that is the case should use the same technique used for making the header and the footer fixed.

If not the case - i.e. if you wan’t the sidebar to scroll with the rest of the content - you could make a new div within the content div, lets say id=” left-content” or id=”sidebar”, and then float it to the left.

by: Aussi

Sat, 27 May 2006 06:56:39 +0000

I really like the CSS frames example , but I would wan't to have a link menu in the sidebar. Any suggestions?

by: Martin Carlsson

Thu, 27 Apr 2006 11:23:45 +0000

I am not sure what you are asking, Mohamed. If you are asking how to create CSS Frames, try the CSS Frames Example I linked to at the end of this post.

To view the CSS code you can look at the source of the example page and copy the link to the CSS file, or you could just follow the the links to the CSS files provided in the page.
The example page also contains a full explaination on how it works.

Good luck and let me know if you have any questions

by: mohamed

Thu, 27 Apr 2006 08:47:12 +0000

It well help for me and colligue a wish youn please m sent to the tutoriayal