iWeb FAQ - General Troubleshoot

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A few things you could try if you experience some problems...

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WARNINGS:


  1. -We deny any responsibility if something gets messed up following the steps described on this page

  2. -MAKE A BACKUP before trying any of the steps described on this page



  1. -A few general tips

  2. -Problems publishing (click here)

  3. -Photo pages troubleshoot (click here)

  4. -iWeb doesn’t open when I’m not connected to the internet

  5. -iWeb opens but isn’t working at all. It won’t let me do anything. Everything is greyed out. What can I do?

  6. -iWeb is not showing my website

  7. -I can’t name a page the way I want to, it reverts to the previous name

  8. -iWeb “doesn’t” or “doesn’t let me” save changes I made: "You do not have permission to save to this file."

  9. -The changes I made don’t display on the web when published

- When I enter my url I don’t get redirected to the page I want it to redirect to or don’t see the site at all

- Internet Explorer compatibility

  1. -The navigation menu does not display

  2. -Problems with comments on MobileMe: the comments don't work

  3. -Opening iWeb a MobileMe dialog window keeps appearing asking me whether I want to purchase MobileMe or not. I don’t want it but it keeps asking me. How can I stop it?

  4. -Text formatting problems: The formatting on the web doesn't match with the one showed in iWeb (Text displaying as normal in iWeb gets bold on the web or underlined and vice-versa)



A few general tips



  1. • Be sure to have the latest version of iWeb updating your software with Software Updater in the menu bar click on the Apple logo and choose “Software Update...”



  1. • Try deleting the preferences file:


1. Quit iWeb

2. Delete the following file:

User/Library/Preferences/com.apple.iweb.plist

3. Relaunch iWeb

If that doesn’t work... Retry it but instead of relaunching iWeb in 3. restart the computer and relaunch iWeb



  1. • Try repairing disk permissions:


1. Go to Applications/Utilities

2. Open Disk Utility

3. Click Macintosh HD

4. Click on Verify Disk Permissions

5. Click Repair Disk Permissions.




iWeb doesn’t open when I’m not connected to the internet



  1. • Go to iWeb preferences and uncheck the Auto Update box. If you have this feature turned on, iWeb tries to connect to the internet to check for updates when you launch it. If it can't check for updates, it refuses to launch.

(Suggested by Roddy, thank you!)



  1. • If you have Airport (wireless) turned on your computer but you’re not connected to the internet (there is no wireless network to select) try to turn Airport off on your computer and open iWeb with Airport turned off.



  1. • Try deleting the preferences file as mentioned in the A few general tips at the top of this page



  1. • If all that didn’t help, have a look at the second suggestion by OT on this post




iWeb opens but isn’t working at all. It won’t let me do anything. Everything is greyed out. What can I do?



  1. • Try to download a new domain.sites or domain.sites2 file, unzip it and double click the resulting file to open iWeb. If iWeb doesn’t open hit ctrl+click the file and choose Open with => iWeb.


- Click here if you have iWeb ’06 to download a domain.sites file

- Click here if you have iWeb ’08 to download a domain.sites2 file

(Suggested by Roddy, thank you!)


If that doesn’t work...



  1. • Go to iPhoto, select some photos, go to Share and "Send to iWeb" (try both Blog and Photopages)

Many people report that going through this procedure 3-4 times awakens their iWeb...


If that doesn’t work...



  1. • Try to follow the “A few general tips” at the top of this page.


If that doesn’t work either...



  1. • Reinstall iWeb




iWeb is not showing my website



  1. • First you have to find the Domain.sites2 file where iWeb stores its files.

To find that file go to:

Macintosh HD/Users/Username/Library/Application Support/iWeb/Domain.sites2

If you can’t find it here search for it with spotlight. Note that the extension .sites (iWeb 1.0) or .sites2 (iWeb  2.0) may be hidden, also search for Domain only. To see if a Domain file is iWeb ’06 or iWeb ’08 select the file press Command(Apple)+i under "Name & Extension" you will find that it is .sites or .sites2.


To get the site showing up in iWeb just open the Domain.sites file by double clicking on it. If that’s not the case hit ctrl+click the file and choose Open With=> Select iWeb



  1. • If still nothing happens

1. Select the domain file

2. Hit ctrl+click choose "Show package contents"

3. There must be a file called index.xml.gz some people reported that the file sometimes renamed itself to index-new.xml.gz if that is your case rename it index.xml.gz




I can’t name a page the way I want to, it reverts to the previous name



  1. • When this happens you probably already had a page named this way some time ago.

The solution is to go to File=>New Site. Create the page under that site and name it the way you want. Drag&Drop it into the other Site and you now have the page named the way you wanted and where you wanted it to be. Now delete the Site you created to create the page. That’s it.




iWeb “doesn’t” or “doesn’t let me” save changes I made: "You do not have permission to save to this file."



  1. • If you transferred the domain.sites2 file where iWeb stores its files from one computer to another or from one user to another...


Change permissions of the Domain file

Select Domain file press Command(Apple)+i under Ownership & Permissions go to =>Details =>Others and select Read & Write

You have to do that in the original user account and computer in which the Domain file was created. If you don’t change permissions you will find an error while publishing and saving from another user account or computer as by default "Others" permissions are set to Read only thus you can't modify/save it.



  1. • ...If that is not your case or if that didn’t help try repairing disk permissions as described in “A few general tips” at the top of this page.




The changes I made don’t display on the web when published



  1. • If a change doesn't display to you in the browser after you published and uploaded it mostly is because the old version of the page is cached (memorized) by your browser. Thus simply emptying the cache of the browser (Open Safari, choose Safari from the menu and go to Empty Cache) and reloading the page should display the changes.




When I enter my url I don’t get redirected to the page I want it to redirect to or don’t see the site at all



  1. • The site and page you want yourdomain.com or your base-url to be redirected to have to be on the top in the left side list of your pages in iWeb. If that’s already the case what you would have to do is replace the main index.html file.

You can do it either hitting "publish all" from the File menu in iWeb with the site and page you want to have displaying entering web.me.com/username or you base-url on top

or publishing this site to a folder and then take the index.html file of the result and drop it in your Web/Sites/ folder in your iDisk replacing the one that is there now.


  1. • If you don’t see your site at all then maybe the problem here is the index.html file which is a redirect-only file.

Entering http://web.me.com/username/

Redirects to: http://web.me.com/username/sitename/pagename.html

Maybe you changed the sitename or pagename and the index.html didn't get updated still redirecting to the old pagename or sitename.

To fix it make a "Publish All" from File menu instead of a Publish.

If you publish your site to a server other than MobileMe be sure to publish it to the right location and to upload all the files.




Internet Explorer Incompatibility



Note that this is not a problem of iWeb. It is a problem of Internet Explorer. A quote:


“I call Internet Explorer the WWB - World's Worst Browser.”

- Roddy -


Most of the people and myself agree.


But what can one do to make the site compatible with Internet Explorer?


iWeb built sites will not show the standard navigation when downloaded to a PC where Java is turned off in IE as the iWeb navigation bar is Javascript rendering. The solution would be downgrading your site and build your own navigation bar by creating a textfield and make text links. Copy&paste the textfield with the links to all of your pages. You can deactivate the standard navigation menu by selecting the page of interest in iWeb, opening the Inspector, going to the Page tab (second from the left) and unchecking the Display navigation menu box.


Make Safari and Firefox (and Quicktime) download links available on your site. Both of this Browsers are real Browsers, they work both on Mac + PC and they are both freeware. Most PC users are stunned by how much better Safari 3 is.


Have a look at Roddy’s page http://roddymckay.com/PlanetRoddy.html for an example on how to add links to those downloads.


However downgrading is a bad move. Make a second navigation bar while keeping the iWeb navigation bar too instead. You could put the second navigation bar at the bottom of your pages. This will also help google indexing your pages.




The navigation menu does not display



  1. • If you experience the problem looking at the site using Internet Explorer have a look at the Internet Explorer incompatibility troubleshoot on this page.



  1. • If you publish to a folder and upload your website via FTP remember to upload the following files:


You should just remember to upload


The Scripts folder

sitename/Scripts/


and the feed.xml

sitename/feed.xml


which files are important for the navigation menu and be sure you uploaded them.



  1. • Further if you publish to a folder have a look at this post in the Apple iWeb Discussion Forums, you maybe have the same problem.




Problems with comments on MobileMe: the comments don't work



Note that iWeb comments only work when publishing to MobileMe. If you don't publish to MobileMe read the Feedback FAQ


That's a problem a lot of people experience since .Mac changed to MobileMe.


Please note that you could loose the comments you have now.


  1. • Make sure you have the latest version of iWeb


  1. • For most people (about 80%) the issue is solved when they do a "Publish all" instead of a "Publish". Go to File=>Publish all


  1. • If you're using a personal domain and you had it set up already when MobileMe still was .mac you will have to update it. If you use CNAME change it from web.mac.com to web.me.com. If you use WebForward change web.mac.com/Username to web.me.com/username


  1. • If you access your site using web.mac.com/username use web.me.com/username instead and the comments should work


  1. • If they still don't work go to iWeb and uncheck the comments feature from the Inspector, save, publish, re-check the comments box in the Inspector and re-publish


I usually recommend to use Haloscan comments even if you're publishing to Mobile and that's why: you don't loose your comments, the feature is more stable, you can add them to all the pages not only Blog and Photo pages.




Opening iWeb a MobileMe dialog window keeps appearing asking me whether I want to purchase MobileMe or not. I don’t want it but it keeps asking me. How can I stop it?



The answer is that Apple doesn’t allow us to stop it from appearing. Usually there’s a checkbox “Don’t ask me again” or something like that. But in iWeb there isn’t. Which is really bad from Apple.


However I recently changed my computer and on the old computer the dialog window wouldn’t appear so I copied my old iWeb preferences file to the new computer and now iWeb doesn’t ask me anymore whether I want MobileMe or not.


Click here to download the preferences file. Unzip it and you will get a file called “com.apple.iWeb.plist”. You need to put this file in your user folder (home folder) =>Library=>Preferences folder. I hope that works for you too since the dialog window is pretty annoying.


After you replaced the preferences file and first launch iWeb you will be prompted/asked to locate your Domain file. You find this file under:

Macintosh HD/Users/Your username/Library/Application Support/iWeb/Domain.sites2




Text formatting problems: The formatting on the web doesn't match with the one showed in iWeb (Text displaying as normal in iWeb gets bold on the web or underlined and vice-versa)



If that happens copy all the text of the Main TextBox

Open a word document and paste the text in it

Select all

In Formatting palette (View=>Formatting Palette) go to Styles and choose "Clear formatting"

In iWeb delete the main TextBox of the page and re-add a TextBox (new text box or copy it from another page)

Go to Word, select all copy and paste it in iWeb and re-apply formatting


Note: it's really important to delete the whole TextBox where the problem occurs not just the text in it (you could also delete and rebuild the whole page instead of only deleting the TextBox from it)




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- Cédric -



 

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