Domino DOCTYPE problems

HCL Domino Domino Forum
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I am working on a Domino website making some changes to it to make it more useable and look better. It currently has a simple navigator at the top that has been written in Javascript, it offers several drop down menus across the top of the page. One of the requirements for this site is that it can be indexed by search engines and I believe that the navigator they currently have is blocking this as it’s not text based. I want to create a navigator that uses CSS and an unordered list to display the menu.

I’ve written the code for the menu and it works fine locally but as soon as I put it on the Domino server it stops working. This is because the Doctype that Domino puts at the top of every page is simply . For the CSS navigator to work, I need this to say something like .

I know there is a server-side setting in domino you can change to get it to output like this but we use a hosting firm in the US and changing the server settings is not an option. This leaves the only other alternative as far as I can see; change the form’s content type in Designer to be HTML. I can then have control over the doctype tag and the navigator works properly. The only problem with this is that the client wants a content management solution where they can create pages with Rich Text in them and have domino reliably reproduce them on the web. If this navigator goes across the top of each page on the site, I have to change the forms that use it to be HTML content type in designer, and then the Rich Text fields aren’t reproduced on the web. I offered to show these content pages with RTF data in a popup window but the client doesn’t want to loose focus on their site.

I have tried using a frameset where the top frame calls a form with just the navigator on it in HTML type, and then the bottom frame uses another form where the content type is Notes but this isn’t really suitable; as soon as you hover over the navigator and the drop down menu appears, it goes beneath the lower frame and you can’t see the options in the list.

Is there a better way to implement something like this where I am not restricted form using valid CSS ?

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Subject: Domino DOCTYPE problems

There is a solution IF you are using Domino 7.0.2 or higher. There are a couple of new web-specific system fields you can use on an as-needed basis:

$$HTMLFrontMatter is used for text that is to appear before the tag (for all intents and purposes, that means the doctype declaration), and overrides any normal server output; and

$$HTMLAttributes is used to set attributes of the tag, such as language and charset – handy for meeting accessibility guidelines.

If you are on a version before 7.0.2, though, the notes.ini setting is the only way to get the complete doctype with elements treated as Notes content.

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Subject: RE: Domino DOCTYPE problems

Just to confirm, I have tested this approach and it works a dream. Thanks once again Stan, I thought I was going to have to change the design of the app yet again to overcome this problem.

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Subject: FYI: It is $$HTMLTagAttributes

I came across this post (belated thx to Stan) and couldn’t get the $$HTMLAttributes field to work. Elsewhere I found it was actually $$HTMLTagAttributes. I’m sure it was just a typo, but wanted to save others the trouble of tracking it down.

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Subject: $$HTMLFrontMatter works

Thank you for this post. I was having problems with Internet Explorer not rendering the web page correctly. The issue was traced to the DOCTYPE attribute not set properly - it needed to appear before the tag. The issue got resolved after I set the DOCTYPE using the reserved field $$HTMLFrontMatter.

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Subject: RE: Domino DOCTYPE problems

Thanks Stan, I’ll check this and see if it works. It sounds exactly like what I need.