[philthomas]

Hi guys ..... I'm trying to help a friend out here and Web Design is not my strongest skill.

He's designed a basic system on a Local Server (not web based), using html files to make a company Help page, with hyperlinks pointing to other files on the server.
What he's after is a simple counter script and a simple search script, which doesn't rely on Internet access.

Any help or advice would be very welcome.

Thanks in advance

Phil

[leoh187]

Hi

Is it possible that he could run PHP & MySQL on the local server, that would make the task alot easier?

Many Thanks

Leo

[philthomas]

Thanks for the reply, but i don't think that's going to be possible as i have since found out he's using a shared network drive to store the files and not a server. Beginning to think this might not be possible unless one of you clever guys knows different?

[leoh187]

Hi

Without a server-side language such as PHP or ASP or a database this would be very hard (impossible) to implement.

However they could install a webserver, PHP and MySQL easily and for free, which would make the task alot easier.

I hope this helps.

Many Thanks

Leo

[philthomas]

Thanks Leo ...... I think he will have to get by without his counter & search.

I'll mention the Server/PHP/MySQL option, but I dont think he will have enough freedom at work, or the knowledge to do this. The options, as far as I know, were "nice to haves" rather than essential, so I dont think he'll be too disappointed.

[dr john]

Start by installing XAMPP Lite (google it) on one of the computers on the network - the one where the html files are currently stored.
This creates a web server for you on your system, at http://localhost - with Apache, MySQL, PHP, Perl. No technical skill required really.
Then move the html pages to the hdocs folder and start the server program. You now have your own internal web server. (It's how I test my PHP and MySQL work for example, before transferring it to the client's server.)
Then install a search script of which there are many - google on search script
This one for example uses perl and is apparently relatively easy to install. (I've seen it in action and it is quite good.) http://www.kscripts.com/scripts.shtml

Now I have to admit I've never tried using XAMPP Lite on a local network and accessing localhost from another PC, but as it is easy to install and run, why not try it - you have nothing to loose.

If that doesn't work, install google desktop search and point that at the PC that contains your html files. You really only have to think for a few seconds to come up with a few possible solutions.

I do have to ask, why is someone who doesn't know what they are doing creating html help pages???

[philthomas]

Thanks drjohn, I'll pass that info on to him.

Originally Posted by dr john

I do have to ask, why is someone who doesn't know what they are doing creating html help pages???

A bit of a long story, but basically he was asked to write some work related procedures and help files (not html help), using Word. The initial idea was to print them off for about 20 staff.
Having written them he thought it might be a good idea to save them in Word as html files and create a simple Contents page, with hyperlinks, so folk in the company could access it easily on a shared Network drive ..... then it grew and folks started asking for more stuff to be added and a search feature.

[dr john]

Ah yes, things like that do just keep snowballing along don't they. Poor guy, I'll bet he gets no thanks for it either.