Previewing and Testing Web Pages

Note: These instructions pertain only to creating Faculty Professional Pages. All other SNC department/organization web sites are being maintained using Cascade Server, the College's content management system (CMS).

Previewing Web Pages

We recommend previewing your web pages before transferring them to the web server. Viewing your pages is a good way to check your work, so that you can correct major mistakes before the page is available to the public.

To preview your pages:

Create your pages in your web editing program and save them on your M: drive or C: drive.
Open your web browser.
From the File menu, choose Open File or Open.
In Internet Explorer, click the Browse button.
Locate your file and click Open.

You will see your web page displayed. Take a look at the page to see if it looks the way you intended it to look. Read it over and make sure there are no errors. Be aware that some items may not display properly during the preview, but will appear after you transfer your pages to the web server. These items include things such as images that you have not yet transferred to the server, images or other files used from centralized repositories on the server, and anything for which you have used include files.

Transferring Web Pages to the Server

Once you are satisfied with the way your files look in preview mode, copy the files to the web server. For instructions on transferring files, see Transferring Files to the Professional Home Page Server: Windows or Transferring Files to the Professional Home Page Server: Mac. Once you transfer your pages, you'll need to test them one final time.

Testing Web Pages

Testing your web pages is a necessary quality control step in the web development process. Remember that your pages are a part of the College's image to the outside world.

View your pages on as many different computers and monitors, using as many different web browsers as possible. Your pages will not look the same in Firefox and Internet Explorer, on Macs and Windows, or even in different versions of the same browser. You might be amazed at how different things can look on different computers.
Consider how your site would look in black and white, or to someone who is colorblind. How would your site "sound" to someone using a text reader to visit the site?
Proofread and spell-check all of your pages. It helps to have someone who's never seen the page before read it over.
Test all of the links to make sure that they work.
Make the necessary corrections, save the changes, and transfer the pages again.
Check your pages one more time.