php alternative to frames

[dessie1981]

Hi Everyone,

Im currently designing a webshop in php , i have most of the functionality done now i just want to change the layout of the site.
At the moment i have different pages for most things, e.g. searching, viewing results, viewing quotations, cart etc....

I would like to have the one page for the user to do most things, i would normally think of using frames but i know there a lot of disadvantages if i take that road, e.g.
search engines find it hard to navigate through the site etc....

So is there anything in php that can help me instead of using html frames. Or do you think frames are my only option!

Thanks

Des

 

[sleipnir214]

I don't understand. What is it you are doing with frames?



Want the best answers? Ask the best questions! TANSTAAFL!

 

[dessie1981]

I have not done anything with frames yet.

I am new to php and i am just wondering if there is a way to navigate through my site keeping, for example the navigation buttons static on the page rather than loading them on each page, In your opinion do you think that using html frames is the only way to achieve this?

 

[sleipnir214]

It's probably either gotta be frames or AJAX.



Want the best answers? Ask the best questions! TANSTAAFL!

 

[vacunita]

If navigation is your concern, then with PHP there is alot that can be done, without relying on frames.

You could use Includes, you coud use content DIV's, and output the file contents into the DIV. You could store you page content in a DB and load it on request.

There are many alternatives in PHP to do what you want. Frames are never the only option.


----------------------------------
Ignorance is not necessarily Bliss, case in point:
Unknown has caused an Unknown Error on Unknown and must be shutdown to prevent damage to Unknown.

 

[dessie1981]

Cool Thanks for the info.

Dessie

 

[theniteowl]

Include files work well for keeping a single nav control for every page. The one disadvantage is that changing pages causes the entire page to reload rather than just a content area. Unless you are on dialup this is not usally a problem.

I prefer to do as much on page as possible and not have to reload the page if I can get around it but that would require client-side code. An Ajax approach would require client-side script to retrieve page information and display it on the current screen. This can be a very nice way to handle things but it does require that the end-user have scripting enabled.


It's hard to think outside the box when I'm trapped in a cubicle.

 

[Vragabond]

Also worth noting is, that after the first load, the navigation menu will be cached by the browser and will contribute hardly anything to load times. So doing anything but includes is over-engineering here, IMHO.