First impression. Web users form first impressions of web pages in as little as 50 milliseconds (1/20th of a second), according to last researches. In the blink of an eye, web surfers make nearly instantaneous judgments of a web site's "visual appeal".
You only get one chance to create a first impression, make it count. A clean, professional, and fast-loading menu bar can ensure that your visitors first impression will be a good one.
Now the menu is search engine friendly! The main disadvantage of flash navigation is now eliminated! Set up navigation as ordinary HTML links. The flash menu file reads these links and draws the visually appealing Vista menu. Everything is easier, more convenient and compact. Any search engine can read this navigation and index all the links.
Download free versions:
First button always link to f-source website
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VISTA DROP DOWN MENU (multidomain menu licence)
2) Type file name in pop up dialog named "Save flash element". This file will be loaded in all your web pages containing the flash menu.
3) Now you can check the appearance of the Vista Drop Down Menu in Dreamweaver by pressing the "Play" button in your " Property inspector" (Ctrl + F3). As you can see the menu already functions with default parameters. To test the menu with your own navigation settings press F12. Only in a browser the menu will work with all features and settings. In Dreamweaver the flash object has a Height of 45px. Do not change it based on your submenu height! The height will be adjusted automatically when the submenu is dropped in the browser.
Important! Visit online 'Adobe Flash Player Security Setting Manager'
To test the menu on your PC you need to check 'Always allow'. (No changes needed when you test it on a web server.)
1) The flash object appears in your document window in "Design view". There is no need to change the height of the flash object according to submenu height. You need only to set the flash object width according to the real menu width (which appears in browser) by dragging the sizing handles.
2) All parameters can be configured in the Dreamweaver "Tag Inspector" (Click on Flash Object, then F9).
- _mainButtonHeight - height of the main menu bar. - _mainButtonTextColor - main button text color. - _mainButtonWidthExt - button width depends on the text width + this extension. - _mainFont - font type for main buttons. - _mainFontSize - font size for main buttons. - _mainHighlightColor - color of main button highlighting. - _menuColor - color of main navigation bar. - _minSubWidth - minimal width for submenus. - _subButtonHeight - height of submenu buttons. - _subButtonTextColor - submenu button text color. - _subFont - font type for the submenu buttons. - _subFontSize - font size for the submenu buttons. - _subHighlightColor - color of subbuttons highlighting. - _subHlTransparency - subbuttons highlighting transparency. - _subMenuColor - color of the drop submenu. - bg_Pic_URL - url of picture (jpeg only) to place under the menu. - clickSoundURL - path to the mp3 file, if you want to make some sound when mouse clicks on menu . - mainSoundURL - path to the mp3 file, if you want to make some sound when mouse gets over main buttons . - searchFieldColor - search input field color. - searchFieldWidth - width of search field. - searchTextColor - search input text color. - showSearchField - show or hide search field. - stretch_width_to - stretch the menu bar to particular width (in pixels). - subSoundURL - path to the mp3 file, if you want to make some sound when mouse gets over sub buttons . - xml_Path - type here the path to XML file with navigation settings, if you prefer XML (cut from a page the DIV with id='menu' and paste it in the XML file).
Setting up the navigation
In "Code View" after <body> tag you can find the code of your menu navigation. It consists of ordinary HTML links and they can be indexed by search engines.
You can add, rename, move elements of this structure and the flash menu will follow your changes. Press F12 to test. (When you press "Play" button the menu appears with default navigation.)
- Button 1 - main button caption, type your name e.g. Home. - http://f-source.com - link of the button, type your link e.g. http://yourdomain.com/ - Add target attribute if you want to specify new window or specific frame name as target for link.
_self specifies the current frame in the current window (the menu use it by default).
_blank specifies a new window.
_parent specifies the parent of the current frame.
_top specifies the top-level frame in the current window.
- If you want to make a button text bold change the bold caption tag to <b>, so the caption <b>Button1</b> should be like this: <b> Button1 <:/b>
To use Google to search your own web site set the link like this: (http://www.google.com/search?sitesearch=flasf-extensions.net%26q=). Substitute the text "yourdomain.com" with your actual domain name. Using this same logic and the proper GET parameter you can set the link to any search script.
An alternative way. Cut the DIV with id='menu' from the page and paste it in XML file. This file is an ordinary text file with .xml extension. It must contain nothing more than DIV with id='menu'.
The parameter xml_Path(in Tag Inspector) can be relative (navigation.xml) or absolute (http://www.yourDomain.com/navigation.xml).
The first method is search engine friendly, but this method gives you ability to make changes only in one file. It is difficult to choose? Do not choose. Combine them. If you will keep search engine friendly navigation setting on the most important pages of your site you will get advantages of both methods.
3) Now you can check the appearance of the Vista Drop Down Menu in Dreamweaver by pressing the "Play" button in your " Property inspector" (Ctrl + F3). As you can see the menu already functions with default parameters. To test the menu with your own navigation settings press F12. Only in a browser the menu will work with all features and settings. In Dreamweaver the flash object has a Height of 45px. Do not change it based on your submenu height! The height will be adjusted automatically when the submenu is dropped in the browser.
- _mainButtonHeight - height of the main menu bar.
