getting support from Actinic

[moeb]

My situation is I have taken on an Actinic based site for a colleague after the last designer was not being any help with updating etc. My colleague paid £300+VAT to update from Client to 'full' designer so that we (I) could have full control of the site and catalogue (don't like that American spelling!!)
This site is www.theframefactorycardiff.co.uk and is about 90% working but there are a few pages/links that are not working. I have created basic sites in Dreamweaver so I am not an absolute beginner but I am finding it fairly difficult to fix certain pages of the site due to not having created the site in the 1st place and not knowing Actinic for more than a few weeks.

A member of Actinic support said that they would look at the site snapshot and see if he could help me sort it out. He has since come back to me and suggested that I start afresh and create a new site in Dreamweaver and import it into Actinic. I DO not need to start again and do not see this as being suitable support for a ‘paid up member’.

I spoke to another member of support just now and he suggested that I read all the help files and information online but he couldn’t seem to grasp the idea that I was a relative beginner (in Actinic) but that the site was nearly complete, and that I really need someone to show where links were not working and get advise for fixing them etc, rather than posting a question to someone in support because I can’t explain what I’m trying to do because I am a beginner in actinic.
What I guess I am asking is for some helpful soul to assist me with these minor problems. Does anyone know anyone who could look at a snapshot and possibly figure out what is wrong with parts of the site.
No doubt if I had created this site from the start I would know how actinic works and would certainly be much wiser.

Please help some’knowlegable’body..

Moeb

[guccij]

I think you're misunderstanding what Actinic Support is there for.

It's not a design service.

It's there to help when things go badly wrong, like for example, a corrupted database, or a bug.

All of us were new to Actinic once and we all did the "read the help files route". Well, some of us did

It's not that this community won't help, it's that we can't unless you help us with what, specifically, is wrong.

I'd love to look at your snapshot, but I do not have the time. It's hours of work. I'm quite a nice person but I don't do that sort of stuff for free, sorry.

[Duncan Rounding]

You can't expect Actinic support to fix the errors of a custom design.

Tackle your issues one by one and post each separately on the forum. I'm sure you will then get assistance from some community members that will help you sort out your problems.

[wesleythorne]

having a quick look at your site I would say it might be easier to start afresh, it might not be that bad or long to do it.

I would suggest using the basic standard theme to start with, don't worry about colours too much as you can change them later once the functionality works.

Import your old products only into the content tree

Have a good look around to see how the products are built, this is time consuming to learn but is a fundamental part of actinic to master.

If you are happy with the products check the payment option and shipping charges are correct.

Then make your design changes as required, actinic has some in built colour templates to get you started.

What ever you do be sure to make a snapshot before any changes or before you start editing products or pages.

Wes

[leehack]

Go standard theme for sure, if you don't know what you're doing and struggling to grasp it, stick with bog standard setup, so much easier.

[moeb]

starting a-new, well kind of .....

Hi
Thanks for the advice. Maybe I was expecting too much support from Actinic regarding my particular situation.
A question, just one!, is it easy to export just the catalog of items and then install them into a new design? I presume that if I start a new design, index, contact page etc I will learn how it all works but if I can then import all the previous items in to the catalog it will save me a bit of time.

moeb

[NormanRouxel]

You should be able to do this. Use File / Export to produce a Hierarchical File containing all Sections / Products / Brochure pages. You can then import this into a new site (make sure all images are in the same place relative to the new site) via File / Import.

[moeb]

Thank you Norman,

Now once I know that I can backup the catalogue I need to know who to to create a new 'home page'/'contact us' pages etc. I can leave the existing, if slightly, dislocated site online untill I create and test a new set of pages.
Is there somewhere in the Actinic program that will allow me to begin again (removing all traces or original site) without having to register a 'new site' with them?

kind regards

moeb

[NormanRouxel]

I assume you have only a single license so cannot create aa additional clean site.

Uninstall Actinic / Delete Site1 folder (save all important images though) / Reinstall Actinic.

Or install Actinic onto a spare PC, replace Site1 on duff system with Site1 from fresh, again saving all important images.

Spare machine is a good route as it would let you import that exported sites contents to be sure it works.

[moeb]

thought that may be the case, will start up a spare pc, (after a visit to asda for a cheap keyboard) and go for the un-install/re-install route, at lease I will have my backups safe (mental note, DO IT NOW!) and see how I go !

cheers

[chris ashdown]

Jan at mole-end has a free backup program that you can set to make automatic backups at what ever time interval you need, as you are new to actinic I strongly reccomend you use this bit of software as a safeguard

[moeb]

hide view cart/checkout

Hi
I know this is not technically a new thread but I'm still getting the hang of this forum, indeed any forum..... I need to be able to hide or remove all references to ordering online, i.e. the view cart and checkout buttons as well as the 'add to cart' and all related. We did not sell much online so we just need a site that advertises the products and services we offer. Is this possible?
I have looked for these answers but as yet I have not found any answers, maybe due to the fact that Actinic is all about selling online whereas we don't want too!!

Please help !

[PeterW]

Hello Moeb,

Yes it is possible. I have done the same at http://www.fenfarmsupplies.co.uk

I did it by using the design tab (V10) and finding the various parts that I did not want and putting them in <!-- --> tabs to stop them from showing without deleting them in case I need them at a later date.

It seems to work although some of it was trial and error with my limited know how.

Peter

[Jan]

You can remove the add to cart button from products by unticking the 'Can be ordered online' button in the product details, it's on the general tab.

If you have to many product to do this you can edit the product layout and comment out the add to cart button the way the previous poster mentioned.

Regards,

[chris ashdown]

I would be interested in your reasons for not selling online with it's massive potential for sales, if you are already selling in a retail environment like it sounds then dispatch would be the only addition to what you now do.