Big problem with sections....

[Matt Giles]

Recently I lost a section somehow and upon re-adding this section I went to preview offline only to find the section not coming up at all - thus the section isnt coming up when viewing the website online. However, if I preview offline the entire catalogue the section is present - BUT all sections are old, outdated sections. Please help me, my head is tied in knots and every resolution I come to has the possibility of me deleting the whole catalogue which is a big no-no.

[leehack]

Try a web|refresh see if that solves it for you.

[fergusw]

Hi Matthew,
Do you have a URL of the site so we can see it?

Is the section page missing (i.e. the html file) from the server or are you referring to the section link in your navigation or sitemap?

When previewing offline Actinic generates the preview HTML files in the PreviewHTML folder in your site1 folder. You can check if it is created there. Conversely if it is a link that is not being created then check the "update status" time of the HTML files in the PreviewHTML folder or the SiteHTML folder to see if they are actually getting created and updated.

Another good option is to Compact your Actinic database "Housekeeping | Compact Database" and try again to see if this resolves it.

[Matt Giles]

I've just attempted the web refresh and at present it it still doing this - will let you know how it pans out.

[acompton]

Try doing a search (on the website) for a product that you know is in a missing section. Chances are, you have dragged and dropped it into another section (I lost a section like this; recreated it, then found the original months later)

[Luddite]

I had a problem that was not dissimilar to yours. Check out this post - In particular post 7.
It might be a blind alley, or even irrelevant to your problem, but worth checking.

Nick

[Matt Giles]

UPDATE - Web refresh has not helped but I've only just started working for this company full-time and no-one knew anything about the web refresh thing so it clearly has never been done before.
In a nutshell this is what is still happening -
If I offline preview any section it takes me to the correct version of the website and everything is hunky-dory - with the exception of the re-added section which takes me to the website but doesnt bring the section up offline. My original thought was we must have accidently lost that in another folder but if I use FIND it doesnt recognise any of the items that are in that section which it should do even if the section has "wandered off". Also a lot of products are duplicated in other sections (a necessity of the business) and if I search online at the website for something I know to be in the missing section it will only come up in any other section it may be in. SO MUCH FOR THE "in a nutshell" REMARK!
Finally, the main point is if I preview at the top of the list (tree), i.e the online catalogue, this opens an old version of the catalogue probably circa 2004.
This is clearly to do with the htmlpreview folder but what? inside this folder are five htmlpreview folders - 3 are marked version5 which is odd, 1 is a copy, 1 is empty and prior to the web refresh the only one marked v7 contained all the sections of the catalogue but that they were added in 2004.
Now they all appear identical with sections added in 2007 - however if I go to any of these folders and click on the missing section that is causing all the bother none of them open up the section that I added but instead show old sections from 2004ish.
Needless to say I am very confused...

[fergusw]

Needless to say I am very confused...

You're not the only one.

This is clearly to do with the htmlpreview folder but what? inside this folder are five htmlpreview folders

This does not sound correct for a start.

A standard, single Actinic website LOCAL folder architecture should have everthing within a "site1" folder.
Inside this folder there are usually only 5 sub-folders (unless sub folders have been manually made e.g. to hold images etc)

These folders are:

Common [contains some sample import and export file data for Actinic]
CommonOCC [contains site specific HTML templates and scripts for online credit card processing e.g. Via worldpay/PROTX etc]
PreviewHTML [contains the html and image files required to preview the pages within Actinic for an OFFLINE preview (note: no subfolders)]
ShipControl [contains database and HTML templates for control of shipping charges in Actinic]
SiteHTML [contains all fully generated HTML files prior to Actinic FTP'ing (uploading) them to the server]


With 5 sub-PreviewHTML folders in your site there is something strange going on. Possible some legacy folders misleadingly created for archive purposes.

Without seeing the local site folder structure, the live URL of the current site or even screenshots it is very difficult to exactly identify the cause, however I would possibly suggest backing up everything you have, including making a current new snapshot, then uninstalling and reinstalling Actinic and importing the snapshot in again to see if that rectifies the issue.

There are several other posts on this forum that give good guidelines on the data to save before undertaking an uninstall/reinstall of the Actinic program.

Sorry I can't be of more help.

[Matt Giles]

Thanks everyone for your help and ideas but the immediate problem concerning the missing section and why its replacement wouldnt preview offline has been resolved. The images in this section hadnt been resized enough and with too much data to deal with the page just wouldnt open. Resizing all images has made the page work - I think Doh is the correct expression here.
I had accidently lumped two issues in to one - all the issues with the missing section etc. have been resolved.
Although not an immediate issue I'd be interested to know what to do about the other issue - i.e clicking on entire catalogue in actinic opening up old versions of the catalogue offline, this isnt a major concern coz we never need to do this. I've since learned that all our pics are stored in folders on the desktop and not in actinic as we were advised when it was installed. We were originally on v5 and this shows in the site 1 folder. Since web refreshing yesterday all the data in these folders is shown as having been added in 2007 yet double clicking on any brings up the webpage offline and the old version of the catalogue.

Thanks again for all your help everyone.