Lightbox stopped working - Any help please?

[i4detail]

our website http://www.staircasekits.co.uk has been running for a couple of years now, using Actinic v9. However in the past week or two, there have been several problems with it relating to the server settings resulting in it stopping working for a couple of days. These were eventually resolved, but I am left feeling very uncomfortable as I did not make any changes to the server settings but somehow they changed...
Anyway, we now have a problem with lightbox, which has stopped working. This has been running on the site for at least a year or so without any problems.
I can't see where the fault is and would ask the forum for their help with this. I have been through the forum and see various posts relating to lightbox but nothing which helps us.
The page where this is clearest is http://www.staircasekits.co.uk/acatalog/Gallery.html but lightbox is threaded throughout the site so this is causing us more problems again.
Any help please?
Thanks
Sally

[NormanRouxel]

Looks like you've hard-coded a lot of stuff. I see references to non-existent files in css and js sub-folders of actalog which you must have manually created but no longer exist.

Also duplicated attempts to load the same files:

<script type="text/javascript" src="js/prototype.js"></script>
<script type="text/javascript" src="js/scriptaculous.js?load=effects"></script>
<script type="text/javascript" src="js/lightbox.js"></script>
<link rel="stylesheet" href="css/lightbox.css" type="text/css" media="screen"/>
<script language="javascript" type="text/javascript" src="actiniccore.js"></script>
<script language="javascript" type="text/javascript" src="actinicextras.js"></script>
<script type="text/javascript" src="prototype.js"></script>
<script type="text/javascript" src="scriptaculous.js?load=effects"></script>
<script type="text/javascript" src="lightbox.js"></script>

You can probably delete the first 3 lines and remove the css/ from the 4th.

Then make sure all files are in your Site folder and Actinic will upload them for you.

You may also need to manually upload the effects.js file as this will not be detected and uploaded by Actinic.

[peblaco]

Your links are incorrectly formed: <a href="variousgroup1B.jpg" rel="lightbox<Actinic:Variable Name = 'variousgroup'/>"title="Fusion/Vogue Riserbars"> Also your page seems to have 4 document types.

[i4detail]

Thank you for your quick replies, guys. I'll take a look at this. Does any of this explain why it's been working fine for over a year at least, and now suddenly doesn't work?
Sally

[i4detail]

Thanks, Peblaco. I'm rather unsure about this info as I don't know as much about actinic as I should. The code in the lightbox link is written:
<a href="variousgroup1B.jpg" rel="lightbox[variousgroup]"title="Fusion/Vogue Riserbars"><img src="variousgroup1.jpg" border="0"></a>

Do the square brackets automatically translate into an actinic variable? If so, how did this code ever work? Sorry, but I am a bit confused!

[NormanRouxel]

Try rel="lightbox[ variousgroup ]"

The spaces will stop Actinic from messing with your code. Whether Lightbox will be happy you'll have to try and see.

[i4detail]

Just tried that but no luck. I don't understand why lightbox has always worked in the past and now doesn't? Has there been some sort of upgrade or change in Actinic that has done this? Not pointing the finger (I'm the last person who should do that!) but I am completely stumped.

[i4detail]

Thanks, Peblaco. I've seen the 4 document types. How do I know which one is the correct one? Is it safe to delete the others, then?

[NormanRouxel]

Just tried that but no luck

If you're referring to rel="lightbox[ variousgroup ]" then I see no sign of you doing that on the live site. It will be worth uploading so we can see what's now wrong. It's quite possible that you have several issues and they may all need fixing before things start working.

[i4detail]

Ha! I've just made changes to that page to display the images normally. I haven't changed any of the other pages, so if you'd like to look at
http://www.staircasekits.co.uk/acata...r_Gallery.html
this shows the current problem.
I've also upgraded Lightbox to v2.03a but this has made no difference.
I think you may be right about several issues, unfortunately, but I don't know why they would suddenly arise. I just hope that I haven't compounded any issues with the work I've done today!
Thank you for your continued help.

[i4detail]

Norman,
I've been ploughing through the forum to see if there is any other information and found the following thread:
http://community.sellerdeck.com/showthread.php?t=39561
This person was having a similar problem but I was concerned to see one of the posts saying:
"This could be a bug in Actinic, it has correctly added the path to the first and last file but not the one with the extra command. There are other problems with actinic V9 and how it modifies file names so this might be worth reporting."
Does this explain what seems to have been happening to my site (as this is just the latest issues I've had) or am I just grasping at straws?
Thanks
Sally

[NormanRouxel]

The prototype / scriptaculous / effects / lightbox stack is very difficult to get working in Actinic. I use Slimbox2 - http://www.digitalia.be/software/slimbox2 - in my lightbox add-on. It's jQuery based and much more modern than the 6 year old one you are using.

It's not hard to switch to it. Just remove all the stuff in the HEAD area that loads the existing lightbox and replace with the slimbox2 files. I.e. Remove the lines:

<script type="text/javascript" src="prototype.js"></script>
<script type="text/javascript" src="js/scriptaculous.js?load=effects"></script>
<script type="text/javascript" src="lightbox.js"></script>
<link rel="stylesheet" href="lightbox.css" type="text/css" media="screen"/>

<script type="text/javascript" src="prototype.js"></script>
<script type="text/javascript" src="scriptaculous.js?load=effects"></script>
<script type="text/javascript" src="lightbox.js"></script>

Then look for the line that loads jQuery (I've no idea why you're loading it but it's already there!):

<script type='text/javascript' src='http://ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/jquery/1.4/jquery.min.js'></script>

And after it add:

<script type="text/javascript" src="slimbox2.js"></script>
<link rel="stylesheet" href="slimbox2.css" type="text/css" media="screen" />

And make sure files slimbox2.js and slimbox2.css are in your Site folder.
Edit file slimbox2.css and make add quotes around all files in URL tags. E.g:

url(loading.gif)

Becomes:

url('loading.gif')

Finally make sure all these image files are in your Site folder.

Also, I don't think you've done my recommended adding spaces to rel="lightbox[ variousgroup ]" .

And you didn't do my recommendation to delete repeated lines.

[i4detail]

Norman
I did delete the repeated lines and refreshed the site - but they are back in again, which is nothing to do with me!
I also added the spaces inside the square brackets and tested but, as it didn't work, I just put the lines back in again to keep all the lightbox coding uniform, to make it easier for any changes that are made in the future.

I appreciated your suggestions and followed them - but this just demonstrates the problems I'm having at the moment as Actinic which changes and adds lines of codes.

Thank you for your advice on slimbox which I will tackle next.
Sally

[i4detail]

Just to demonstrate this is how the code looks on my actinic layout code and this is what I uploaded:

<link href="actinic.css" rel="stylesheet" type="text/css">
<script type="text/javascript" src="js/prototype.js"></script>
<script type="text/javascript" src="js/scriptaculous.js?load=effects"></script>
<script type="text/javascript" src="js/lightbox.js"></script>
<link rel="stylesheet" href="lightbox.css" type="text/css" media="screen"/>

But this is how it looks when I view the source on the live website:

<link href="actinic.css" rel="stylesheet" type="text/css">
<script type="text/javascript" src="js/prototype.js"></script>
<script type="text/javascript" src="js/scriptaculous.js?load=effects"></script>
<script type="text/javascript" src="js/lightbox.js"></script>
<link rel="stylesheet" href="css/lightbox.css" type="text/css" media="screen"/>
<script language="javascript" type="text/javascript" src="actiniccore.js"></script>
<script language="javascript" type="text/javascript" src="actinicextras.js"></script>
<script type="text/javascript" src="prototype.js"></script>
<script type="text/javascript" src="scriptaculous.js?load=effects"></script>
<script type="text/javascript" src="lightbox.js">

This is why I am confused. Can you explain this to me?
Thanks
Sally

[NormanRouxel]

Actinic doesn't sneak in when you're not looking and change things back!

Are you sure you're editing the correct Overall Layout? All editing should be done within the Actinic program. You shouldn't be editing any files on your server.

In your first snippet of code above, you've not posted what comes before or after. Without seeing that (several lines above and below will be useful) it's hard to say what's going on. Possibly there are extra lines with Standard JavaScript Header Functions.

Also, some Actinic Themes use a different Overall Layout for the Brochure pages than for the rest of the site. In that case you'd need to make changes in both layouts.

It will help from now on if you tell us the name of the layouts you are working on so we know where you're changing things.