Getting Started

To scan your site:

1.	Choose one of the following methods to start a Linkbot scan:

•	Enter the URL into the URL Field as you would in your web browser.

•	Select New Project from the File menu and enter the URL.

•	Select a local file by selecting the Browse button on the toolbar.

2.	Press the Enter key.

Results

After you hit the Enter key, Linkbot will begin scanning your Web site. You will notice that Linkbot is working by the Linkbot chain rotating in the top right corner.  Linkbot will branch out at all the links that are connected to the initial starting document (Base Address). This can take a few seconds to many minutes depending on the size of your site and other variables such as the speed of your internet connection. By default, Linkbot will scan your entire site.

You can modify Linkbot’s options to customize your scan, see Options Overview for more information. If you have forms on your site, Linkbot will ask you for more information as described in Scanning Forms.

The scan continues until:

•	The Stop button  is pressed.

•	All links have been checked.

•	The search depth has been met as specified in the Scan Option tab.

•	The links limit has been met as specified in the Scan Option tab.

Reports

When the scan is complete, Linkbot prompts you to publish a site report. Select Yes, and you will automatically see the site report in an newly invoked web browser. The results of the scan are also presented in the Linkbot interface; in the Left and Right panes. For more information see Reports Overview.

Stopping and Continuing a Scan

To stop the search at any time, select the stop button in the toolbar.  To re-start the scan from the stop point, select Continue Checking from the Tools menu.


Purchasing and Registering Linkbot

Fill out the on-line registration form to qualify for free upgrades and notifications.

To Register after Installing Linkbot

When you first start up Linkbot, you will be asked to fill out a registration form.  Fill this out and it will automatically be sent to Watchfire.

Note:  If you are not able to send the form in the first two attempts, print it out and fax it to (613) 599-3826 or register at http://www.watchfire.com/register.

Purchasing Linkbot

Once your 15-day trial has expired, you must purchase Linkbot to continue using it.  Linkbot can be purchased directly from Watchfire or through an authorized reseller. For the latest pricing and payment information:

•	Call: 1-888-245-5550 or 1-613-599-3888

•	Go to the Web site at http://www.watchfire.com/store

After you purchase Linkbot, a code will be sent to you that will activate the software.


Ordering Linkbot

To order Linkbot, please go to http://www.watchfire.com/store or call 1-888-245-5550 (toll free in North America) or 1-613-599-3888.


Linkbot Support

Linkbot support is available free to registered and unregistered users. Before reporting a problem, please check the on-line support site for Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) at:

http://www.watchfire.com/support/.

If the answer to your problem is not listed in the FAQs, contact Watchfire as shown below.

Option 1 - Online Support

Fill out the support request form at the support Web site shown above and send your question through the internet.

Option 2 - Telephone or Email

Call technical support at 613-599-3888 or email support@www.watchfire.com.

Please ensure to include the following information:

•	Company or personal name.

•	Telephone or email addresses where you can be reached.

•	Detailed problem description and any error messages.

•	Instructions on how we can reproduce the problem.

•	Version number and system information. To get this data while running Linkbot, select System information from the Help menu. Copy this data into your email message.

•	Your PC profile (CPU, OS, RAM, etc).

•	Your internet connection (direct, dial-up, proxy, etc).

•	What URL you were checking.

•	If possible, a copy of the BOT file and reports that were generated by Linkbot.


What's New in Linkbot

To find out what’s new in Linkbot, please go to:

 http://www.watchfire.com/support/link-history.


System Requirements

Linkbot Client

Linkbot Pro has been tested to work with the following minimum requirements:

•	IBM PC or compatible with Pentium class processor.

•	PC Running Windows 95b, Windows 98, or Windows NT 4.0 or greater (Service Pack 5 or greater is needed for NT 4.0).

•	32 MB RAM (64 MB recommended).

•	15 MB free Hard Disk space to install the program.

•	Ιnternet Explorer 4.01 with Service Pack 3 or greater (optional).

Note:  Internet Explorer does not need to be your browser of choice, however, it is needed when using the Browse tab in the Right Pane.

Web Server

Linkbot can scan any web server and is not platform dependant in its scans.


Linkbot Overview

Linkbot is a complete website testing solution that automatically scans for more than fifty potential problems.  Linkbot generates graphical and text reports detailing what errors need to be fixed.  Linkbot has all the tools to ensure the accessibility, functionality and usability of your website.

For complete details on Linkbot’s Features and Benefits, please go to:

 http://www.watchfire.com/products/linkbot.htm


Types of Links Checked

Linkbot will check links to all file, HTTP, HTTPs and FTP resources and can also check links to password protected pages. Linkbot supports all standard HTML 4.0 and can be configured to check web-based forms and JavaScript links.

For more information refer to Linkbot’s website at:

 http://www.watchfire.com/products/linkbot.htm

Note:  Linkbot checks the syntax of mailto references but does not determine if the mail address is valid.


Types of Link Statistics

Linkbot gathers up to eight individual statistics for each URL.  Each of these statistics is shown as a new column in the Children and Parent tabs.  Please note that not all these statistics will be available for every URL.  This is because some statistics don't apply to specific kinds of links and some Web servers do not supply them.  If a statistic is unavailable, it will appear empty in the report.

Explanation of Link Statistics

•	Link URL: The URL of the link being verified.  Each type of URL will be identified with a different icon.

•	Link Status: Indicates whether the link is broken and what the error message returned by the server was.  'OK' means the link works.  'Error' means the link is broken. Warnings can be generated for a variety of reasons such as the URL has been moved (302 code) or unsafe characters have been found in the URL.

•	Hits: This column shows how many hits the page has received.  This data is derived from your Server Log and must be configured as described in Log Analysis Option .

•	Type: The link type (HTTP, FILE, Mailto, News, FTP etc.)

•	Description: The descriptive text associated with a URL.  In Web pages, this text appears underlined.

•	Document Title: The document title of the link in question.

Note: Linkbot will not gather document titles for external links.

•	Last modified: The date the document was last modified.  Not all HTML authors include this information.

•	Author: The name of the author that created the HTML document.

•	Link Size: The size measured in bytes of the HTML document or image.


Using Metatags to Identify Authors

It is recommended to use embedded Metatags within your files to identify the Author of the page.  This way, Linkbot can create a report that groups the problems on your site according to author. To specify a page's author enter the following hidden Metatags within the head area of the HTML page:

<HEAD>

<META NAME="Author" content="John Smith">

</HEAD>

To view the errors grouped by author when using Metatags:

1.	Create an HTML site report. See Creating a Site Report.

2.	Select the Broken Links report from the Left Pane drop down menu.

3.	See the Author column in the Right Pane.

Note:  For a Tool to automatically generate and embed Metatags, use Watchfire’s Metabot.  For more information, go to http://www.watchfire.com/products

Scanning SubDirectories

If each author on your site is responsible for a directory on the Web server, you can have Linkbot analyze this directory and all its subdirectories. The report Linkbot creates from this scan will only reflect the individual author's problems, not the entire Web site's.

To scan a subdirectory:

1.	Choose New Project Options from the Tools menu.

2.	In the Scan tab, check the box labeled only check the starting directory and subdirs.

3.	Start the scan by entering the URL of the author's subdirectory, for example http://www.watchfire.com/bob/

If there are many authors on the site, you may wish to automate the generation of these reports using the Linkbot scheduler.  This will enable you to configure the scan for each author once, then repeat the generation of the customized reports each time Linkbot is started.


Password Protected Pages

Linkbot can access password-protected pages. However, each page or directory on the site must use the same user ID  and password.

To specify the default user ID and password:

1.	From the Tools menu, choose New Project Options.

2.	Select the Connections tab.

3.	Check the box labeled Use the following user name and password for authenticated pages.

4.	Enter your user name and password in the spaces provided.


Checking Links One Page at a Time

By default, Linkbot will scan all Links on your website that are connected to the starting URL.

If you need to check the links one page at a time:

1.	From the Tools menu, select New Project Options.

2.	Select the Scan tab.

3.	Select Check current domain to a depth of 1

4.	Select OK.

5.	Start Linkbot running by entering the URL and Enter.


Errors and Warnings

For each URL on your site, Linkbot will assign one of four status levels:

•	OK: the URL is working.

•	Warning: the URL has been temporarily or permanently redirected or contains a syntax error.

•	Error: The URL is broken.

•	Unknown: Linkbot does not support this URL's protocol or the scan was stopped prematurely and Linkbot could not test the link.

Note: To see the definitions of numeric status codes to HTTP requests, please go to: http://www.w3.org/protocols/http/htresp.html

Errors

Error messages can be generated in Linkbot for the following reasons:

Not found: The file referenced by the URL can't be found on the server. It has either been deleted or moved.

Can't Connect: The base address of the URL is incorrect or the server is no longer functioning.

Time-out: The server failed to respond to Linkbot's request within the time limit specified in the search options.

Unauthorized:  The page requires a user name and password. For a possible resolution, see Password Protected Pages.

 Tip:  If Linkbot produces "can't connect" or "timeout" errors for links that you know are working, try reducing the number of connections in the Connections Options window. It may be possible that your server is not able to handle the load.

Warnings

Warnings can be generated for the following reasons:

•	Linkbot cannot check this type of URL because it is unsupported or it was disabled in the Scan Option

•	The link has been re-directed to a new location but is still functioning.

•	The link is a mailto URL and Linkbot only checks if the syntax is OK.  Linkbot cannot determine whether the email address is valid or not.


Re-Checking Some or All URLs

After you repaired the bad links or other problems found on your site, you can re-check the entire site or narrow down the scan to specific links.

To re-check the entire site:

Select Tools > Check Entire Site.

To re-check specific Links:

1.	Select the All Links icon from the drop down menu in the Left Pane

2.	Select the Children tab in the Right Pane.

3.	Select one or more Filters from the toolbar (e.g. External Links filter).

4.	If required, select specific files using the Shift and Ctrl Key as you would in Explorer.

5.	Select Tools > Re-Check > All Links in Current List or Selected Links.

 Note:  You can also right click in the Right Pane and select Re-Check Selected Links.


New Project

To create a new project and start a scan, enter an URL in the Starting URL field and press OK. To check a site stored on your local hard disk, use the Browse button to enter the path.


Increasing Performance

Linkbot's performance is controlled by five factors:

1.	Speed and memory for your PC.

2.	Speed of your Internet connection.

3.	Response time of your Web server.

4.	The number of parallel connections setting.

5.	The time out setting.

Speed and memory for your PC

A Pentium PC with 32MB of RAM as the minimum system configuration. More RAM may be required if you are checking sites with greater than 5000 URLs.  64 MB of RAM should be sufficient for checking sites with up to 20,000 URLs.

Speed of your Internet Connection

The minimum recommended connection speed is a 28.8 Kbs modem.

Response time of your Web server

In many cases Linkbot's speed will be controlled by the response time of the server. Try running at off peak hours if you feel performance is lacking.

The number of parallel connections setting

In the Connections tab of the Options window you will find a setting for number of simultaneous connections.  Here you can specify how many URLs Linkbot should check at the same time. The default value is 10. You may set this number between 1 and 30.  Setting this value higher will make the run progress faster but it will also consume more of your PC's resources and also increase the stress on your Web server.

With a dial-up connection it is unlikely that Linkbot will degrade your Web server's performance significantly. However, with a direct Internet connection, a high performance PC and slow Web server, your users may experience some decrease in response time from the Web server while Linkbot is running.

The time out setting

By default, Linkbot will time out after 60 seconds of waiting for the server to respond.  You may change the default time-out to any value, however, setting this value lower will speed up your run times.


Validator Overview

After the scan, you can use the Validator tool to ensure proper HTML syntax is used in your HTML files.  You can validate each file individually or by selecting multiple HTML files (batch validation).

To validate the  files individually:

1.	Select the HTML file in the Right Pane or in the Left Pane.

2.	Click the right mouse button and select Validate HTML or select Tools > Validate HTML.

The Batch Validation window will open showing the results. In the Batch Validation window, double click on the line number to have the source open in the Right Pane where you can edit the syntax.

To validate several files (batch validation):

1.	Select the HTML files in the right pane by using shift-click (for files listed one after another) or ctrl-click (for files separated by others).

2.	Click the right mouse button and select Validate HTML or select Tools > Validate HTML. The HTML Validator “Batch Validation” window will now open showing the results.

3.	In the Batch Validation window, double click on the line number to have the source open in the Linkbot Right Pane where you can correct the bad syntax.  Also, click the Next button to see the HTML validation results for each file selected in the Right Pane.

 Tip: You will not be able to validate unless the selected files are good links and are HTML files. To see all good HTML files listed in the Right Pane, select All Files in the Left Pane and press Show Good Links [image] and Show HTML Links [image]  in the Filters toolbar.

To set the Validator Options:

1.	Select Validator Options from the Tools menu

2.	Select Program Options and/or HTML configuration.

3.	Set the relevant options. Use the Help button for more information on each tab.


Customizing Toolbars

You can arrange the toolbars and icons to have your own look and feel. You can click on the outer edge of the toolbar block and drag it to a new location. You can also create your own toolbars containing the filters you use most frequently.

Note: These customizations will be saved in the registry and will appear when you use Linkbot in the future.

To create a new toolbar:

1.	Select Toolbars from the View menu.

2.	Select New.

3.	Enter a name for the toolbar in the New Toolbar window.

4.	Click OK.  The new toolbar will now be listed in the Toolbar list and will appear on the screen (with no icons).

5.	To add icons to the toolbar, select the Commands tab in the Customize window.

6.	Select a category in the Categories list.

7.	Drag the desired buttons to the new toolbar.

To customize a  toolbar.

1.	Select Toolbars from the View menu.

2.	Select Customize.

3.	Select the Commands tab in the Customize window.

4.	Select a Category.

5.	Click on the icon and drag it to its new location.

Removing Icons from Toolbars

To remove the Tool icon from a toolbar, drag and drop it anywhere on the screen.  You must do this while in the Toolbars Customize window with the Commands tab selected.  Also remember to delete the Tool name from the Toolbars list by selecting it and clicking delete.


Toolbar Filters and the Right Pane

Linkbot's filters allow you to work with specific subsections of a Website's objects. By selecting different combinations of filters in the toolbar, you can see thousands of different kinds of results in the Linkbot interface.

Filters allow you to:

•	Find problems with ease by displaying specific information.

•	Select a subset of URLs to re-check, print, export to HTML or text file.

•	Limit the number and type of URLs shown in the Children and Parent lists.

Note: Filters only affect the Parents and Children tabs (in the right pane).

 Tip:  If you are not seeing what you expect in the Right Pane, ensure you have not forgotten about or inadvertently pressed a filter button.  When a filter button is activated, it will become a lighter shade of gray.

Filter Types

Each of the filters can be used one by one or in several combinations.  The filters are divided into blocks according to its type:

•	Status Filters: Filter list by the status of the link (OK, bad, warning, unknown, checking or not checked).

•	Mime Filters: Mime types refer to the file type of the URL (HTML, image, PDF etc.).

•	Scheme filters: Scheme types refer to the internet protocol used to retrieve the URL (http, ftp, file, etc).

•	Location filters: Specifies either internal or external URLs.

•	Advanced filters: Allow you to filter password protected links, applet links, javascript links and other URL types.

You can customize the filters and other toolbar buttons by selecting Toolbars from the View menu.  For more information, see Customizing Toolbars.

Filter Descriptions

To see all available filters and their descriptions:

1.	Select Toolbars from the View menu.

2.	Select Customize.

3.	Select the Commands tab in the Customize window.

4.	Select a Category.

5.	Click on the icon to see its description in the Description window.

 Tip:  Full descriptions are also available in the Linkbot User  Manual (see Linkbot User Manual).

Filter Logic

If a combination of filters are used within its group, then OR logic is being used.  If a combination of filters are used between different groups, then AND logic is being used.  For the advanced filters AND logic is used with the exception of Anchors and Authors where AND and OR are used.


Upgrades and Downloading the Latest Version

The latest version and minor upgrades of Linkbot can be downloaded from Watchfire's Web site at: http://www.watchfire.com/download

Upgrades

To use an updated version of Linkbot you must purchase an upgrade.  Your upgrade will include one year of free updates. For more information:

•	Call: Toll Free 1-888-245-5550 or 1-613-599-3888

•	See the Web site at: http://www.watchfire.com/download

Upgrade Notification List

To receive instant notification of major upgrades, send an email to upgrades@www.watchfire.com with the subject: Add to List.

Note:To be removed from the Mailing List, have the subject read: Remove from List.


Overview of Linkbot's Interface

The Linkbot interface has six components:

•	File Menu.

•	Toolbar (includes filters, see Toolbar Filters and the Right Pane).

•	URL Field (see Starting, Stopping and Continuing  Scans).

•	Status Bar.

•	Left Pane .

•	Right Pane .


Contacting Watchfire

Watchfire's Email Addresses

Support or feature suggestions: support@www.watchfire.com

Sales: sales@www.watchfire.com

Marketing and business: marketing@www.watchfire.com

Mailing list for future upgrades and releases: upgrades@www.watchfire.com

General Information:  info@www.watchfire.com

Watchfire's Telephone and Fax

 Phone: 1-613-599-3888, Sales Toll Free 1-888-245-5550

 Fax: 1-613-599-3826

Watchfire's Website

 Main Page: http://www.watchfire.com

 Linkbot Information: http://www.watchfire.com/products/linkbot.htm

 Linkbot Support: http://www.watchfire.com/support

 Purchasing Instructions: http://www.watchfire.com/store


Over Write Warning

Linkbot warns you when you are about to over write the current report.  Each time you enter a new starting URL and hit the Enter key, a new report will be produced.  The only exception is when you re-run a previously created report, which will overwrite the old report.  If you want to keep the existing report, close it and then start the new scan.  When this new scan is completed, save the file with a new name.


Upgrading from Standard to Pro

To upgrade to Linkbot, please go to: http://www.watchfire.com/download


Upgrading from Express to Pro

To upgrade to Linkbot, please go to: http://www.watchfire.com/download


Command Line Interface

Linkbot allows you to use command line parameters to do the following:

•	Start a new project.

•	A bot file can be run from the command line by using the parameters –r botfile.bot.

The command line parameters allow you to customize the options (ini) file that is used when starting the program or when starting a run. These parameters can also be used to start Linkbot with a specific URL. A command line parameter can be entered from the Windows run dialog box or from Linkbot’s Address field (where URLs are entered).  You must first set up your site-specific options and save them before you can call up an options .ini file in the following procedures.

To start Linkbot using a specific URL:

Type Linkbot.exe http://www.yoursite.com into the Windows run dialog box.

To start a Linkbot run using a specific ini file:

Type http://www.yoursite.com -i option_file.ini into Linkbot’s Address field.

To associate a specific options file with a scheduled run:

Go to the Tools menu and choose Schedule Runs. The Schedule Runs dialog box appears.

Type your address followed by the option ini file in the Starting URL field. For example, ‘http://www.yoursitename.com  –i option_file.ini’, where your sitename is the address of your site, and option_file is the name of your options file.


Linkbot User's Manual

The Linkbot User's Manual can be found in the Linkbot application folder (Linkbot.PDF) and can be opened through the Windows Start menu > Linkbot Pro > User’s Manual.  You can also download a copy from: http://www.watchfire.com/download

Note: The Linkbot manual is stored in Adobe PDF format. You must have an Adobe Acrobat reader to view and print this document. If you don't have Adobe Acrobat reader, download it free from: http://www.adobe.com.

Other Sources of Linkbot Information

On-line help: This on-line help system contains extensive information about Linkbot's functions and features.  You can access specific information about each dialog window by pressing the help button.

On-line Tutorial: The Linkbot tutorial (in HTML format) is included with this software. The tutorial will walk you through Linkbot's major functions. Access the tutorial from the Help menu or from through the windows Start menu button under Linkbot.

Watchfire Website: The Website contains the latest pricing, support and feature lists for Linkbot. You can access the Website at http://www.watchfire.com/products/Linkbot.htm.


Status Bar

The status bar, located at the bottom of the interface, tells you what site is currently being checked and the progress of the scan.   The information changes as the scan progresses.  The status bar contains the following information:

•	Number of links found.

•	Number of links checked.

•	Number of bad links found.

•	Orphans found (if an Orphan Analysis  was performed).

•	Number of links checked per minute.

•	Time that Linkbot took to complete its scan of your site.

When a BOT file is opened, the statistics that were in the status bar at the time the scan was completed will be re-written in the status bar.


Starting, Stopping and Continuing Scans

To start scanning your site:

1.	Enter the URL into the URL Field in the toolbar just as you would in your web browser.   Or, select New Project from the File menu and enter the address. Or, select a local file by selecting the Browse button on the toolbar.

2.	Press the Enter key.

The scan continues until:

•	The stop button is pressed or Tools > Stop Checking is selected.

•	All links have been checked.

•	The search depth-stopping criterion has been met as specified in the Scan Option.

When the scan is complete, Linkbot prompts you to publish a site report. Select Yes, and you will automatically see the site report in an newly invoked web browser. The results of the scan are also presented in the Linkbot interface. For more information see Reports Overview.

To stop the search at any time:

Select the stop button in the toolbar or select Tools > Stop Checking.

If you press the stop button in the midst of a scan, the scan results will be incomplete.  To get the full results, you can restart the scan as described below.

To continue a scan from the stop point:

Select Continue Checking under the Tools menu.

This will re-establish the current status in the status bar and start checking the site from the point where the scan was stopped.  The results will be presented as normal and there will be no indication of the stoppage.


Scanning Forms

Linkbot can scan past Forms that require input data in order for the scan to continue.  For example, you would use this feature when a User ID and Password are required in a web-based form.  First you will need to enter the input data using Linkbot’s Forms Interface.   Optionally, this data can be saved so that when Linkbot encounters the form in subsequent scans the data will be entered automatically. For more information, see Forms Option.

To see the forms on your site and invoke the Forms Interface:

Select Pages with Forms from the drop down list in the Left Pane.

or

Select Yes when after the scan you are asked:  “Linkbot has found Forms on your website.  Would you like to fill out these forms and submit them now?”. Linkbot will automatically go to the Pages with Forms selection in the Left Pane’s drop down list  which invokes the Forms Interface.

Forms Interface

The forms interface is used to capture the input data and is divided into three panes:  Left Pane, Browser Pane, and Forms Pane.

Left Pane

The left pane shows the list of Forms on your website and the status of the URLs link as described below:

Icon	Status	Description
	No Data	The form has not received your input or the data was deleted.
	Data	The form has received your input.
	New	The form is new and was not present in the last scan. The form has not received your input.
Browser Pane and Forms Pane

The right side of the interface is split into two panes: The Browser Pane and the Forms Pane.

The Browser Pane (the bottom section) shows the form as it will appear in a web browser window. Ensure the form has completely downloaded into the browser before you enter and submit the input data.

Note: In the Forms Interface, HTML links are not active within the Browser Pane.

The Forms Pane (the top section) displays the input data that you enter in the Browser Pane and only after the forms submit (or equivalent) button has been pressed.  The Forms Pane has three columns as shown below:

Forms Pane Column	Description
Link URL	Shows where the form will be sent when submit is pressed.
Post Data	Shows the input data entered after submit is pressed. Note:  If the form is not using the “Post Data” method, this field will be blank and the input data will be attached as a string to the Link URL.
Save	Shows if the input data will be saved in the BOT file (Yes or No) so that the data can be used in future scans. Depending on your Form Option settings (see note), you can Right click on the line to save  or not save the forms input data.  Note:  You can set this to always be “No” through the Forms Option by selecting Don’t save form input data in BOT file.  This means you will not be able to toggle to Yes in the Save column.
Note: Different data can be entered as many times as required, however, identical lines cannot be submitted twice.

To delete a line of entries from the Forms Pane section:

Right-click on the line and select Delete Post Data.

or

Select the line and press the delete key.

Re-Scan

After you have entered the data into the forms, select Re-Check > All Links in Current List or Continue Checking from the Tools menu.  Linkbot will now verify the form’s links.

Note: If you are using ASP based pages, cookies may be used and you may need to select Tools > Check Entire Site rather than the above.

Saving Form Input Data

When the scan is complete, save the BOT file so that the form data is saved in the file (optional).  The data will be saved for future scans if you do not have Don’t Save Form input Data into BOT file selected in the options: Tools > New Project Options > Forms.

If for security reasons you do not want the form data saved in the BOT file, go to Tools > Option > Forms option and place a check mark in Don’t Save Form input Data into BOT file.  This will cause all Forms to have the “No” Save status and you will not be able to change it to “Yes” as described below.  For more information, see Forms Option .

If the latter is not chosen in the options, you can selectively save or not save the data for each form by right clicking on the input line in the Forms Pane. A check mark will appear (or will be removed) from the selection “Save Post Data”.  You will also notice that the Save column toggles between “Yes” and “No” depending on your selection.


Forms and Repair Option

If you have Forms on your website, specify if and how Linkbot will scan the forms when they are encountered.

Also for the Repair Tool, use this option to specify case sensitivity and if and how backup files will be stored.

Forms

Show dialog when new forms are found

Select this option if you want Linkbot to notify you when Forms are found in the scan.  If you select this option and forms are found, Linkbot will ask you if you want to enter and submit the form data.  If you select Yes, Linkbot will default to the Forms interface (Pages with Forms selected in the Left Pane).  If you do not select this option, Linkbot will not check forms for linkage problems. For more information see Scanning Forms.

Don’t save form input data in BOT file

Select this option if you do not want to save the form input data for Security reasons.  You can determine if this selection is enabled through the Save column in the Form Pane which will indicate ”No” for all forms. See Scanning Forms for more information.

Repair

Ignore case during repair

Select this to have the Search and Replace tool  disregard the case when doing a search in a file.  For example, http://www.Watchfire.com/Default.htm would be the same as http://www.watchfire.com/default.htm.

Note:  Do not select this if your web server is a UNIX or Lotus Domino server.

Create a backup file when repairing files

Select this to have backup files created when performing a Search and Replace to repair bad links.  If a mistake is made during repair, The backup files could then be used to overwrite the modified files.  A backup file will be created for every file including files that were not modified.

The backup file will have the same name as the original file except LB1 will be added to the suffix.  For example, the file Index.htm  will be backed up to Index.htm.LB1.  The number will be incremented by one for each backup created for that file (example: Index.htm.LB2 and so on).

Note: If required, you can over-ride the above setting in a current session as described in Search and Replace.

Backup Directory

Specify the directory to store the backup files. Each site scanned will have its own backup subdirectory.  The main subdirectory of a site is determined by the base URL of the site. For example, the files for c:\mysite would be backed up into backupdir\C\mysite and www.watchfire.com would backed up into backupdir\www.watchfire.com.  Individual files are backed up into specific subdirectories in this structure based on their path within the website.  For example, www.watchfire/support/index.htm would be backed up into a subdirectory into backupdir\www.watchfire.com\support

Note: If you do not specify a directory here and you selected Create a backup file when repairing files,  the backups will be stored in the Linkbot application folder.


Quality Index

The Website Quality Index in the HTML Report  shows how your web site rates (see Quality Rating in HTML Site Report Overview). The Quality Index allows you to  quickly compare your website against your peers, competitors and other industry groups.   The index calculates the total number of broken internal links, broken external links, slow pages, pages missing titles and broken anchors and averages it out per 1000 links.


Adding or Removing Filter buttons from Toolbars

If you use some filter types more frequently than others, you can add or remove a toolbar to or from the Linkbot interface.

To add or remove a toolbar from the GUI:

1.	Select Toolbars from the View menu.  The Toolbars Window will appear.

2.	In the Toolbars list, add or remove a check mark in the check box.  You will immediately see the toolbar appear or disappear from the GUI.

Toolbars Window

The buttons in the Toolbar window are described below:

Toolbars:  Lists all the toolbars available to show in the Interface.

Toolbar Name: Shows the name of the selected toolbar

Close: Closes the Toolbar window.

New:  Creates a new toolbar for you to add filter icons.  For more information, see Customizing Toolbars.

Customize:  Allows you to customize the toolbars to include or exclude filter icons. For more information, see Customizing Toolbars .

Reset:  Moves the toolbar icons back to their original configuration.

Help:  Invokes this help page.

Show Tooltips: Identifies the filter when the cursor is placed over the icon.

Cool Look: Removes borders between filters.

Large Buttons: Increases the size of all filter icons.


Search and Replace

Use Search and Replace to repair broken links in multiple files by modifying the parents of broken links.  The Search and Replace feature is invoked through the Repair Tool.

Window Selections

Find

Enter the bad URL in the field provided.

Note: This must be an absolute URL  path (example: http://www.oursite.com/products/index.html or file:///inetpub/wwwroot/mainsite/index.html).

Replace

Enter the correct URL in the field provided.

Make Backup Files

For the current session of Search and Replace, you can over-ride the settings in the Forms and Repair Option by enabling or disabling backup files.  The default setting will have this enabled or disabled depending on what you have chosen in the Forms and Repair Option.

Ignore Case

For the current session of Search and Replace, you can over-ride the settings in the Forms and Repair Option by enabling or disabling the Ignore Case setting.  The default setting will have this enabled or disabled depending on what you have chosen in the Forms and Repair Option.

OK

Select OK and The URL changes will be made to each file selected in the Repair Tool window. The number of files modified will be reported after the task is complete.


Scan Rules

Use the Scan Rules tab to ensure specific in-house requirements are met in all your HTML files. You can include the following types of requirements:

•	Presence of Link and Tag text

•	Presence of Text

•	Presence of Link

•	Presence of Frame

To see files that pass the Scan Rules, select Scan Rules in the Left Pane drop down menu. The Right Pane will default to the Children tab and show all files that meet your in-house requirements.

To add Scan Rules:

1.	From the Options window, select the Scan Rules tab.

2.	Select Add.  The Scan Rule window opens.

3.	From the drop down select Presence of Link and Tag text, Presence of Text, Presence of Link, or Presence of Frame.

4.	If you chose Presence of Link and Tag text, type in the  Link (example: http://www.watchfire.com/) and Tag Text (example: Copyright)  in the relevant fields. If you chose Presence of Text, type in the text in the field provided (example: Home Page). If you chose Presence of Link, type in the Link in the field provided (example: http://www.watchfire.com/). If you chose Presence of Frame, type in the Frame Link (or leave it blank to find any frame) in the field provided (example: http://www/watchfire.com/frames/fintro.htm).

5.	Choose Yes or No for Case Sensitive and Must Match.

6.	Press OK.  You will now see the Rule Name and Value listed in the Scan Rules window.

Note: For more information on the above selections, see Rules Configuration.

To edit a Scan Rule:

Perform the procedure above except in step 2, click on the Rule to be modified in the Scan Rule window and press Edit.

To Delete a Scan Rule:

1.	From the Options window, select the Scan Rules tab.

2.	Click on the Rule to be deleted in the Scan Rule window and press Delete

Scan Rules Usage

Below are examples of why you would use the Scan Rules feature.

•	Detect all pages that contain links referring to a specific server.

When porting your Web site to a new server, you will need to verify that there are not any links that refer to the old server.  Add a literal text scan rule for the hostname of the old server.  Subsequently,  these links are identified and  can be corrected.

•	Verify that every page contains a link to the Copyright page and that the displayed text for this link is always "Copyright".

Add a Presence of Link and Tag Text rule where the link is the copyright page and tag text is “Copyright”.


Log Analysis Wizard

Use the Log Analysis Wizard to quickly enter accurate server information to do a Log Analysis.  If you have not filled out the Log Analysis Tab,  select Tools > Log Analysis to invoke the Log Analysis Wizard.  The settings you establish here will automatically be written to the Log Analysis Tab in the current project options.  You can change these settings in the future by visiting the Log Analysis Tab.


Orphan Analysis Wizard

An orphan file is a file that takes up space on your web server but is not referenced, or used, by your Web site.  Use the Orphan Analysis Wizard to quickly enter accurate server information to do an Orphan Analysis.

 If you have not filled out the Server Information Tab, select Tools > Orphan Analysis to invoke the Orphan Analysis Wizard.  The settings you establish here will automatically be written to the Server Information Tab in the current project options.  You can change these settings in the future by visiting the Server Information Tab.

Once you perform the Orphan Analysis, you can remove the orphan files as described in Locating and Deleting Orphan Files .


Printing the Right Pane

You can print the contents of the Right Pane (with any tab selected) by selecting Print from the File Menu.

Tip: If you are printing the Site Map, select File > Print Setup and choose Landscape.


FTP Configuration

If you get the following warning: “Warn: FTP Server Root/Login directories differ (See Help)", your ftp server’s login directory is configured so that it is not at root level.  A filename specified in the URL must be relative to the login directory (not the system's root directory). Therefore, Linkbot will look for the file relative to login.

To fix this problem, you must configure your ftp server accordingly; the FTP daemon must acknowledge that relative to login is also relative to root.


Left Pane

The Left Pane selection effects the output in the Right Pane and includes a drop down menu where you can select one of 15 views:

•	Directory Tree: Shows the structure of the file system on your web server.

•	URL Tree: Shows the site structure in a collapsible tree diagram. This is useful in exploring your site, for example, selecting the All Links icon in the URL Tree will display all the site's URLs in the Right Pane when the Children tab is selected. You can then use the filters in the toolbar to view a subset of the site's objects.

•	Broken Links: Lists all the broken URLs on the site. By selecting a URL in this list and then clicking on the Parent Links tab, you will see all pages that reference the bad link.

•	Pages With Broken Links: Lists all pages that contain one or more bad links. By selecting a page and then clicking on the Children Links tab, you can see all the bad links within that URL.

•	New Pages: Lists pages that have been recently modified in a specified time interval.

•	Old Pages: Lists pages that have not been modified in a specified time interval.

•	Slow Pages: Lists pages that may be slow for visitors to download.

•	Orphaned Files: Lists unused files that are unnecessarily taking up space on the Web server.

•	Pages Missing titles: Lists pages missing a title tag.

•	Pages with Framesets: Lists pages with a frameset tag.

•	Pages Missing ALT tags: Lists pages that have image URLs missing ALT tags.

•	Pages Missing Height/Width tags: Lists pages that have image URLs missing Height and Width tags.

•	Pages With Log Errors: Lists pages with error entries in your access log.

•	Pages with Forms:  Lists pages that contain forms.  For more information, see Scanning Forms.

•	Site Map:  Creates a graphical site map of your site (see Site Map ).

•	Scan Rules: Shows the HTML pages that fail your in-house requirements for content (see Scan Rules).

•	All Links: Lists all URLs on your site.


Right Pane

The Right Pane has tabs that are used in conjunction with the Left Pane selection to get the desired report. The Right Pane will display the report by selecting one of the five following tabs:

•	Children Tab: Displays the URLs that link from the page selected in the Left Pane. When the Children Tab is selected the following columns appear: Status (see Types of Link Statistics), Description, Title, Author, File Size and Last Modified Date.  The URL Link list can be sorted by clicking on the heading of the column.

•	Parent’s Tab: Displays the URLs that reference the object selected in the Left Pane. . When the Parent Tab is selected the following columns appear: Status (see Types of Link Statistics), Description, Title, Author, File Size and Last Modified Date.

•	HTML Tab: Shows the HTML code of the file selected in the Left Pane.

•	Browse Tab: Displays the selected URL in Linkbot’s embedded Internet Explorer Browser.

Note:  When Pages with Forms is selected in the Left Pane, the Right Pane becomes divided into  two windows.  For more information on the Forms Interface, see Scanning Forms.

•	Properties Tab: This provides a single view summary of the statistics of the URL selected in the Left Pane. This includes: status, description, title, author, file size and last modified date.

 Tip: If you select All Links in the Left Pane and select the Properties Tab in the Right Pane, you will see a complete summary of the scan results.

•	Site Map Tab: Creates a graphical site map of your site (see Site Map).


Search and Replace Wizard

Use the Search and Replace Wizard to quickly enter accurate information to modify multiple files to correct bad links.  The settings you establish here will automatically be written to the Server Information Tab in the current project options.  You can change these settings in the future by visiting the Server Information Tab.

To fix broken links with the Search and Replace wizard:

1.	In the Left Pane, select Broken Links.

2.	Highlight a single URL.

3.	Right click and choose Repair or select Tools > Repair. The Repair window will now open and all Parent files of the page that contains the broken link will be listed.

 Tip: You can print the list of Parent files by pressing Print.

4.	Press Search and Replace. If you have not configured the Server Information Tab in the Options, the Search and Replace wizard will ask you a series of questions that must be completed.

5.	Enter the URL paths in the Search and Replace window.  See Search and Replace for more information.

6.	Select OK. The URL changes will be made to each selected file.


Locating Pages that Pass Scan Rules

To see pages that meet your in-house requirements, from the Left Pane drop down menu select Scan Rules. The Right Pane will default to the Children tab and show all files that meet your in-house requirements.

To establish Scan Rules, fill out the Scan Rules tab.


Rule Configuration

The Rule Configuration window is opened through the Add button in the Scan Rules option. All links entered in a rule must be typed in as its true full path (example: firstpage.html should not be entered; instead you must enter http:www.oursite.com/example/firstpage.html).  The below examples show the correct and incorrect ways to enter a Scan Rule.

Correct	Incorrect
http://www.watchfire.com/	www.watchfire.com
http://www.watchfire.com/help/	..../help
http://www.watchfire.com/	http://www.watchfire.com
Presence of Link and Tag text - Checks whether an HTML page has specific Link and HTML tag text (example: for the link field, enter - http://www.watchfire.com/copyright.htm.  For the Tag Text field enter – Copyright).

Presence of Text - Checks the HTML page for specific text (example: Watchfire). This will be a literal match against the HTML code, and not what is presented on the screen.

Presence of Link: Checks whether an HTML page has specific Link (example: http://www.watchfire.com/home/index.htm)

Note: If entering a mailto: link, ensure to include the mailto: syntax when entering the address (example: mailto:johndoe@watchfire.com).

Presence of Frame: Checks the HTML page for a Frame Set or Frame Link. To check for any frame set, leave the field blank and Linkbot will verify that <Frame Set> is present on the page. To check for a Frame link, type in the full path to the page  (example: http://www.watchfire.com/frames/firstpage.html).

Case Sensitive – Yes:  The case in the text must exactly match what is entered here.  No: The text can have uppercase or lowercase characters irrespective of what is entered here.

Must Match  - Yes: The text or tag must be exactly as typed here.  No: The text or tag must not be as typed here.


Frame Definition Page

In a frame definition document, the <BODY> tag is replaced by the <FRAMESET> tag. The <FRAMESET> tag will be ignored if any tags normally found within the <BODY> element are placed before it. The <FRAMESET> container holds the <FRAME> elements which describe the frames that will make up the page.


Repair Tool

Use the Repair tool to fix broken links in individual or multiple files.

To fix broken links with the Repair tool:

1.	In the Left Pane, select Broken Links. Or, in the Right Pane, select the Children tab and the Broken Links [image] filter.

2.	Right click on the file with the broken link and choose Repair or select Tools > Repair. The Repair window will now open. All Parent files of the page that contains the broken link will be listed.

Note: This list may include a URL that does not include an HTML file in the path  (example: http://www.watchfire.com/).  This cannot be modified because a file is not shown. However, this refers to the default file in the directory (example: http://www.watchfire.com/index.html ) which may already exist in the list.

3.	Highlight a single file and press Edit. The file will open with your external editor.  Or, make the URL change to multiple files by selecting the file’s check box and press Search and Replace. For more information, see Search and Replace . .

4.	Make the correction in the file(s) and save.

Repair Tool Window Buttons

Edit: Select this button to edit a single file in the Repair window.  The file will be opened in your default HTML editor (see External Applications Option).

Search and Replace: Select this button to open the Search and Replace window or to begin the Search and Replace Wizard.

Print: This will print the complete list of URL’s (parents of the page with broken link) in the Repair dialog.

Select All: Inserts a checkmark against all files

Deselect All: Removes the checkmark from all files.

Help: Opens this help topic.

Close: Closes the Repair window.

.


Scan Option

Before you start a scan, you can customize how  Linkbot  will scan your site as described below.

Window Selections

Check the Entire Site: Linkbot will check all links in documents that have the same base address as your starting URL.  For example, if you start Linkbot by entering the URL: http://www.watchfire.com, then all documents will be checked that have the base address: 'http://www.watchfire.com'.

Limit the Scan to a Depth of x:  Limit how deep Linkbot searches your site by entering a depth value. For example, if you set the depth to one, Linkbot will only check the links in the first page of your site.  If you set the depth to two, Linkbot will check the first page and all links in the pages referenced by the first page.

Note: If this is not selected, Linkbot will completely traverse your site until all URLs with the same base address are found.

Limit the Scan to x links: Select this option to limit the number of links checked.  Use this option if your site is very large and you want to shorten the time it takes to scan.  The results will give you an idea of how your site rates in the quality index without doing a full scan.

Check External Links: Select this box to verify links to Web sites outside of your site.

Note: Linkbot will check if the link is successful but will not traverse the external web site.  However, you can add an External  Domain Name in the  Internal Option tab to have an external link scanned.

Only Check Links in Starting Directory and SubDirectories: Select this box if you don't want Linkbot's search to branch into directories outside the starting directory and subdirectories.  For example, if your starting URL is: http://www.netcom.com/~mysite/ , Linkbot will not branch into directories outside the /~mysite directory.

Look for robots.txt: Select this option if you want Linkbot to use the robots.txt instructions when checking your website.

 Tip: This operation can also be accomplished by using Linkbot's built in Filters option. See Filters Option for more information.

Accept Cookies: Select this option if you want Linkbot to accept cookies.

Note:  Ensure your default browser has the same setting as above or it will override Linkbot’s setting.

Internal links are not case sensitive: Select this option if you want Linkbot to ignore the case of all internal URLs.  Internal URLs are URLs that point to documents that are within your site’s directory.  For example, if you select this option and an internal link has upper case characters such as …/ABC/www.MainSite.htm, Linkbot will recognize the link as …/abc/www.mainsite.htm.

Check Anchors/Bookmarks: Select this option if you want Anchors and Bookmarks checked.

Site Uses Lotus Domino and Lotus Notes: Select this option if you are using a Lotus Domino web server that uses a Lotus Notes database.  This is required because Linkbot must know if your URL paths will have an .nsf extension whereby it can properly handle the Lotus Domino URL by ignoring the path found on the right of .nsf.  The path to the right of .nsf is relevant to the Lotus Notes database and will only confuse Linkbot. For example if the URL path is http://www.lotus.com/home.nsf/view/openview.doc, then everything to the right of .nsf will be ignored and Linkbot will be able to scan the site properly. Orphan checking will also be impacted if you do not select this option because all files found to the right of .nsf will erroneously be counted as orphan files.

Scanning an Intranet: Select this option if you will be scanning your Intranet.  This is required if you wish to type in an internal node name in the URL field to perform a scan (example: bobm_01).  Select this so that Linkbot knows it can accept characters that are normally not valid in an Internet hostname, such as an underscore.  The following is what will be accepted in the URL path with (column 1) or without (column 2) Scanning an Intranet selected.

Column 1. URL Characters permitted with Scanning an Intranet Selected (checkmark in box)	Column 2 URL Characters permitted without Scanning an Intranet Selected (box cleared)
a-z, A-Z, 0-9, !$%^‘)(.-_{}~.	a-z, A-Z, 0-9, -
Note: commas in the above table are used to separate different entities.

Run Log Analysis as Part of Site Scan: Select this option to have a Log Analysis performed during each scan.

Run Orphan Analysis as part of Site Scan: Select this option to have an Orphan Analysis performed during each scan.


Options Overview

Linkbot contains many options to customize how the program operates. Configure the options to:

•	Limit the depth and speed (the number of links checked simultaneously) of a search.

•	Filter specific URLs and directories from a search.

•	Configure proxy and password settings.

•	Customize the What's New, What's Old and What's Slow  reports.

•	Specify external applications for HTML and image editing.

•	Plus much more.

To set your options for specific projects (scans) and to set your default options see Project Options


Internal Option

The Internal Domains list specifies additional URLs that you want Linkbot to check within your web structure.  This option is used to scan URLs that do not have the same Base Address as the starting URL. Linkbot treats URLs with a different Base Address as external, verifying the links but not checking the children.  For example, if want Linkbot to check www.Linkbot.com and support.Linkbot.com, add support.Linkbot.com to the Internal Domain list.  Start the run with www.Linkbot.com as normal. Linkbot will now branch out checking all the children of the URLs that contain both www.Linkbot.com and support.Linkbot.com.

 Tip: Use this option to scan external URLs that are related to your site to consolidate the scan results.

Window Selections

Add:  Adds the URL entered in the entry field to the internal list.

Replace: Replaces a selected URL in the internal list window with a new URL in the entry field.

Delete: Removes the selected URL from the internal list window.

Delete All: Deletes all the URLs from the internal list.


Connection Option

Use this option to configure Linkbot's network connections.

Number of Simultaneous Connections

Linkbot can check up to 30 links at once. Setting this value higher will make the run progress faster but it will also consume more of your PC's resources and also increase the stress on your Web server.  With a dial-up connection it is unlikely that Linkbot will degrade your Web server's performance significantly. However, with a direct Internet connection, a high performance PC and slow Web server, your users may experience some decrease in response time from the Web server while Linkbot is running.

Connection Time-out in x Seconds

By default, Linkbot will time out after 60 seconds of waiting for the server to respond.  You may change the default time-out and it can be any variable. Setting this value lower will speed up your run times.

Use PASV for FTP transfers

Some FTP proxy severs require that the client use Passive mode while accessing the proxy. If the orphan checking or FTP checking on your site is not working, try checking this box. Ask your system administrator for help if you're not sure about this setting.

User name and password for the Following Username and Password for Authenticated Pages

If your site contains pages that require a user name and password, enter them here. When Linkbot encounters a page that requires authentication it will automatically use the user name password you provided.  The Authentication must be Basic or NT Challenge Response.  Scanning Forms will not work if this option is selected.

Note: only one user name and password can be used for the entire site.

Email address for anonymous FTP checking

When Linkbot tests your site's FTP links, it will log into the FTP server with the user name set to 'anonymous' and the password set to your email address. This is standard protocol used when checking anonymous FTP links.

HTTP User Agent

If your site has been customized for a specific user agent, you can select one from this list or enter your own. This will enable Linkbot to pose as a specific browser when checking your site.


Server Information Tab

Use this tab to specify your Web Server’s parameters so that Linkbot can do an Orphan Analysis and when repairing bad links with Search and Replace.  This is needed because Linkbot must be able to access the directory where your website files are located to perform these operations.  Also, if you are performing scans on your local directory, fill out the Local Checking fields so that Linkbot can determine the root path and default HTML file.

Window Selections

Server Access Disabled: Check this option if Linkbot does not need to access your web server to perform the scan.

FTP Access: Check this option to check files via FTP on a remote Web server.  When you check this, the FTP Site dialog will highlight (see FTP Site below).

Local Site: Check this option if your files can be accessed from your local or network drive.

Base URL

Use Base of Starting URL: Select this option so that Linkbot knows that the Starting URL is also the Base URL.

If you do not select the above and if you are checking an FTP site, specify the Base URL and Initial Directory as described below.

Specify Base: If the Base URL is different from the Starting URL, enter the Base URL here.  For example if the starting URL is http://www.watchfire.com/ and you only want http://www.watchfire.com/products checked for orphans, enter http://www.watchfire.com/products here.

Directory

Initial Directory: If you did not select Use Base of Starting URL, you must specify the local path where your web server files are stored.  This applies to Local and FTP checking.  For Local checking, the Specify Base field will automatically be filled in when you use the Browse button to select the path (example: H:\Marketing\website).

Ignore FrontPage Directories: Check this so Linkbot will ignore all FrontPage directories when orphan checking.

FTP Site

FTP host: Enter the host name of the FTP site where your files are located.

Username: Enter the user name required to logon to the server for the FTP site.

Password: Enter the password required to logon to the server for the FTP site.

Local Checking

If you are performing scans on your local directory, use this option so that Linkbot knows where the root path is located and the default file name. Linkbot must know this because scanning your local drive is unlike scanning a URL where the / must be treated as the root.

Default File

Enter the file name. This file would be equivalent to the main HTML file in a URL (example: index.html).  You must specify this because unlike entering an URL path which automatically looks for index.htm when entering http://www.watchfire.com/, Linkbot does not know which HTML file to scan first when entering C:/website/watchire.

Root Location

Enter the directory path to where the above Default File is located (example: C:/website/watchfire/).  This enables Linkbot to know which  directory to branch from when scanning.


External Applications Option

This window is used to specify the external application invoked when you select a file, right click, and select Edit or when you select the Launch Editor button in the toolbar. You can add an HTML and Image editor of your choice including FrontPage, HomeSite, and Dreamweaver.  Also, Linkbot scans can be initiated directly from these applications as described below.

The External Scripts button opens the External Scripts window and is used to have Linkbot automatically invoke your own scripts before or after the Linkbot scan. For more information see External Scripts.

External Editors

Allaire HomeSite: If you have HomeSite installed, select this radio button so that HomeSite is activated to edit the file.

Microsoft FrontPage: If you have FrontPage installed, select this radio button so that FrontPage is activated to edit the file.

MacroMedia Dreamweaver: If you have Dreamweaver installed, select this radio button so that Dreamweaver is activated to edit the file.

Command Line: If you do not have the above applications installed, enter the path to an HTML editor such as Notepad or Wordpad. Use the Browse button to find the path and executable.

Note:  If the file to be edited is located on the web and not in a local directory, the file will be downloaded to your TEMP directory and given a temporary name with the prefix LB~, for example ~LB25506.  You will need to delete this file when it is no longer required.

External Image Editor

Command Line: Enter the path to your image editor to edit image files. Use the Browse button to automatically enter the path.

Adding Linkbot Functionality to your External Editors

Microsoft FrontPage Integration

Linkbot will check your FrontPage sites and pages directly from the FrontPage Tools menu. Select Activate Linkbot Toolbar and Linkbot functionality will be added directly to the FrontPage application.

Note:  Ensure you close FrontPage before you activate the Linkbot toolbar.

Check page with Linkbot and Check site with Linkbot will now be listed under the FrontPage Editor Tools menu.   FrontPage Explorer will only have Check site with Linkbot in its Tool menu.

To remove the Linkbot items from FrontPage, select Remove Items from FP menu.

Note: The Add button toggles to a Remove button when selected and vice-versa.

Allaire HomeSite Integration

If you have HomeSite installed, select this option to have Linkbot check your HomeSite sites and pages directly from the HomeSite toolbar. Select Activate Linkbot Toolbar and Linkbot functionality will be added directly to the HomeSite application.

Note:  Ensure you close HomeSite before you activate the Linkbot toolbar.

Linkbot icons will be added to the HomeSite toolbar so you can check pages and sites instantly.

To remove the Linkbot items from HomeSite, select Remove Linkbot Toolbar.

Note: The Add button toggles to a Remove button when selected and vice-versa

Dreamweaver Integration

If you have Dreamweaver installed, select this option to have Linkbot check your Dreamweaver web pages directly from the Dreamweaver menu.

Select Activate Linkbot Toolbar and Linkbot functionality will be added directly to the Dreamweaver application.

Note:  Ensure you close Dreamweaver before you activate the Linkbot toolbar.

Linkbot icons will be added to the Dreamweaver menu so you can check web pages instantly.

To remove the Linkbot items from Dreamweaver, select Remove Linkbot Toolbar.

Note: The Add button toggles to a Remove button when selected and vice-versa


Export Option

These settings control the output for the Export to HTML (the HTML report) and Printing for the right pane. Include the following fields at your discretion:

•	Show Link

•	Show Description

•	Show Status

•	Show Last Modified Date

•	Show Child Links

•	Show Parent Links

•	Show Image, Mailto, FTP, and Applet Links


Proxies Options
Proxies Option

Use this option to configure Linkbot to work through your proxy server for firewall protected sites.

To configure Linkbot to work through a proxy server:

1.	Select Options from the Tools menu.

2.	Click on the Proxy tab.

3.	Select Connect through a proxy server.

4.	Select the Settings button.

Enter the appropriate proxy configuration. Select the help button in the Proxy Settings window for instructions or refer to Proxy Settings.

Note: If you are checking an Intranet site with a proxy server or firewall, you will need to configure the proxy Exceptions in the Proxy Settings window.

Window Selections

Direct Connection: Disables the proxy server fields.

Connect through a proxy server: Allows Linkbot to work through a firewall.  See the instructions above.

HTTP Proxy Server Requires the Following User ID and Password: Enter the user ID and password for your proxy server.


Proxy Settings

Use this window to configure your proxy settings.  To do this, copy the proxy settings in your Web Browser proxy fields into the following Linkbot fields:

•	HTTP

•	Secure

•	FTP

•	Gopher

•	Socks

FTP Proxy is TIS FTP Gateway or CERN HTTP Proxy

If you are using a dedicated TIS FTP gateway for your FTP URLs, check the first option. If you connect to FTP URLs using an HTTP gateway, check the second option.

Note: You will know that the FTP proxy is not working properly if all FTP URLs are reported as "Error: Timeout" in Linkbot's report.

Exceptions

Use the list to specify sites that Linkbot should not use the proxy server for. Use wildcards (*) to filter out all addresses on your local network. For example, watchfire.com would create a proxy bypass for all hosts with the domain extension watchfire.com.  You can also enter IP numbers here instead of host names.

An alternative option is to select Do not use Proxy Server for local (Intranet) addresses.


New/Old/Slow Option

Use this window to customize the What's New, Old and Slow lists reported in the Linkbot interface and in the HTML site report.

What's New

This option generates a list of URLs that have recently been modified. Enter the time interval that will be used to construct the What's New page in the site report. The default value is one month, which will generate a list of all URLs that have been modified within the last month.

What's Old

This option generates a list of URLs that have not recently been modified. Enter the time interval that will be used to construct What’s Old page in the site report. The default value is 6 months, which will subsequently generate a list of all URLs not modified in 6 months.

What's Slow?

This option generates a list of files that may be slow to download for your users.  Slow pages are calculated by summing the contents of all the pages URLs (HTML text + images + other URL objects). If the page's size exceeds a threshold specified in the options, Linkbot flags the page as slow.

Determine what you believe is to slow for your visitors and enter the values for:

Pages Download Size Greater Than: enter the file size in KB that Linkbot should consider slow. Note that this is the combined page size (HTML + images + other objects).

Download time: This is a read-only field that shows how long it would take to download a page of this size using the selected access speed.

Access speed: Change the access speed to test how long it would take to download the selected page.

Note: 64 KB is used to calculate ISDN access times.

Calculate time button: Press this button to calculate the download time required for the values that you have entered.

Select the Only Include HTML files and Exclude External Links at your discretion.


Reports Option

Use this option to customize the output of Linkbot's HTML reports as described in HTML Site Report Overview. To have a specific report generated, check the box adjacent to the report heading in this option.

Select pages to Include in HTML Report

Warnings:  Include all warnings in the report.

Broken URLs:  Include all Broken URLs in the report.

Broken Pages:  Include all Broken Pages in the report

What's Deep: Include What's Deep in the report where you set this value.  The default value is 4.

What's New: Include What's New in the report according to specifications in What's New/Old/Slow option.

What's Old: Include What's Old in the report according to specifications in What's New/Old/Slow option.

What's Slow: Include What's New in the report according to specifications in What's New/Old/Slow option.

What's Small: Include all small files in the report where you set this value; the default is 3 KB.

Orphaned URLs: Include the Orphan URLs found as specified in the Orphans options.

Image Catalog: Include all Images in the report.

Pages Missing Titles: Include all files with missing Titles to indicate the author.

Links Missing Attributes: Include all files missing  Height/Width or Alt Text attributes.

Local Files:  Include all Local Files found in the report.

Site Map with Depth: Specify the depth of the Site Map where you enter a value here; the default is 2.

Show Link: List all links in the report.

Show Description: Give a description of each report heading.

Site Quality Index:  Include your website’s quality rating according to the Quality Index.

Meta Data: Report the number and percentage of pages with Metatags on your site.

Recommendations:  Include tips in the report on how to improve your site based on the scan results.

For more options, see More Report Options.


More Report Options

These are the extra reporting choices for Report Options:

Launch Report in Browser: Immediately launch the browser when the report is complete.

Show Watchfire Graphics: Include Watchfire Graphics in the report.

Create Report when Finished Checking: Write the report to specified files when complete.

Insert HTML page header from File: Include the HTML header in the report

Breakdown Reports by Author: List reports according to Author.

Show Watchfire Links: Include links to Watchfire Software web sites.  These will be shown in the bottom left frame.

Display Help Text: List all help text for the reports

Open External Links in New Browser: Select this so that when you open an external link from the report, a new browser window will open with the page loaded.


Scripting Option

Use this option to configure Linkbot's JavaScript checking options. When activated, most types of JavaScript links will be checked by using Linkbot's default setup. However, some configuration may be required to check different types of JavaScript code.

Window Selections

To activate JavaScript Checking, select Enable searching for URLs in JavaScript.

Default Patterns

The default patterns provided with Linkbot are sufficient for most sites.  However, additional patterns may be required to eliminate an occasional unconventional URL.  The syntax used to define patterns is the standard syntax used for regular expressions.  Linkbot's JavaScript setup can be customized by adding new patterns or editing the current list of active patterns (see below).

Customizing the JavaScript Options

Add a custom pattern if the default patterns do not sufficiently find your JavaScript links. To add a new pattern:

1.	Select the Add button.

2.	Enter a pattern in the Edit Pattern Window.

3.	Press OK.

How it works

A string will be considered a URL if the following criteria are met:

The string occurs in a context that suggests it could be a URL.

•	The string matches one of the patterns listed in the Patterns box of the Scripting option window.

•	The string does not match any of the patterns in the exclusion list.


Pattern Editor

Use the Pattern Editor to add patterns.  The Pattern Editor can be invoked by selecting the Add button in the Scripting Option or the Error Pages Tab . The syntax used to define patterns is the standard syntax used for regular expressions.

Note:  Standard DOS patterns will not work.

Syntax	Description
(PQ)	A grouping of P followed by Q.
P?	An optional occurrence of P.
P*	0 or more repetitions of P.
P+	1 or more repetitions of P.
P|Q	Either P or Q.
\X	Escapes one of the characters ()?*+|\.[]^$ otherwise it would be interpreted as a special character.
.	A period matches any character.
[a-eyz]	Any of the set of characters "abcdeyz".
(a-e)	An inclusive range.
[^xza-e]	Any character not in the set "abcdexz".
Note:  The pattern must match the *entire* URL. The special characters "$" and "^" used to anchor a pattern to the beginning or end of a string are not required and must not be used.

Examples

http://x/cgi-bin/.+\.pl will match "http://x/cgi-bin/anything.pl" but not "http://x/cgi-bin/x.pl?abc=x"

abc.gif will match "abc.gif" but not "http://mysite.com/abc.gif"

[^.]*\.gif will match "/xyz/def/abc.gif" but not "/xyz/def.ghi/abc.gif"


Log Analysis Option

Use this option tab or the Log Analysis wizard to have Linkbot report on data derived from your Log Analysis file.  Using this data, Linkbot can report the following:

Log Finding	Report Location in Linkbot
The amount of hits each file on your site receives	Hits column in the Right Pane of the interface.
Broken URLs (404 errors) not found in the original scan. These may be URLs from a visitor’s bookmark, a link from a web page, or from a search engine result.	See Frequently Visited Problems under the Site Summary HTML report or the Broken URL HTML report. Also, from the Left Pane drop down menu select Pages with Log Errors.
Windows Selections

Do not Scan the Server Log: Select this to not have your Server Log scanned.

Scan the Server Log: Select this to have Linkbot scan your Server Log for hits, broken URLs, and 404 errors.

Only report errors with x or more errors when Publishing:  Use this to specify how many errors must occur before it is reported in the HTML reports and in the Interface (select Pages with Log Errors in the Left Pane drop down menu).

Base URL

Use Base of Starting URL:  Select this option so that Linkbot knows that the Starting URL is also the Base URL.

Specify Base:  If the Base URL is different from the Starting URL, enter the Base URL here.  For example, if the starting URL is http://www.watchfire.com/ and you only want http://www.watchfire.com/products  checked, you would enter the latter here.

Log File Path and Location

FTP or File: Select FTP or File from the drop down menu to specify how Linkbot will access the Server Log.

Path:  Enter the path to the Server Log. You can use the Browse button to enter the path.

Type of Web Server: Select from the drop down list the type of web server you are using (example: CERN Common).

FTP Username and Password:  If you selected FTP as the access method, enter the required Username and Password.


Base Address and Domain Name

This is the address within the URL which was entered to start the site analysis. For example, if the URL entered is http://www.watchfire.com/index.html:

•	The base address is:  http://www.watchfire.com

•	The domain name is:  www.watchfire.com


robots.txt

robots.txt is a file that tells visiting robots what directories they are allowed to look in when traversing your Web site.


Filters Option

Use the Filters option to stop Linkbot from checking specific files and directories.  This option is also used to specify Session ID information (if required) so that Linkbot can ignore the Session ID part of the URL.

To set your filters:

1.	Select the Input Format: Pattern or URL.

2.	Enter a URL prefix in the box.

3.	Select Add.

Linkbot will now ignore all URLs that match or begin with the entered URL.

Example: By entering a filter prefix http://www.watchfire.com/download/, all URLs that started with this prefix will be ignored.

Note: To stop Linkbot from branching outside a specific directory, check the Only Check Starting Directory in the Scan option. See Scan Option for more information.

Window Selections

Input Format:  Select either Pattern or URL.

Enter an URL Prefix or Pattern: Enter the URL or pattern to exclude from the scans.

Note: For more information on which patterns to use, refer to the table found in  Pattern Editor

The Filters option window has the following selections below the URL entry:

•	Add: Adds a URL to the filter list.

•	Replace: Replaces the currently selected URL with a new one.

•	Delete: Removes the selected URL from the filters list.

•	Delete All: Deletes all the URLs from the filters list.

•	But Include:  Filters out the entered URL but will scan a path which is located within the respective URL.

  Tip: By using the filter options, it is possible to prevent Linkbot from checking specific type of URLs such as an ftp link.

Example: To stop Linkbot from checking all FTP URLs, enter the filter "ftp://".!AL("Customizing Linkbot Toolbars;Toolbar Filters and the Right Pane;Options Overview;Reports Overview",0,`',`')

Sessions ID

Use this option if you track a users progress through your site by embedding a key in their URL or by setting a session sensitive cookie in their browser.  You must identify the start and end of the session ID so that Linkbot can ignore the session ID portion of the URL during processing.  If you do not do this, Linkbot could get into a continuous loop of finding new pages.

Configuring Session IDs

If the Start field is empty, no portion of the URL is excluded.

If text is entered in the Start field then Linkbot will exclude a portion of the URL based on what is typed in the String field.

If the String field is empty, Linkbot will ignore the characters in the Start field till the end of the URL

If the String Field is not empty, Linkbot will ignore the characters from the start of the Start field to the first instance in the String field.


External Scripts

You can have your own scripts (such as batch files) automatically initiated before or after the Linkbot scan.  Select the External Scripts button in the New Project Options > Apps window to open the External Scripts window.

Window Selections

Pre-Scan: To have your script invoked before the Linkbot scan, enter the script’s path and filename.

Post-Scan: To have your script invoked after the Linkbot scan, enter the script’s path and filename.

Note: Use the Browse button to have the path and filenames entered correctly.

Run Post-Scan script in the background: Select this box to have the Post-Scan script run in the background so that it does not interfere with other scheduled Linkbot scans.  If you do not select this, a window will appear when the script is initiated: “Waiting for external script C:\filepath\scriptname to finish.  Please wait”.  Linkbot will not proceed with any other scheduled scans until the script has finished its run.


Project Options

Each time you save a Linkbot Project file (filename.bot) the URL and the option settings will be saved in the projects BOT file. The next time you load or schedule the project, these options will be used in the scan.  You can set the current project’s options (the project that is currently showing in the GUI) or set the default options for all new scans  (projects) as described below.

To set the options for an existing project:

1.	Open the Project by selecting the BOT file from File > Open Project.

2.	Select Project Options for …  from the Tools menu (the current project’s URL will replace the …)

3.	Make the changes to the options.

4.	Under the File menu select Save Project.

The options setting will be saved in the project’s BOT file.

To set the default options or have a different set of options for a new scan in the same session, use the New Project Option command as described below.

To set the default options for new projects (scans):

1.	Enter the URL for the new project in the URL field.

2.	Select New Project Options from the Tools menu.

3.	Make the changes to the options.

4.	Under the File menu select Save Project.

The new options settings will be saved in the new projects BOT file.


Other Watchfire Products

Other tools you will need to maintain your web site can be found at: http://www.watchfire.com/products

  Linkbot Enterprise

Scans web sites of unlimited size to ensure quality, accessibility, and usability.  It then loads your site's data into a SQL database and produces personalized web-based reports using Active Server Pages and standard HTML. Linkbot Enterprise also automatically sends email to all interested parties keeping them abreast of their section’s status.

 Metabot

Metabot is a tool to automatically generate and embed Metatags into your HTML, Microsoft Office document, and Image files.   Metatags makes it easy for you and your customers to search and find relevant information on your website.  For example, Metatags identify keywords, author, last modified date, and subject.

 Wisebot

Wisebot creates web site navigation systems and other tools to help visitors navigate through your site.  It can automatically create a Portal Interface to your Internet or Intranet.


Troubleshooting Orphan Analysis

Linkbot checks for orphans by doing the following:

1.	Scans through the files on your Web server by accessing a local drive or by FTP.

2.	Matches up each file found on the Web server to the files in the Base URL.

3.	Files on the local drive or FTP location that don’t match with the files in the Base URL are considered orphans.

The following describes common problems and how to solve them when Orphan Checking.

Problem	Resolution
No Orphans are Found	- Linkbot may be having trouble accessing your Web server's file system. Check to make sure the login and initial directory are correct. Also, if you're using a proxy server, make sure that this is correctly configured in the Proxy options. - - Use PASV for FTP transfers.  Some FTP proxy servers require the client use Passive mode while accessing the proxy. If the orphan checking or FTP checking on your site it not working, try checking this box in the Connections window in Options. Ask your system administrator for help if you're not sure about this setting.
All  files are listed as orphans	- The Base URL setting may not be correct. If you start the run with http://www.watchfire.com/ then your base address should also be http://www.watchfire.com/. If your starting URL is file:///C|/Linkbot3/test.htm then your base address should be file:///C|/Linkbot3/
Some files are reported as orphans and you know this is incorrect.	- You're running Linkbot on your hard disk not a Web server. If you're running on a hard disk and you have the Local Checking option configured in the Server Information Tab, ensure you start the scan by entering the path of your first URL relative to the root. For example, if the root location is c:\my documents\web\ then start your scan using  file:///C|/index.htm   and not file:///C|/My Documents/web/index.htm.
If you are still having problems, see the support site at: http://www.watchfire.com/support.


Sites to Check

Use this window to specify the URL or BOT files to be used in the scheduled scan(s).  Also enter the name of the report that will be created for each scan.  You are not limited to one scan as you can create a list of sites to scan.

Window Selections

Starting URL or BOT file: Enter the path of the URL or enter the BOT file that contains the options and URL.

Site Report File: Enter the path and filename to store the report that will be generated. Use the Browse button to enter the path and filename to overwrite an existing report.

Note: If a new report file is being created and you are not overwriting an existing report, ensure to include the HTML extension when typing it in (example, myreport.html).

Add, Replace, Delete, Delete All: Use these buttons to modify the scan list.


Run Schedule

Use this window to tell Linkbot when to turn itself on and start the scheduled scan. You can tell Linkbot to run just once at a specific time or to run regularly at preset intervals.

Note: If the NT Service is not being used, Linkbot must be loaded when the scheduling time occurs or the scan will not be initiated.

Frequency

Off: Turns all scheduling off.

Run when Linkbot is started:. Select this so that everytime you startup Linkbot, immediately the scan is started of the URL stored in the BOT or the URLs listed in the  Site to Check tab.

Run Once: Linkbot will start just once at the time specified in the "Time to Start" field.

Every hour, day, week: Choose this option if you want Linkbot run at regular intervals. For example, every Sunday night at 12am.

Time to Start Run

Specify the time and day when Linkbot should start the scheduled run.  These boxes will become highlighted when you select the relevant Frequency option.

Report Settings

Create site report when run is complete: Check this option if you want Linkbot to create an HTML site report after it finishes the run.

Load site report in the browser: Check this option if you want to launch your browser with the site report after the run has completed. If you don't check this option, this site report will still be created but you'll have to load it into the browser manually.

Close Linkbot report window when the run is complete: If this option is not checked Linkbot will leave the Report window open when the scheduled run is complete. This may cause your PC to run out of memory if you enter many sites into the Site to check tab.  To stop this problem from happening, check this option and Linkbot will then close the Report window when the run is complete.

Exit Linkbot when all scheduled tasks are complete: Select this option if you want Linkbot to close itself down after the scheduling is complete.


Dialup Connection

Check the box in this window if you would like Linkbot to automatically dial up your modem and establish an Internet connection when the scheduled run is initiated.

Entry:  Select a dialup Entry from the list available in your dialup networking folder.

Username:  Enter the user name required to access your dialup connection.

Password:  Enter the password required to access your dialup connection.


Run as NT Service

If you are running Linkbot on a Windows NT platform, use this window to run Linkbot as an NT Service. This is used so you do not have to leave your workstation logged on for Linkbot to perform its scan(s).

Note: You must have Administrator status to be able to log on as an NT service.  Contact your System Administrator if you are unsure about your status or follow the below procedure.

To establish Administrator Status on NT:

1.	From NT Administrative Tools, select User Manager or User Manager for Domains.

2.	Select User Rights from the Policies menu.

3.	Select the checkbox marked Show Advanced Rights

4.	Select the following capabilities:  Log on Locally, Log on as a Service, Log on as a Batch Process, and Act as part of an Operating System.

To activate the Linkbot NT service option:

1.	Check the box labeled Start Linkbot as an NT Service.

2.	Enter your user name and password.

3.	In the Site to Check tab, enter the sites or bot files to be updated.

4.	In the Run Schedule tab, specify the scheduling update interval.

5.	Close all applications.

6.	Restart your workstation and leave it powered on.

Note: While running as an NT Service, Linkbot will not display any information on the screen.


Scheduling Overview

Linkbot's scheduling features allow you automate routine maintenance of your site. For example, you can have http://www.watchfire.com/ scanned every Sunday night at 12a.m so you have a report waiting for you on Monday morning. If you manage several sites, you can have Linkbot scan many sites simultaneously as established in the Sites to Check tab.

You can schedule Linkbot scans using one of the following methods depending on your security requirements:

Tool	Must Leave Linkbot Loaded?	Must Leave Workstation Logged On?
Linkbot’s Scheduler	Yes	Yes  Note: You can lock your machine with the screensaver settings or the OS locking feature.
Linkbot’s Scheduler with NT Service Feature	No	No
Third Party Scheduler (such as AT Scheduler in Windows NT)	No	Yes Note: You can lock your machine with the screensaver settings or the OS locking feature.
To use Linkbot’s built in scheduler:

1.	Select Schedule Runs from the Tools menu.

2.	Enter one or more sites in the Site to Check tab.

3.	Select the Run Schedule tab.

4.	Select one of the following radio buttons in the Frequency field: Run Once, Every Hour, Every Day, or Every Week.

5.	Enter the time (and day if required) in the Time to Start Run field.

6.	If required, select and complete the Dialup Connection tab settings.

7.	Ensure to leave Linkbot loaded before the scheduled run initiates.

To use Linkbot’s built in scheduler and the NT Service feature:

1.	Select Schedule Runs from the Tools menu.

2.	Enter one or more sites in the Site to Check tab.

3.	Select the Run Schedule tab.

4.	Select one of the following radio buttons in the Frequency field: Run Once, Every Hour, Every Day, or Every Week.

5.	Enter the time (and day if required) in the Time to Start Run field.

6.	If required, select and complete the Dialup Connection.

7.	Enter the Run as NT Service tab settings.

To use a third party scheduler:

1.	Select Schedule Runs from the Tools menu.

2.	Enter one or more sites in the Site to Check tab.

3.	Select the Run Schedule tab.

4.	Select the Run when Linkbot is Started option in the Frequency field.

5.	Exit the Linkbot program.

6.	Using your third party scheduler, specify a date and time you want it to load Linkbot. When the third party scheduler starts up Linkbot, Linkbot will scan the specified sites.


Creating and Opening an HTML Site Report

When Linkbot finishes its scan, you will be prompted to publish a site report.   Click YES and the report will open in your web browser.  You can also create a site report at a later time by opening the project and selecting Publish Site Report from the Tools menu.

To Open an HTML Site Report:

From the File menu, select View Report.

To Open an HTML Site Report that has recently been opened:

From the File menu, select Recent Report and select the report that was previously opened.


Exporting to an HTML File

To export the contents of the Children or Parent list to an HTML file:

1.	Select either the Children or Parent tab in the right pane.

2.	Select File > Export > HTML Index.

You can change the appearance of the exported HTML file by modifying the Export Option settings.

 Tip:  You can filter the contents of the Children and Parent lists by selecting one or more of the filter icons on the toolbar.  Only the URLs that are showing in the Right Pane will be exported to HTML.


Exporting to a Text File

To export the contents of the Children or Parent list to a delimited text file:

1.	Select either the Children or Parent tab.

2.	Select File > Export > Delimited Text.

Linkbot will create a text file with fields separated by commas. You can then import this list into a spreadsheet or database.

Note: You can filter the contents of the Children and Parent lists by selecting one or more of the Filter icons on the toolbar.  Only the URLs that are showing in the Right Pane will be exported.


Saving and Opening BOT Files

You can save the scan results and all the relevant data in a BOT file (filename.bot).  The options you have specified for the project are also stored in this file.

Note: The Report BOT file is not the same as an HTML Site report file. To create and open previously saved HTML reports, see Creating and Opening an HTML Site Report.

To save a BOT file:

Select Save Project from the File menu or select [image] from the toolbar.

To open a previously saved BOT File:

Select Open Project from the File menu or select [image] from the toolbar.

Note: If the BOT file has recently been opened, it will be listed under the File menu for quick access.


Reports Overview

Linkbot displays the results of your website’s scan in two ways: in the Linkbot Graphical User Interface (GUI) and in the HTML Reports.

Linkbot’s Interface

The Interface is divided into two panes which allows you to view specific results depending on your selections.  The Left Pane has a drop down menu where you can select one of many views. The Right Pane has tabs that are used in conjunction with the Left Pane selection to get the desired report.  For more information, see Overview of Linkbot's Interface.

HTML Reports

Linkbot generates HTML reports that are convenient and easy to read.  The HTML report includes all website statistics including charts that breakdown specific results of the scan.  For more information on this report, see Creating a Site Report.


HTML Site Report Overview

At the end of each run you will be prompted to create an HTML Site Report. This report is an integrated set of HTML reports that summarize various problem areas on your site.  Each report is an HTML file that is linked from the main HTML file.   The following reports are generated:

Site Summary: This report outlines the major problem areas of your site and shows how these problems are changing over time. Detailed information about specific errors can be found in the individual problem reports. Each time you re-scan your site by updating the Linkbot Project file (BOT), the previous problem statistics will be recorded in the 'change from last' column and in the graphical chart.

Scan Statistics: This report shows the options used in this scan and also lists summary data about the results of the scan.

Site Statistics: This report gives a breakdown of the MIME and Scheme types used on your site. MIME types refer to different types of files such as HTML, images or executables. Scheme types refer to different URL protocols such as HTTP, FTP and mail. The change column in the tables shows the percentage increase or decrease from the previous scan.

Quality Rating: This report gives a website quality index score (see Quality Index).

Warnings: warnings include temporary and permanent redirects and other miscellaneous, non-critical problems.

Broken URLs: a detailed listing of all URLs that are not functioning.

Broken Pages: a listing of all pages that contain bad URLs summarized by author using the HTML Author Meta Tag .

What's Deep? This report lists pages that require more than 'x' clicks to get to from the front page. The default value for 'x' is 4 and can be changed in the options in the Reports tab. This report is useful for improving your site's usability by ensuring that users are not required to follow too many links to get to a page.

What's New? A listing of all documents that have been modified in a specified time period. You can customize the time period covered in the What's New page in the Report option.

What's Old? A listing of all documents that have not been modified in a specified time period. You can customize the time period covered by the What's Old? page in the Report options.

What's Slow? A listing of all documents that will be slow for visitors to download. You can customize the definition of what's slow in the Report options.

What's Small? This report lists pages that are very small in size. It is useful for identifying pages that may be incomplete. You can customize the definition of what's small n the Report options.

Orphaned URLs: A list of all files that are found on the Web server but are not referenced by the actual web site. This feature is useful for cleaning out unused files from your server.

Image Catalog: A thumbnail gallery of all the images on your site.

Pages Missing Titles: Lists pages that are missing HTML title tags.

Missing Attributes: Lists images that are missing ALT, height and width tags.

Meta Data: This report shows the number and percentage of pages with Metatags on your site.

Note: For a tool to automate the creation of Metatags see Metabot at http://www.watchfire.com/products/metabot.htm.

Local files: This report lists absolute file:/// URLs found when a http:// URL is used to start the Linkbot scan. The absolute URLs may point to files on your local server that users outside your network will not be able to access.

Site Map: A hierarchical view of your site.

Recommendations Report: Gives you advice on how to improve your Web site based on the scan results.


Printing Reports

To print the contents of the Right Pane:

1.	Select the relevant tab to get the desired report.

2.	If required, filter the contents of the Children and Parent lists before printing.  Do this by selecting one or more of the Filter icons on the toolbar.

3.	Select Print from Linkbot’s File menu.

To print an HTML Site Report:

1.	Open the report with your web browser.

2.	Click the right pane of the framed web browser window.

3.	Select the print button in your web browser.


Editor Report

You can have a report based on a single page.   The Editor Report displays the following information about the page:

•	A summary of the findings.

•	Number of broken links.

•	HTML syntax errors.

•	Page size.

•	Images missing Attributes.

•	Metatags found in the file.

To create report for a single HTML page

1.	Select a single HTML file in the Left Pane.

2.	Right click and select Publish Editor Report.

3.	Enter the report name and select OK.

4.	The report will be generated and opened in your web browser.

To create a report directly from your external editor:

1.	Integrate your editor with Linkbot as described in Apps tab.

2.	From your external editor, open a HTML page

3.	Go to the menu bar and select Tools – Check Page with Linkbot . A dialog will pop up informing you that the scan is complete and the editor report can be published so that you can view the report.

.


 Repairing Broken Links

You can display and repair broken links in several ways.  The most popular method is to use the Repair Tool which allows you to fix individual files or several files at once. For other methods, see Other Repair Methods.


Locating Old, New, and Slow Pages

Linkbot’s What's Old analysis lists files that have not been modified recently. These pages may be out of date and should be checked for incorrect information.

 The What’s New analysis reports what has recently been updated.

The What's Slow analysis lists files that may be slow to download for your users.  Slow pages are calculated by summing the contents of all the pages URLs (HTML text + images + other URL objects). If the page's size exceeds a threshold specified in the Options, Linkbot flags the page as slow.

For more information on how to setup the What’s New, What’s Old, What’s Slow feature, see New/Old/Slow Option.

Locating Old, New, or Slow Pages in the Interface

In the left pane select Old Pages, New Pages or Slow Pages from the drop down menu. Linkbot will display a list of Old, New, or Slow Pages in the left pane.

Locating Old, New or Slow Pages in the HTML Report

View the list of old or new files in the HTML Site Report under the relevant heading. To create an HTML Site Report, select Publish Site Report from the Tools menu.


Locating Pages Missing Titles

Linkbot allows you to quickly locate pages on your site that are missing titles.  The title should be entered into the <HEAD> tag of your all your HTML pages. This tag is an important HTML component because it displays the title at the top of the browser.  It is also used to uniquely identify the results of a search engine query.

Note:  For a Tool to automatically generate and embed Metatags into your HTML files, use Metabot.  For more information, go to http://www.watchfire.com/products

Locating Pages Missing Titles in the Interface

In the left pane select Pages Missing Titles from the drop down menu. Linkbot will display a list of Pages Missing Titles in the left pane.

Locating Pages Missing Titles in the HTML Report

View the list of pages missing titles in the HTML Site Report under the relevant heading. To create an HTML Site Report, select Publish Site Report from the Tools menu.


Locating Images Missing Attributes

Linkbot allows you to quickly locate images on your site that are missing ALT and Height/Width tags.  The ALT tag is a text alternative that will be displayed in browsers that have images turned off.  Height and Width tags are also important as they make images load faster in the browser.  The settings are established in the Reports Option.

Locating Pages Missing Attributes in the Interface

In the left pane select Pages Missing ALT Tags or Pages Missing Height/Width Pages from the drop down menu. Linkbot will display a list of these pages in the left pane.

Locating Pages Missing Attributes in the HTML Report

View the list of pages missing titles in the HTML Site Report under the relevant heading. To create an HTML Site Report, select Publish Site Report from the Tools menu


Locating and Deleting Orphan Files

Linkbot’s Orphan analysis identifies files on your web server that are not being used.  These files are probably using up valuable disk space and can be deleted. Linkbot compares the files found in the directories on the local web server to the URLs found in the scan. Files found that are not referred to by any page are flagged as orphans. To configure Linkbot so that it can perform the Orphan Analysis use the  Orphan Analysis Wizard or complete the Server Information Tab .

To locate and delete Orphan file(s):

1.	In the left pane select Orphaned Files from the drop down menu.  The orphan files will be listed in the Left Pane.

2.	Select the orphan files you want to delete in the Left Pane.

3.	Right click and select Delete Orphan.

You can also select the file(s) and in the menu bar select Edit > Delete Orphan or select the file(s) and press the delete key.

To locate Orphans Files in the HTML Report:

Select the Orphaned Files link in the left frame of the HTML Site Report.


Locating What's Deep

To see this report, open the HTML report and select the What's Deep heading.

Note:  To help resolve the Deep page problem, use Wisebot a tool that can automatically create a Portal Interface to your Internet or Intranet. Wisebot makes it easier for your sites' users to find the information they are looking for, using Site Maps and Indexes of your content.   For more information, see http://www.watchfire.com/products .


Locating Pages with Log Errors

You can perform a Log Analysis to have Linkbot report on data derived from your Server Log file.

To perform a Log Analysis:

From the Tools menu, select Log Analysis.

This will invoke the Log Analysis Wizard or if you have already completed the Log Analysis Option tab, Linkbot will immediately perform the Log Analysis.

Using this Server Log data, Linkbot may report the following:

Log Finding	Report Location in Linkbot
The amount of hits each file on your site receives	Hits column in the Right Pane
Broken URLs (404 errors) not found in the original scan. These may be URLs from a visitor’s bookmark, a link from a web page, or from a search engine result.	From the Left Pane drop down menu select Pages with Log Errors. Refer to Frequently Visited Problems under the Site Summary HTML report or the Broken URL HTML report.


Other Repair Methods

Other methods to repair the bad links are as follows:

Left Pane	Right Pane	Files needing Repair
Select Pages with Broken Links in the drop down menu.	Select the Parent tab.	Right click and select Edit on each of the Parent files in the Right Pane.
Select Pages with Broken Links from the drop down menu.	Select the Children tab.	Right click and select Edit on each page listed in the Left Pane.
Select All Links in the Left Pane.	Press the Show Bad Links filter in the Filters Toolbar	Right click and select Edit on each page in the Right Pane.
Select Pages with Broken Links.	Select the Children tab and select the file.	Select the HTML Tab in the Right Pane and modify the file. Select any other tab and you will be asked to save the file.
Publish a Site Report and select the Broken Links page to get a list of bad links. Locate the files manually to do the repairs.

 Tip: You can have Linkbot  invoke an external HTML editor and Image editor of your choice. To do this, see External Applications Option.


Error Pages Tab

Use the Error Pages tab if you use custom 404 pages and/or redirect pages to guide a visitor when they encounter a bad link. Linkbot needs to recognize these pages so that when they are encountered in a scan, they are counted as a bad link.  You can enter a Title pattern string and/or URL.

To specify a Title pattern as a custom 404 or redirect page:

Note: To use this option, you must have the Title of the error page specified by using the <TITLE> Metatag in the HTML file. You can use Metabot to do this as described in Other Watchfire Products .

1.	Insert a check mark in Mark pages with titles matching the following patterns as broken links.

2.	Press the Add button.

3.	Enter the pattern as it appears in the <TITLE> Metatag of the HTML file.

4.	Press OK.

The Title pattern will now be listed in the window.

 Tip: You can use the patterns described in Pattern Editor .

To specify a URL as a custom 404 or redirect page:

5.	Insert a check mark in Mark pages redirected to the following URLs as broken links.

6.	Press the Add button.

7.	Enter the URL in the field provided.

8.	Press OK.

The URL will now be listed in the window.

Window Selections

•	Add:  Adds a URL or Title pattern to the list.

•	Replace:  Replaces the currently selected URL or pattern with a new URL or Title pattern.

•	Delete:  Deletes the selected URL or Title pattern from the list.

•	Delete All: Deletes all URLs or Title patterns from the list.


Site Map

You can create a Site Map to get an overall picture of your Web site. The Site Map can also highlight problem areas on your Web site such as “Broken Links”. You can see the hierarchy of your site in a variety of ways. To modify the appearance of the Site Map, change the Site Map Options.

To create a Site Map:

•	In the Right Pane, click on the Site Map tab.

or

•	In the Left Pane drop down menu, select Site Map.

or

•	From the Tools menu, select Site Map > Generate Site Map.

Linkbot will generate a Site Map based on the files linked to the Base Address.  This may take some time if your site is very large.

The Right Pane will show the graphical representation of your site. The Left Pane will show an explorer type view of your site.

To add or remove sections from the Site Map:

In the Left Pane, add or remove the check mark adjacent to the file.

To focus on specific sections:

In the Right Pane, click on the + sign to see the files linked below the selected file.  Click on the – sign to go back to the original view.

To see a file loaded in the browser:

In the Right Pane, click on the file’s icon.  The browser will open and load the file in the Right Pane. To go back to the Site Map, right click on the page and select Back.

or

In the Left Pane, right click and select Browse.   The browser will open in a new window and load the file.

To edit your files in the Site Map:

In the Left Pane, right click on the file and select Edit.

Tip: To choose an HTML editor of your choice, see External Applications Option. To print the Site Map, see Printing .


Site Map Options

Modify the Options to change the appearance of the Site Map and to highlight specific errors found on your Web site.

To change the Site Map options:

1.	From the Tools menu, select Site Map > Map Options.

2.	Change the settings as described below.

Style

The Style dictates the look of the site structure.  Your choices are: Organization Chart, Tree View, and Skyscrapers.

Titles

The Titles dictate how each file is described:

•	Full Titles Shows the Title of the HTML page as extracted from the Title Metatag contained in the HTML code. .

•	URLs Title: Shows the locations of each page instead of a title.

•	Short titles: Shows an abbreviation for the full title.

Error Icons

Specify which Error icon will appear in the Site Map to identify specific problem areas on your site. Select one of the below choices.

Icon	Description
None	Select this to have no error icons appear in the Site Map.
	Errors: Shows pages that do not exist or have bad HTML syntax.
	Slow Pages: Shows pages that take too long to load as specified in the New/Old/Slow Tab in the Options.
	Broken Links: Shows pages that contain broken links.
	Metatags: Shows pages that do not have a Title Metatag and/or pages missing the image Alt/Height/Width tag.
	Missing Pages: Shows pages that do not exist but have been referred to by an HTML page.
	Log Errors: Shows page that have been identified as a problem in your Server log file (see Log Analysis Wizard).
What’s New

The What’s New option specifies how new or changed pages will be identified on the map.  Your choices are to not identify New Pages or to use one of four icons.

Icon

Move the slide rule to change the Border, Shadow and Spacing values:

•	Border: changes the width of (or remove) the border round the page thumbnails.

•	Shadow: changes the intensity of (or remove) the drop shadow below each thumbnail.

•	Spacing: changes the spacing between thumbnails

Style Specific Options

Organization Chart Buttons

•	Color: to change the colors used for the big, medium and flat buttons.

•	Logo: to change the graphics used to represent the home page (a typical choice would be a company logo).

•	Big Buttons: to change the graphic displayed above the text in the big buttons.

•	Column Width: to change the width of the buttons.

Skyscraper Layout

Move the slide rule to change the Tower height and spacing values:

•	Tower Height: adjust the height of each tower.

•	Tower Spacing: changes the spacing between the towers.

Skyscraper Tower Colors

Choose a preset color or select a custom color to change the look of each tower.


Program Options

Edit Boxes

•	Default HTML Configuration file - Each time you launch (run) Validator, it attempts to automatically load a configuration file that contains information about what HTML tags are valid, along with each tag's attribute and attribute value information. The file that contains this information should be specified here with a full pathname such as C:\Program Files\HTMLValidator\htmlval25.cfg. The file should end in a .cfg extension and is created by choosing Save Config or Save Config As in the Validator HTML Configuration Editor. If this is your first time running Validator you should set this to the configuration file included in the archive to take advantage of the pre-done configuration that includes HTML 4.0, HTML 3.2, Microsoft Internet Explorer, Netscape Navigator tags, and more.

Check Boxes

•	Autosave configuration - Check this box if you always want to save any changes to the HTML Configuration without Validator asking you if you want to do so. Otherwise you are asked to save the HTML Configuration if it has changed and you attempt to exit the program or load a new HTML Configuration.


Validator 1

Edit Boxes

•	Maximum errors - This edit box lets you specify the number of errors that  Validator will generate for a single HTML document before terminating the validation due to too many errors.

•	Maximum warnings - This edit box lets you specify the number of warnings that Validator will generate for a single HTML document before terminating the validation due to too many warnings.

•	Message line length - When a message (such as an error, warning, or comment message) is output to the output file during a validation, the message is word wrapped according to the line length specified in this edit box. You can adjust this value to determine the best line length for your method of viewing the validator's output.

Check Boxes

•	Validate entities - Check this box if you want Validator to validate character entities. It is recommended that you keep this box checked.

•	Numeric entities include Unicode - Check this box if you want Validator to validate 16 bit Unicode character entities.

•	Allow hexadecimal numeric entities - Check this box if you want Validator to validate hexadecimal numeric character entities. These entities are in the form &#xH;, where H is a hexadecimal number.

•	Enable warnings - Check this box to enable the generation of warning messages. This box must be checked to receive any warning messages, even if Enable comment warnings is checked. It is recommended that you keep this option enabled.

•	Enable comment warnings - Check this box to enable the generation of warning messages when a comment in the form <!-- --> contains '<' and '>' characters. This option only has an effect if Enable warnings is checked.

•	Enable missing attribute warnings - Check this box if you want Validator to generate warning messages for missing attributes that have the Warn if missing option checked. This option only has an effect if Enable warnings is checked.

•	Enable programs - Check this box to enable the tag name program feature of Validator. Disabling this feature will speed up validation but may significantly reduce the number of problems found and messages displayed. It is recommended that you leave this option enabled at all times, which is the default.

•	Flag 1-10 - Check and uncheck these flags to enable or disable tag name program flags that are used in tag name programs. This allows a tag name program to be written so that certain behaviors of the tag name program can be instantly changed by checking or unchecking a flag. For instance, tag name programs can be written to warn users about using tag names that may only work in certain browsers. If you do not want to see these warnings, a tag name program can be written so that the warnings will not be generated if a certain flag is checked or unchecked. In this case, you can easily enable or disable these warnings by checking or unchecking the appropriate flag or flags. The default is all flags checked (set).

•	Show document structure - Check this box if you want Validator to show the document structure at the end of a validation report.

•	Show entities - Check this box if you want Validator to display character entities in the document structure. This option has no effect if Show document structure is not checked.

•	Use compact form - Check this box if you want Validator to display the document structure in a form that requires less lines. It may be more difficult to read. This option has no effect if Show document structure is not checked.


Validator 2

Check Boxes

•	Check HTML tag nesting - Check this box if you want Validator to report potential nesting problems from such input as <H1>Validator <I>Released!</H1></I>. Here, the heading tag is closed before the italics tag is closed, even though the heading tag was opened first, resulting in a nesting error.

•	Check for high ASCII characters - Check this box if you want Validator to report high ASCII characters as warnings. HTML documents generally should not contain these characters. A high ASCII character is a character with an ASCII value of over 127. Note that this option checks the whole HTML document, even if there are sections in the document that are set to be ignored. If you want to display high ASCII characters in your documents, you should use character entities.

•	Include HTML document in output - Check this box if you want Validator to reproduce the HTML document that is being validated in the output file (with added line numbers for each line). Otherwise Validator will not reproduce the original HTML document in the output.

•	<!-- ... --> Strict comments - Check this box if you want Validator to generate error messages for comments not in the <!-- ... --> format. A comment such as <! Document modified 5/21/96 > will generate errors if this box is checked. It is recommended that you keep this box checked and use this type of comment in your documents.

•	Collapse <% ... %> in tags to 'ASP' - Check this box to replace any <% ... %> block occurring in a tag to 'ASP'. This minimizes the number of errors Validator generates due to using <% ... %> blocks in tags. This option has no effect if Ignore text in <% ... %> is not checked.

•	Allow spaces such as in < b > - Check this box to allow spaces immediately after the opening '<' character in a tag and immediately before the closing '>' character in a tag. With this option checked, tags such as <b > and < /b> will not generate warnings due to the spaces in the tags. v2.53

•	Allow spaces around '=' - Check this box if you want Validator to not generate warning messages for attributes that have spaces before or after the equal sign. For example, if this box is not checked, ALIGN = CENTER and ALIGN= CENTER will generate warning messages due to the spaces around the equal sign. If this box is checked, spaces around the equal sign do not generate validation warnings.

•	Allow multi-line quotes - Check this box if you want to be able to have parts of the same quoted string on more than one line. It is usually best to keep this box unchecked and to keep your complete quotes on a single line. This makes it easier to find errors when an opening or closing quotation mark is missing, which causes numerous errors to be generated.

•	Show validator comments - Check this box if you want Validator to add comments to the output file when a validation is completed. Depending on what happens during the validation, you may get no comments at all, or several. These comments may provide you with new, useful information. The comments are dependent on the kind of errors and warnings generated. It is recommended that you keep this option enabled and that you read any comments that are produced.

•	Messages at bottom - Check this box if you want the error, warning, and comment messages to be located at the bottom of the output file. Otherwise, if Include HTML document in output is checked, the messages will appear near the lines of the HTML source that they were generated for.

•	Require optional closing tags - Check this box if you want Validator to require that all tags having optional closing tags instead have required closing tags. For example, <P> has an optional closing tag if this option is unchecked. If this option is checked, errors will be generated if there is not a matching </P> closing tag for each <P> tag. This may be useful for educational purposes.

•	(first tag) can be anywhere - Check this box if you want any tags with (first tag) as the valid range to be valid anywhere. Otherwise if (first tag) is the only valid range for the tag, then it must be the first tag in the document (should be HTML). v2.53

•	Tag range always valid - Check this box to override range checking of tag names. If a tag name's category is active, the tag will always be in valid range. It is strongly recommended that you keep this option unchecked unless you have a good reason to enable it.

•	Allow double quote in text - Check this box if you do not want Validator to generate error messages when you use the double quotation mark in the text portion of HTML documents. If unchecked, Validator will generate errors when quotation marks are used where the character entity '&quot;' should be used instead.

•	Ignore text in <% ... %> - Check this box if you want Validator to ignore text (usually server side scripts for Microsoft IIS) between '<%' and '%>' strings.

•	Treat all quotes as equivalent - Check this box if you want Validator to treat single and double quotes as equivalent when they are used to enclose attribute values. This function will cause an attribute value that is enclosed in single quotes not to generate an error message if the HTML Configuration requires that the value must be enclosed in double quotes, because the single quotes are 'equivalent' to the double quotes. You may want to enable this option if your documents are written for 'modern' browsers that do not have problems with using single quotes.

•	Ignore all quotation requirements - Check this box if you want Validator to ignore all quotation requirements for attribute values. Validator will not generate error messages due to quoting or failing to quote any attribute values. It is recommended that you keep this option unchecked.

•	Enable extended messages - Check this box if you want to enable extended messages. Currently extended messages include displaying the actual valid and invalid range when a tag is out of range, displaying the valid attributes when an invalid attribute is used, and displaying the valid attribute values for an attribute when an invalid attribute value is used. Disabling extended messages simplify certain messages but also reduce the amount of information contained in them. By default, extended messages are enabled.


Logging Options

This is where you set up logging options and settings. Logging is useful if you want to drag your whole web site onto Validator and then find out which documents may contain problems without going through each individual validation report. Using the log (one file), you can quickly determine which documents need attention and which do not. Please note that if you keep logging enabled and do not occasionally delete the log file, the log file can become very large.

These options are available from "Log|Logging Options...".

Edit Boxes

•	Log reports to filename - Specify the filename with full path that is used to log the results of validations if logging has been enabled.

Check Boxes

•	Enable logging - If you want to turn on logging, check this box. The validation results of all HTML documents that are validated will be logged to this file.

•	Log error messages - Check this box if you want the log file to include the actual error messages that are generated by the validations.

•	Log warning messages - Check this box if you want the log file to include the actual warning messages that are generated by the validations.

•	Include HTML lines containing errors and/or warnings - Check this box if you want the log file to include the lines from an HTML document that generated an error or warning message. You must also check Log error messages or Log warning messages for the HTML lines to be logged because an HTML line is not logged if the corresponding warning or error message is not logged.


Tag Names Editor

This editor is available from the Tag Names tab of the HTML Configuration Editor. The HTML Configuration Editor is available from " Tools > Validator Options > HTML Configuration.

This editor allows you to add new tag names and reconfigure existing ones.

List Boxes

•	Tag names - This list box contains a list of tag names. Examples of tag names: P, A, TITLE, BODY, HTML, B, I, etc. See below for the buttons used to add and delete tag names to and from this list box.

•	(everywhere) - Any tag name with this assigned to its valid range will be valid anywhere in the document, regardless of any other ranges assigned.

•	(first tag) - Any tag name with this assigned to its valid range will be valid if it is the first tag name in the document, in addition to the other ranges assigned.

•	Tag range - Contains a list of tag names that specify where in the HTML document the tag name being configured may or may not appear. The tag name being configured may validly or invalidly appear as a tag between the opening tag of any tag listed in the Tag Range List Box and its closing tag. Priority is first given to built-in tag names (such as (everywhere) and (first tag)) then given to the most recently opened tag in the HTML document when calculating if the range of a tag is valid. To remove a tag name from this list box, select the tag name to remove and click the delete button (<-) or double click the tag name to remove. To add a tag name, select the tag name from the Tag Names List Box and click the add button (->) or double click the tag name to add. Use the Range View Radio Buttons to select whether the valid or invalid range is being viewed and/or edited. Note that if the valid and invalid ranges conflict, the range of the tag is unpredictable.

Combo Boxes

•	Tag Name Being Configured - Use this combo box to select a tag name to configure. The tag selected here is the tag whose configuration is being displayed and edited.

•	Tag Name Category - Use this combo box to select which tag category the tag name being configured belongs to.

Push Buttons

•	New Tag - Press this button to add a new tag name to the Tag Names List Box. The tag name that is added is the string contained in the edit box above the New Tag Button. Note that the tag may not contain spaces and will be changed to all uppercase characters. This does not mean the tag name must appear in uppercase to be valid when an HTML document is check. Tag names are not case sensitive.

•	Delete Tag - Press this button to delete the tag name selected in the Tag Names List Box. Built-in tag names cannot be deleted. Also note that if you delete a tag name, all other tag names that contain the deleted tag name in its range will no longer contain it.

Radio Buttons

•	Closing Tag - Use these buttons (No closing tag, Optional closing tag, and Required closing tag) to set the tag name being configured to require no closing tag, have an optional closing tag, or require a closing tag.

•	Range View - Use these three buttons to toggle the view in the Tag Range List Box. In order to change a range (add or delete a tag name from the Tag Range List Box), the correct view must be selected that corresponds to whether the valid range or invalid range is being edited.

Check Boxes

•	Ignore to closing tag - Check this box if you want Validator to ignore all text (comments, tags, and entities) between the tag being configured and its closing tag. You should set this only when the tag being configured requires a closing tag. Note that though ignored, the text is still read and parsed, therefore, mismatched quotation marks may prevent the closing tag from being found, as well as if the closing tag is in a comment. Note that ignored text is still checked for high ASCII characters, if high ASCII character checking is enabled.

•	Display message when used - Check this box if you want Validator to display the message in the Message When Used Edit Box when the tag being configured is used in an HTML document. This allows specific messages to be displayed to the user depending on the tags in the HTML document being validated. Note that even if a tag name with a displayable message is used multiple times, the message will display only for the first time the tag name is used. This avoids unnecessary repeats of the same message.


Program Editor

This editor is available from the Program tab of the HTML Configuration Editor. The HTML Configuration Editor is available from Tools > Validator Options > HTML Configuration.

The Program tab in the HTML Configuration Editor allows you to view and edit the program that is associated with the currently selected tag being configured. The program for a tag name is executed each time the tag name is used in a document that is being validated. These programs are also called tag name programs because they are generally run when a certain tag name is encountered in a document that is being validated.

General

•	Function and procedure names are case insensitive.

•	Integer expressions are computed from left to right, without regard to operator precedence.

•	Comments can be included in the program by beginning them with "/*" and ending them with "*/". For example: /* This is a comment */

Variable/Symbol Names

•	must be alphanumeric

•	must begin with an alphabetic character

•	setting variables in integer and string expressions is possible

•	To access a variable, use $name. The return value is a string if name is accessed in a string expression, or an integer if name is accessed in an integer expression. #name can also be used in an integer expression.

•	To increment an integer variable by one in an expression, use $name++, to decrement by one, use $name--. To increment an integer variable by one using a statement, use $name++;, to decrement by one, use $name--;. Note that using # instead of $ is also valid.

$name=string exp value;

Creates variable name (if it doesn't already exist), and sets its value to value. The return value is value and is a string.

#name=int exp value;

Creates variable name (if it doesn't already exist), and sets its value to value. The return value is value and is an integer.

Data Types

•	int - an integer such as -7, 0, 89, etc.

•	int exp - an expression that evaluates to an integer such as -7, 0, 89, 5+3, 56-34, 3*2, 6*(7-3), etc.; variable names and functions returning an int can be used

•	!int1 : returns 1 if int1 is 0, else returns 0

•	int1 + int2 : returns the sum of int1 and int2 (int1+int2)

•	int1 - int2 : returns int1-int2

•	int1 * int2 : returns int1*int2

•	int1 & int2 : returns the bitwise AND of int1 and int2

•	int1 | int2 : returns the bitwise OR of int1 and int2

•	int1 == int2 : returns 1 if int1 and int2 are equal, else returns 0; note the double equal signs

•	int1 && int2 : returns 1 if int1 and int2 are both nonzero, else returns 0

•	int1 || int2 : returns 1 if either or both int1 and int2 are nonzero, else returns 0

•	int1 >= int2 : returns 1 if int1 is greater than or equal to int2, else returns 0

•	int1 <= int2 : returns 1 if int1 is less than or equal to int2, else returns 0

•	int1 > int2 : returns 1 if int1 is greater than int2, else returns 0

•	int1 < int2 : returns 1 if int1 is less than int2, else returns 0

•	int1 <> int2 : returns 1 if int1 does not equal int2, else returns 0

•	int1 != int2 : returns 1 if int1 does not equal int2, else returns 0

•	float exp - similiar to an int expression but with floating point numbers instead of integers; should not be of much use for tag name programs

•	string exp : an expression that evaluates to a string

•	constant strings can be enclosed in double quotes (") or single quotes ('), such as "This is a string" or 'This is also a string'

•	string1 + string2 : concatenates string1 and string2, returns string1string2

Flow Control

do { statement; ... } while (int exp);

Executes a statement or statement block while the integer expression is true (nonzero). The statement or statement block is executed at least once.

if (int exp) { statement; ... } [else { statement; ... }]

Executes a statement block, depending on the value of the integer expression. Executes the statement block following if if the integer expression is nonzero, else executes the statement block following else if the integer expression is 0. The else part is optional.

for (statement1; int exp; statement2) { statement3; ... }

Executes statement1, then evaluates the integer expression. If the integer expression is nonzero, then statement3 is executed, otherwise control returns to the statement immediately following the block that contains statement3. If the statement3 block is executed, statement2 is executed immediately afterwards. The integer expression is then reevaluated and the loop continues until the integer expression evaluates to zero. statement1 and statement2 may be statement blocks.

For example, this loop continues while the integer expression is nonzero: execute statement1, evaluate integer expression, execute statement3 block, execute statement2, evaluate integer expression, execute statement3 block, execute statement2, evaluate integer expression, ...

while (int exp) { statement; ... }

Continues executing a statement block while the integer expression is true (nonzero).

Functions

int checkVersion(float exp version)

•	version - the minimum version of the validator required for the function to return 1

•	Returns 1 if using Validator version version or greater, else the function returns 0.

•	Use this to help make sure that the procedures and functions that are being used are valid for the version of Validator that is executing them.

int getAttIndex(string exp attribute)

•	attribute - the attribute in the tag to search for

•	Returns the index of the attribute. If the attribute does not exist, the function returns 0. For example, if the attribute exists and is the first attribute for the tag, the function returns 1.

location getAttLocation(int exp index)

•	Returns the location of the first character of an attribute of the tag, specified by index. The first attribute has an index of 1. An index of 0 returns the location of the first character of the tag name.

•	Generates an error if the attribute at the given index does not exist.

string getAttName(int exp index)

•	Returns an attribute of the tag, specified by index. The first attribute has an index of 1. An index of 0 returns the current tag name.

•	Generates an error if the attribute at the given index does not exist.

string getAttValue(int exp index)

•	Returns the attribute value of an attribute of the tag, specified by index. The first attribute value has an index of 1, and is the attribute value for the attribute that also has an index of 1. An index of 0 is the value attached to the tag name which generally should not exist.

•	Generates an error if the attribute at the given index does not exist, because if the attribute doesn't exist, it can't have a value.

location getAttValueLocation(int exp index)

•	Returns the location of the first character of an attribute value of an attribute of the tag. index is the index of the attribute whose value you want the location of. The first attribute has an index of 1.

•	Generates an error if the attribute at the given index does not exist or if index is 0 or less.

int getNumAttributes()

•	Returns the number of attributes for the current tag.

string getTagName()

•	Returns the current tag name that the validator is validating.

•	The tag name is returned as used in the document without any case conversion. For example, if <BoDy> is used in the document, getTagName() returns BoDy.

int hasEqual(int exp index)

•	Returns 1 if the attribute at index has an equal sign following it, otherwise returns zero.

int isCatActive(int exp category id)

•	category id - the id of the category to check

•	If the category is active, the function returns 1, else the function returns 0. The active categories are set in the HTML Configuration Editor.

int isDefined(string exp name)

•	name - the name of the variable

•	Returns 0 if the variable name has not been defined, else the function returns nonzero.

int isFlagSet(int exp flag)

•	flag - the tag name program flag to check

•	If the tag name program flag is set, the function returns 1, else the function returns 0. The tag name program flags are set in the Validator Options Dialog Box.

int isInRange(string exp tag name)

•	Returns a positive integer if the current tag is in the range of tag name, else the function returns 0. A tag name (called tag1) is in the range of another tag (called tag2) if tag2 has been opened but not closed before tag1.

int matchCase(string exp string, string exp str1[, string exp str2...])
int matchNoCase(string exp string, string exp str1[, string exp str2...])

•	These functions compare a string to a list of strings to see if string matches any of the strings in the list. If string does not match any strings, these functions will return 0, else the functions return 1 or greater. For instance, if string matches str1, the functions will return 1, if string matches str2, the functions will return 2, etc.

•	matchCase performs a case sensitive compare, matchNoCase performs a case insensitive compare

int strcmp(string exp string1, string exp string2)
int stricmp(string exp string1, string exp string2)
int strncmp(string exp string1, string exp string2, int exp length)
int strnicmp(string exp string1, string exp string2, int exp length)

•	These functions compare two strings and return a comparison value. The function returns a value of zero, less than zero, or greater than zero if string1 is equal to, less than, or greater than string2, respectively.

•	strcmp and strncmp perform a case sensitive compare

•	stricmp and strnicmp perfrom a case insensitive compare

•	functions with a length parameter only compare up to the first length characters

string toString(int exp convert)

•	convert - integer to convert to a string

Procedures

setClosed(int exp id);

•	id - the id of the tag name to mark as closed; this id is the id of the tag name in the document structure, not in the HTML Configuration

setValidated(int exp index, int exp what);

•	index - the index of the attribute and/or attribute value to set

•	what - what to set (specifies to set the attribute, the attribute value, or both)

•	SET_ATTRIBUTE - set the attribute to be valid so that no error messages are generated for the attribute

•	SET_ATTVALUE - set the attribute value to be valid so that no error messages are generated for the attribute value

•	To set both at the same time, use $SET_ATTRIBUTE+$SET_ATTVALUE.

unDefine(string exp name1[, string exp name2...]);

•	namex - the list of variable names to remove from memory

•	After this function is used on a variable, such as name1, isDefined(name1) will again return nonzero. Accesses to the variable name will fail because it will no longer exist.

•	If a variable name in the list is already undefined, then the function has no effect on the undefined variable name.

Combination Functions and Procedures

int requireAllAttributes(int exp display, string exp att1, string exp att2, ...);

•	display - if nonzero, a default error message is displayed if one of the listed attributes is not used, if zero (0), the default error message is not displayed

•	attx - an attribute

•	This function returns 0 if all of the listed attributes are used, or returns 1 or greater if one or more of the listed attributes are not used:

•	The function returns 1 or greater if one or more of the listed attributes are not used. For instance, 1 is returned if the first listed attribute is not used (att1), 2 if the second (att2), and so on. If more than one of the listed attributes is not used, the return value indicates the first attribute in the list that is not used.

•	If the return value is 1 or greater, and display is nonzero, then a standard error message will be generated stating that the tag requires all of the listed attributes.

int requireMutuallyExclusiveAttributes(int exp display, int exp returntype, string exp att1, string exp att2, ...);

•	display - if nonzero, a default error message is displayed if more than one of the listed attributes are used, if zero (0), the default error message is not displayed

•	attx - an attribute

•	This function returns -2 if none of the listed attributes are used, -1 if more than one of the listed attributes is used, and 1 or greater if exactly one of the listed attributes is used:

•	If returntype is RETURN_LISTINDEX, the function returns 1 or greater if exactly one of the listed attributes is used. For instance, 1 is returned if the first listed attribute is used (att1), 2 if the second (att2), and so on. If more than one attribute is used, the return value is -1.

•	If returntype is RETURN_ATTINDEX, the function returns 1 or greater if exactly one of the listed attributes is used. The return value is the index of the used attribute. If more than one attribute is used, the return value is -1.

•	If returntype is RETURN_NOTUSED, then the return value is undefined. Use this if you do not use the return value of this function.

•	If the return value is -1, and display is nonzero, then a standard error message will be generated stating that the tag requires listed attributes to be mutually exclusive.

int requireOneAttribute(int exp display, int exp returntype, string exp att1, string exp att2, ...);

•	display - if nonzero, a default error message is displayed if none of the attributes are used, if zero (0), the default error message is not displayed

•	attx - an attribute

•	This function returns -1 if none of the listed attributes are used, else the function returns 1 or greater:

•	If returntype is RETURN_LISTINDEX, the function returns 1 or greater if one or more of the listed attributes are used. For instance, 1 is returned if the first listed attribute is used (att1), 2 if the second (att2), and so on. If more than one attribute is used, the return value indicates the first attribute used in the list.

•	If returntype is RETURN_ATTINDEX, the function returns 1 or greater if one or more of the listed attributes are used. The return value is the index of the attribute. If more than one attribute is used, the return value is the index of the attribute that appears first in the list.

•	If returntype is RETURN_FIRSTATTINDEX, the function returns 1 or greater if one or more of the listed attributes are used. The return value is the index of the attribute that appears first in the tag and is anywhere in the list, and not necessarily the index of the attribute that is in the tag and appears first in the list.

•	If returntype is RETURN_NOTUSED, then the return value is undefined. Use this if you do not use the return value of this function.

•	If the return value is -1, and display is nonzero, then a standard error message will be generated stating that the tag requires at least one of the listed attributes.

int Message(int exp display, int exp messagetype, string exp message[, location exp location]);

•	display - if nonzero, the message is displayed; if zero (0), the message is not displayed

•	messagetype - the type of message to display

•	MSGBOX_INFORMATION - displays a standard windows information dialog box on the display; returns 1

•	MSGBOX_ERROR - displays a standard windows error dialog box on the display; returns 1

•	MSGBOX_WARNING - displays a standard windows warning dialog box on the display; returns 1

•	MSGBOX_YESNOQUESTION - displays a standard windows question dialog box on the display with Yes and No buttons; returns 1 if the user answers Yes or returns 0 if the user answers No

•	MSG_ERROR - adds an error message to the message output of the validator; returns 1

•	MSG_WARNING - adds a warning message to the message output of the validator; returns 1

•	MSG_COMMENT - adds a comment message to the message output of the validator; returns 1

•	MSG_MESSAGE - adds a general message to the message output of the validator; returns 1

•	message - the actual message string to display

•	location - (OPTIONAL) points to the location in the html document that caused the message to be generated; the default is the first character of the tag name; this parameter is not used if messagetype is a MSGBOX.

int setInt(string exp name, int exp value);

•	name - the name of the variable being created or changed; must follow the rules for variable names

•	value - the integer value to set the variable to

•	Returns value.

•	The variable name is created if it doesn't exist. If it already exists, the value of the variable becomes value.


Attributes Editor

This editor is available from the Attributes tab of the HTML Configuration Editor. The HTML Configuration Editor is available from Tools > Validator Options > HTML Configuration.

This editor allows you to add new attributes and reconfigure existing ones. It is also used to assign attributes to the attributes list of the tag name being configured.

List Boxes

•	Attributes - Contains a list of all possible attributes that can be assigned to tag names. See below for the buttons used to add and delete attributes to and from this list box.

•	(ignore all) - Any tag name with this built-in attribute assigned to its tag attributes will cause Validator to ignore all attributes and attribute values of that tag name, regardless of any other attributes assigned. If the tag name is considered valid, all of its attributes and attribute values are considered valid.

•	Tag attributes - Contains a list of tag attributes that are valid for the selected tag name being configured. To remove an attribute from the Tag Attributes List Box, select the attribute to remove and click the delete button (<-) or double click the attribute to remove. To add an attribute to the Tag Attributes List Box, select the attribute to add from the Attributes List Box and click the add button (->) or double click the attribute to add.

Combo Boxes

•	Tag Name Being Configured - Use this combo box to select a tag name to configure. The tag selected here is the tag whose configuration is being displayed and edited.

•	Attribute category - Use this combo box to select which tag category the selected attribute in the Attributes List Box belongs to. The attribute will only be valid when the selected category is an active category.

Push Buttons

•	New Attribute - Press this button to add a new attribute to the Attributes List Box. The attribute that is added is the string contained in the edit box above the New Attribute Button. Note that the attribute may not contain spaces and will be changed to all uppercase characters, unless the attribute being added contains a combination of uppercase and lowercase characters. This does not mean the attribute must appear in uppercase to be valid when an HTML document is check. Attributes are not case sensitive.

•	Delete Attribute - Press this button to delete the selected attribute or attribute group in the Attributes List Box. Built-in tag attributes cannot be deleted. Also note that if you delete an attribute, all tag names that are assigned the deleted attribute will no longer be assigned the attribute.

Check Boxes

•	Required attribute - Check this box if the selected attribute in the Attributes List Box must be used with any tag name assigned the selected attribute. An error will be generated if the attribute is not used when the tag name is used.

•	Warn if missing - Check this box if the selected attribute in the Attributes List Box "should" be used with any tag name assigned the selected attribute. A warning will be generated if the attribute is not used when the tag name is used. This option has no effect if Required attribute is checked.

•	Display message when used - Check this box if you want Validator to display the message in the Message When Used Edit Box when the selected attribute is used in an HTML document. This allows specific messages to be displayed to the user depending on the attributes used in the HTML document being validated.

•	Disp. msg when doesn't validate - Check this box if you want Validator to display the message in the Message When Doesn't Validate Edit Box when the selected attribute is used but has an invalid value. This allows specific messages to be displayed to the user depending on the attributes and attribute values in the HTML document being validated.


Attribute Groups

This editor is available from the Attribute Groups tab of the HTML Configuration Editor. The HTML Configuration Editor is available from Tools > Validator Options > HTML Configuration.

This is where you can add, edit, and delete attribute groups.  You can assign certain attributes to an attribute group, and then assign the group to tag names. This is an easy way to quickly assign multiple attributes to a tag name.

List Boxes

•	Attributes - Contains a list of all possible attributes that can be assigned to an attribute group. See below for the buttons used to add and delete attributes to and from this list box.

•	Attributes in group - Contains a list of attributes that are in the attribute group being configured. To remove an attribute from the Attributes In Group List Box, select the attribute to remove and click the delete button (<-) or double click the attribute to remove. To add an attribute to the Attributes In Group List Box, select an attribute from the Attributes List Box and click the add button (->) or double click the attribute to add.

Combo Boxes

•	Attribute Group Being Configured - Use this combo box to select which attribute group is being configured (edited).

Push Buttons

•	New Group - Press this button to add a new attribute group to the Attributes List Box. The attribute group that is added is the string contained in the edit box above the New Group Button. Parenthesis are automatically added around the group name to help distinguish attributes from attribute groups.

•	Delete Attribute - Press this button to delete the attribute or attribute group selected in the Attributes List Box. Built-in attributes cannot be deleted. Also note that if you delete an attribute, all tag names that are assigned the deleted attribute will no longer be assigned the attribute.

•	-> - Press this button to add the selected attribute in the Attributes List Box to the Attributes In Group List Box. Note that you may also double click an attribute in the Attributes List Box instead of pressing this button.

•	<- - Press this button to delete the selected attribute in the Attributes In Group List Box. Note that you may also double click an attribute in the Attributes In Group List Box instead of pressing this button.


Attribute Value Editor

This editor is available from the Attribute Values tab of the HTML Configuration Editor. The HTML Configuration Editor is available from Tools > Validator Options > HTML Configuration.

This is where you can add, edit, and delete attribute values. An attribute value is the value that appears following an attribute and an equal sign. For instance, in ALIGN=LEFT, ALIGN is the attribute and LEFT is the attribute value.

List Boxes

•	Attribute values - Contains a list of all available tag attribute values, including several built-in attribute values. See below for the buttons used to add and delete attribute values to and from this list box.

•	(16 color names) - Any attribute with this value assigned to it may equal one of 16 color names: aqua, black, blue, fuchsia, gray, green, lime, maroon, navy, olive, purple, red, silver, teal, white, and yellow.

•	(alphanum string) - Any attribute with this value assigned to it may equal an alphanumeric string. A period and dash or negative sign is also valid.

•	(CF six digit hex) - Any attribute with this value assigned to it may equal a number in the form ##xxxxxx where each x is 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, a, b, c, d, e, or f (case insensitive). This is for Cold Fusion support.

•	(Cold Fusion variable) - Any attribute with this value assigned to it may equal a string in the form #x# where x is an alphanumeric string that begins with an alphabetic character and may also contain periods and underscores.

•	(ignore value) - Any attribute with this value assigned to it may equal any value, including a zero length string of characters (but it must be quoted if zero length). The value ends at a space character or is a string enclosed in double-quotes.

•	(int offset -6 to +6) - Any attribute with this value assigned to it may equal -6, -5, -4, -3, -2, -1, -0, +0, +1, +2, +3, +4, +5, or +6.

•	(integer offset) - Any attribute with this value assigned to it may equal an integer offset such as +1, -9, +2, etc., where the sign of the number is mandatory and where +0 and -0 are not valid values.

•	(integers 1 to 7) - Any attribute with this value assigned to it may equal 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, or 7.

•	(neg integer) - Any attribute with this value assigned to it may equal a negative integer such as -1, -4, -89, etc. 0 is not a negative integer.

•	(Netscape color names) - Any attribute with this value assigned to it may equal one of the 140 color names supported by Netscape.

•	(no value) - Any attribute with this value assigned to it is considered valid if it has no value. That is, there is no '=VALUE' attached to the attribute.

•	(null string) - Any attribute with this value assigned to it is considered valid if it is equal to a NULL string. That is, an equal sign followed by two double quote marks with nothing between them.

•	(percent) - Any attribute with this value assigned to it may equal a percent such as 50%, 0%, 23%, etc., in the range 0% to 100% inclusive.

•	(pos integer) - Any attribute with this value assigned to it may equal a positive integer, but not a negative integer. Examples are 56, 23, and 782. 0 not a positive integer.

•	(relative width) - Any attribute with this value assigned to it may equal a value in the form i*, where i is a positive integer. A single "*" is also validated.

•	(single alphanum char) - Any attribute with this value assigned to it may equal a single alphanumeric character.

•	(single character) - Any attribute with this value assigned to it may equal a single character. The character does not have to be alphanumeric.

•	(six digit hex) - Any attribute with this value assigned to it may equal a number in the form #xxxxxx where each x is 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, a, b, c, d, e, or f (case insensitive).

•	(string) - Any attribute with this value assigned to it may equal a non-zero length string of characters. If the string is not enclosed in double-quotes, the string ends at a space character, otherwise the string is all the characters between two double-quotes. Note that assigning this value accepts a very large number values, especially if the string does not have to be double quoted.

•	(string 2) - Same as (string). With two strings, you can require that one require double quotes and another have optional quotes.

•	(string 3), (string 4) - Again, similar to (string), but you can assign different quotation requirements to each (string x).

•	(zero) - Any attribute with this value assigned to it may equal the integer value 0. 00, 000, 0000, etc., are also valid values.

•	Attribute's attribute values - Contains a list of attribute values that are assigned to the currently selected attribute. These are the attribute values that are considered valid values for the selected attribute when a document is validated. To remove an attribute value from the Attribute's Attribute Values List Box, select the attribute value to remove and click the delete button (<-) or double click the attribute value to remove. To add an attribute value to the Attribute's Attribute Values List Box, select an attribute value from the Attribute Values List Box and click the add button (->) or double click the attribute value to add.

Combo Boxes

•	Attribute value category - Use this combo box to select which tag category the selected attribute value belongs to.

Push Buttons

•	New Value - Press this button to add a new attribute value to the Attribute Values List Box. The attribute value that is added is the string contained in the edit box above the New Value Button.

•	Delete Value - Press this button to delete the attribute value selected in the Attribute Values List Box. Built-in attribute values cannot be deleted. Note that if you delete an attribute value, all attributes that have the deleted attribute value assigned to it will no longer have the deleted attribute value assigned to it.

•	-> - Press this button to add the selected attribute value in the Attribute Values List Box to the Attribute's Attribute Values List Box. Note that you may also double click an attribute value in the Attribute Values List Box instead of pressing this button.

•	<- - Press this button to delete the selected attribute value in the Attribute's Attribute Values List Box. Note that you may also double click an attribute value in the Attribute's Attribute Values List Box instead of pressing this button.

Radio Buttons

•	Allowable Quotation Buttons - These buttons affect the currently selected attribute value in the Attribute Values List Box. If the selected attribute value requires that it be enclosed in double quotation marks (i.e. ATTRIBUTE="ATTRIBUTEVALUE"), select Must be double quoted. Otherwise, select Cannot be quoted or May be double quoted, or another option, depending on the attribute value. You can now also select options for single quoted attribute values.

Check Boxes

•	Case sensitive - Check this box if the currently selected attribute value in the Attribute Values List Box is case sensitive. If this box is checked, then each character's case of the selected attribute value must match each character's case of the attribute value in the HTML document in order for it to be valid.


HTML Categories Editor

This editor is available from the Categories tab of the HTML Configuration Editor. The HTML Configuration Editor is available from Tools > Validator Options > HTML Configuration.

This is where you can add and delete tag categories. Each tag name, tag attribute, and tag attribute value may be assigned different tag categories. The tag category is used so that you can check HTML documents that conform to different "standards" of HTML tags. Validator includes a configuration that allows you to validate an HTML document based on HTML 3.2, Microsoft Internet Explorer, Netscape Navigator tags, and more.

List Boxes

•	Categories - Contains a list of categories that can currently be assigned to tag names, attributes, attribute values, and character entities. The built-in categories are enclosed in parenthesis and cannot be deleted. See below for the buttons used to add and delete tag names to and from this list box.

There are currently several categories for the included configuration file. When selecting what HTML category or categories you wish to be valid, you must remember that the HTML 2.0 category is used as a "foundation" for the others. That is, you should always have HTML 2.0 active regardless of any other categories you may or may not have active.

If you wish to use frames, add the category Frames.

If you wish to use tables, add the category HTML 3.2. It is mainly included to take advantage of tables which are currently available in many browsers. You should also be aware of the fact that just because the table tags and attributes you are using are in this category, it does not mean they will all work in a table capable browser.

For creating documents in Netscape Navigator or Microsoft Internet Explorer, choose the respective extensions category and make it active along with HTML 2.0, and any other categories you wish. For instance, you may want to have all categories active except for Microsoft IE Extensions when developing documents for Netscape Navigator. This will disable Microsoft specific tag names like <MARQUEE>. See the HTML Configuration Notes Tab for more information.

•	Active categories - Contains a list of categories that are assigned to tag names, attributes, attribute values, and character entities that are considered valid when Validator validates a document. Tag names, attributes, attribute values, and character entities not assigned to categories in this list box are not considered active (or valid) when a document is validated. To remove a category from the Active Categories List Box, select the category to remove and click the delete button (<-) or double click the category to remove it. To add a category to the list box, select a category to add from the Categories List Box and click the add button (->) or double click the category to add it.

Push Buttons

•	New Category - Press this button to add a new category to the Category List Box. The category that is added is the string contained in the edit box above the New Category Button.

•	Delete Category - Press this button to delete the category selected in the Categories List Box. Built-in categories cannot be deleted. Also note that if you delete a category, all tag names, attributes, and attribute values that are assigned to that category are reassigned to the built-in category "(undefined)".

•	-> - Press this button to add the selected category in the Categories List Box to the Active Categories List Box. Note that you may also double click a category in the Categories List Box instead of pressing this button.

•	<- - Press this button to delete the selected category in the Active Categories List Box. Note that you may also double click a category in the Active Categories List Box instead of pressing this button.


Character Entity Controls

This editor is available from the Entities tab of the HTML Configuration Editor. The HTML Configuration Editor is available from " Tools > Validator Options > HTML Configuration.

This is where you can add and delete character entities. Character entities are used to display special characters such as the less than and greater than characters that are used to contain tags (the hypertext markup). In addition, they are also used to display characters that are not available in the lower ASCII set, but are in the ISO-Latin-1 character set or other character set.

List Boxes

•	Character entities - Contains a list of all character entities, including "built-in entities" that validate all numeric character entities (such as &#34;) and certain groups of named entities. See below for the buttons used to add and delete character entities to and from this list box.

•	(HTML 2.0 entities) - Named entities valid for HTML 2.0 compliant documents. Included are the popular character entities &gt;, &lt;, &quot;, and many more.

•	(math, greek entities) - Named entities that include mostly math symbols and Greek letters.

•	(numeric entities) - An entity in the form "&#D;", where D is a decimal number in the range of 32-126 or 160 to 255 (inclusive). 16 bit Unicode numeric entities can also be validated with this built-in entity if enabled in the Validator Options. Hexadecimal entities in the form "&#xH;", where H is the hexadecimal value of the entity, can also be validated if enabled in the Validator Options.

•	(special entities) - Named miscellaneous entities.

The entities contained in the built-in named entity lists are displayed in the list boxes to the right of the Character Entities List Box. You can only view these entities.

Combo Boxes

•	Entity category - Use this combo box to select which tag category the selected character entity belongs to. You cannot change a built-in entity's category.

Push Buttons

•	New Entity - Press this button to add a new character entity to the Character Entities List Box. The character entity that is added is the string contained in the edit box above the New Entity Button. Do not include the ampersand (&) and semicolon (;). Character entities are case sensitive.

•	Delete Entity - Press this button to delete the character entity selected in the Character Entities List Box. Built-in character entities cannot be deleted.


Notes Editor

This editor is available from the Notes tab of the HTML Configuration Editor. The HTML Configuration Editor is available from Tools > Validator Options > HTML Configuration.

The Notes tab in the HTML Configuration Editor allows you to view and edit text information that is saved with the HTML Configuration. Here you can include helpful reference information about the HTML Configuration file that is currently loaded into Validator. Users can view this file for any important information about the specific HTML Configuration file that they are using.

Edit Boxes

•	User defined HTML Configuration version - This edit box lets you specify your own version number for the HTML Configuration file to help you keep track of the HTML Configuration files that you are using. With the included HTML Configuration file, it is also used with the update feature to make sure that you are using the latest HTML Configuration file. If you customize your own HTML Configuration file and do not want Validator asking you if you want to update the HTML Configuration file, enter a large number here, such as a number above 2000000. This will make Validator think that you are always using a later version of the HTML Configuration file than is available from AI Internet Solutions.


Tip of the Day

To have the Tip of the Day appear each time you open Linkbot:

1.	From the Help menu, select Tip of the Day.

2.	Place a check mark in Show Tips on Startup.


Tag Name Program

This is where you can control how tag name programs function.

Options

•	Enable programs - Check this box to enable the tag name program feature of  Validator. Disabling this feature will speed up validation but may significantly reduce the number of problems that are searched for in your validated documents. To obtain the best syntax checking possible, it is recommended that you leave this option enabled at all times, which is the default.

Program Flags

•	Flags 1-60 - Check and uncheck these flags to enable or disable tag name program flags that are used in tag name programs. This allows a tag name program to be written so that certain behaviors of the tag name program can be instantly changed by checking or unchecking a flag. For instance, tag name programs can be written to warn users about using tags that may only work in certain browsers. If you do not want to see these warnings, a tag name program can be written so that the warnings will not be generated if a certain flag is unchecked. In this case, you can easily enable or disable these warnings by unchecking the appropriate flag or flags. The default is all flags checked (set). For information about what these flags affect with the included HTML Configuration, please see HTML Configuration Overview .


HTML Configuration Overview

Validator includes an HTML Configuration that supports many different 'categories' of tags. Support for HTML 4.0, Netscape Extensions, Microsoft Internet Explorer extensions, Cold Fusion, and more is already included.

An important characteristic of the included HTML Configuration is that the categories of HTML are built upon one another. This means that if you want to validate against HTML 3.2, you must also make the category HTML 2.0 active, in addition to making the category HTML 3.2 active. If you want to validate against HTML 4.0, you must make the categories HTML 2.0, HTML 3.2, and HTML 4.0 active. You cannot make just the category HTML 4.0 active. This is because the category HTML 4.0 requires the category HTML 3.2 as its "foundation", and the category HTML 3.2 requires the category HTML 2.0 as its "foundation" .

To validate for Microsoft Internet Explorer (Microsoft IE), you will also need to make the categories HTML 2.0, HTML 3.2, and (for Internet Explorer 4.0 only) HTML 4.0 active as well as the category for the Microsoft IE Extensions you wish to use (either 3.0 or 4.0). If you make the Microsoft IE 4.0 Extensions category active, you must also make the Microsoft IE 3.0 Extensions category active.

A similar situation applies for Netscape Extensions. You will have to select the Netscape Extension category that you wish to validate against, as well as HTML 2.0, HTML 3.2, and other "foundation" categories that Netscape supports.

The WebTV category requires at least the HTML, Microsoft IE Extensions, Netscape Extensions, and Tables categories active for full support.

The SMIL category only requires the Element Identifiers category active if you will use the ID attribute. Other categories may be deactivated. The tag name program for the SMIL tag automatically disables most categories, so you don't have to disable any categories for SMIL syntax checking.

The default is for all categories to be active. It is recommended that you leave all categories active.

Notes

•	The Dynamic HTML and Scripting & Applets categories should normally be made active or inactive together.

•	The Obsolete category contains tags such as LISTING, NOTE, PLAINTEXT and XMP.

•	The Miscellaneous category contains tags such as NEXTID, and the MSIMAGELIST, NATURALSIZEFLAG, and NOSAVE attributes.

•	The General category contains the CSEIGNORE tag. Use the CSEIGNORE tag to surround tags that you want Validator to ignore during a validation.

Validator Flags

The tag name programs in the included HTML Configuration may act differently depending on what validator flags are set. This allows you to further customize the behavior and validation of Validator. Listed below are the effects that having certain flags set will cause to documents being validated with the included HTML Configuration. Setting a flag usually causes certain messages, warnings, and/or errors to be enabled for display. Most of these messages, warnings, and errors begin with "[x]" where x is the validator flag that can be unchecked or checked in order to disable or enable the message, respectively. This lets you easily determine which flag you need to disable if you see a message that you do not want to be displayed during a validation. However, remember that when you disable a flag, you may be disabling multiple messages. Therefore, to determine most or all of the effects of disabling a specific flag, you can use the following information.

Note that flags that are not listed are probably not used, depending on what HTML Configuration you are using. Flags not listed will likely be used in future HTML Configurations. If you are using a newer HTML Configuration, then some flags may be used that are not documented here. If you are using an older HTML Configuration, then some flags documented may not be actually used. The effects of some flags may also differ according to the version of Validator that you are using. For example, flag 14 has no effect for versions prior to 3.9.

Flag 1 (Internet Explorer specific messages)

•	If ACRONYM is used, displays a message indicating that ACRONYM is Internet Explorer specific.

•	If BGSOUND is used, displays a message indicating that BGSOUND is Internet Explorer specific.

•	If the BGPROPERTIES attribute is used with the BODY element, displays a message indicating that it is Internet Explorer specific.

•	If the LEFTMARGIN and/or TOPMARGIN attributes are used with the BODY element, displays a message that it is Internet Explorer specific.

•	If BUTTON is used, displays a message indicating that BUTTON is Internet Explorer specific.

•	If the VALIGN attribute is used with the CAPTION element, displays a message indicating that it is Internet Explorer specific.

•	If COL or COLGROUP is used, displays a message indicating that it is Internet Explorer specific.

•	If COMMENT is used, displays a message indicating that COMMENT is Internet Explorer and Mosaic specific.

•	If DEL is used, displays a message indicating that DEL is Internet Explorer specific.

•	If DFN is used, displays a message indicating that DFN is Internet Explorer specific.

•	If FIELDSET is used, displays a message indicating that FIELDSET is Internet Explorer specific.

•	If the COLOR attribute is used with the HR element, displays a message indicating that it is Internet Explorer specific.

•	If IFRAME is used, displays a message indicating that IFRAME is Internet Explorer specific.

•	If the CONTROLS, DYNSRC, LOOP, LOOPDELAY, START, and/or VRML attributes are used with the IMG element, displays a message indicating that the attributes are Internet Explorer specific and may be removed in future versions.

•	If INS is used, displays a message indicating that INS is Internet Explorer specific.

•	If LABEL is used, displays a message indicating that LABEL is Internet Explorer specific.

•	If LEGEND is used, displays a message indicating that LEGEND is Internet Explorer specific.

•	If MARQUEE is used, displays a message indicating that MARQUEE is Internet Explorer and WebTV specific.

•	If OBJECT is used, displays a message indicating that OBJECT is Internet Explorer specific.

•	If Q is used, displays a message indicating that Q is Internet Explorer specific.

•	If the BORDERCOLOR, BORDERCOLORDARK, BORDERCOLORLIGHT, FRAME, and/or RULES attributes are used with the TABLE element, displays a message indicating that it is Internet Explorer specific.

•	If the BORDERCOLOR, BORDERCOLORDARK, and/or BORDERCOLORLIGHT attributes are used with a TD, TH, or TR element, displays a message indicating that it is Internet Explorer specific.

•	If TBODY, THEAD, or TFOOT is used, displays a message indicating that it is Internet Explorer specific.

Flag 2 (Netscape specific messages)

•	If the ARCHIVE attribute is used with the APPLET element, displays a message indicating that ARCHIVE is Netscape specific.

•	If the COLOR attribute is used with the BASEFONT element, displays a message indicating that it is Netscape specific.

•	If BLINK is used, displays a message indicating that it is Netscape specific.

•	If the MARGINHEIGHT or MARGINWIDTH attribute is used with the BODY element, displays a message that it is Netscape specific.

•	If the POINT-SIZE or WEIGHT attribute is used with the FONT element, displays a message indicating that it is Netscape specific.

•	If ILAYER is used, displays a message indicating that ILAYER is Netscape specific.

•	If KEYGEN is used, displays a message indicating that KEYGEN is Netscape specific.

•	If LAYER is used, displays a message indicating that LAYER is Netscape specific.

•	If MULTICOL is used, displays a message indicating that MULTICOL is Netscape specific.

•	If SPACER is used, displays a message indicating that SPACER is Netscape and WebTV specific.

•	If the BACKGROUND attribute is used with the TR element, displays a message indicating that BACKGROUND is Netscape specific.

Flag 3 (Deprecation messages)

•	If APPLET is used, displays a message indicating that APPLET is deprecated in favor of the OBJECT element.

•	If DIR is used, displays a message indicating that DIR is deprecated in favor of a UL list.

•	If the VERSION attribute is used with the HTML element, displays a message indicating that it is deprecated.

•	If ISINDEX is used, displays a message indicating that ISINDEX is deprecated in favor of an INPUT element.

•	If MENU is used, displays a message indicating that MENU is deprecated in favor of a UL list.

Flag 4 (Obsolete messages)

•	If BQ is used, displays a message indicating that BQ is obsolete in favor of BLOCKQUOTE.

•	If COMMENT is used, displays a message indicating that COMMENT is obsolete and is Internet Explorer and Mosaic specific, and that <!-- --> should be used instead.

•	If FN is used, displays a message indicating that FN is obsolete.

•	If LISTING is used, displays a message indicating that LISTING is obsolete in favor of PRE.

•	If NEXTID is used, displays a message indicating that its use is not recommended.

•	If NOTE is used, displays a message indicating that NOTE is obsolete.

•	If PLAINTEXT is used, displays a message indicating that PLAINTEXT is obsolete in favor of PRE.

•	If XMP is used, displays a message indicating that XMP is obsolete in favor of PRE.

Flag 5 (General compatibility messages)

•	If TYPE=FILE is used with the INPUT element, displays a message indicating that it is only supported by Internet Explorer 4.0 and above and Netscape 3.0 and above.

•	If NOBR is used, displays a message indicating that it is only supported by Internet Explorer and Netscape.

•	If PALETTE is used with the EMBED element, displays a messages indicating that it only has an effect on the Windows platform.

•	If SOUND is used, displays a message indicating that it is only supported by Mosaic.

•	If STYLE is used, displays a message indicating that it is only supported by Internet Explorer 3.0 and above and Netscape 4.0 and above.

•	If the BACKGROUND attribute is used with TD, displays a message indicating that it is supported by Internet Explorer 3.0+ and Netscape 4.0+ and may not work with other browsers.

•	If WRAP is used with the TEXTAREA element, displays a messages indicating that it is only supported by Internet Explorer 4.0+ and Netscape 3.0+. Also included is information about the values that WRAP can take with regards to the 4.0+ browsers.

•	If WBR is used, displays a message indicating that it is only supported by Internet Explorer and Netscape.

•	If a mailto link is used in an HREF attribute for an A tag and includes extra information (such as a subject or body), displays a message indicating that this may cause a user to have problems when trying to send email with software that does not support extra information in a mailto link.

Flag 6 (Helpful tip messages)

•	creating borderless frames

•	using the TEXTAREA element instead of TYPE=TEXTAREA with an INPUT element

•	using EMBED to substitute for BGSOUND

•	If TOPMARGIN is used in BODY, suggests that you may also need to use MARGINHEIGHT to create the effect that you want in Netscape.

•	If LEFTMARGIN is used in BODY, suggests that you may also need to use MARGINWIDTH to create the effect that you want in Netscape.

•	If MARGINHEIGHT is used in BODY, suggests that you may also need to use TOPMARGIN to create the effect that you want in Internet Explorer.

•	If MARGINWIDTH is used in BODY, suggests that you may also need to use LEFTMARGIN to create the effect that you want in Internet Explorer.

Flag 7 (Style messages)

•	Displays a message when skipping heading levels (for example, using H4 before using H1, H2, and H3); however, allows the first heading to be any level without displaying an out of order message.

•	Displays a message when an HTML document does not contain a HEAD section or if the HEAD section does not contain a TITLE element.

•	If APPLET is used without the ALT attribute, displays a message that ALT should be used.

•	If BGPROPERTIES=FIXED is used with the BODY element, displays a message stating that it is considered to be bad style and to be annoying.

•	If BLINK is used, displays a message stating that some consider using BLINK to be bad style and to be annoying.

•	If IMAGE is used without all of the following attributes: ALT, HEIGHT, WIDTH, displays a message that these attributes should all be used.

•	If MARQUEE is used without the HEIGHT attribute, displays a message that it should be used.

•	If OBJECT is used without the ALT attribute, displays a message that ALT should be used.

Flag 8 (Search engine messages)

•	If a META DESCRIPTION tag is not used, displays a comment recommending that it be used.

•	If a META KEYWORDS tag is not used, displays a comment recommending that it be used.

•	If <META HTTP-EQUIV="refresh" ... >' is used, displays a message stating that search engines may penalize sites that use refresh.

Flag 9 (more deprecation messages)

These are deprecation messages for certain HTML 4.0 deprecated tags and attributes that are still considered to be in high use or still useful. Many may want to uncheck this flag.

•	Displays a deprecation message for the following tags: BASEFONT, CENTER, FONT, S, U

Flag 10

•	Displays a comment about how you can disable certain messages by unchecking validator flags. You will probably want to disable this message by unchecking flag 10. The reason for this message is to make you aware of how easy it is to disable messages that you may not want to see.

Flag 11

•	Enables sound, such as playing a sound if there are any errors or warnings. Also plays a different sound if there are no errors or warnings. Uncheck this flag if you want to disable these sounds for any reason.

Flag 12

•	When unchecked, does not change the priority of Validator before validating a document. This means that Validator usually runs at normal priority. When checked, the priority will be set to low before each validation if Validator believes that it is best that it should work in the background (for instance, when Validator is run from command line parameters). This will more easily allow you to do work with other applications while Validator processes documents in the background.

Flag 13

Some users may want to uncheck this flag. However, it is recommended that you use ALT for IMG and AREA elements and that you leave this flag checked.

•	If the HTML 4.0 category is active, displays a warning when ALT is not used with an IMG elements.

•	If the HTML 4.0 category is active, displays a warning when ALT is not used with an AREA element.

Flag 14

•	When the validator is generating an easily parsable output file and this flag is set, displays a status comment containing information such as the number of tag names, comments, entities, etc.

Flag 15

•	If a PICS-Label is not present in a META tag in the HEAD section of a document, displays a message about PICS-Labels and RSACi.

Flag 16

•	Displays an error message that HTML 4.0 requires the TYPE attribute for the script element when TYPE is missing. This flag lets you disable this message because current browsers may have problems with this attribute or do not use it.

Flag 17

•	Displays a comment message when tables may be too deeply nested and cause a problem.

Flag 18

•	Displays a warning message if LI is used outside of a UL, OL, DIR, or MENU section.

Flag 19

•	Displays a comment if NATURALSIZEFLAG is used in the document (usually added by Adobe PageMill).

•	Displays a comment if MSIMAGELIST is used in the document (usually added by Microsoft FrontPage 2000).

Flag 20 (SMIL style messages)

•	Displays a message if the TITLE attribute is not used with a SMIL element where its use is recommended.

Flag 21 (WebTV specific messages)

•	If the SELECTED attribute is used with the A element, displays a message indicating that it is WebTV specific.

•	If AUDIOSCOPE is used, displays a message indicating that AUDIOSCOPE is WebTV specific.

•	If BLACKFACE is used, displays a message indicating that BLACKFACE is WebTV specific.

•	If the CREDITS, INSTRUCTIONS, and/or LOGO attributes are used with the BODY element, displays a message that it is WebTV specific.

•	If the EFFECT and/or TRANSPARENCY attributes are used with the FONT element, displays a message that it is WebTV specific.

•	If the INVERTBORDER attribute is used with the HR element, displays a message indicating that it is WebTV specific.

•	If the SELECTED and/or TRANSPARENCY attributes are used with the IMG element, displays a message that it is WebTV specific.

•	If the BGCOLOR, CURSOR, and/or USESTYLE attributes are used with the INPUT or TEXTAREA elements, displays a message that it is WebTV specific.

•	If MARQUEE is used, displays a message indicating that MARQUEE is Internet Explorer and WebTV specific.

•	If the AUTOACTIVATE, BGCOLOR, SELCOLOR, TEXT, and/or USESTYLE attributes are used with the SELECT element, displays a message that it is WebTV specific.

•	If SPACER is used, displays a message indicating that SPACER is Netscape and WebTV specific.

•	If the GRADANGLE, GRADCOLOR, and/or TRANSPARENCY attributes are used with the TABLE, TD, or TH element, displays a message that it is WebTV specific.

•	If the TRANSPARENCY attribute is used with the TR element, displays a message indicating that it is WebTV specific.

Flag 22

•	Displays a warning when the ALIGN attribute is used without the WIDTH attribute in an HR element.

Flag 23 (WebTV Comments)

•	Displays a comment about optimizations when the TRANSPARENCY attribute is set to 50, if the TRANSPARENCY attribute is used.

Flag 24

•	Displays a message if the tag HTML is used without a DOCTYPE (prologue identifier).

Notes

•	If you want to disable all tag name program functionality (not recommended), you can uncheck the Enable programs validator engine option. This will cause any messages (such as the above messages) generated by a tag name program to not be displayed. It will also speed up the validation engine. However, disabling the tag name programs may significantly reduce the effectiveness of the validation. The tag name program feature is considered to be a powerful feature of Validator Professional, and therefore should not be disabled.

•	If you want to disable a tag name program for a specific tag name, you can use the Programs Tab in the HTML Configuration Editor to select the tag name with the program you wish to disable and then uncheck the Enable open program for tag or Enable close program for tag option.