Chapter 16. Working with Library Items
IN THIS CHAPTER
One of the challenges facing web developers is that of repeating content on their websites. Navigation menus, company logos, copyright notices, and so on are all pieces of functionality consistently applied across an entire site, yet until now, there's been no central interface for globalizing that content to prevent the tedious task of opening every page and making the same change across every page. Enter library items and server-side includes. Library items provide a way to create the functionality once and then share that functionality across multiple pages on your site. When the time comes to make updates, you make the change once in the central library item file, save your work, update your site, and changes instantly trickle down to the files in your site that use the library item.
In this chapter, we'll examine the power and importance of library items in your site. We'll discuss the fundamental differences and similarities between library items and templates and, of course, provide an example as it relates to the Dorknozzle project. In addition, you'll learn to use server-side includes. Server-side includes, otherwise known as SSIs, are another method for globalizing content within your websites and also allow you to display information directly from the server.
As you have done for the rest of the chapters in this book, you can work with the examples in this chapter by downloading the files from www.dreamweaverunleashed.com. You'll want to save the files for Chapter 16 in an easy-to-find location. I'll place mine in C:\Dorknozzle\Chapter16.
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