Confusion with Check In/Out

I've always been the sole person updating websites using Dreamweaver, so I've
never used the check in/out feature. I now need to set up a site for
collaborative work. I read up on this feature in "Dreamweaver: The Missing
Manual" so I believe I understand how it works. However, I have a couple of
questions about it and how it works with the Notes feature.

First, when you are the sole site developer, the local site has the most
recent version of the files. When they are ready to go live, you simply upload
them to the live (remote) site. In a collaborative environment, the remote site
has the most recent versions and the developers check the files out to work on
them. They should get (but not check out) some or all of the other site pages
if they need them to make the checked out file work locally (e.g., CSS files).
When the developer is finished with a file, he/she checks it in and the file is
now live.

What happens, then, if a file is not ready to be live, but it needs input from
the other developers. The book describes using the Notes feature to instruct
other developers what needs to be done on the web page (e.g., "Frank, please
add a picture between paragraphs 2 and 3" or "This page needs to be copy
edited"). OK, but in order to get the changed file to Frank, the unfinished
not-ready-for-prime-time file gets checked back in to the remote site and is
live. Isn't this a big problem? I was actually just looking at a site that had
a live page with "Add content here" on it.

It seems to me that in order to make this work without embarrassing files
going live that you'd need to have three sites. There would be a staging site
where the developers would check the files in and out to a site on their own
PCs -- then check back in to the staging site where other developers could
check the file out if needed. That site would be tested to make sure all was
ready, then it would be uploaded to the live, remote site.

I'm not seeing a way to do this in Dreamweaver. Am I not understanding the
problem correctly? I would appreciate any information from people with
experience in this.

Second, if this actually is an unsolvable problem, is it better to instead use
Subversion or some other form of content management system to update a local
site (say, on a local network) and then just "put" the files on the remote site?

Thanks for your help.

What happens, then, if a file is not ready to be live, but it needs input
from
the other developers. The book describes using the Notes feature to
instruct
other developers what needs to be done on the web page (e.g., "Frank,
please
add a picture between paragraphs 2 and 3" or "This page needs to be copy
edited"). OK, but in order to get the changed file to Frank, the
unfinished
not-ready-for-prime-time file gets checked back in to the remote site and
is
live. Isn't this a big problem?

Yes, it would be. And your analysis of the problem, and your solution are
exactly right.

One person on the team would have to have a second site definition, with the
local site at the staging server, and the remote site at the live server.
Only publish files to the live server from this site. All other
contributors only have the first site definition.

is it better to instead use
Subversion or some other form of content management system to update a
local
site (say, on a local network) and then just "put" the files on the remote
site?

Any product like Subversion is going to be MUCH more robust than CI/CO,
which is pretty rudimentary. All it takes is for one person to not follow
the process and you are in the muck....

--
Murray --- ICQ 71997575
Adobe Community Expert
(If you *MUST* email me, don't LAUGH when you do so!)
==================
http://www.projectseven.com/go - DW FAQs, Tutorials & Resources
http://www.dwfaq.com - DW FAQs, Tutorials & Resources
==================


"Baische" <webforumsuser (AT) macromedia (DOT) com> wrote

I've always been the sole person updating websites using Dreamweaver, so
I've
never used the check in/out feature. I now need to set up a site for
collaborative work. I read up on this feature in "Dreamweaver: The Missing
Manual" so I believe I understand how it works. However, I have a couple
of
questions about it and how it works with the Notes feature.

First, when you are the sole site developer, the local site has the most
recent version of the files. When they are ready to go live, you simply
upload
them to the live (remote) site. In a collaborative environment, the remote
site
has the most recent versions and the developers check the files out to
work on
them. They should get (but not check out) some or all of the other site
pages
if they need them to make the checked out file work locally (e.g., CSS
files).
When the developer is finished with a file, he/she checks it in and the
file is
now live.

What happens, then, if a file is not ready to be live, but it needs input
from
the other developers. The book describes using the Notes feature to
instruct
other developers what needs to be done on the web page (e.g., "Frank,
please
add a picture between paragraphs 2 and 3" or "This page needs to be copy
edited"). OK, but in order to get the changed file to Frank, the
unfinished
not-ready-for-prime-time file gets checked back in to the remote site and
is
live. Isn't this a big problem? I was actually just looking at a site that
had
a live page with "Add content here" on it.

It seems to me that in order to make this work without embarrassing files
going live that you'd need to have three sites. There would be a staging
site
where the developers would check the files in and out to a site on their
own
PCs -- then check back in to the staging site where other developers could
check the file out if needed. That site would be tested to make sure all
was
ready, then it would be uploaded to the live, remote site.

I'm not seeing a way to do this in Dreamweaver. Am I not understanding the
problem correctly? I would appreciate any information from people with
experience in this.

Second, if this actually is an unsolvable problem, is it better to instead
use
Subversion or some other form of content management system to update a
local
site (say, on a local network) and then just "put" the files on the remote
site?

Thanks for your help.

you could always create a "hidden" directory onthe server, and put your
working copies there (with no incoming links). Security through obscurity
sucks, but sometimes is a usefull workaround.
For the record, dreamweaver does a really crappy version of code
control/check in/out. there are much better shareware tools, and commercial
code control is amaizing stuff...
-J





"Murray *ACE*" <forums (AT) HAHAgreat-web-sights (DOT) com> wrote

What happens, then, if a file is not ready to be live, but it needs input
from
the other developers. The book describes using the Notes feature to
instruct
other developers what needs to be done on the web page (e.g., "Frank,
please
add a picture between paragraphs 2 and 3" or "This page needs to be copy
edited"). OK, but in order to get the changed file to Frank, the
unfinished
not-ready-for-prime-time file gets checked back in to the remote site and
is
live. Isn't this a big problem?

Yes, it would be. And your analysis of the problem, and your solution are
exactly right.

One person on the team would have to have a second site definition, with
the local site at the staging server, and the remote site at the live
server. Only publish files to the live server from this site. All other
contributors only have the first site definition.

is it better to instead use
Subversion or some other form of content management system to update a
local
site (say, on a local network) and then just "put" the files on the
remote site?

Any product like Subversion is going to be MUCH more robust than CI/CO,
which is pretty rudimentary. All it takes is for one person to not follow
the process and you are in the muck....

--
Murray --- ICQ 71997575
Adobe Community Expert
(If you *MUST* email me, don't LAUGH when you do so!)
==================
http://www.projectseven.com/go - DW FAQs, Tutorials & Resources
http://www.dwfaq.com - DW FAQs, Tutorials & Resources
==================


"Baische" <webforumsuser (AT) macromedia (DOT) com> wrote in message
news:gb19n0$la3$1 (AT) forums (DOT) macromedia.com...
I've always been the sole person updating websites using Dreamweaver, so
I've
never used the check in/out feature. I now need to set up a site for
collaborative work. I read up on this feature in "Dreamweaver: The
Missing
Manual" so I believe I understand how it works. However, I have a couple
of
questions about it and how it works with the Notes feature.

First, when you are the sole site developer, the local site has the most
recent version of the files. When they are ready to go live, you simply
upload
them to the live (remote) site. In a collaborative environment, the
remote site
has the most recent versions and the developers check the files out to
work on
them. They should get (but not check out) some or all of the other site
pages
if they need them to make the checked out file work locally (e.g., CSS
files).
When the developer is finished with a file, he/she checks it in and the
file is
now live.

What happens, then, if a file is not ready to be live, but it needs input
from
the other developers. The book describes using the Notes feature to
instruct
other developers what needs to be done on the web page (e.g., "Frank,
please
add a picture between paragraphs 2 and 3" or "This page needs to be copy
edited"). OK, but in order to get the changed file to Frank, the
unfinished
not-ready-for-prime-time file gets checked back in to the remote site and
is
live. Isn't this a big problem? I was actually just looking at a site
that had
a live page with "Add content here" on it.

It seems to me that in order to make this work without embarrassing files
going live that you'd need to have three sites. There would be a staging
site
where the developers would check the files in and out to a site on their
own
PCs -- then check back in to the staging site where other developers
could
check the file out if needed. That site would be tested to make sure all
was
ready, then it would be uploaded to the live, remote site.

I'm not seeing a way to do this in Dreamweaver. Am I not understanding
the
problem correctly? I would appreciate any information from people with
experience in this.

Second, if this actually is an unsolvable problem, is it better to
instead use
Subversion or some other form of content management system to update a
local
site (say, on a local network) and then just "put" the files on the
remote site?

Thanks for your help.

Thank you for the information, Murray -- that makes a lot of sense.

In order to use Subversion effectively with Dreamweaver, do I need to use SVN
for Dreamweaver?

http://www.dreamweaver-extensions.ne...r--Windows-and
-Macintosh/

I believe (I don't use Subversion) that CS3 includes native support for
Subversion.

--
Murray --- ICQ 71997575
Adobe Community Expert
(If you *MUST* email me, don't LAUGH when you do so!)
==================
http://www.projectseven.com/go - DW FAQs, Tutorials & Resources
http://www.dwfaq.com - DW FAQs, Tutorials & Resources
==================


"Baische" <webforumsuser (AT) macromedia (DOT) com> wrote

Thank you for the information, Murray -- that makes a lot of sense.

In order to use Subversion effectively with Dreamweaver, do I need to use
SVN
for Dreamweaver?

http://www.dreamweaver-extensions.ne...r--Windows-and
-Macintosh/