why do ssi includes not display?

I have a range of pages that use ssi includes containing menu / navigation that
only work intermittently. All my files are on the inetpub/webpub root folder,
called shtml and .ssi for the pages and the includes respectively, My problem
with Dreamweaver is as folllows:

When I open 'site files' , click on a file and press F12 to preview the page
the includes do not appear??
But if I open 'site files' , double-click on a file to open it, and press F12
to preview the page the SSIs do appear!
Then when I navigate from this correctly functioning page to a different page
the SSIs fail to appear again??

It's impossible to test a site properly if Dreamweaver can't handle SSIs
consistently, how can I ensure Dreamweaver includes SSIs correctly every time?

EdMX,

There are a couple issues here.

I have a range of pages that use ssi includes containing
menu / navigation that only work intermittently. All my
files are on the inetpub/webpub root folder, called shtml
and .ssi for the pages and the includes respectively,
My problem with Dreamweaver is as follows:

When I open 'site files' , click on a file and press F12
to preview the page the includes do not appear??

There is a known bug where SSIs are not translated in temp file on
Preview in Browser from Files Panel context menu when the page is not
open, so you'll just have to remember to avoid this case.

But if I open 'site files' , double-click on a file to open
it, and press F12 to preview the page the SSIs do appear!
Then when I navigate from this correctly functioning page
to a different page the SSIs fail to appear again??

If you are you "temp" files with PIB, DW will copy the contents of SSIs
to the current file, and maintain links to your other files, but will
not copy SSIs the other files. If you are using PIB of actual (i.e. not
"temp") files, then you'll need to manually upload your include files to
your remote server.

It's impossible to test a site properly if Dreamweaver can't
handle SSIs consistently, how can I ensure Dreamweaver
includes SSIs correctly every time?

To see all SSIs in all files, you'll need to upload all of your include
files to your remote server and turn off "temp" files for PIB, or view
the live site.


HTH,
Randy

Very informative Randy, Thanks