Is CSS used for this?

Hi everyone I am new here but was searching the web for some help. I am currently building a web site at www.commentyuwie.com this issue I am running into is the left hand link menu. This will be changing from time to time. Currently the page is built in html only which means if i add a link to the menu i have to go into every html page could be 100 pages soon and add the link in. There has to be a better way. My thinking is CSS however I have no idea how they work or how to set one up. Would anyone be able to assist me in this or perhaps you have a better suggestion then using CSS?
Thanks!
Sean

 

seeing as this is 2 columns just use this

<?php include ("left_column.php")
?>

Open notepad copy and paste this (Also, delete this code from the html files **)

<p><img src="images/comment.jpg" width="150" height="30"><br>
          <font color="#990000" size="3" face="Trebuchet MS">&gt; <a href="http://www.commentyuwie.com/pages/welcome.html">Welcome</a><br>
          &gt; <a href="http://www.commentyuwie.com/pages/thanksadd.html">Thanks 
          For Add</a><br>
          &gt; <a href="http://www.commentyuwie.com/pages/moneytags.html">Money 
          Tags</a></font></p>

        <p><font color="#990000" size="3" face="Trebuchet MS"><img src="images/days.jpg" width="150" height="30"><br>
          &gt; <a href="http://www.commentyuwie.com/pages/monday.html">Monday</a><br>
          &gt; <a href="http://www.commentyuwie.com/pages/tuesday.html">Tuesday</a><br>
          &gt; <a href="http://www.commentyuwie.com/pages/wendsday.html">Wendsday</a><br>
          &gt; <a href="http://www.commentyuwie.com/pages/thursday.html">Thursday</a><br>

          &gt; <a href="http://www.commentyuwie.com/pages/friday.html">Friday</a><br>
          &gt; <a href="http://www.commentyuwie.com/pages/saturday.html">Saturday</a><br>
          &gt; <a href="http://www.commentyuwie.com/pages/sunday.html">Sunday</a></font></p>
        <p><font color="#990000" size="3" face="Trebuchet MS"><img src="images/holidays.jpg" width="150" height="30"><br>
          &gt; <a href="http://www.commentyuwie.com/pages/fathersday.html">Father's 
          Day</a><br>

          &gt;<a href="http://www.commentyuwie.com/pages/mothersday.html"> Mother's 
          Day</a><br>
          &gt; <a href="http://www.commentyuwie.com/pages/easter.html">Easter</a><br>
          &gt; <a href="http://www.commentyuwie.com/pages/aprilfools.html">April 
          Fools</a><br>
          &gt; <a href="http://www.commentyuwie.com/pages/stpat.html">St. Patrick's 
          Day</a><br>
          &gt; <a href="http://www.commentyuwie.com/pages/vday.html">Valentine's 
          Day</a><br>

          &gt; <a href="http://www.commentyuwie.com/pages/july4th.html">July 4th</a><br>
          &gt; <a href="http://www.commentyuwie.com/pages/halloween.html">Halloween</a><br>
          &gt; <a href="http://www.commentyuwie.com/pages/thanksgiving.html">Thanksgiving</a><br>
          &gt; </font><font color="#990000" size="3" face="Trebuchet MS"><a href="http://www.commentyuwie.com/pages/christmas.html">Christmas</a><br>
          &gt; <a href="http://www.commentyuwie.com/pages/newyears.html">New Years</a></font></p>

        <p><font color="#990000" size="3" face="Trebuchet MS"><img src="images/codes.jpg" width="150" height="30"><br>
          </font> </p>

Code (markup):

then save it as left_column.php

then when u need to add something just change the php file, save it and overwrite it on the server and every page that includes that file should change.

-Cy

 

Not CSS but server-side includes. Essentially, you just change the code in one file which the include reads from, so all pages containing the include will change.

http://www.smartwebby.com/web_site_design/server_side_includes.asp

 

Thank you very much! Going to give it a shot now should save me hours of work lol

 

Also don't forget that you will need to rename every .html page that you want to have the menu to .php for the code to work.

 

Well you don't need PHP includes, if you take a look at the link I posted. you can use SHTML.

 

Exactly. Either Server Side Includes or PHP will work here. Please refer to the PHP & Server Side Includes link in my signature (it goes to a post here on the forums) for details.

 

i prefer the php include method.
i like to put it in a function and call it that way.

function writeMenuNav() {
echo "<a href=\"link\">name</a><br/>\n";
}

PHP:

then you include the menu file in the top of the regular file, and then just call the unction where the left nav is needed.

writeMenuNav();

PHP:

you dont have to do it that way, just a way i like to do things. never hurt to have a new example.