Welcome to the ButtonMaker Ver 0.07 Readme file (21st January 1999) for Windows 95/98/NT


1. INTRODUCTION
2. THE DIFFERENT TYPES OF ROLLOVERS
3. USING THE PROGRAM
4. WHAT TO NAME YOUR IMAGES
5. LEGAL STUFF
6. VERSION HISTORY
7. THE END


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1. INTRODUCTION

ButtonMaker is a Win95/98/NT console program designed to take the hard work out of making a web site with Javascript rollover buttons. A web page with 2 frames is created. One being a navigation page (with 2,3 and 4 stage rollover javascript 'nav' buttons) and the other being the content frame. After asking you a small number of questions, it automatically creates these HTML pages, and all the content pages as well. All you need to do is design the buttons and add the content!

I wrote this program for my own use, so it assumes that you have at least basic HTML knowledge.
If you don't know what any of the following HTML terms are, I suggest you find out ;)

FRAMESET
HREF
TARGET
ROLLOVER BUTTON ;) 

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2. THE DIFFERENT TYPES OF ROLLOVERS

2 Stage: This is the normal type.
	Stage 1 - The off button.
	Stage 2 - Mouse over button.


3 Stage: Same as above except when the image/button is clicked, It stays on (with a new 'on' image), even when the mouse is moved over another button.

	Stage 1 - The off button.
	Stage 2 - Mouse over button.
	Stage 3 - Mouse click - clicked button stays on until another button is clicked.


4 Stage: Same as 3 Stage except when the mouse moves over an 'on' button, it is replaced with another button, but when the mouse is moved off, the 'on' button comes back.

	Stage 1 - The off button.
	Stage 2 - Mouse over button.
	Stage 3 - Mouse click - clicked button stays on until another button is clicked.
	Stage 4 - When mouse moves over 'on' button, it is temporarily replaced with another image.

For an example of a 4 stage rollover have a look at http://www.pesky.demon.co.uk/swat

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3. USING THE PROGRAM

Run ButtonMaker.exe

It asks:
Nav frame width(or height) in pixels. - self explanatory
Left, Right, Top, Bottom - This is where you want the nav frame to sit on the page.
Number of Buttons? - (ie number of button you want in the nav frame)
Number of States for each button? (ie Stages - see above)
GIF or JPG - (ie whether the images are .gif or .jpg)
TARGET name? (ie name of the main content frame)
Name of each Button? (eg home or links etc)
HREF link for each button? (ie the page that is loaded into the content frame when you click that button)

After you have answered these questions, the program creates a number of HTML files :
'index.html' (defines the Frames)
'nav.html' (the navigation frame)
and a page corresponding to each of the buttons.
All these are created in the same directory as ButtonMaker.


IMPORTANT: The program assumes that all your images will be located in an 'images' subdirectory called 'images'.

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4. WHAT TO NAME YOUR IMAGES

After you have designed and made your buttons. You will need to name them.
So, if you have want a 4 stage rollover for a 'links' button (and have, therefore, made 4 different 'links' images) you would name them as follows:

links_off.gif		(Stage 1)
links_over.gif		(Stage 2)
links_on.gif		(Stage 3)
links_onover.gif	(Stage 4)

NOTE: In the program you would put in the name 'links' (without the quotes) for that button.


Well, thats about it...
Clear as mud!



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5. LEGAL STUFF:

ButtonMaker is freeware!
You use this program at your own risk.


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6. VERSION HISTORY

NEW IN VERSION 0.07
1. Added 'initialise' function to nav.html. This prevents the first button staying 'on' in non-javascript browsers. (Cheers Gerhard!)
2. Added clearimg() function to 2 stage code, so the mouseOver state doesn't stay 'on'
3. Tidied up HTML code

NEW IN VERSION 0.06
1. Added Meta tags in index.html
2. Added hover 'style' to href text links
3. Hopefully made browser check work properly!

NEW IN VERSION 0.05
1. Added links on the content pages which update the nav buttons when clicked.
2. Added Nav frame width input.
3. Added Nav bar position input.

NEW IN VERSION 0.04
1. Added creation of index.html page (defining the frameset)
2. Added creation of an html page corresponding to each button
3. Renamed button.html to nav.html

NEW IN VERSION 0.03
1. Added Browser Check so IE3 does'nt complain ;) 

NEW IN VERSION 0.02
1. Added option to specify TARGET
2. Added Alt tags (ie "Nav - {button name}")
3. Altered code to allow unlimited (well 999!) buttons on a page. In Version 0.01 it was set to 10 due to VERY lazy coding ;)
4. Added some onscreen messages.
5. Added a tincy wincy bit of error checking....

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7. THE END

For an example of a 4 stage rollover have a look at:
http://www.pesky.demon.co.uk/buttonmaker/

Any suggestions/questions/comments:
email: will@pesky.demon.co.uk

Will Roscoe
