B.5. Modify Menu

You can use the commands in the Modify menu to adjust the properties of common document objects: like links, tables, and layers:

• Page Properties. Opens the Page Properties window, where you can specify document-wide attributes—such as the page title, background and link colors, page margins, and background image—or select a tracing image to use as a reference for designing the page.

• Template Properties. Opens the Template Properties window, where you can modify settings for various template features, such as controlling the visibility of optional regions, the properties of editable attributes, and the values of any template expressions you've created. Available only when you're working on a template-based page, as described in Chapter 19.

• Selection Properties. When this item is selected (as indicated by a checkmark in the menu), the Properties inspector palette is on the screen; you use it to edit the current settings for selected page elements. This command is the same as choosing Window → Properties.

• CSS Styles. Controls the display of the CSS Styles Panel. A checkmark tells you that the panel is open. This item has the same effect as choosing CSS Styles from the Window menu.

• Edit Tag. Opens a dialog box with detailed options for the HTML tag that's active in the current document. This advanced feature is for the true HTML geek—it gives access to all the properties for a specific tag (not just the ones Dreamweaver displays in the Property inspector). But skip this option: The Tag inspector, which provides a less intrusive panel with all the same options, is better. Choose Window → Tag Inspector to open it.

• Quick Tag Editor. Lets you edit an HTML tag without leaving Design view. If nothing on the page is selected, the Quick Tag editor prompts you to enter a new HTML tag at the insertion point (by choosing from the alphabetical menu). But if text or an object is already selected when the Quick Tag Editor is opened, the window displays the selection's HTML tags for editing.

• Make Link. Turns a highlighted page element (graphic or text) into a link. The standard Select File dialog box appears; choose the document you want to open when someone clicks the link.

• Remove Link. This command is available only when a link is selected or the insertion point is inside a link. Remove Link deletes hyperlinks by removing the <a href> tag from the selected text or image.

• Open Linked Page. Opens the linked page in a new document window. This command is available only when a link is selected or the insertion point is inside a link. (You can, however, hold down the Ctrl key [⌘] and double-click a link to open the page to which it's linked.)

• Link Target. Sets a link's target and defines whether the linked page appears in the same browser window or a new one. You can choose from blank, parent, self, or top targets, or manually define the target in the Set Target dialog box. This command is available only when a link is selected or the insertion point is inside a link. (See Chapter 5 for details on links.)

• Table. Opens a list of options for modifying a selected table. You can adjust the number of rows and columns, add row or column spans, or completely clear cells' defined heights and widths (see Chapter 7).

• Image. Opens a list of options for modifying a selected image, including optimizing it in Fireworks, or using one of the new built-in image-editing tools, such as the crop, resample, and sharpen tools. See Section 6.5.

• Frameset. Offers options for splitting the current page into frames. Or choose the Edit No Frames Content command to create alternative Web-page material that can be read by older browsers that don't support frames. Frames aren't used much any more, and they're best avoided by the professional Web designer.

• Arrange. Lets you change the Z-index (the front-to-back order) of overlapping absolutely positioned elements. You can choose to send one element in front of another absolutely positioned element, send it to the back, and so on. You can also tell Dreamweaver to prevent overlapping elements altogether. If two or more layers are selected, you can also choose from one of this menu's alignment options to align things like the tops of two elements. See Chapter 9 for more on absolutely positioned elements.

• Convert. Don't use this menu! It's meant to take a table-based layout and turn it into a layout using CSS absolute positioning. It doesn't work well at all. Better to recreate your design using the CSS layout techniques described in Chapter 9. The other option—converting absolutely positioned elements to table layout—produces awful HTML and no benefit (unless you're building a "Retro Web Design Circa 1998" Web site).

• Navigation Bar. Skip this option. It's meant to help edit the navigation bar available from the Insert → Image Objects (see "Image Objects" on Section B.4). The Spry Navigation bar discussed in Chapter 5 is far superior.

• Library. Lets you add selected document objects to the site's Library file (Chapter 18). You can also update the current document, or multiple documents, to reflect any changes you've made to a Library object.

• Templates. These commands affect template documents (Chapter 19). Using these commands, you can apply a pre-existing template to the current page, separate the page from its template, or update the page to reflect changes made to its template. If the open document is a template file, you can use this menu to create or delete editable regions (remove template markup), and update all site files based on that template. You can also use this menu to add repeating template regions and editable tag attributes.

• Timeline. The submenu provides options for adding or deleting timelines, animation frames, objects, or behaviors. This feature is a bit archaic and adds lots of JavaScript code to your page. If you're still interested, you can download a chapter from an earlier edition of this book, which discusses how to use this feature: www.sawmac.com/missing/dwmx2004/DWmx_Ch12.pdf.