Publishing Sites

Packaging Sites for Publishing

Publishing the results of your work is one of the most important steps in the life of a project so Site Recorder includes tools that can allow quick and easy publication of complete data sets.

The Site files that are generated by Site Recorder can be shared amongst other Site users.  Those without the full Site Recorder program can use the free Site file reader program called Site Reader, this is shipped on CD with Site Recorder and can be downloaded from the 3H Consulting web site. 

Security of the site information is always a concern, mainly to ensure that it remains intact and secure but also to guard against theft.  It may not be an advantage to allow the raw data to be modified, to be extracted and reused or to be printed.  There are compromises to be made in ensuring that expensive and hard-won information gets published but not so that it can be reused for free.  Site Recorder incorporates a publishing scheme that allows free distribution of raw data but optionally disallows modification, exporting and printing.

Site files can be locked so they cannot be modified but they can be opened and viewed.  The files are password protected so they can only be changed once unlocked with the correct password.  This mechanism protects the file against accidental change or tampering and any attempts at overriding the locks will most likely result in the file being corrupted and unusable.  It is also not possible to merge Layers from any Site file that has been locked.

The Site file on your computer may include links to source documents and images in any number of different folders.  To allow the files to be shared and archived the files have to be copied to a CD and maintaining this same folder structure can be difficult.  To overcome this problem, Site Recorder includes a Package tool that neatly wraps up the Site file along with all of the other linked files into a neat folder structure which can easily be copied to CD.

To package the site, the main Site file is copied to a folder of your choice and is locked if required.  Folders for images, sources and wordlists are created under the chosen folder then linked images are copied to those folders.  The file links for each object within the Site file are modified so that they match the new folder structure and so that the whole set of folders can be copied or moved.

The tool includes the option to include linked files and shared site files.  If selected, any linked image or source files are included with the Site file and any shared site files are merged in automatically.

Site Reader

Site Reader is a program used to read Site files.  Site Reader is free to download and the installer can be freely distributed so it can be put on CD along with your Site file.  Once Site Reader has been installed from the CD the Site file can be opened and viewed.

Site files can also be posted on web sites.  Although it is possible to post the installer for Site Reader on the same web site it is better to add a link or button to allow download from the 3H Consulting web site downloads page.  Downloading from the 3H web site ensures the latest version of Site Reader is used and avoids having to keep the large install files on other sites.  Logos and web buttons can be downloaded from the 3H web site.