Changing the location of the search window

[Veng]

Hi.
I am not a skiled programmer but I want to change the location of the window where the search page is opened and results presented from a "new window" to the mid area (ContentPlaceHolderID="MainContent") of my asp website: http://www.relatie-voeding-gedrag.nl/ (in Dutch but with Google translation button).

Is this an easy config setting, or does it need asp programming effort? (If needed, I can get some help from an asp programmer who setup the site, but I prefer to do it myself and learn)
Can someone give me a hint? Thanks in advance

Veng

[Ray]

There are a few things you can do.

First of all, you are currently linking to your search page with this:

<a href="[URL="http://www.relatie-voeding-gedrag.nl/Index/search.asp"]/Index/search.asp[/URL]" style="font-weight: bold" rel="nofollow" target="_blank" [FONT=monospace]title[/FONT][COLOR=#000000][FONT=monospace]="[/FONT][/COLOR][FONT=monospace]Zoeken op [/FONT]deze site.">Site doorzoeken</a>

The target="_blank" part is what makes the search page open in a "new window". If you remove this, the page will open in the same window.

Next, please note that the rest of your site uses .aspx pages. These are "ASP.NET" pages, and not the same as .asp pages (what was known as "ASP" but now referred to as "Classic ASP" for clarity). ASP is not the same as ASP.NET. Classic ASP is alot easier to use than ASP.NET.

You have these options:

(a) Simply modify the "search_template.html" to match the appearance and layout of your site. So you can copy the HTML for the header, footer, menus, etc. And have a plain which looks much like the rest of your site. Place the tag <!--ZOOMSEARCH--> where you want your results to appear (within the "MainContent" div in your case).

This is the easiest option, but you will lose the additional features from your ASPX pages (likely the Tag-Cloud and Tweets) on your search page. You may be able to stick those in to the HTML as well, i'm not sure if they depend on JS or ASPX codebehind.

(b) Switch to using the ASP.NET option with Zoom. But this requires installing the Server Control on your web server. Does your hosting company allow you to do this? This can also be a bit more complicated if you are not experienced with ASP.NET

(c) Use an IFRAME to show the "search.asp" contents within a new .aspx page of your creation. That is, you would have a new page created like your other pages on the site. For example, "http://www.relatie-voeding-gedrag.nl/Pages/search.aspx" and have an IFRAME which loads the "search.asp" for the results. You may also need to create a HTML search form as described here.

[Veng]

Hi Ray,

Thanks for the extensive answer. See some of my remarks below:

The target="_blank" part is what makes the search page open in a "new window". If you remove this, the page will open in the same window.

I am aware of that, but I want to open it within my center window, so keeping both side windows.

(a) Simply modify the "search_template.html" to match the appearance and layout of your site. So you can copy the HTML for the header, footer, menus, etc. And have a plain which looks much like the rest of your site. Place the tag <!--ZOOMSEARCH--> where you want your results to appear (within the "MainContent" div in your case).

Good idea, but see my previous answer

This is the easiest option, but you will lose the additional features from your ASPX pages (likely the Tag-Cloud and Tweets) on your search page. You may be able to stick those in to the HTML as well, i'm not sure if they depend on JS or ASPX codebehind.

I think JS. To check I use Firebug as an add-on in FireFox

(b) Switch to using the ASP.NET option with Zoom. But this requires installing the Server Control on your web server. Does your hosting company allow you to do this? This can also be a bit more complicated if you are not experienced with ASP.NET

Here you can see what my hp offers. http://www.mijnhostingpartner.nl/hos...specificaties/ I use the "Totaal pakket"
Although he is very busy, I could ask my contact who setup the page for me.

(c) Use an IFRAME to show the "search.asp" contents within a new .aspx page of your creation. That is, you would have a new page created like your other pages on the site. For example, "http://www.relatie-voeding-gedrag.nl/Pages/search.aspx" and have an IFRAME which loads the "search.asp" for the results. You may also need to create a HTML search form as described here.

This is a solution I could implement myself I think.

I will study all the solutions and see if one suits me

Thanks again.

VenG

In the mean time, I tried to implement solution c) It seems however that the code of ZI is conflicting with my asp.net code: No search results show up in my screen. So for this moment I abandonned the attempt and went back to the default solution.