MS Word docs problem

[rogerthomas]

I am currently constructing a website and have encountered an annoying problem which I can't seem to solve.

I am using FrontPage 2000 to make my site and want to have a page where users can click on a link which opens a MS Word document on their machine, assuming most people have MS Word which most people do. Whilst testing the links I get a window pop up asking me for a username and password. The window is titled 'Enter Network Password' and says 'please enter your authentication information'. If I click cancel on the window, the MS Word file opens as I want but I can't put the site online because this would be messy and confusing for users. If I try the same thing with a pdf file it opens straight away without asking for the password etc.

The file that I'm linking to is located in the root directory of my website.

Could someone more net savvy than me please provide me with a solution to this.

Many thanks in anticipation.

[vehelpfulguy]

Well I would NOT put your document on the site in Word format, use PDF (Adobe Acrobat format)

First, Word files are large as compared with PDF fles. It will take longer to download a Word file than a PDF file.

Second, it is a bit arrogant to assume everyone has Word. Many web users are not even on Windows (Macs, Linux, even mainframes can all use the web, and many may not have Word).

Even those with Windows may well not have Word.

A reader to look at PDF files is free, and you have the benefit that the people who look at it cannot change it.

[vehelpfulguy]

You say the Word file is in the root directory of your machine.

Well eventually you will need to upload all the files to a web server, and then they will need to be in the same directory (or sub directories under the main directory) .

If you are providing a link to the word document it must also be in the same directory as the rest of the web site pages. DO NOT hard code the directory path or name as these will not be the same when it is on the web.

[stevie21]

I agree with the advice to use pdf in place of a Word doc unless you need people to be able to download the document and then be able to edit it.

I think that what the 2nd post here is saying is don't link to "file:///C:yadda yadda yadda/word.doc"
Use a "relative" rather than an "absolute" path in the link.

Have you tried putting the file online and clicking on the link? Maybe the error is only something that occurs offline on your PC and wouldn't apply anyway on the website.

[rogerthomas]

First, it is not arrogant to assume that most people have MS Word. They do.

The file is not located in the root directory of my PC, but in the root directory of my web. E.g. c:/documents and settings/myfiles/mywebs/mysite/myfile.doc.

A reader to look at pdf files is indeed free but have you seen the cost of a pdf writer. I would love to put my documents in pdf format, but, and I stand to be corrected, Adobe Writer costs in the region of �300 and I can't afford that.

By the way, the files that I want to put on the web are all between 25kb and 42kb so size is not a problem.

Now don't get me wrong, I am grateful for the replies, but no-one has solved the original problem.

[Kerplunk]

Actually

[Ralph]

http://sourceforge.net/projects/pdfcreator/ for an excellent and free PDF writer. Just print your DOC to the pdf creator printer in Word and away you go. It won't do all the fancy stuff of Acrobat, but most people don't need it anyway. Let us know if this helps, if not, tell us what functionality you're looking for and we'll see what we can find.

[rogerthomas]

Ralph. Many, many thanks for pointing me to this. It does exactly what I want and I can continue building my site. You're a star!