Tips & Tricks
Hover
Hover? Yep. Hover. HTML has a neat attribute: title. Most modern browsers use the title attribute to show those little “tool tips” boxes—the tags that pop up with more information. You can hover over lots of things on the site (hold your mouse over a link or word for a second or two, until the tip pops up).
For example, the links on the Summer Camp table of contents pages have story codes, which tell you what kind of sex to expect in the chapter. On the Women of Summer Camp and Men of Summer Camp pages, hovering tells you the character’s last name, as well as a little biographical info.
You can also hover over acronyms or abbreviations in the stories themselves. For instance, hover over the word “HTML” (left, or above) and you get “HyperText Markup Language”. The Greek fraternity names and abbreviations like FBO also have title attributes.
Some browsers show a little dotted line under words with a title tag. Unfortunately, Internet Explorer doesn’t (aaargh!), although it will show the tips if you hover over the word.
I’ve added lots of title attributes to the site, so hover over things and see what kind of additional information you get.
(Not all links have a title attribute. Some links are self-explanitory, and a title attribute would simply duplicate the text of the link itself. But a lot of links do have title attributes, so it never hurts to hover over them. With a little experience you’ll get to know where to expect them.)
Variables
What kind of variables, Nick? I got tired of hitting Refresh (F5) to test my random images on the Summer Camp Extras page. So I wrote a bit of javascript to set which “random” image I want to display. You can use the same trick.
At the end of the URL (in the address bar on your browser), add “?girl=name”, where you replace name with the girl’s name.
For example, if you wanted to see Susan’s image, you’d add “?girl=Susan”. So the complete URL would be: http://www.nickscipio.com/summercamp/extras/index.html?girl=Susan
You can do the same thing on the Women of Summer Camp page. So the variable for Beth is “?girl=Beth”, and the complete URL would be: http://www.nickscipio.com/summercamp/extras/scgirls/index.html?girl=Beth
Try it with any of the girls’ names. You can even bookmark the URL with the variable, so you’ll see the same image every time you load the page.
On the Men of Summer Camp page, the syntax is “?guy=name”. So if you wanted to see Paul’s image, use “?guy=Paul”. The complete URL would be: http://www.nickscipio.com/summercamp/extras/scguys/index.html?guy=Paul
Have fun!
(I’ve got a bit of error-trapping in the code, though, so if you enter a name that isn’t on the list, you get a random picture. And for those of you who are entirely too clever for your own good, you’ll gnash your teeth if you try something like “?girl=TheWife” or “?girl=DeadWoman”. Sorry. ;-)
Title Graphics
Did you know that you can click on the story title graphics and go back to the table of contents page?
On the Summer Camp chapter pages, the title graphic takes you to the ToC. (Did you remember to hover over the word ToC? It’s an acronym with a title tag. Cool, huh?)
On the short stories, clicking on the title graphic even takes you back to the original story description box.
You can actually click on most of the title graphics (including the site logo). Most non-IE browsers will even show you where you’re going if you click. Unfortunately, IE doesn’t conform to the W3C standard, so it shows the image alt text instead of the link’s title attribute.
So for those of you still using IE,
.
Little Red Ps
On the Who’s
Who and More Who’s
Who in Summer Camp pages, the little red circular P graphics
(
) link to that character’s
images in the Women or Men
of Summer Camp pages.
What’s New
Check out the What’s New page. Whenever I add features, post new images, or make any changes to the site, I post an entry on the What’s New page.
For those of you who use RSS, you can even subscribe to the What’s New RSS feed.
The Forum
Join the Forum. As of this moment, the Forum has nearly 5200 members, and hosts some lively discussion. I’d love to be able to trade e-mail with everyone who reads my stories, but I just can’t do it. Not if I want to write the stories in the first place, that is.
So the Forum is a good place to talk about everything: my stories, other authors’ stories, and stuff in general. Nothing is off-topic, and it’s fun group of people. Check it out.
The FAQ
I know it sounds like a no-brainer, but you’d be surprised how many people ask questions without reading the FAQ.