Problems?
This page was prepared for those of you who may be experiencing some problems with one or more of the Web pages.
As you can see, there is no background on this page, and no logos or other graphics, and the minimal amount of HTML code. That's so I can make sure you can read it! :-)
First, if you have Netscape before version 1.1, then it would be a good idea to upgrade to version 2.02 or higher.
If you have Microsoft Explorer version 2.0 or before, then it would be a good idea to upgrade to version 3.0 or higher. Explorer 3.0 and Netscape 2.0 are about equivalent to each other.
Next, somewhere on the menu, there is a way to "clear your cache." In Netscape version 2.02 (which is what I'm using right now), it's under the "Options", then "Network Preferences" menu. In Explorer 2.0 (yes, I've got an older version which doesn't work quite right), it's "View", then "Options", then choose the "Advanced" tab. The idea is, somewhere in your browser is the ability to clear out the cache.
Now, what does that mean? Well, each time you access a Web page, the contents of that page are actually transferred to your PC (or Mac; when I say "PC", I'll also mean "Mac", ok?). When the page is completely transferred, then the Netscape meteors will stop and the Explorer clouds will stop. At that point, all the elements of the page will be "local", meaning, on your PC.
Now, once you clear your cache, the page should try to reload. If it doesn't, then you may have to exit the browser, then load it again.
Why did we do all that? Well, maybe some of the files that make up the page weren't downloaded properly, causing the browser to display them improperly, or not display them at all. By clearing out the cache, you forced the browser to reload the files.... hoping that this time, they are all okay.
What else?
Um, let's see. First of all, these pages are developed and tested on 3 different machines, each with a different resolution, different CPU processor, and different monitor. Consequently, it is unlikely that the problem is a bad Web page code. But... not impossible. Unfortunately, there's no way for you to test that. If you try the errant page several days in a row, and you try it (if you can) with at least two different machines with different modems, and you still can't load the page, then it's probably our problem.
You think the page is loading too slow? We've tried to minimize the number of graphics on the pages. There are only four on the main "home" page, and most of the others either have one or none. So except for the background graphic (which should cache after the first page, and be very quick after that), most of the pages should be pretty easy to download. If you're still having problems, call up or e-mail a buddy and see if he/she has the problem. Sometimes, the servers that sit between your PC and the NSS-CDS Web server can cause slowdowns that affect only certain groups of people. Often these slowdowns are temporary, so the speed may come back up in a few days.
But, if you get consistently slow speeds, we'd sure like to know about it. Like I said, we try to do whatever we can to keep the speed up as high as possible, and still present a good-looking Web page.
Thanks for reading through all of this!
-- NSS-CDS Webmaster Webmaster@NSSCDS.org