If you plan to develop dynamic pages, Dreamweaver needs the services of a testing server to generate and display dynamic content while you work. The testing server can be your local computer, a development server, a staging server, or a production server.
For a detailed overview about the purposes of a testing server, see David Powers’s Dreamweaver Developer Center article, Setting up a local testing server in Dreamweaver CS5.
Note:
As of Dreamweaver CS5, Dreamweaver no longer installs ASP.NET, ASP JavaScript, or JSP server behaviors. (You can manually re-enable the deprecated server behaviors if you wish, but keep in mind that Dreamweaver no longer officially supports them.) If you’re working on ASP.NET, ASP JavaScript, or JSP pages, however, Dreamweaver will still support Live view, code coloring, and code hinting for those pages. You do not need to select ASP.NET, ASP JavaScript or JSP in the Site Definition dialog box for any of these features to work.
You must specify a Web URL so Dreamweaver can use the services of a testing server to display data and to connect to databases while you work. Dreamweaver uses the design-time connection to provide you with useful information about the database, such as the names of the tables in your database and the names of the columns in your tables.
A Web URL for a testing server comprises the domain name and any of your website’s home directory’s subdirectories or virtual directories.
Note:
The terminology used in Microsoft IIS may vary from server to server, but the same concepts apply to most web servers.
The home directory
The folder on the server mapped to your site’s domain name. Suppose the folder you want to use to process dynamic pages is c:\sites\company\, and this folder is your home directory (that is, this folder is mapped to your site’s domain name—for example, www.mystartup.com). In that case, the URL prefix is http://www.mystartup.com/.
If the folder you want to use to process dynamic pages is a subfolder of your home directory, simply add the subfolder to the URL. If your home directory is c:\sites\company\, your site’s domain name is www.mystartup.com, and the folder you want to use to process dynamic pages is c:\sites\company\inventory. Enter the following Web URL:
http://www.mystartup.com/inventory/
If the folder you want to use to process dynamic pages is not your home directory or any of its subdirectories, you must create a virtual directory.
A virtual directory
A folder that is not physically contained in the home directory of the server even though it appears to be in the URL. To create a virtual directory, specify an alias for the folder’s path in the URL. Suppose your home directory is c:\sites\company, your processing folder is d:\apps\inventory, and you define an alias for this folder called warehouse. Enter the following Web URL:
http://www.mystartup.com/warehouse/
Localhost
Refers to the home directory in your URLs when the client (usually a browser, but in this case Dreamweaver) runs on the same system as your web server. Suppose Dreamweaver is running on the same Windows system as the web server, your home directory is c:\sites\company, and you defined a virtual directory called warehouse to refer to the folder you want to use to process dynamic pages. The following are the Web URLs you would enter for selected web servers:
Web server |
Web URL |
|---|---|
ColdFusion MX 7 |
http://localhost:8500/warehouse/ |
IIS |
http://localhost/warehouse/ |
Apache (Windows) |
http://localhost:80/warehouse/ |
Jakarta Tomcat (Windows) |
http://localhost:8080/warehouse/ |
Note:
By default the ColdFusion MX 7 web server runs on port 8500, the Apache web server runs on port 80, and the Jakarta Tomcat web server runs on port 8080.
For Macintosh users running the Apache web server, your personal home directory is Users/MyUserName/Sites, where MyUserName is your Macintosh user name. An alias called ~MyUserName is automatically defined for this folder when you install Mac OS 10.1 or higher. Therefore, your default Web URL in Dreamweaver is as follows:
http://localhost/~MyUserName/
If the folder you want to use to process dynamic pages is Users:MyUserName:Sites:inventory, then the Web URL is as follows:
http://localhost/~MyUserName/inventory/
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