Troubleshooting and Helpful Hints

Troubleshooting and Helpful Hints
If your code doesn't display as you think it should, there are several things you can do:
1. Press the “Reload” button. The browser you are using to preview your web page may be displaying the
previous version of your document.
2. Ask someone who is more experienced to look over your document, and be sure to preview your document
in Netscape, Firefox, and Internet Explorer as you are developing it. Page elements may appear differently in
each of these browsers, and you need to be aware of this as you are creating your page.
3. Be sure you have used an ending tag wherever required. Omitting the ending tag (or forgetting the slash
within it) is a common error.
4. If a link is not working, make sure you typed quotation marks before and after the URL. Make sure you
have the entire URL, including http://. Check to see whether you've made any capitalization or spelling errors
within the URL.
Introduction to HTML – UM University Libraries 17
5. With your page displayed in Netscape or Firefox, click on “View”, then “Page Source”. This will show your
HTML document with tags and attributes in a different color from the text. This format makes it easier to see
your tags and figure out what is wrong.
6. Break up the information you have on your site into coherent "chunks" rather than placing unrelated
information all together on one long page. These smaller chunks make it easier for people to link to the specific
information that interests them at your site.
7. Visit the Information Technology Division’s “Web Author Resources” page for more suggestions, tips, and
hints: http://www.lib.umd.edu/itd/web/resources.html/.
8. Use the World Wide Web Consortium’s (W3C) HTML validator service (described below).