Q: When setting up a new project, I typed in the name of the project and the project file, but the "Save" button is disabled. What's wrong?

A: There are several required fields in the New Project, Project Preferences, Import Directory As New Project and Import Web Site As New Project dialogs. All of the required fields must be filled in before the Save button will become enabled. The required fields are marked with an asterisk, as in "*Host name:".

Q: During a (project upload/FTP session/Telnet session), I got the message "Timed out waiting for response; try increasing the timeout value and try again". I did that, but Rocket Science is still using the old value. What's up?

A: You are probably confusing the Target preferences settings with the Application preferences settings. The FTP, Telnet and Project Upload settings in the Application Preferences dialog have no effect on the currently opened project, they are used to provide default values when you create a new project. Make sure you are changing the Target preferences and not the Application preferences.

Q: When I press the Upload button, I don't get an opportunity to select any files, it just starts copying them to the server. Where do I select the files I want to upload?

A: Rocket Science maintains date/time sync between the project on the host and the project on your PC. When you punch the "Upload" button, Rocket Science sends to the server all of the files in your project that you have modified since the last successful upload. Therefore, you do not need to individually select files, Rocket Science will figure out what goes and what stays. If you insist on uploading individual files, you can do so using the FTP Session window. You can also select the Project/Publish/Clear dependancies menu item in the Project Window to force Rocket Science to upload all files in the project regardless of their date/time stamp, or conversely the Project/Publish/Set dependancies menu item to update the dependancies such that no files will be uploaded.

Q: I started to upload my project, and I got a message box asking if I wanted to create a new directory. How does Rocket Science know where to put the files?

A: When you set up a project, you can specify two server directories in the Project dialog. One is the home directory, the other is the CGI-BIN directory. In a basic Rocket Science project, any file that is not a CGI-BIN file goes into the home directory, anything that is a CGI-BIN file goes into the CGI-BIN directory. In addition, you may have references in your HTML documents to files that are in subdirectories (<IMG SRC="images/red_ball.gif">, for example). The message box you received asking you if you wanted to create a directory was telling you that one of these directories does not exist on your server, and do you want Rocket Science to create it for you? If not, Rocket Science will abort the upload since the reason it needs to create the directory is to store a file and now it has no place to put it.

Q: I tried to upload my project to the server, and it started to go but then it I got an error message and it stopped. Now what?

A: Ah, a deeeep subject! The short answer is: look at the Messages Window to find out what caused the error, fix it and try again. The long answer is:

Rocket Science gets your project to the server in pretty much the same way you would, using FTP and Telnet, only in an automated fashion. When setting up your very first new project, you might need to try several times to upload it to the server, tweaking the upload settings between tries, before you get it right. The good news is, once you get over this hump you may never have to deal with FTP or Telnet again!

Most upload problems fall into one of three categories: communication errors, FTP errors and Telnet errors. When your upload does not successfully complete, there will be information in the Messages Window which will indicate the cause of the failure. In most cases, the problem will be glaringly obvious. If this is the first time you've tried to upload a particular project, the first thing to look at is your project upload settings. If you are uploading to a Windows NT server, you should set the "Set access permissions using..." selection to "Do not set permissions", since Windows NT does not support this. Then, check the Messages Window. Here are some examples taken from actual failed upload sessions:

Here we are uploading to a Unix server and using FTP to set access permissions, but it turns out that the FTP server does not support the FTP SITE command. You will have to use Telnet to set access permissions.

• SEND "SITE chmod 755 index.htm"
• RECV "502 SITE command not implemented."
• SITE chmod command failed: Command not implemented.
• Disconnecting from FTP host

Here we are uploading to a Unix server and using FTP to set access permissions, but the FTP server does not have access to the file. In this case, using Telenet to set the permissions will probably work.

• RECV "226 Transfer complete."Changing access permissions for "nasasite.htm"
• RECV "553 Permission denied. (chmod)"
• SITE chmod failed: Requested action not taken."
• Disconnecting from FTP host

This is what it looks like when you are using Telnet to set access permissions, but have not configured the Prompt character correctly. Rocket Science does not know it should be looking for the ':' character, and times out because it is waiting for something else instead.

• Looking up Telnet host: "wakwak.edu"
• Contacting host
• Host contacted
• SEND "cd /usr/local/myproj/"
• ECHO "cd /usr/local/myproj/"
• RECV "1 wakwak /usr/local/myproj:"
• Timed out waiting for response from host.