There are apparently several different ways to make data downloadable and transportable to Excel. I believe the miscommunications between me, the users, and the coders stems from using different combinations of browser/os and also from different expectations. Providing a link on an html page that takes text out of an html table and puts it on the screen so that it looks like a tab-delimited text file is what is frequently provided as a service called "download tab-delimited text" or "export file for Excel".
In order to actually put this html into Excel from Firefox on a PC requires copying the text on the screen, opening Excel, and choosing "paste special" from the edit menu. Then change from html to text and paste. It doesn't work if you just paste. Thus, there is no reason to redraw the web page because one can select and copy any html table and paste it into Excel the same way. Drawing an ugly html page does not facilitate viewing the info in Excel.
Most biologists will also interpret "download" or "export" as meaning a file will appear on the local computer; not that an ugly web page will appear and do nothing--not even prompt you to copy it. I can provide a help statement that can go on the template for this type of "exported" file that will explain what to do with it in the common browser/os combinations. This will help a lot.
PC users who run Internet Explorer have the easiest time--any html table that is copied can be pasted directly into Excel, retaining the links. This is ultimately what I want any user to be able to do--transport the search results or the protein context table or the BBH into a table in Excel WITH the links to NMPDR.
Here is a list of the most frequently requested downloads; some of these can be addressed immediately by my adding instructions to the templates and FAQ. Some will require Bruce and Kaitlyn to do something. (I don't know what).
Search results table with links to nmpdr protein page. Because the link is an image button, this is not automatic. The button is big and repetitive in the results table, so if it needs to be changed to a text link, fine.
Subsystem spreadsheets with links to the nmpdr protein pages.
clustalW alignment (I can fix this by adding a copy-paste instruction to the template)
Protein sequence of pegs selected in the BBH table.
DNA sequence of the whole 16 kb region shown on the protein page.
Contents of the tables that appear when you hit the commentary button on a pins page or compare regions.
Comments (2)
Why do the many carriage returns I put in between paragraphs not appear in this one long ramble?
Posted by leslie | October 12, 2006 5:48 PM
Posted on October 12, 2006 17:48
This is a configuration option. I will change it.
Posted by Bruce Parrello | October 12, 2006 6:50 PM
Posted on October 12, 2006 18:50